Chirp!:

    Tuesday, December 05, 2006

    She's Making a List...


    Checking it twice ...
    forgetting stuff, adding it later, crossing stuff off, accidentally crossing off something she hasn't done, adding it back again.

    I have taken this week 'off' to do all those things i've been neglecting in favour of fun ( buying 'Gala' outfits ... anticipating the Deal ... ).

    I started with the tree, which looks great, but I can't get it to photograph nicely. It's always been decked out in red & green, but maybe it's the bigger house (?) .. but it looked dark and bare this year. I had to go out and get a heap of silver to fill & lighten it out. My little birds add a golden touch.

    We've also been toilet-training these past 2 weeks, and I don't want to jinx the system by going out and having to wear a nappy. He's doing really well.

    Next on the agenda was cleaning the bath, which actually hadn't been cleaned that long ago, but it's an old stained bath anyway, where the enamel has worn away in parts. Add to that some creative bath-crayon drawing ( that STAINED ), and you've got a pretty skanky centrepiece. I nearly died when a friend made an inpromtu toilet visit the other day. Ugh !!

    Anyway, it's a bit hard to clean sometimes around here because my son LOVES to clean ( 'Bonus!', I hear you all cry ).

    Nada.

    By clean, I mean ... wrestling me for the vacuum cleaner, and wailing when I eventually insist it now be put away. That's not the worst bit though .. that honour belongs to my windows, the grottiest in town.

    They're fingermarked, facemarked, painted, and then he 'cleans' them for me .. with milky-residue-leaving baby wipes, or a cloth dipped in water used to clean his paintbrushes. Other times, he'll wet a clean sponge and use clean water, but it's still oh-so-rank. So I have to do these things when he sleeps ( which is never ), and even then, do I want to ALWAYS be cleaning when he takes a sleep ? No.
    Mumma needs time out too sometimes, kiddo ...

    I put up these chinese lanterns yesterday. I've had them for a while, but have been trying to work out where to hang them. I love them here, hung between my house and my 'greenhouse'.

    We're having a BBQ here on Sunday with a few of my ex-workmates and families. Should be fun, but there's so much to do. Weeded all day yesterday in the hot sun.

    Congratulations also to my friends E & G, who welcomed their first baby about the same time I was making goo-goo eyes at Andrew O'Keefe.
    E. is like 4'9" and about 40kgs dripping wet.
    Her baby was a 10pound whopper - how the hell does that happen ?

    I swear one day 20yrs from now, we'll all discover that the 'multivitamins' we all took ( Elevit, Blackmores ) during our gestations were all part of some govt-funded gigantism scheme.
    Honestly, how else can you explain that 10pound babies are now the norm rather than the exception ?

    So welcome Baby J. Can't wait to meet you and check you out and hear the horror of your birth-story so I can gasp and put my hands over my mouth in horror and sympathise with your poor mum ......

    18 comments:

    Anonymous said...

    Tree looks good, ours is a little over done I feel!!! 10lb tiny little thing what about 10lb 13oz that was my 4th. I was jipped!!! my forth and last newborn!!! Three months old at birth!!!
    The yard looks nice.

    Stomper Girl said...

    10lbs!! *crosses legs* Your poor friend.

    I just sang your list-ditty. I did! Its very good.

    Loving those chic lanterns. And will be doing our tree this weekend, which will have no colour co-ordination or style whatsover. But it will have candy canes because that is the main thing Climber remembers about the previous years' tree. Lollies. Hang on it.

    Go clean your windows woman. Give the boy the squirter bottle of windex (tell him he's NOT to drink it) and some kitchen paper and he should just work away on one pane while you get the rest done. Kids love the squirty bottles. Its a fact.

    Just call me Martha.

    SuburbanMom said...

    LOVE chinese lanterns. Love them.

    Anonymous said...

    Lovely tree! We aren't really doing one as we won't be here for Christmas and I'm concerned about leaving a tree with two dogs and two cats!

    I love those lanterns! And that's a great place to put them!

