Memo To Self

Five!

2013-05-16T11:10:00.000+10:00

In my immense slackness as a blogger, I have failed to record the Birthday of Amazingness that was Lolly's Fifth birthday! She had a party on her actual birthday, with lots of school friends, which was heaps of fun.

Skateboard from her brother!

Big bike from us :D

Her party was a Teddy Bear's Picnic theme, it was sunny and hot!

Before the hordes descended.

Compulsory adorable cake.

Hungry!

Even the turtle got in the party mode.

Dino piñata!

Excuse the lazy photo blogging! :D

School days...Part the Second

2013-05-11T09:10:00.000+10:00

Lolly is in Prep this year, which here in Brisbane is our first year of school. She goes to a democratic independent school, which has just been amazing. Thought I'd share a few shots of school awesomeness.

On the BIS tree.

In the end of term art show!

Flying kites at pick up time with some friends.

Dress up Day! (Cleo from Clifford, the Big Red Dog)

Cheeky.

So...we got a wheelchair adapted car!!

2013-05-05T17:24:00.000+10:00

And it is awesome...

At the dealer :D

We may have added some bling...

How it works.

DinnerDad pimped my ride with shagadelic Ikea rugs!

Snail contemplates a Banana - IN OUR CAR!!

It fits two chairs, TWO!!

Lolly looking cute and me peering in.

The car has transformed our lives. It's amazing. Just amazing.

:D

School Days

2013-02-07T13:36:00.001+10:00

Lolly has started Prep at school! She's doing great, and the school is wonderful. It's an Independent school with a small group of students, Lolly has only 13 kids in her combined Prep and grade 1 class. She's doing really well, and loving the play and learning.

I'm doing okay, it's a big change for everyone. Here are is a non-specific picture of the awesomeness of her school grounds. It's a whole new world!

Standing Frame Frolics

2012-11-21T17:13:00.000+10:00

We have a standing frame on loan at the moment from the Cerebral Palsy League, so that Snail can use it to build up some strength and as part of her rehab. While it looks like some kind of medieval torture device and takes up more room than a small car, it's worth is for the fun Snail has in it!

Monkey!!

DinnerDad loaded up the girls on the weekend to storm watch in our front yard, here's Lolly on the front. Too cute.

We're probably going to apply for some funding to get one, they're pretty cool :D

Travels and such...now with too many photos!

2012-11-18T11:50:00.002+10:00

All has been quiet on the blogging front, for two main reasons. First, not having anything interesting to report for most of the time, we've been either home with Snail, or sick and home with Snail. The girls have watched a LOT of My Little Pony.

The other main reason is we had a whirlwind trip overseas to Stockholm and London! DinnerDad had to work in Stockholm (as you do) and we had a week holiday there and in London before heading back home.

It was awesome!! Here are some snapshot highlights for your viewing pleasure :D Sorry about the photo bombing, I've been sick since we got home two weeks ago with a bug we picked up in Sweden. Blerg. But worth it!!

Gamla Stan on our first day in Stockholm

Cute hat!


Up close with the Lemurs at Skansen!

More picturesque at Skansen, Stockholm.

Snow!!

More cute hats and frozen puddles.

Wolf hat and half-frozen lake at Uppsala

Butterfly House, Stockholm.

"Keep off the Grass" NOT - at Westminster Abbey.

Kensington Palace

Hyde Park!

Tower of London looks imposing.

FANCY hotel in London!!

Pony on the London Eye

Squirrel!!

After a LOT of flight time, Lolly watches more MLP on takeoff from Singapore.

Doings - August and September!

2012-10-01T11:32:00.001+10:00

Not as many doings as we are normally, well, doing, due to being at home a LOT with Snail. But we get out when we can.

To the wonderful Bush Kindy, organised by a dear and wonderful friend.

Treasure hunt collage!

Sunny days doing a bird ID walk at bush kindy.

The very start of Spring, already roasting here in Brisvegas!

I LOVE that the kids were to "tick" the birds as they spotted the cards, and Lolly drew an actual tick (as in, the little bug). She'd just had a tick on her neck that week, so it was clearly topical. ;)

Ticks :D

To Sushi train, where kitty gets salmon.

More sushi train, in which Lolly is so grown up.

Sisters watching Bananas on the iPad.

All of the drawing.

"Mummy and Lolly in a house with a sun and birds."

Making the most of an occasional cold August night at our fire pit.

Why yes, Lolly did toast a carrot over the fire as we had no marshmallows! She ate two!

