Twinnies

They call themselves 'twinnies'. They wish that they actually were.

They conjure up games in their quirky make believe ways, like riding their magic skateboards that are invisible and can do anything and take them anywhere. Especially when we're in the car and they sit in the back row together and think up things to do with their magic skateboards.
Or travelling to the land of rainbows. a magical place that only they can go, where they speaak a language only they know.

A special bond I hope will never be broken.

Lately...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lately we've been spending most of our time either at home or at the farm. The cold weather is still hanging around and Chris has been kept busy carting wood for the fire. It's never ending, and we seem to go through a lot!

Chris has been working on the boundary fence with our neigbour for the last month. They've almost finished, and the front section across the front paddock, closest to the road, is almost done too. The kids have had a lot of fun playing in a pine tree across the road while Chris works on the fence. Lucky it's a quiet road.

 

Lately Milly will not let me take pictures of her. She runs away and it's become a bit of a game with me hiding and trying to snap a picture when she's not looking. Cheeky thing.

 

Lately Emmett has been pretty cheeky too, testing the waters a lot actually. I think he's going tobe ready for school next year after all, I did have my doubts a few months ago but he has really grown in that time. He's become more active than ever and gets bored so easily. He's loving animal games, where he pretends to be all sorts of animals, mainly aggressive growling ones!

 

I've been doing a lot of knitting lately, can't seem to stop. I just love seeing a project come together, and the excitement of finishing a project and choosing another. I've made a start on christmas gifts, my goal this year is to make as many presents as I can, so I'm starting early. Usually I leave it to the last minute and don't get much done and then get very frustrated with myself!

 

Lately the kids have been picking me lots of flowers, the orange gazanias that grow everywhere here in our yard and along the road.

 

Lately the days have been getting longer and you can feel that winter is almost at it's end.  Only a couple more weeks and it will be spring!

 

 

 

Changing Rooms (Again)

 

 

 

I've been at it again. Changing the furniture and bedrooms around. I swear I'm just trying to find the set up that works best, it's just taking me a while! Luckily Chris is mostly happy to indulge me with my slightly neurotic behaviour and help me move the furntiure.  Most people that visit us here, friends and family, say that the house is rearranged differently every time they come here. That's exaggerating slightly I think...

 

So after having Emmett and Milly sharing one room, and Max and Leah having their own rooms, we decided to go back to a girl's room, boy's room and a little playroom in the other bedroom. So far so good with the bedrooms. The kids are happy, and I had a massive declutter of toys and stuff that school aged girls seem to collect. Paper, notebooks, craft, hairbands, christmas cards from school friends and the list goes on. Oh and lots of dirty socks and jumpers. (Milly I'm looking at you...)

 

We also bought my brother's lounge off him because it was too big for their house after they moved house, so the loungeroom also got a bit of a makeover last weekend when Pete delivered it for us.

 I must say this is the most content I've ever felt with the furniture arrangement in the loungeroom. It makes a huge difference actually having furniture that fits in the space.  It's lovely for all of us to fit on the lounge together at the same time without being on top of each other! I never thought I'd buy a (bonded) leather lounge, but I must say it's much easier upkeep with the kids. One wipe and it looks like new. The cube storage shelf is the perfect size to fit my Project Life albums in too, so I'm really happy with that as a tv unit.

Most of all I love the afternoon light in this room. It feels just how I hoped it would.

Weekly Stills ~ Lately...

 

 

~ The words haven't been flowing well for me lately, I've been battling in my head about babies and schedules and to do lists, and looking after sick children. When it rains it pours around here, (refering to the sick people), we've had various ailments affecting everyone to some extent over the last few weeks.

 I've been working on a few different crafty projects, and managed to finish Max's beanie. He's only worn it once as the weather has again fooled us and decided to warm up again. Not having to light the fire though has given Chris a chance to build up a good stockpile of wood , before the cold weather really sets in.

