This is fairly amusing...

Reb's handiwork...

Why do they keep publishing this kind of moronic crud? (Computers in schools are NOT going to save the world.)

This article in The Age made my head spin, while being violently ill like in The Exorcist. While the author is undoubtedly very knowledgeable about computers, he doesn't know much about education.

These are your options

Freya's vocab is growing rapidly. She is coming out with wonderful sentences at the moment, some of which are hilarious. I have forgotten many good ones... the other day she said "I want to get into bed and have snores".

Today, before bed, Freya sang the whole first verse of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star perfectly...

Funny Freya

Reb & Kate are off at the Death Star tonight for late night shopping, so I have put Freya to bed. She is currently lying in there, singing madly:
"Twinkle twinkle little star,
Daddy bought a motor car,
Push the button, pull the choke,
Off we go in a cloud a smoke."

After she had sung a couple of verses and got tired she yelled "Oh no! A Gruffalo!", and is now howling happily.

"Oweee oooh I want my bah-bie wee a wee a woooooo"

Huuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuge weekend

Extremely massively huge weekend. Started on Saturday morning with a trip to the St Brutus's pool with Kate, Greg & Chloe. Freya was quite cautious to start with, but once she saw we were all having fun, she was happy to climb in and splash about, hanging onto us and the various floaty things. Then we went down to Bentleigh for coffee and cake, and off to the costume shop to get some outfits for Tracy & Ray's Deadwood party in the evening. I had thought we could go as Mr Wu's pigs, but they were out of pig noses & Reb wasn't keen for us to go in home made noses, so we bought a cowboy hat and a toy gun and and indian headdress for Reb.

After Freya's nap (well actually before it had finished, we woke her up - not pretty!) we went to a birthday party for a couple of the creche kids. A fun time was had by all, Freya was mad for the trampoline there. Then we headed home for the usual supper, baths & bed before Vicki arrived to babysit.

I decided that my cowboy hat was way to wussy to wear as-is, so I got my old possum skull and wired it onto the front of the hat. Instant improvement!

We finally made it out the door and to the party. The turn out was impressive - many people had put a lot of time into their costumes! Someone I used to work with a bit at the Borg was there... small world etc. Tracy had bought a pigs head to add a bit of authenticity to the barbecue... I asked it if I could have it for my decomposition project & Tracy kindly agreed!

On Sunday, after burying the head in my pet sematary, we were getting ready to go to see a Thomas the Tank Engine show in Emerald, which is in the hills outside Melbourne. All was going well until we realized that daylight savings had kicked in and we were late! So we bundled everything into the car and headed off. It was windy as a windy thing today, and when we arrived the wind was howling in the trees. We had a very windy picnic lunch before we met up with most of the old Mogro crowd, and then checked out the attractions. There was a Thomas cut-out for the kids to have their photos taken in, a slightly manky petting zoo with the most hideous chicken I have ever seen, and an assortment of old rail paraphernalia. Freya sat very patiently to have her face painted like a tiger, and proceeded to roar all the time. We went for a train ride with their Thomas steam engine on one end and an old diesel on the other - it was an authentic adventure, a fallen tree blocked the track! Freya loved it all the same. We reversed back to the station and then watched a short panto featuring Thomas and some troublesome trucks.

Home again... Freya fell asleep in the car, poor chick. The wind finally died down in the night.

Soon to be renamed: "The Decaying Roadkill Blog".

Off to the zoo today with my science class... the kids were well prepared, with ample supplies of healthy, nutritious lollies, soft drink and enough mobile technology to launch several moon landings. All the electromagnetic radiation I soaked up from the mobile phones & bluetooth games has probably increased my cancer risk about five billion percent. When the batteries started running out the poor wee kiddies were a a total loss. I can't actually recall any conversations that weren't about mobile phones, computer games, mobile computer games, computer games on mobile phones, or something of that nature. Nothing that was actually about... anything. I didn't take a camera, and of course the aminals were in fine form. There are lots of new beasties at the zoo & most were out & about. A good day was had by all.