Sad neglected children get toasted carrot.

Snail is doing really well. She had to have one of the hip pins out as it had come through her skin (!!) but recovered quickly and we are well into rehab. She is (as of a couple of weeks ago) back in her normal wheelchair, so it's goodbye to the reclining thing we spent 9 weeks in! She's doing great at physio, and standing transfers are close in our future, which will make all our lives a lot easier, especially hers! It's been a hard time, but the light is at the end of the tunnel.

At one of our post-surgical appointments, around 8 weeks after surgery, at the hospital cafe, traveling in style!

Finally, girls with "pricklefoot" have to use their sister's reclining wheelchairs to recover.

How do you know it's Spring?

2012-09-27T18:24:00.002+10:00

Why, when your Hermit crabs come out of hibernation! Big Alice was spotted in early September, on the sea salt sponge.

Evidence!

We are rather relieved they are all still alive, Little Alice basically disappeared all winter, I kept opening up the case to see if it smelt like a bad seafood cocktail. But no, all was well, and Big Alice, Little Alice, and Pinchy are back crabbing around as it heats up. It's getting even more like a naturalist paradise round ehre, Lolly is insatiable with her need to get new pets and care for them.

In other pet news, here is Squirtle's new home!

A fab red makeover for the stand, courtesy of DinnerDad

Squirtle: OMG, Awesome!

New family members, or: OMG PUPPY!

2012-08-20T18:19:00.004+10:00

My delightful sister-in-law and dear friend has a new (ish, she's had her a few months now!) puppy. A puppy of awesomeness. A puppy whose cute-osity knows no satiety. Lou-Lou!!

Giant fluff ball...and puppy

My DSIL (delightful sister-in-law) has never known so frequent a visitor as young Lolly, since obtaining this puppy paragon. Lolly barely gets a week before demanding to see "her puppy Lou-Lou."

ZOMG the cute

I mean, seriously. 'tis not a dog, 'tis a fur-ball of cute!

Alarming similarities?

Two happy puppies.

Lou-Lou and DSIL, we loves you!!

Are you ready for too many photos of the Ekka?

2012-08-17T15:43:00.001+10:00

I hope so, because here they are! If not, look away...NOW

The day before the Snail got back home, I took Lolly to the Ekka (for our overseas guests, a big country fair kind of dealio held for a few days every year at these inner-city showgrounds). We've been every year since she was 2! Okay, so that's only 3 times, but still.

The best part for a Lolly is the giant baby animal feeding/poop centre. We seriously spend ages in there.

OMG tiny animal!

Feeding goats.

From there, it's a straight route over to the horses.

OMG HORSE!!

Dogs and cats are next.

More shots of Lolly patting things.

We hit the kiddie ride section pretty hard this year, it was the first year she really wanted to go on anything.

Excuse the finger over the lens, but check out that face!! On the Ferris wheel with Nanna.

Riding the tea cups with Pop!

Pony ride with Nanna!

Overpriced and ever-shrinking strawberry icecream!

Carousel.

Bees!

Produce!

I'm sure (if you've read this far) that you get the gist of the Ekka from these shots. It's a kid's paradise, basically. This year she was quite interested in the show bags, too, and we chose the "pretty pony" bag, with an over-abundance of over-priced ponies. Awesome!! She's already counting down the time to next year when we get to go again.

Can I just give a bit THANK YOU to Nanna and Pop. And my lovely friend, Vanessa, who made that gorgeous top, which mean Lolly was the cutest identifiable kid at the Show :D

Home again.

2012-08-14T17:06:00.001+10:00

Snail is back with us! She's here for three weeks, then, if she's up to it, we'll be back to week about. Transfers are a little hard to say the least at the moment!

We're nearly 4 weeks out from her surgery now, and we're getting there...slowly! Snail still has a fair bit of pain, and isn't eating well. Given that most of her meds are oral (don't ask about the others!) this is a fun time for all. Still, she is getting better every day, which frankly is odd.

Not that she would get better from surgery, of course she would. Her health is basically good, and her immune system works a treat. It's more the weirdness of her having something awful happen that will GET BETTER. We're more used to "oh, that's the suckfullness that is her/our lives now, and we just have to wear it." The CP, the intellectual disability, seizures that just get worse and worse and don't respond to meds well, then the hips, which have been gradually deteriorating for at least a year now (in the acute phase, longer really in terms of decreasing mobility and increasing pain). So yeah, we don't really get things that GET BETTER.

