Happy Australia Day!

Hope youre having a good one!!!

Observations on how to celebrate being australian on Australia Day in our house:

-There was talk over wearing a aussie flag as a super hero cape & getting drunk (to a american xbox360 friend... Yes having a xbox360 is a VERY CHEAP OPTION FOR LONG DISTANCE CALLS/CHATS!!! ($299 console + $60 headset. lasts until 1) kitten chews thru headset cord 2)you have no broadband 3)xbox360 dies) so far the boys have had a few drinks... (but it is still only 5.30pm-ish here as a type!!)
it would be polish imported vodka they are drinking too.. lol.. shame its not the aussie made & exported sake made by Sun Masamune *link*( they usually drink. Go shu nama, Go shu blue & go shu... with the expensive Go shu 40 only at special occassions!)

-Someone had vegemite?!?! I found it left out.. not sure if someone just wanted to smell the australian spirit? lol!!! As people had for breakfast: cheesy baked beans n toast (boys), fruitloops (tia) and lite PB on toast for me. :)- Someone (no guess as to who eh!) had gone shopping and bought food! Coming back with the very australian.. wagon wheels, steak, white bread, frozen chips, some brand of salt n pepper squid and a box of beer battered flake... oh and the very cute finger buns in safeway today (4 for the same price of 1 at brumbys!!!!)So Lunch was steak sandwiches with white bread (tom sauce for me, HP sauce for the boys :/ yuk!) With the yummy rice bran butter or is it marg?! gah.. anyways its on special this week @ safeway 2 for $6 (save $2) and the oil is on special too $2.78?

I finally got a calendar for this year!!! Its actually a 17month calendar but those extra 5 months have long gone! (last year) Ive been eyeing it off at officeworks... i saw alike ones in k-mart etc but after christmas and the sales all that are left are boring calendars.. altho i did see a slow cooker recipe a day calendar you know the little ones the size of a post-it on sale at myer but still $20-odd! :/ and of course the day i had $0! ah well... ;) one that got away! hehe
anyways my calendar was $14.. it has 5 spaces at each day, stickers and a pocket for ("reciepts, coupons etc... lol) ive noticed it has international holidays marked on it e.g martin luther king & a coming of age day in Japan..

anyways have a good one!

Kettle

Christmas tree with the lights on (8 AA batteries needed) in the dark..

Playing catch up here!! So bare with me!!
Hubby and i recieved a lovely gift this year of a kettle bbq just before christmas. A great suprise being that well, we had been thinking and planning on getting one... probably would have settled for some cheap one from k-mart had we found one.. But instead we were blessed with a big Weber kettle bbq! It meant christmas cooking would be smooth and the heat outdoors (not that it matter we had a very mild christmas day may have reached 25deg cel?The meat on the test run was a lovely bolar blade from the butchers. The woolworths roasts i found had to little fat on the top than i wanted.. I am learning that my butcher has far superior quality of meats than the supermarket/safeway woolies. And i love my butchers diet mince for $9.95 a kg or 2kgs for $16? It truly is diet mince, none of this stuffing around with star ratings that coles and woolworths offer.. anyways getting off track.
hubby out the back with the kettle.. the meat is inside.. and he is pretty much "are you quite alright taking photos of me?!!" (notice the awful amount of cardboard rubbish we have.. with expansion comes rapid carboard.. my recycling bin is always full.. we have more carboard in the laundry too..)
The end product, was delish!!!!! I requested more! (that is more frequent roasts. Not more on my plate) hhehehehe!!!

random pics

All the bubs taking a nap on the office floor today. Alyssa just woke up!



My cheap shoes that broke :) Yes happy, have new shoes!!

The naughty kittens caught in the pram.. NOT HAPPY SAM! (sam.. pram.. get it.. ugh..)
If its not the pram its the cot?! If its not those 2 places its the rocker?!