On the way from skool I saw a dead magpie on the side of the road on the corner of the highway, so on the home tonight I stopped & went to pick it up. As I did this one of my students was walking by. He looked at the dead bird, and looked at me with the plastic bag in my hand, and said "Hello Mr Beast". And I said "Yup. I'm going to get the bird." So tales of my roadkill collecting (and probably consuming) will be widespread throughout the Mt Doom community and Myspace in no time. The poor young magpie is now residing in compost next to my almost skeletonized rat.

Bought a nice set of plastic insects from the zoo for Freya, she was quite chuffed. She seems to be lurgi-free at the mo & is a fairly happy camper. Lately she's been wanting to go to sleep with her door open, and seems to get to sleep just fine. She is also mad on jumping everywhere, and usually wants us to jump, or hop, along. Going to bed is a ritual of jumping down the hall, with me hopping in pursuit, putting the plastic toy frogs in the bath, putting her milk cup cup back in the kitchen, and finally making it to bed after some good cuddles.

Mega-huge-uber busy weekend this weekend... kiddies party on Saturday, and going to see a Thomas show on Sunday with Mogro. Should be good.

Ugh.

Gratuitously late night last night doing some marking... not a bad day today, saw one of my feral classes for the last time this year. Was kinda tired but buy the time I got home I was feeling all achy & weird all over... seem to be coming down with something. Boog has been a bit sick lately... some high temperatures but no other real symptoms. So tonight i was a total wuss & veged out on the couch while Rebecca waited on me hand & foot.

Off to the zoo tomorrow with the year 7 classes... hopefully will be a nice enough day.

What a difference a day makes...

My decaying rat has undergone a huge transformation since yesterday... all the skin & fur has come away, and there is a huge mass of maggots in the bottom of the container. There are also quite a few beetles chowing down on it.

I'm going to make a Photostory from my pics, just need to get "Don't Worry, Be Happy" for my soundtrack.

Rat update

My rat is decaying quite nicely, thanks to a hot day and plentiful blowflies... yummo.

Even more disgusting & vile photos to come.

S(c)ummer days are hear again...

Summer is definitely imminent, and with it are the seasonal flocks of flies and blowflies and double-triple-hyper blowflies that make living in Melbourne so pleasant. Of course this may have something to do with the dead possum I picked up off the side of the road & left overnight on the bonnet of the corolla. This morning I buried it in the garden, so I can dig it up in a few months' time. I'd quite like to have a complete skeleton, it would be an interesting thing to show to my classes.

It's about 31 degrees here today... we just had a pleasant lunch at a cafe near the Yarra with Charlotte & Ben. Ben told me it used to be a toilet block... noice.

Spider antics

The Daddy (or should I say Mummy) Long-Legs in the bathroom has a nice bundle of eggs...





The funky pale spider by the front door scoffed on a big caterpillar...



One of the new blackies has many cute babies... they are "toyny" as Freya says.



And here's the new Evil Fiendish Malevolent Blackie - she's moulted a couple of times recently & is now really long... if she bulks up like the other black house spiders she will be huge!

Faster Pussycat, Kill Kill

Arrived home today to find a poor young rat curled up on the path with half it's face ripped off... nasty. I think Frieda must have got it during the day, I can't imagine Bomb catching a rat unless it tried to climb in her mouth while she was asleep.

I think I have successfully put it out of its misery by asphyxiating the poor wee beastie with a CO₂ cylinder for filling bike tyres...

Gruesome photos to come.

Momentous occasion...

Freya actually had a wee in the toilet yesterday.

Someone still needs her afternoon nap...

Today Freya decided to stay awake chatting and playing with her toys rather than having a snooze. All was well until bedtime, when she underwent the sort of nuclear meltdown usually seen in poorly maintained Soviet Bloc reactors. Notable moments included "I want to jump!" "Go on then." "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!!", and "Daddy's in the kitchen! Go away! Go to the living room!".

Fortunately she calmed down a bit and had a nice long cuddle with Reb. She even wanted to give me a kiss goodnight, and once in bed she was out like a light. Poor chick!

Epic rambling blog catch - up due shortly.

Ha ha ha ha ha!

Ha ha ha ha haaaa!

Holidays are here again!

I think I have Dutch elm disease

Feeling a bit woozy all day, now fully fledged wooze with a bit of quease at times.

Hello little creature!