This will, you know, get better. She'll feel gradually better every day. She'll get MORE movement and ability back instead of less. She'll get LESS pain instead of more. When it's all said and done, she'll be better off in a few months than she has been in years. We might even get some mobility back, it's been ages since she could use her walker, or walk supported. So, it's kind of awesome. Though I'm not quite feeling it yet. Cautiously awesome.

We've got another nearly four weeks of splints and the foam wedge that holds her legs and hips in position, then hopefully after her follow-up appointment and x-ray we'll get more of a repreive and can move to just using them at night. Then an intensive couple of weeks of physio at the hospital to get her used to moving again. Then, back to school and regular physio. Can't wait!!

So, that's my mildly coherent update. And here are some shots of our various contraptions, which are numerous! The recliner for relaxed telly watching that we borrowed from her Mum...

The reclining wheelchair, complete with bonus world's fattest cat and our new turtle tank :D

Snail and DinnerDad are camping out in the lounge because we can't get the enormous chair down our tiny hallway. At least it's bright and sunny out there!

There's a hoist too, but apparently I haven't uploaded a pic. Next time. We haven't had to use it yet as the 2-person lift is working fine.

Lolly the Artist - age 4 and nearly half

2012-08-07T09:16:00.000+10:00

Lolly is 4 and a half (nearly) and loves art. A day doesn't go by that she isn't drawing, painting, or doing some kind of gluing masterpiece. And I'm here to make sure the internet viewing public sees them all!!

Here are some of her latest work, I've been so interested to see how much detail she does in her drawing lately! Eyes will have circles and pupils, even little holes in the ears, fingers and toes, and hair, of course.

Crab!

Snails having a race!

Here, she's done her current fave - people with puppies. You can see where she's written her name up the top. Love the backwards "L" and will be sad to see it go.

Eyes with pupils! Ears with little holes "to hear out of"!

All her pictures have elaborate and awesome stories attached to them. Like this one, which is "a turtle in a tank with some feeder fish, some bubbles, and bees and a caterpillar for company."

Turtle in a tank :D

I am a total slacker and mostly make her do watercolours for painting, which is an inside job on a plastic table cloth. I liked this one, which is water over a texter drawing of a dinosaur.

But lately she's been very into going outside with "proper" paints, which necessitates several baths a day.

Easel of mess :D

Products of easel of mess.

She also loves gluing and construction of all kinds. Here is a puppy she made with a wooden peg and some fancy yarn my sister sent her for her birthday in March.

Finally, after an epic post of kid art (Yay, you all say, if you got this far!) - we have playdough ponds with creatures in them, her playdough fave thing to make lately.

Fish pond with eels, a horse and some lavender "trees"

Recent doings - July

2012-08-05T18:01:00.002+10:00

After horrid lurgys, and being at home with Snail pre-surgery, then having the surgery - Lolly and I have found ourselves with time to go out! It's very strange. But Snail is at her mother's, so weirdly after all the *emergency* of our past few weeks, we had basically 2 weeks off, with no Snail, no lurgys, and lovely fine winter weather. She's back Friday.

Once I'd had a couple of days at home reeling around and feeling anxious, depressed, and weird, we've been off doing stuff.

We visited an awesome friend at her new home (yay! Much closer to us!), and Lolly had her face painted.

Lolly - Face painting by her little friend, B.

We've been to the shops! Lolly's lunch of choice when out is what we call "McSushi" - fries, a raw salmon sushi roll, all dipped in oodles of soy sauce.

McSushi

One night last week Lolly decided she was going to sleep in the toy basket.

The cute!!

And when we can, we go visit Snail at her mother's. Here we are, all buckled up ;)

Click, clack, front and back!

We've also been to playgroup, had Nanna and Pop over, and generally been enjoying a strange island of peace and quiet as much as we can.

Hospital time

2012-08-03T09:02:00.003+10:00

So, this is what we've been doing the past few months...

As most of you know, Snail has cerebral palsy, and uses a wheelchair. A lot of CP kids develop hip problems, mostly due to their lack of weight bearing in early development. Your hips and femurs need walking and weight bearing to finish forming properly. So a lot of kids with issues walking, and issues with muscle tone, end up with hip malformations which eventually leads to dislocations.

Which is just what happened to our Snail.

Over the past year, since an x-ray last August, we've known that Snail would need surgery. Last August, her right hip was 40% subluxed (sitting incorrectly in the socket), early this year it was 80%. A few weeks ago, we had a bad incident with her pain and when they did an x-ray at Emergency, her right hip was completely dislocated.