Our new lil girl bub Alyssa

Born on monday 14th july (1 day early) at 4.23pm. 6hrs 40-something mins labour.. no drugs (until after the placenta delivered naturally), no stitches, delayed cord clamping, 2nd bub born on the floor (lol) bean bag this time.. interesting..
8lb 2.5oz, 35cm head circ. 50cm length (not tall apparently, lol) 7.5oz or 225g lighter and 2.5cm shorter than tia.

got 2 hospital via taxi.. arrived at hosp & got asked lots of questions while in labour, was examined 2 find i was 8cms dilated!!!!

bub poo-d n wee-d when she came out (and screamed) we then got a private room (lucky lucky) which was right near the nurse/midwife desk & the front doors (boo hiss!!! way 2 noisy) stayed 24hrs in hospital went home 2 a quiet house & my comfy bed and slept!!!!!!!!!!

typed 1 handed, hope every1 is well.

Big Mummy tummy 37weeks pregnant

Wrinkles?

Look at this face! No wrinkles huh! Its due to her amazing wrinkle cream apparently.
I'll start at the beginning of the story.
We had just watched Dr phil and oprah was starting and on the ads they had a commercial for garniers ultra Lift spf 15 cream. And Tia goes "Oh no Mummy! Ive got wrinkles!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" *runs off and comes back a few seconds later* "Look mum. All my wrinkles have gone away!"
this happens again so i went to see what she was playing with in the bathroom.. turns out that Liquid hand soap on a bit of toilet paper rubbed into the cheeks does the job.... err.. LOL

bummed for fresh pasta fettucini ideas

Ive taken a liking to fresh pasta, the only downside i find is that it comes in a huge amount and i need to make a few meals of it b4 its no longer any good. i think fresh pasta somewhat is of better quality than the dried stuff, i quite like it..

i made a beef strognoff-ish dish. beef, onions, mushrooms, pepper and evaporated milk. that was yum with the pasta thrown in.. but yeah its been awhile since ive done anything italian noodle like. Any ideas?

Heat Rash

A heat wave had hit melbourne.. and it was a few hours till my mum and sister flew in/took the train and arrived. This was Thursday.
It was a easy 30 deg plus day, Tia and i walked at 9.30am to her daycare, then a 20min walk in the path of the sun and no shade to Hubby work to drop off the brownies i made the night before(which he forgot to take that morning) *which i had a sit-down and cool down in the air con* and then walking 20mins back in the other direction to the shops. At about 1.30pm i left the shops, walked home in the heat. 2.30pm back out in the heat 10min walk there and back to pick up Tia.
Trying to clean the house, organize bedding, towels, pillows and other chores.. before doing another 10min walk to the laundromat at around 5-6pm *still baking hot* ordered some hot chips from the shop next door and sat in the h-o-t laundromat for 45mins before walking home again, resting my feet and still trying to de-clutter, clean and organise the house..
and then i saw a huge blotchy blood red patch...
argh instant stress!!!!!!!!!!
My heat rash was on the back of my leg just above my ankle.
My heat rash, is only itchy after waking up in the morning from rubbing on the sheets. Im what 23 weeks pregnant, not far along. But it was the first day or so without taking a few cold showers thru the day to cool down, wearing long pants... usually on hot days i do nothing, stay inside, with cold baths/showers to cool down.
My heat rash looked heaps blotchy, bright blood red. it was really strange. I had no stiff joints, neck, headache, no new cold symptoms. (ruling out anything nasty) i only felt sick due to me stressing over it all.

Day 2 of the heat rash it had gone from blood red to a wine, magenta colour. It was going down. However with walking for 6+hrs shopping locally even in air con. (my pants must have been rubbing the back of my leg) I noticed a faint pink blotchiness that eventually went bright red later that night.

Day 3 was a trip to the city in the afternoon. The first heat rash had dulled even more. The new heat rash in same spot just different patches.. slowly turning magenta. This day was filled with 3-4hrs walking in melbourne, (melbourne central, bourke st mall, lil bourke st, down to flinders st station, then over to southgate and back to flinders st station)

Day 4 was beach day. Old rash still hanging on, light red. New rash being stubborn and magenta. Got cream. paraderm was apparently a good cream for itches, bites and heat rash but has been dis-continued. *no where had it* So mum bought me the new cream, thats supposed to be the same called Medi Quattro First aid cream.