Freya is coming up with some great lines at the moment. Yesterday there was an earwig on the ground next to her, and she said in her cutest voice "Hello little creature!". A couple of days ago we were looking at a convoy of snails near the front door and she was saying "Hello snails! Hello little one!". Very nice.

Many of her conversations involve not-so-nice comments, such as those ones we have been teaching her for dealing with less pleasant situations at creche. "Don't speak to me like that" and "move away" are ones we often hear, if we have committed some minor transgression. She also likes to correct our choice of words. Just the other night I pointed up in the sky and said "Look Freya, those are the pointers!" and she said "No they're not pointers, they are bork!" And on a less gibberishy note, when Freya was in the swing yesterday, Rebecca pointed to the blossoms on the nectarine tree and said "These are nectarines", and Freya said "No, they're not nectarines, they're blossoms."

In spider news, Auxilliary Blackie has emerged from her web and is just as huge and fiendish as last year. I can't imagine that she'll live beyond this summer.



I also have three young, small black house spiders in the nice spots in the conservatory, who are all growing nicely. One has taken over EFMB's spot from last year, and has patched up the web quite nicely. There are a couple of other blackies living under the verandah outside, but they tend to get eaten by birds fairly quickly. Just last week the daddy longlegs in the primary toilet ate a reasonable sized blackie that stumbled into its web, probably while searching for some new digs.





Last week of skool coming up... hooray. This term has generally been good, but there have been a few rough patches. On the whole I am feeling that I'm on top of things, although one of my classes regularly tramples over me like a herd of ADHD goats and leaves me dazed and bloody in the foetal position on the floor. (OK that's an exaggeration - I'm not dazed, just playing dead.)

Poor Boog has had hand, foot & mouth disease and was excluded from creche for most of last week, so Reb & I alternated days off. Part time rocks! Freya was a bit cranky while she was sick, but has perked up a lot now, and is healthily cranky instead. When we took her to the Dr (and saw Dr Satan, who really did not live up to the terrible reputation I have previously given him) she was staring at the jelly beans, and as we left the room (having forgotten about them) her little face started to crumple into tears and she cried "I want a jelly bean!". Fortunately it was easily fixed, and she was much happier. At home during the week we read lots of books, played with her trains and play-dough, and even had a go at making some sparkly feathery shiny goo things.

Have been getting out into the garden, and have made a really big difference to the weeds, and also straightened up a couple of our trees which were falling over in the front garden. Looks very good, if I may say so.

WHAT are they getting up to at creche?

While having supper tonight Freya held up a knife and asked Reb: "Can I stab you in the eye?"

Why I hate Dr Who...

This week they had an army of scarecrows. Scarecrows. Next week they
have a swarm of flying monkeys and the Tin Man. That and the CONSTANT
background music, (Torchwood takes that to new levels of hideousness),
it's very annoying. Although old-skool Dr Who was pretty cheesy at
times, the new Dr Who frequently veers wildly away from Science Fiction
into some weird sub-genre of fantasy. All very dissatisfying.

Good taste in music

Yesterday when I picked up Freya, I turned on the car & asked "Winnie the Witch or Courtney Love?", as Hole's Celebrity Skins was playing on the CD player. Freya enthusiastically replied "Courtmey Love!"

Today I asked "Winnie or Metallica?" and Freya replied "Metallica!". And a moment later "There's no Courtmey Love!"

The week of Snot

Went to the Drs again on Monday, the nasty cold & sinus pain had been festering for a week. Dr prescribed some antibiotics. I had forgotted to mention the sinus pain... d'oh. Freya was uber good at the Drs, & got a couple of jellybeans. Today I did some googling & realized that I totally must have had infected sinuses. Must be less forgetful next time. Fortunately they feel a whole lot better this arvo.

Sick as a dog

Currently festering at home with a cold, which is the sequel to a sore throat which has been afflicting me for a few days. Poor Freya has had colds for successive weeks, with a bit of a chest infection the first time round. She seems to be clearing up OK now, but she's still a bit coughy and not her happy self.

Weather is varying from fairly pleasant, sunny winter days to foul, cold and windy ones.