So, after living with that for several weeks, she had surgery 2 weeks ago.

Here is a simple link to what she had done. She had a femoral varus derotation osteotomy on both sides (re-angling of the femoral head), and an acetabuloplasty on the hip socket (re-shaping the hip socket) on the right side. Basically - it was an operation on both femurs, to reposition the head of the socket correctly, and to make sure her legs came out the same length after surgery (which is why they do the both sides at the same time). She also had her right hip socket reconstructed into a more normal shape.

It was, in the words of one of the registrars, a "big day out" in surgery. One of her surgeons commented that it's pretty much the maximum amount of surgery they can do on a person, other than in a crash or something. It was 4 hours, and took two surgeons.

Towards the parent lounge, during surgery.

Surgery day was everything you might expect, horrible, torturous, awful. And can I say there's nothing quite like having to spend the entire waiting time with your husband's ex-wife. I'm sure she would say the same! No way round it when we're all there waiting for Snail to get the awful thing done.

She looked AWFUL in recovery. It was a shock. You know that's what people are going to look like after surgery, but it's still horrible to see Snail go through it. She was white as a sheet, with heaps of cords and lines everywhere. She ended up having two transfusions. For which we are so grateful for Australia's safe blood supply! We're all going to donate blood in the next couple of weeks. You should too: there are kids out there, like MY kid, who need it.

The first couple of days were predictably horrid, DinnerDad stayed at the hospital, I went up a lot as my Mum and Dad stayed a couple of days with Lolly (THANK YOU - you both rock!!). She looked like death and was barely moving or awake. She had a temperature, and part of her lung collapsed. Both her legs are in these fabric splints, and hold a foam wedge in place so her hips can't move. She had an epidural for four days. They put a naso-gastric tube in as hospital and pain upset her eating and drinking, and she needed her regular oral epilepsy meds. So, you know, all that fun stuff.

By day four she was starting to perk up. Truly amazing what our bodies can recover from, and so quickly. She was more awake and interested in us all, and watching telly. They got her chair organised, a reclining wheelchair as she can't sit at more than 45 degrees for several weeks. We also have a hoist to do transfers, as she can't help with transfers and can't be moved much until 6 weeks afterwards.

This is day 4, trying out the reclining wheelchair and getting some sun!

Day 5 I think! Watching Blue's Clues on her iPad and starting to look better!

The girls watching iPad telly :D

She went home after 8 days, back to her mothers for two weeks. We'll do our catch up after that, and will have her here for a good while. Can't wait, we miss her.

It's very strange to have a child go through this and not be with them (even if you aren't their "real" mother). I feel for DinnerDad, it's been very hard on him not being with her, too. Looking forward to having her here!!

Turtle tales

2012-08-01T16:27:00.002+10:00

We can haz turtle. In fact, we has haz turtle since we bought the house we're in! Our place had a rather...unique wavy in-ground tank, in which our turtle, Squirtle (most common turtle name, EVAH!) resided since the people before us built this house in the early '90s.

Squirtle, and our giant goldfish (the fish has sadly gone to the pond in the sky).

Being an inherited creature, we didn't have a licence for him until very recently *gasp*. That's right, our family was living on the edge, walking the line, practically criminal!!

Anyhoo, as part of our never ending renovations before we sell the house, we decided to knock out this paragon of eighties architecture.

The old tank that was built in, complete with kid-proofing and kid.

Tres classy!

Cleaning it out on moving day.

Which involved re-homing Squirtle. One 4ft tank and much hefting later, we have a temporary spot for him in our lounge room. When the painting of the new bits of wall are done, he'll go in our doorway to greet the world.

New tank, precariously resting on a TV stand.

Catching all the feeder fish that lived in the old pond! Hours of fun...

Given how much fun he's had since we moved him into the new tank, I now feel like we'd been keeping him in some kind of turtle-torture cave for the past few years. Still, he's out now, and loving it.

Turtle renovation: done!

Oh, extra bonus shot of our other fish tank. You can't keep fish in with a turtle (unless they're big enough), the turtle will eat them! As we learned to our shame...it was two fish-buying sessions and a lot of "where did those fish go!?" before we worked it out.

So when the kid wants goldfish and guppies, you get a kids tank for them. So we did.