    And as for ten pound babies, I was 10lbs and most of the time when I say that to people, they say, "What? But you're sooooo tiny!" Mr. B was 9 1/2 pounds and he's very tall! So I don't know if weight at birth is any indication at all! :)

    meggie said...

    Weight at birth- nothing.
    I do 'feel' for your friend... my mother was a tiny little person, & she birthed my whopping huge 10lb 5oz brother, who had been BREACH until the last possible moment.
    There was talk of one of them dying!!
    I really like the look of your tree!

    lazy cow said...

    No,MY windows are the dirtiest in town :-)
    So jealous regarding the toilet training. My boy is going to be in nappies till he's 18, sigh.

    velcro said...

    The FB was 9.1lbs at birth and his cousin was 7lbs. I have a photo of the two of them together at 10 weeks; the FB is almost double the size of neiceE. Suspect this one is going to be bigger than his brother ekkk!

    Have a son just like yours who loves to clean I have to give him the feather duster so I can get the vacuuming and mopping done

    caramaena said...

    Love the tree and the lanterns.

    My kiddo loves to 'help' too. Well, he used to. Now he just follows me around getting all his toys back out of where I've tidied them up to.

    10 pounds is quite a size huh. A friend had her first last thursday and he was 8 pound something, a bit over a week overdue and the doctor reckons bubs still looked a bit 'uncooked'. He still had a huge amount of vernix for an overdue baby.

    The baby was induced and my friend was sure of her dates - plus the ultrasounds agreed. She said she dreaded to think what size he could have ended up with if they'd waited for him to choose the day he came out.

    Anonymous said...

    Well congratulations to your friends, 10lb babies now that does sound scary. I think your tree looks lovely and of course I love the golden birds.

    Damselfly said...

    Love the lanterns! And of course the tree too.

    How cute your little one wants to clean.

    . said...

    Your tree looks great! And the lanterns are fantastic! Where did you get them from? I think my backyard desperately needs a bunch of them :)

    LBA said...

    Kirsty - at least it was your forth and not your first !! :)

    Stomper - I do clean them, but they're ruined daily .. and when destroying windows gives me such peace .. I just go with it sometimes :)

    Marianne & lantern lovers - your local Asian-run $2 shop. They must be a high-shoplift-risk item though, as I get mine from 'behind the counter' and have to ask for them. $1 each, and 5 colours to choose from, love 'em !

    nutmeg said...

    Greenhouse! V. jealous! And those lanterns are nice (and sooo different to the normal fairy lights - of which you know my opinion :-))

    And the birds in the tree - beautiful. I have yet to put ours up - it's going to have to wait for the coming weekend.

    Victoria said...

    Don't worry, enjoy your christmas tree and remember that clean windows are totally overrated and the bath will only get dirty again.

    Anonymous said...

    Ooh I love clean windows, but they're just a dream of a memory round here (except for the two I did on Monday). Your backyard looks lovely and neat and all festive with the lanterns. I can't believe you were gardening in that heat, hope you were wearing a hat and had a nice bevvy afterwards.

    I saw over at threetimesthree that you are thinking of doing the gender meme. Let me just say, as far as memes go it was a brain spinner (I thought). I had to do it on paper first, which I found like so last century. I'll be back to see what you said.

    Bec said...

    Are your lanterns electric or the kind you put the tea lights in? Either way, I love them too and I know just the Asian $2 shop to dig behind the counter!

    good luck with Sunday - our big gig is Saturday, as you know, so I can lie back and think of you when ours is all over!

    Anonymous said...

    I thought I had the grubbiest windows around! Monet LOVES to help me clean too - vacuuming now takes twice as long and she loves to wipe the windows with baby wipes too. Urgh. At least we are bringing up good cleaners (she just needs to learn to clean up her room!!)

    I like your Christmas tree shot and your backyard looks great - the colours against that vivid blue Melbourne sky!

    Anonymous said...

    My first one (a boy) was 10lb 3oz. It took 3 hours to push him out... fortunately the next two (both girls) were smaller!

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