Day 5 was yet another scorcher in the heat wave. stayed home till 2pm and then walked 20mins to the train station to say bye to my mum. poor tia was so hot her face had turned bright red. i decided to take it easy and rest in the air con of the shopping centre for a few hours.
Both rash had gone down a bit more

Day 6 1st rash is a slight orange/pink can hardly see it. 2nd rash clinging on tad magenta pretty dull.

And by day 7-9 it had completely gone.

Happy Birthday Maria

Have a good one!!! Hope u get nicer surprises in the mail!!!!!!!!!!!

The lazy stirfry

This is a super stirfry for lazy or busy people. Its very quick and easy and requires little cooking ability.

Ingredients:

a type of meat or tofu.
whatever stir-fry-ish veggies you have e.g carrots, onions, capsicums, shitake mushrooms!
Noodles or rice.
Sweet chilli sauce
Soy sauce
pepper/salt to taste

First fry up your meat, then the onions. Have your rice either cooked or the water boiling for the noodles. Add the rest of the veggies. You dont need a wok. sure they help. but a big frying pan or pot will do the trick. When all is cooked add perhaps 3-4tbs os sweet chilli sauce and 1 tbs of soy sauce. add pepper and salt to taste. Stir thru the meat n vegs. and serve on a bed of rice/noodles.
yeah i dont bother to julienne carrots.. its a lazy stirfry recipe!
We love the Hakubaku noodle range. Particularly the soba (buckwheat) In australia find it in the asian section in both Coles and Wooloworths $2.40-ish one packet does 3 meals for 2-3 people.

Life...

A update on how things are going. :)

On friday, Tia and I went to the beach in the afternoon for a few hours. I bought a $4 inflatable ring for her to play with, that took some figuring out on how to blow up the cheap ring! She loved playing with it. It was low tide, so she spent alot of time playing in the muddy sand in between a small pool of water stuck due to the sand and the tide all the way out. We had alot of fun towards the end, rolled up my pants and took her into where the beach was. Had her lay on her back on top of the ring, she loved it, just floating around being pushed by the waves. Whats odd coming from one who hates getting water on/in her eyes.. is what she enjoyed most when there was a bit of a tiny tiny surf (but the most ive ever seen at frankston) basically she rode the waves (like a metre away from where we were in the water) onto the sand where the waves ended on the increasing shore line (as the tide decided to come in) and splash on her, true thats how you end up with sand in your bathers.. but she wasnt thinking of that! she loved it..
I put sunscreen on my feet when we got there (thought the socks n shoes might rub it off on the walk?) and then was the only thing i re-applied sunscreen to half way thru the time we were there! lol! i think im paranoid over getting sun burnt feet again!

We have been waiting for the bengal kittens to arrive at the pet shop, i wonder what they will look like?

Had a place to move into in mind, its not available till saturday. I hate when you ring up a real estate agent that they promise to call you back and then they dont.. or you speak to the head receptionist of non-big brand rental real estate companies who never know whats going on..
But now ive got doubts on whether its close enough to a school, wary that im putting all my eggs into 1 basket when the photos online are 7 years old? isnt great to have time stamped photos.. lazy real estate people. That and why do some places have photos of the kitchen and the back yard or something but not the bedrooms? ugh..

Ive had some days where i feel completely zapped of energy at the drop of a hat.. feeling like i could so go back to sleep before lunch! ha!
(my collection of polish chocolates)
I found a new awesome deli and import shop, that stocks alot of polish chocolates and other euopean (i say that coz i cant read it except that its european) stuff. Like i think i found german mushroom paste! lol! I also found some kinda local ginger creamed honey for $6 a jar. Oh how i missed ginger honey! lol! I also noticed a tin of hungarian? poppy seed filling.. false positive opiate drug test here i.. nah i didnt get it.. I got some polish gingerbread covered in chocolate biscuits, OMG ive never had gingerbread that reminded me more like marshmallow it was so light, puffy and wow. ^^ thumbs up to kopernik! WOW! i walked out of there with chocolates and honey! lol!.. interesting shopping trip dont you think

i looked up babies crying on youtube to show tia, that altho the baby is very quiet now its going to be very noisy. i came across this cute little funny cry. she is sooo cute.. i looked up births on youtube also, but felt anxious and a tad disturbed afterwards..