Stuff Lolly does: aged 4

2012-07-01T10:46:00.000+10:00

Lolly is four and three months, and is all the awesomeness that is four! She's outspoken, engaging, friendly, stubborn, and fiery! She loves to chat, and loves to have complicated things explained.

Here are some recent gems:
- How do engines work?
- What are stars?
- Why does it rain?
- Why do we have hair?
- Why are some animals carnivores and some are herbivores?
- Why do those cars drive over there on that side of the road and we drive over here on this side?
- What is that bug and can we keep it as a pet?!

Lolly, being foolish :D

She is VERY interested in numbers and letters, both writing and reading, and does a lot of practice of both.

She's super-competent on my iPhone and iPad, and chooses mostly pre-school style games with adding, subtracting, matching, and letter/word recognition. Her game play is more advanced now, she loves this kindy game (Teach Me: Kindergarten) where you answer questions for "coins" that you spend building an aquarium. While part of me cringes at the *reward* thing, I actually think it's been positive for her "saving" for fish and accessories, and working out how many questions she has to do to get her next "thing." She also watches a bit of telly on it, but not much, it's mostly games.

Bug, from Tickle Tap, by Lolly!

She's very oriented towards play with others, but also has very shy days, where if we go to the park with friends, it can take 45 minutes of sitting on my lap before she feels she can go play. Once she does, she's totally fine and can't be dragged away by the proverbial wild horses. I actually remember being very similar as a child, feeling painfully shy and unsure, but also very social and making new friends seemingly easily once I'd taken that painful first step. It's hard to watch as a mother!

She's kind, but also feisty. She speaks up for what she wants, and is willing to fight for it. While this is, frankly, a pain in my parental arse at times, it's also one of the qualities I really wanted to give her as a parent, despite it's frequent inconveniences.

She's a fan of television, but in a moderate way. It's a rare day she can sit through more than one episode of something without having to run off an play something else. I use TV more than I am comfortable with at the moment, but we all have compromises. While my ideal is no TV unless she request is (self-regulation), I all too often suggest it myself as I'm desperate for a break, or to get something else done. As Lolly is kind of an only child (in a practical sense, with no siblings who can or will play with her, and some not present for a week at a time), and I don't live in a tribe filled with children who can fulfill her needs to learn and socialise, TV is all I can manage some days. Watching favourites at the moment are Octonauts!, Play School, Mister Maker, Dinosaur Train (!!), and Blue's clues, with a bit of Diego thrown in.

Lolly is articulate, and awesome words at present includes the adorable 'oncentrate, "actually," and the less fabulous (but still hilarious) "shitbags!" For extra effect, she calls me "knittingbags" when pissed off. "Bumhead" is also a favourite insult/term for Daddy.

Lolly and the various Alices

The other main part of her day at the moment is PETS. She's always been oriented toward our animals, and this has just taken off over the past few months. She now has pet fish (Gup A, ~~Gup B~~ (filter accident!), Alice and Alice), complete with snails (Alice and Pippin), pet hermit crabs (Alice, Little Alice, and Pinchy), and a keen interest in our turtle, Squirtle. Nearly every day, she feeds them and looks after them. Also, all of them are called Alice. Hilarious.

What's this? A post...?!

2012-06-04T13:08:00.001+10:00

Clearly *checks date stamps* it has been some time since my last blather here on Memo To Self. Why? Not sure! We all fall out of the habit of blogging our lives at some point or another, and this, I am guessing, was one of my points.

Oh, and life got busy and shiz.

So here's post, with random life shots :D

Smash contemplates modes of transport, at the beach.

It has been quite remarkable how many things fell off my wagon since taking on a measly one day of work a week this semester!! I teach a grand total of 3 contact hours (which is around 8-10 hours a week over the semester in prep, admin and marking), and have promptly stopped exercising and blogging. I guess that's where I found the time!

Lolly swimming in freezing water on a recent weekend away :D

Well, assignments are back, and I'm on a short break until they have their exam, so I'm suddenly back.

At the movies for the Muppets!

We've had a whirlwind of a time these past 3 months, we've been renovating the house (some more) and plan to have it on the market in the next few weeks. We've had bad hip news for the Snail, who needs a major hip reconstruction and repair, also in the next few weeks (now THAT sucks). Lolly is well and truly four, and into all the things four year olds love, which is mostly awesome. Smash had his school formal (!!) and has been busy with an assortment of grade 12 things, and mindless computering (the latter, probably not to the benefit of his final marks ;)). I've been on a body transformation journey, and have switched to a paleo/primal mode of eating (not strict, yet!), together with exercise and strength training, and have been remarkably more well, more energy, and have shed 11 kilos I didn't need. And Nanna and Pop have been away, making us all sad and miss them (no really, we're glad they're having a good time, sort of! xo).

