Remembering Birthdays

1989

Today would have been my Dad's 90th birthday, had cancer not taken him from us nearly twenty years ago.

It's not hard to imagine what he'd have been like at 90.  Probably not so much different from how he was at 70.  Just older.  He would have been proud to see me happily married and he would have loved having a granddaughter, I'm sure.  He would have been secretly pleased that like me, she also shares his love of camping, and of cats.

I will always miss him, but often it's the smallest things that bring that home to me...  Like stargazing with Cheyenne and remembering how my Dad would set up his telescope and point out constellations for my brother and I (most of which I have forgotten and need to look up).  Or counting how many seconds between the flash of lightning and the rumble of thunder to see how far off a storm is.  Do you think I can remember the formula for that?  My Dad knew.  If only I could still ask him.  Yes, I'm sure the answer is out there for me to Google, but it's just not the same.

Happy Birthday Dad.  I love you ♥

July 1976

Life begins...?

Apparently, if you believe what the popular adage says, "Life begins at 40."  Wait, what?  What exactly have the last 39 years been?  Not life?  Perhaps a mere existence then.

Well, three and a bit months in and I'm still waiting for this "new beginning".  Come at me Life. I'm ready.

...No ?

Thought as much.

Nothing has changed.  Inside, I don't feel any older (or wiser, lol).  I'm still married to a wonderful (if sometimes exasperating) man, still have a daughter with attitude, still have a mortgage, still looking for work, still enjoying the company of my friends...

So, I'm fairly sure this "life begins" business is just BS to bolster the spirits of those who are depressed because turning 40 apparently means they are now OLD.  But you know what?  I'm ok with it being BS because I'm ok with being 40.  Age is not a number, it's a state of mind.

Being 40 does not make me feel old.  The fact that Cheyenne is now 10 and started Grade 5 this year?  That makes me feel old.

Photoboard of my first 40 years.

Happy "Back To School" To You All

Well, despite the Big Wild Wet of the long weekend, and predictions of showers for the remainder of the week, the first day back at school dawned bright and sunny, with barely a cloud in the sky.

No power outages or flood damage in our neck of the woods, so Cheyenne's school was open for business.

Figured we'd make a good impression for the first day, so she wore one of the new style polos. The uniform is in transition, meaning for the next year, the students can wear either the new or the old uniform. As I'd only just bought her two brand new polos (old uniform style) at the beginning of last year, I only bought two of the new style shirts this year.  As you can probably tell, I did not buy a new hat.  I can't see the point in spending money on a nice, crisp-brimmed beauty, when it is only going to be jammed into the school bag during class. Within a week it would look like her current one (although, perhaps less faded, lol).

We had to get a new school bag this year, too.  Her old one only just made it to the end of its second year of use.  Can I just put it out there that I'm unimpressed with the available selection of backpacks at Big W, Kmart, Target, etc.  They are all either too small to put folders in, too humungous for a kid to carry or come in a bundle pack (because EVERYONE needs a new pencil case, ruler, lunchbox, utility case etc that they will probably never use).  Most of the selections this year also seem to come equipped with a laptop compartment and a "wet section".  I'm guessing this is for stashing your togs and towel after swimming lessons... or maybe it's for leaky drink bottles?  Does anyone still sell normal backpacks?

Anyway, Cheyenne likes her teachers - she's in the two teacher (job share) class - and is, for the most part, happy with the kids who are in her class.  She's excited to be learning Japanese for the first time, looking forward to her first school camp later in the year, and, so far, happy to be back at school.  Hopefully she retains this positive outlook.

After 3 days of rain, we actually needed sunnies!

 

2013 Already? Happy New Year!

Well, didn't 2012 flash past rather quickly!   It seems like only a month or so ago that I was writing a "Happy New Year 2012" post, but in fact it's been twelve months.

I'll admit it now - I was VERY SLACK last year, postwise.  I think I managed to post twice. Twice?  I really will try to make more of an effort this year.  Not that it's a New Years Resolution. I don't make them.  I'm not anti-resolution or anything. I just think that if you want to turn over a new leaf, you can do it whenever you want. You don't need to wait until New Year.

So...  what has happened since my last post in August?   Let's see.  Cheyenne turned 9 in September, I turned 39 and Steve turned 41 in October, and Cheyenne finished grade 3 with an encouraging (although not fabulous) report card.  We bought Cheyenne an early Christmas present of a Honda CR50 dirt bike, which she is getting more confident at riding. My boss closed her office for the whole of December, so I've had a month off work.  Nice, except that no work equals no pay for casuals. Oh well.  I finally bought myself a new Christmas tree, managed to get my Christmas cards done on time, and did a little bit of Christmas baking (including Baileys balls - YUM!).  We had a nice quiet family Christmas lunch at my mum's followed by a bbq dinner at Steve's mum and dad's. As usual, Cheyenne received far too many presents.

We've just had a relaxing week away camping with friends at Borumba Deer Park.  Although we do enjoy it there, we have vowed to try somewhere different this year.  I sense some Googling research in my future, lol.

Steve returned to work today after two weeks off, and I go back to work on Wednesday, so I guess with three weeks to go, it's time to start covering school books and getting ready for the new school year.

I wonder if 2013 will seem to fly by as quickly as 2012 did.

August Already...?

Where has this year gone?