When I counted them up, I've got 3 crochet projects on the go, and still knitting my baby jumper, so I'm not allowing myself to start another project until I finish some! I've joined in Jodi at Jellywares' Winter Yarn Club, knitting instead of crocheting this time, and it's due to arrive next week. A big incentive to finish some projects.

I'm planning on also returning to a more regular gratitude practise this week, I have noticed that being extremely busy and not stopping to reflect leads to me not being very grounded and second guessing myself and my decisions. I start procrastinating and not being very productive with my time, then find myself staying up too late trying to catch up on things that I could have done much earlier in the day!  It's certainly not working for me after 3 weeks of living like that. After returning to my exercise class today for the first time in about 5 months, which also involved coffee afterwards, I found myself in a conversation with friends about being grateful, being happy with your choices and not trying to be supermum, and I'm feeling more grounded than ever. Sometimes reaching out, taking a risk and talking about your values comes full circle and returns to you just what you've been needing to hear. ~

 

 

1. Mother's Day gifts from Leah

2. Washing...

3. Milly made me this I Love You This Much thing

4. Mother's Day camp oven dinner, complete with toasted marshmallows

5. Colourful yarn for crocheting

6. I finished Max's puppy beanie

7. Trevor, he's looking old these days and prefers to sleep at the door amongst the shoes

8. Birthday gift from my bestie, ustom ordered just for me.

9.  Chopping wood

10. Emmett helping me roll out the spelt wraps

11. Gum trees behind the house

12. Leah's school yard handicraft.

 

Joining in with Emily at The Beetle Shack

 

 

On A Child Free Day

 

 

 

Yesterday Chris took all the children to the farm for the day to mark calves and get a load of firewood.

I stayed home alone. A whole day at home.

Alone

 

This happens every so often and I'm both fortunate and grateful for the luxury of a day to myself. I love being home together as a family, but I also enjoy my space.

Trouble is I usually write out this terribly long list of jobs to do and feel guilty if I stop to do anything fun. But not yesterday.

I hung out the washing.

I cleaned up the kitchen.

I folded the clean washing and put it away.

 

Then I finished off my 2013 project life family album. (or so I thought, last night it was disovered that I had missed Max's birthday. Ooops.)

Then I watched 3 episodes of Call The Midwife on dvd and knit and knit and knit.

I'm not far off finishing my very first cowl knit in the round.

 

And I did not allow myself to feel guilty, I just relaxed and did as I pleased.

Today I'm content to do the jobs that need doing.

It was a good day.

xxx

 

What do you do with a child free day?

Dear Baby

 

To my baby that wasn't meant to be...

I will never know your face

I will never hold your hand

I will never wipe your tears

You will never call me mum.

I will never know the colour of your hair.

I will never smell your sweet baby breath

I will never wrap you in that blanket.

I will never bring you home.

But you will forever be in my heart.

 

{On the 17th December 2013 I went for my 13 week scan for my fifth pregnancy, and was told there was no heartbeat, my baby had died at around 11 1/2 weeks. I was in absolute shock, I hadn't had any sign that I was miscarrying, or that anything was wrong.  In disbelief, I rang my husband who was away working. He came home a few hours later, and we sat in shock for the afternoon until the girls arrived home from school and the boys home from daycare.

The next day I had a d&c and I cried for the next week. The hardest part was having to tell our children the sad news, when we had only told them a few days earlier that they were going to have a new brother or sister to love.

It's been a long road to now, but I have had some closure in the last few weeks after learning that I had a partial molar pregnancy, which was the cause of my missed miscarriage. Knowing why has strangely helped me to break through that wall of grief, and understand why my body has been behaving this way.

It's now the waiting to try again that is hard. I'm waiting for my body to recover, but my heart longs for a baby. And I am the most impatient person ever! It seems there are new babies and pregnant mums everywhere, and I want so much to be where they are. Being creative is a great outlet for me at the moment, I just can't help bookmarking baby things to knit and sew! All in good time I guess...}

 

I'd love to hear from anyone who has been in this situation, it's always good to know you're not alone, and to learn from others' experiences. Happy weekending :)

 

Kelly x