Snail and Lolly have a hug at the ANZAC day parade.

More on all this exciting life stuff in future posts.

I miss you, bloggy interweb friends! xo

Shitty cat is shitty, but this time with good cause.

I have eclectic tastes in books

2012-04-21T19:46:00.001+10:00

I read a lot, in a range of things, and my current Goodreads recommendations, based on my Read shelf, includes:

The Lightning Thief, Rick Riordan

The Well-Trained Mind: A Guide to Classical Education at Home, Susan Wise Bauer and Jessie Wise,

The Stand, Stephen King (actually one of my favourite books), spinoff book, Captain Trips.

John Holt's How Children Learn

and

A World on Fire: Britian's Role in the American Civil War, Amanda Foreman.

It made me laugh a bit.

My latest weaknesses have been in zombie literature, and crappy vampire books. No, really.

Check out my books on Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/profile/Selenegonecrazy

I have new kitchen friends

2012-04-06T12:47:00.003+10:00

Thanks to my Grandma, and some money she was lovely enough to leave me, I have some new kitchen friends!

Meet Davros, my Thermomix! And the as-yet-unnamed coffee machine of awesomeness!

See, they like each other...

My A-Y-U-C-O-A grinds beans and has twin thermoblocks. I don't even know why, but am guessing it's awesome!

I *heart* you both, kitchen friends!

We art, we craft

2012-03-28T16:50:00.001+10:00

Lolly has been going to Gymboree lately, to get us out of the house, basically. She isn't doing kindy this year, and I wanted some input other than mine. Oh and doing that much art might break me!

She LOVES it. She's like an art and craft machine. As I type this she is using glitter glue to glue googly eyes and sparkles on cards for her cousin's birthdays. She does endless series of glitter gluing of eyes and pom poms that DinnerDad reckons looks like fairy/alien road accidents.

Serious face, at art class.

"I am so totally artistic!"

Fairy/alien road carnage. Or party bags.

Focus face. Making fairy/alien road carnage requires FOCUS!

I love it, she loves it. It's a cool stage. When we finish the art room upstairs, you know I'll be bragging about it here! Until then, craft on!

Birthday Party!

2012-03-22T15:05:00.003+10:00

Lolly had her fourth Birthday Party on Sunday, which was a rousing success! There was a green dinosaur cake.

Roar!

DinnerDad puts on the finishing touches.

Birthday cake proves to be a pied piper for the small ones.

ZOMG, cake!!!!

My piece!

Birthday girl gets cake.

Festive cat is festive.

There was face painting, thanks to a lovely friend (she is available for parties if you're interested!).

DinnerDad's dino watermelon!

There were lots of family and friends, lovely gifts, and a happy, tired, birthday girl at the end of the day. Thanks to everyone for making it a lovely, special day for all of us. xo

We make cupcakes!

2012-03-08T17:40:00.002+10:00

And then ate 'em! They're pink.

As you were!...

Cutest hat in the world!

2012-02-27T09:49:00.001+10:00

Cutest hat in the world!, a photo by Selenegonecrazy on Flickr.

I knit cute hats, apparently. Being new to knitting, I remain overly impressed with myself. Hence sharing here :)

Birthday garden fun

2012-02-22T13:55:00.001+10:00

Last week was my birthday, the last of my 30s! I took the girls to the Botanic gardens with my family. Here is a lazy blogging set of photos from the day. :D

Snail and me!

Following the children's trail (intently!)

Giant bug, with child.

Pop, Lolly, and Aunty J!

Snail and Lolly both loved the giant xylophone!

Lolly the Artist

2012-02-15T08:46:00.002+10:00

Lolly is loving the artwork at the moment, she loves to draw and paint, and do collage, and stick all manner of things on to all manner of other things.

DinnerDad was particularly proud of this drawing of Snail's new wheelchair Lolly did while we were at the hospital for a Snail appointment last month. It has perspective!

Snail's wheelchair (with dinosaurs)

I was even motivated to take her to art class at Gymboree! She LOVED it.

At art class!

We have clearly nurtured an artistic genius ;)

Footprints in a puddle, by Lolly

She has been doing collage all morning, and told me just now "Mummy, when I grow up, I want to be an artist!"