Seriously, I had good intentions of keeping my blog up to date this year.  Clearly that hasn't happened.  I could try to tell you that life has just gotten in the way, but that would be less than true.  To be honest, I've just been very slack.  

That's not to say I didn't have anything to post about. 2012 has provided me with plenty of blog-worthy events (I even had titles for potential posts rattling around in my head).  I guess I'll just have to do a quick roundup post to bring you all up to date.

Shortly after Christmas, Steve hit triple digits on the scales and decided he needed to do something about it.  Over the last ten years we've both gradually put on the kilos, so we figured we'd do this together.  We jump started our weight loss with Optislim shakes, decreased our portion sizes, ate less pasta, cut out fast food and increased our exercise.  This effort has seen Steve lose 12 kg and I've lost 10kg.  I am finally back to my pre-baby weight.  We've been a little slack during the cooler months, but as the weather warms up we'll go on family bike rides again regularly.

I have a "real" job. (Yes, sadly there are some people who believe being a mother doesn't count... *looks pointedly at my darling husband*)  In an effort to stop Steve whining about me "not working", I started applying for casual jobs.  While Cheyenne is still in primary school, I prefer to be there for her before and after school, so that does reduce the pool of available work.  I found a night job doing retail merchandising.  The money was great, the work was good, the people were a wonderful bunch to work with, however the hours didn't really suit our family circumstances.  9pm to 5am sounds doable until you discover that the company considers the end of shift time to be merely a suggestion and that you could be working anywhere from Caloundra to the Gold Coast and out as far as Redbank.  Often the rest of our team worked until 7 or 8am and I had to keep asking to be let off "early" at 6am so that I could be home before Steve left for work.  Couple this with the fact that Steve leaves home at a different time every day depending on where and when he's due to start his first job of the day, and you can see why I was destined to give this job up after only two and a half months.

I'm now working one day a week, during school hours, doing admin work for my tax agent.  Sure, it may be only 5 and a half hours at a lower pay rate than the merchandising job, but I enjoy the work, I'm learning MYOB and some tax software, I can still do the school run, and (the best bit) I have no travel expenses since work is only 6 houses down from me.

Other things have happened this year, obviously, but those are the important things.

I promise I will try to post more regularly from now on.

New Year, New Room

After a nice long reprieve, Operation Room Swap could be put off no longer.  Steve decided that Cheyenne had to move into the front room because her room at the back (that she’d had since she was born) was too cramped and far too cold in Winter.  We decided it would need to be done during the holidays, since there was a lot of shuffling of furniture and the front room needed to be painted before that could happen.  Cheyenne picked out the paint colour she wanted for her new room.  A nice pink called Paper Daisy.

Cheyenne spent a week on holiday with Nanny and Poppy at a caravan park, so we took advantage of that week to get everything done. 

The "before" shots of the rooms.

First we had to move everything out of her old room. For the better part of a week we had to live with her bookshelf in the hallway, her dismantled bed in the rumpus and the rest of her furniture in the lounge room. Then I had to empty everything out of my craft room and move it into her old room.  Then the hard work began. 

Over the next few days, while Steve was at work, I sugar-soaped the walls then got stuck in to the painting.  I would highly recommend not painting on the two hottest days of Summer if you can help it …especially with gloss enamel for the trims.  That stuff is not my favourite at the best of times, but in stinking hot weather it is tacky and nasty and a bugger to apply.

Walls done. Now for the trims...

By the end of the week it was ready to move her furniture back in, including the new tallboy we’d bought her.  Steve had been worried that the pink paint was too dark, but it’s a nice contrast to her white furniture, and hopefully she’ll be happy with it for several years.  The trick will be trying to get her to keep it tidy.  So far, so good.

Fit for a princess.

 

I would also like to add, that despite my reservations, I’m rather pleased with my new craft room …even if it isn’t quite finished yet.

Steve even surprised me by attaching some pieces of alloy angle to each cube, so my over-desk shelf could finally be installed.  Only took him about 5 years, lol.

Cat Lady

I'm not afraid to admit that I am a "cat person".  Steve is not.  I guess you're either a cat person or a dog person.  Dogs are nice and all, but I'd rather have a cat.  This of course, means we have a stalemate situation in our house.  While both Cheyenne and I want to get a kitten, Steve is dead against it.  You might think that two against one should mean something.  It doesn't.  As much as I want to get another cat (since my beloved Zephyr passed away last year), I'd prefer to have a peaceful home life, so to keep Steve happy, we haven't got a cat.  We haven't given up, though; we are still working on him.  Maybe one day he'll give in.

I bought this cat pot plant holder ages ago because it was cute.

It sat empty on my potting table ever since I bought it, for one reason.  The pot is so damn small (just 7cm in diameter) I wondered what I could plant in it that wouldn't get pot-bound too quickly.

Recently, I decided that maybe a small ornamental cactus might be ideal, because, A. you can get quite small ones, and B. cacti are better suited to me because I often forget to water my plants.  So, despite the fact that the local Bunnings had a nice selection of small cacti, I believe it was fate that decided which one I chose.

Not only was this one the right size, but it was covered in "hair" (which fits with the cat theme).  It was flowering when I got it. It gets a ring of pink flowers around the top, which is kinda cool, since none of my other cactus plants have ever flowered. But the best part?  It's called "Old Lady" cactus.

So now I have an Old Cat Lady that isn't embarrassing.  LOL.