The Return of Super MUM!!!

Life has been insanely frantic lately. We are leading up to a huge weekend and this week has been manic. Monday I worked as well as gromming, delivering furniture and organising my next few weeks off training.

Tuesday we delivered furniture and picked furniture up from Ipswich. When I got home I discovered I had forgotten to groom one of my favourite clients so had to race to school, pick up the kids, then groom Fleur the poodle, race home in time for a wonderful lady to come over and choose her new fur baby.

Wednesday dawned with a flying visit to a friend and our work partners home to pick up shelving for the shop and visit with Fairy Mouse, her daughters companion Devon who left our home for her house and likes to eat our cake!

Thursday, furniture deliveries to Eatons Hill and back to the shop where we rearranged the entire shop and cleaned out the store-room, THEN flying out the door to deliver repairs and other stock which we no longer needed.

Friday will be another nightmare day with my final hand surgery happening at 10am. While I spend the rest of the day resting (yeah right) husband will be tending to the shop as well as delivering two lots of stock in the afternoon.

Finally, Saturday and Sunday will bring no less than six Agility runs per day! Nell and I are competing for our Novice Agility, Jumping Dog Excellent, Snooker Dog Novice, Gamblers Dog Novice and Strategic Pairs Excellent titles or qualifications. I am going prepared with plenty of toys, a new collar and some yummy chicken wings for Nell to help keep her strength up. There is going to be good food, great company and fantastic competition all weekend.

BRING IT ON!!

Cheers!

A Huge Day.

At the end of the Summer holidays, the kids and I went to the Museum and, on a whim, followed through to the Gallery of Modern Art. There the kids came in contact with an artwork by Australian artist Ron Mueck. It was a gigantic sculpture of a woman in bed. The realism was amazing at it blew my kids away. So when we found out that he was having a display at the Gallery, well we had to go!

We went around the entire display and I asked each child to tell me their favourite piece. The kids were enthralled with each work and amazed with the depth of detail each one had.

Aidens favourite was the newborn baby "A Girl". It was gigantic and so realistic.

Big Head is another favourite of all three of my children. Each individial bristle had to be hand placed into microscopic pores. He even has his teeth in place and nostril hairs!

Another interesting fact about this piece is that it is a like a giant mask. There is not substance to it, it is literally a mask!

We all found this one to be quite disturbing, mainly for the fact that the subject seemed unaffected by the fact he had been stabbed and was bleeding. There was no emotion. This one affected Caitie quite a bit.

Now we all know boys love gruesome stuff but even this one was a bit gross for my boys. This dead chicken, called Still Life, is about the size of an elephant and hangs inelegantly from a butchers hook suspended from the ceiling.

It is gory and real yet strangely puppetlike. You expect the thing to suddenly start flapping! It was a magnet for alot of children.

If you went around the other side of the bird, you could see where its throat had been cut and all the innards exposed. Very clinical though, no blood.

This gentleman, in his big boat, seemed cold and grumpy to the kids. He held little interest as he was not on their eye level.

Caitlins favourite piece is "In Bed". She told me when she first saw it that she thought the lady was very sad and unhappy. She kept coming back to it though. It was interesting to watch how many people copied her hand position without realising they were doing it. I find her disturbing and heartbreakingly sad.

This is a very jolly lady, attuned to her work. Mind you, there is no way I would be picking these up in the nudy! The balance was excellent, symmetrical.

One of the more "controversial" pieces to show children. It is called Wild Man and Conor liked him immensely. (He secretly told me he liked that he was in the nude. Caitie said that she thought he had a small penis for his size LOL). I did tell my kids before going in that they would be seeing graphic nudity and they already knew what a willy looked like. After a few little sniggers, they settled down to look at the sculptures as a whole rather than just the rude bits.

Yes, I did blank out his bits for those who don't really want to see a gigantic big willy. This was another confronting piece. The title suggested someone who was used to being on his own and the subject seemed anxious and uncomfortable being thrust, naked, into the spotlight.

Caitie and Aiden assessing the gigantic baby. They found the blood and placenta traces to be both fascinating and appalling in equal measures.

While I appreciated the detail, I found this one to be the most unrealistic of all the pieces.

And finally, my favourite piece. Titled "Old Woman In Bed", it is an elderly woman who appears very ill, sleeping huddled under a blanket. It is beautiful in a very sad way. You want to walk up and gently brush the hair off her brow and whisper quietly that it will be alright. It captures a moment between life and death and the Gallery had it hidden away around a corner. Absolutely beautiful.

So, there we have it. The Ron Mueck exhibition at the Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane. Its a must see if you are in the area.

I will post more of my kids trip to the city at a later date. I am tired right now....

Cin.

Long Time...No Post...

Yes, it has been a while. Yes, alot has happened, yes we are busy and yes I think I keep forgetting to breathe!

Four weeks ago Aiden was swinging on one of the huge 20+kg benches we have in the kitchen and flicked it forward whence it fell and smushed his toe. Having three accident prone kids makes one slower to react, so we both sat there and looked at him with a "you're a twit" look on our faces...until he started bellowing that there was blood pouring out. After looking at it we both agreed it was my turn to go to the hospital (yes we take turns, that is saying something doncha think?) Result? Aiden ripped the nail OUT of the nail bed then pushed it back through the quick. He also split it right around the top but didn't manage to break it. After three weeks of constant trips to the doctor, antibiotics and him wearing only one shoe to school, the toenail finally fell off and it started to heal.