Freya is becoming more of a little girl every day... she has the occasional tanty, but on the whole she's pretty reasonable. She can recite some of her books from cover to cover... she was sitting in the car going "Hercules Morse, big as a horse, Bitzer Maloney, all skinny and bony, and Hairy Clairy from Don'son's Dairy." She's nuts for robots at the moment. She has some pyjamas with robots on them, and likes some of the toys we have around the place.

Probably lots of other good things have happened lately, but I'm too fuzzy in the head to remember them. Finally getting around to watching Heroes, it's really rather good.

Back on deck

Survived the second week of term fairly well. Too many late nights though... need to stop burning the midnight oil. Most funny moment in class today, had the model brain out & a couple of students (who have something of a resemblance to a certain pair of cartoon characters off MTV) were holding one half each... it was a real Kodak moment. Oh well.

More funniness from Freya, this arvo I was singing the Freya song & she said "I want Frieda to sing it." I said "She can't sing it," and Freya said "She's got no hands!". Then we ran around the house & tickled lots.

Well that's that...

Currently suffering from a lack of sleep and major post-Harry Potter comedown, having bought HP7 yesterday at 9 am and finished it this morning at 2.16 am. Really enjoyed it... a bit of a slow patch in the middle but the ending was fairly rip-snorting.

In other news, the first week back at skool went pretty well. Freya has a bit of a cold at the moment, poor wee chicky. Reb & Freya went to the aquarium with Kate & Chloe on Thursday, as it was a training day for creche. Reb and Kate have both blogged about it, sounded like heaps of fun.

That was much better than I thought...

On the way to work today I was thinking about a blog post called "Fear and Loathing on Mt Doom". When I went back to skool in term 2 I felt quite anxious (that was the fear part) and going back today I was feeling rather negative about the students (hence the loathing!). However once I got there, it was fine... the kids were pretty good today, they seem to be in a fairly good mood after their holidays.

I had been stressing out a bit about the imminent return to school. After about 10 days of holiday, my stress level was pretty low but then I started to wake up early in the morning thinking about school! And I was a crankypants on the weekend... not much fun to hang out with.

Anyway, now that I'm back it feels pretty good.

Picked up Freya from creche, she was having fun in the sandpit while a couple of the other little girls had a set-to about possession of a spoon. In the car I noticed a little tear on her cheek (the wind was cold) and I commented on it as I wiped it off, she said "I cried". I asked why, and she said "Chloe and I were snatching". Funny chick.

She was a bit cranky this evening, she gets upset when she's tired and doesn't seem to know what she wants. She calmed down when I started to read a book & then we had a good book reading sesh. She knows most of the words in her Numbers book.

On the subject of spiders, this is pretty cool!

This (Spider) Baby's Clever

After Freya's nap (she was well cute, asleep on her tummy with her drinking cup underneath her hips) we went with Kate & Chloe to the DFO (local mega-uber factory outlet thing) where we got some shoes for me (some Converse thingies that Dr Who wears) and got some wee ones for Freya too. Was quite cute seeing Reb (who has some already) walking around holding Freya's hand, & the two of them with matching shoes!

Home again, and as I was getting Freya dressed in her spider pyjamas, she asked me to sing the "Spider Man" song. Now I don't know the right words, and am always inclined to customise them to make them a bit more interesting:

"Spider man, spider man,
Friendly neighbourhood spiderman,
Spins a web, way up high,
Catches thieves, eats their eyes,
Lookout, here comes the spiderman."

(I'm sure many of you will find it difficult to figure out which of those lines is mine...)

Anyway, I sang that, and then I sang the "Spider Baby" version, and when I had finished Freya said "Spider Daddy?" So I sang that, and she then said "Spider Mummy!" and then "Spider Sheep!" (for her little toy lamb)... we had spider duvet, spider blanket, spider toothbrush... great fun.

Stand back from the edge...

This morning we had a bit of a lie in, followed by some book readin' before breakfast. Then we headed out to get some more wool for the cardi Reb is knitting for Freya. On the way back we headed to Kate's, for coffee & some of the date & wallnut bar I made, followed by a trip to the park. It was largely empty when we arrived, just a couple of other creche kids there, and we had a really good time. Chloe & Freya impressed us all by climbing some scary stuff quite well! Lots of good photos to come...