end of the holidays

Hubby starts back at work today. So on sunday night he decided we'd go to the movies as a finale thing. Hubby went and saw I am legend. Tia and I saw Enchanted!
I thought Enchanted was great, a bit of humor there for the adults too. I dont think Tia understood the crossover at the end, but she loved the singing happy princess, the prince and knows a wicked witchy queen when she sees one!
Unfortunately it didnt stay in my mind what the prince name was or what patrick dempsey character name was. To often they were referred as 'dad', 'friend' or 'majesty'.. ah well. I loved that she kept making dresses from curtains! lol! The whole contrast of fantasy falling in love and getting married in contrast to the real world where people date for years before getting married. The whole innocent True Loves kiss, so cute! Go Pip!
My fav lines "i got something better than a fairy godmother", "Well Red likes to tell the story another way(or something like that)", "chipmunks dont talk!"......"well, no. Not here"Hubby said I am legend would have been too scary for me. Yeah zombies arent really my thing.. He said he even jumped a few times! He said it was a great movie, with alot of Christian themes 'divine appointments', ending and so on (surprisingly). It's set in 2009 where the world's population dies from a air borne disease. Of course they die and then well turn into zombies and hunter things who then attack at night. Animals are immune to the air borne virus but not after being bitten. Its just him, the zombies and his daughters dog(who is also quite a hero but with not a happy ending...) It ends with a somber yet happy end. No Spoilers there ;)

My morning sickness is almost all gone!!! yay! When im hungry now, i just feel hungry and not sick! woohoo!

Christmas pics

Christmas trees

So this is the belated shot of the christmas tree. It is actually still there! the star never got on the top and a few lights never got on the tree the batteries on the lights never got changed, so it was a very lazy christmas tree effort on our part. not that we were here on christmas so i guess that makes it ok. But the fact its jan 11 and its still up, well thats us being lazy and enjoying hubbys hoildays. Yes the theme was silver and pink! lol! I picked them up when k-mart put them down from $4 to $1 for a pack of 4.

My parents Christmas tree (with some plaster of paris ornaments i made when i was 10 or so, christmas dinner in canberra)
My grandparents Christmas tree (christmas lunch in canberra)

scorched dry and nuts

Thanks for all the lovely comments guys!
Lets keep it real........ and quick confession one day last week i had a quarter pounder n chips & a cheeseburger for lunch, a big mac and chips for dinner. shocker! definitely a black day for my waist line! and i more bad takeaway thru the week.
Just have to make sure we eat the food thats already here before scoffing down takeaway.
This pregnancy has made a huge difference on my tummy, now that i cant suck it in and the organs have moved out and yeah now i am noticing just how big i really am.Are all these 40deg days highly weird/unusual for victoria? In nsw we would usually get 40deg days end of jan/feb.
Getting ready for another scorcher for today and tomorrow. Did wonder about going to the beach, but the reality is theres no shade out there, and any shade would be to far away from where Tia would be in the water. i guess our beach is better than in NSW as we have no surf at all! weird.. and at least thats a bit safer for tia. Think we will be staying home, cold showers and standing in wet clothes in front of the super-duper fan to cool down and i will run the bath and let tia play in it all day to keep her cool.
Britney spears has been on my mind alot(perhaps due to constantly being on tmz.com or ET why do i read and watch such crap?). (shes never been a favourite celeb, singer, dresser of mine) I feel for her that shes lost her kids now. I dont support parents who abuse alcohol and drugs tho. Its a real shame that its gotten this bad.
Id never ever swap places with her. Surely it would take just a little bit of effort to clean up her act?
The countless photohogs that follow her every move is insane, and how many years has that gone on for? But the fact that she keeps going out for drives thru the night, is she trying to be normal? is she trying to have photohogs take pictures of her filling up her car with gas so theres a 'normal' picture in the magazine? Or is she really nuts, enjoying the crazy vibe, crazy driving and crowds of photohogs? Is she just waiting for a princess Di accident? I do wish there was some sort of help she could get without being further exploited and sold out.