And this is it after three weeks of bandaging and after the nail fell off. A week or two later and he is actually wearing shoes and healing well!

Conor had a disagreement with his bed...this provided another fantastic photo opportunity cause hey, I don't have enough pictures of my injured kids! I should start a collection.....(hmmmm)

Mothers Day was spent going for a bushwalk with my three peeps who decided half way around that fighting like banshees was a preferable option to enjoying the fresh air and autumn sunshine. Isn't that what most Mothers had to put up with?

This, of course, was taken prior to WWIV breaking out. See, they can act like normal loving children occasionally.

Q is growing into a handsome young man who is loving life in all its glory. He is funny, silly and very cute as well!

And finally...if I hear one my child telling me...Its not fair, I'm not doing it, how come I have to...I will scream!

C

2 Boys = One Bed = Trouble

Aiden and Conor are really bad at cleaning their room and end up playing typical boy games. This was the result of their last one...


That is a fantastic bruise on Conors behalf and within a few hours had become a gorgeous black eye. No sympathy from me!

On another note, whilst training my rather large and rather exhuberant male stafford to do the chute tunnel at training, he bit me. He came through the tunnel like an express train, knocked me over and play mouthed me with one of his canines going through my lip...yes it hurt....(sigh) and I wonder where Conor gets it from!

Cheers

Winning Isn't Everything

Aiden can't swim. I mean, he can swim a bit but he is really bad at it. The boy has no internal flotation devices. If sinking was an Olympic sport it would be gold, gold, gold all the way.

He is also terrified of deep water. He fell into the ocean and nearly drowned as a toddler and was saved by Fred. Fred is the gnome that lives in my head, he wears stripey socks, hobnailed boots and lederhossen. (Hey if Pinocchio can have a cricket, I can have a gnome.) Anyway, we were at the beach and Tony was looking after the kids. Aiden wandered off the edge of a submerged sandback and was face down thrashing. Fred booted me in the ear and made me look around. I got to him just in time.

Ever since that day, Aiden has been scared of deep water. If he can touch he is like a dolphin but take him deep and he will climb up your body and sit on your head screaming, "Get me back, get me back!" Every Friday during summer we go to the school pool and have a play. Each child is challenged to do something above their comfort zone to earn money. Ok, its bribery but it works. Caitie swam a length of the pool, Conor swam underwater and Aidens challenge was to jump into the pools deep end. I knew he could do it but he was terrified. It took him nearly two months to get up the nerve to do it. Yes, he did it and, on the day he did, I told him good job, nonchalantly turned away and wiped a tear away.

So, Aiden can't swim, okay?

Sooo, I got a phone call from the school asking me to bring his swimmers to school. Puzzled, I did it, only to find that the "swimming" was the schools tryout for the regional trials. I explained it to him, his teacher explained it to him and he was adamant he wanted to have a go. I shared a bemused glance with his teacher and went home.

That afternoon, Aiden came home, tears welling in his eyes and said, in a shaky voice, "I did one swim and they told me to hop outta the pool." I broke....

I told him that I was so proud of him for having a go, for trying, for just doing something so out of his comfort zone and I...was...proud...of him!

And do you know what I was most proud of (and I told him this) he figured out a way to get out of his classroom and into the pool on one of the hottest days of the year. He grinned... yep, got him figured....

Cheers,

Umm...Pardon?

The sign on Caities bedroom door this evening....

I love her, I really do, she makes me laugh!

I, Superhero

I am six days post-op from having my carpal tunnel operation on my right hand.


For those of you who don't know, Carpal Tunnel Syndrome is caused by repetitive motions with the offending limb. For those of you with your minds in the gutter, go and have a cup of tea and come back when you're sensible.

TYPING caused mine. The tendon in my hand collapsed onto the nerve and caused burning, tingling, loss of strength and other nasty symptoms. So, I went in and had the tendon removed...under local cause I am woman hear me roar! Ok, its was more of a whimper or an OWW, hey that hurt, but you get the drift.

Six days out of surgery. I am just starting to get the movement back and some of the strength in my hand. So, ask me what I did today? Go on...ask, you know you want to.

I cleaned my laundry, replaced one of my dog crates, fixed same crate, swept the floor, picked up the bits of fluff from a torn cushion, hung the washing out and took some off the line. I'm sore.

Why is it that woman feel the need to don our superhero outfits when we should be resting? The day I came home from having a tongue dissection and lymph node removal from my neck (yeah you should see my cool scar!) I was hanging out washing. The day after that ...I was back in the hospital blown up like a frog cause I did too much. Its a woman thing, the world will fall down around our ears if we don't pick up the reins.

Its got nothing to do with the fact that our men are slightly in the useless department when it comes to keeping the house schmicko. Oh they will do their best but its not the same as if we
had done it! And its not quite as good as we would have done it. But, if are going to be anal retentive, thats what we have to do. Because no-one else can do it like we can. So we feel we must wear our Wonderwoman accessories to keep our homes in order.

Now I've said that, I'm going to go and rest...until I notice Tony has folded the towels wrong!

Cheers,