Re your comments:

I'm glad you didn't get one of those air cooler things.. I feel guilty that I didn't have the courage to say last post that I hated ours and found them ineffective. It was hubby's idea..and I felt the stupid thing failed us and I just wanted a proper air conditioner~maria

No need to feel guilty. :D my mum got one ages ago i guess i could have asked what she thought of them as i never saw it actually being used! It had been weighing on my mind also.

Glad your experience with the new doctor was better for you. I never look when blood is being taken either.. So is it crazy-pregnant-woman syndrome that made you look? Hehehe... :-P~maria

Im not afraid of needles and i thought he was crazy in that i couldnt see any veins, i suppose i was watching to see if he knew what he was doing. As i dont enjoy the prick of pain and didnt want more!

Different strokes for different folks though.~jadey

Totally agree with your jadey. i'd love to have a doctor who i'd seen all my life! ;) what a blessing

Another great chocolate trip.. i mean city trip ;)

What a day! Im glad to be absolutely energy-less! :D
We missed our train that would have gotten us there on time, it seems they have put more trains on in the morning (as usually there was a train 1 hr after that one) so there was only a 15 minute gap between the one we missed and the one we got on! (which was waiting already) The morning was awesome! Windy, cold-ish and some light rain! What a break from the heat and sun!

Got in and waited for the other special people to arrive, read in a directory about the clock how it does this marionette opening thing on the hour. maria and jenna arrived and we waited for the clock thing.. and so was 2 different school groups and other tourists.. it was 3 minutes late! funny!Off to the usual chocolate feast place, max brenners. Jenna had a Popsicle fondue (very interesting!) Maria had a 1/2 or 1/4 strength cappuccino in a kangaroo mug, it has a extra pouch at the side of the mug where melted chocolate can be licked.(photo below) (Tia had a milk hot chocolate (which i didnt actually ask for, but oh well.. she can consider herself spoilt for the day) and a chocolate lick now $2.20 (gone up 20c)I had a dark chocolate mocha which was rather on the dark bitter side than i expected and a rich brownie(which the waiter forgot about til i said i was still waiting on it, she still did a good job remembering our order off the top of her head, how many times did we test her? lol).
Tia enjoying the ribbons from the presents Maria & Jenna gave us! Also wearing her funky necklaces that she got! *forgot to try out the torch tonight, will have to try it tomorrow. ;)Maria and I!
Presents i received. YAY! presents! =D Much appreciated! A Tea towel with christmas theme, (we have survived with only 2 tea towels all year.. lol!) a purrrty basket with mini christmas puddings inside, a good health magazine (which i thought would be great to read on the trip home, but spent more time pointing at 2 pages that were 100kj & 400kj with tia pointing out chocolate, chips, strawberry, cheese, sushi etc lol!) a sample of some special baby bath stuff and some stickers! whoot! ;)

A trip to krispy kreme while the queue was short picked up a chocolate glazed creme filled, to share with hubby.Breadtop for lunch! Wishing there was a local one! Love their little buns, rolls, donuts not keen on pork floss buns or chicken & mushroom donut lol! But they have alot of yummy stuff. Also decided to pick up for later. Some choc chip buns & some Red bean Mochi.Central Groceries? Is the asian imports grocery shop where i stock up on mens pocky and look at the daifuku & other mochi (made in taiwan tho, i rather either Japan or Aussie made.. picky arent i)
A visit to L'Occitane, came across a Honey Massage nectar.

Light and soothing. Blend of propolis, royal jelly and honey from Provençal hives soothes; linden extract and bisabolol extract calm and help reduce irritation. Natural honey aroma pleases the senses. Use as a comforting massage lotion or as a body lotion. Suitable for adults and children ages three and up.

On my wish list! Not oily which is great, i hate giving a massage only to get oily hands and think about how terrible it is for hubbys skin.. especially if he falls asleep. Smells good, not over bearing like some cheap stuff!

It was great day! In L'Occitane Tia was asked if jenna was her sister, lol! And after that Tia was very happy to call jenna 'sister'. Tia cried when went to go home on the train, she wanted her sister! lol! Very cute.

Now to get some sleep... Night all! ;)