Home again for lunch, poor Boog was a bit over-tired and tantied-out on us, but she calmed down & was in a good mood at bedtime. She took a while to go to sleep and we are worrying that she's starting to try to climb out of the cot now.

Unfortunately, I found that when I tried to turn Odin (my home computer on) it was completely dead. I bought the motherboard 2nd hand a couple of years back, and it has served fairly well but had a few quirks (such as really irregular fan activity on startup), but this was a bit of a surprise. I had actually unplugged it a few nights back, because there was a bit of lightning happening. The main problem now is that I have kept so far back from the bleeding edge of computer technology that I have just about fallen off the other side! I will be struggling to find a new mobo that will take my cpu and ram, so I might have to go second hand again. The other option is that I upgrade, but that seems a bit of a waste... the old stuff was doing fine! Poor Odin, it served me well.

BEST MOVIE EVER!

Late start this morning as Reb has the day off. It had poured down in the night, for a few minutes. After the usual kerfuffle about whether of not we would have eggs for breakfast (no, Freya, that's only on the weekend) we took Freya to creche. They had let Molly & three of her babies out, and they were happily hopping around the floor. Freya was quite thrilled to see them, and not at all concerned when we left.

We went to Wasteland to catch the 9.30 sesh of Harry Potter & the Order of the Phoenix. Was most enjoyable, much better than the last one (very disappointing), I thought it was at least as good as any of the others. Now I want to re-read the books again! And it's only 8 days until book 7 comes out... oooh, how exciting!

Did a wee bit of shopping & headed home. Picked up Freya in the arvo... when we got there one of the baby buns was still out, very cute wee beastie! Home again, & we had a go at making date & walnut bar from the Metropolitan Bakery cookbook... went OK but not quite what I had hoped for. Went to the shops... Freya chucked a wee tanty when we left, but settled down once we were down the road.

Did the usual bath, books etc... Freya slipped over in the bath AND banged her head on the bedroom wall, but fortunately neither was too bad.

Only three more sleeps to term 3... how sad.

Funny stuff

When we got home this evening, Freya said "I want to ride on Grom." Gromit did not share her enthusiasm!

Later, Grom was in Freya's way and she said "Get out of the way or I'll make you dead!" Where did that come from?

Today I did some school work but mainly spent time on a couple of long-overdue DIY chores. Did some work on the fireplace, which has been in a state of disrepair since Freya ripped the scabby wallpaper off months & months ago. It's on the way to being semi-respectable. Also realized that a piece of wood I had been hoarding would be useful for mounting my Dexion racks in the shed, so I spent an hour or so fixing that up... looks good!

Here's the fireplace (a work in progress)...


My most excellent tool board (almost finished) made from 99% salvaged materials:


I also had a small DIY task bought home from creche - just need to cut some MDF to size and screw it onto some box sections.  Did the cutting this morning.

A big blowfly buzzed into the house today, and I caught it and threw it into Auxilliary Blackie's web. She's been out & about a bit lately, and I thought she might like a juicy midwinter snack.


Here she is with the fill light up a bit, so you can see the coloration:


Creche rang at 3pm and I went to pick up Freya.  Normally she rushes up to me (or at least saunters) but today she was fairly keen to finish her afternoon tea, so I sat next to her and she had a big serve of yoghurt, some banana, some pear and one of the biscuits they had made today.  (Great way to get Freya to eat - ask her if you can eat something and she goes "No!" and scoffs it.) Then she wanted to dance with the other kids (spinning around in a tutu is being a butterfly, apparently) before they all went outside and played for a while. After this she finally decided to leave. She's obviously pretty happy there!

We went for a stroll at the shops, ended up buying a little Thomas book (about Harold the Helicopter - Freya wants us to sing the little song all the time) and had a little milkshake.

There were a couple of other funny moments today which I have forgotten... interspersed between moments of high level contraryness!

Global warming doubters...

I'm quite happy for people to be skeptical about global warming, just as long as they understand that they will be eaten first when it all goes pear shaped.

Call an exorcist (or two) AKA picking up Freya from creche

After a somewhat productive day doing some rehashing of the not very much liked Forensic elective (altho I like it much more than the horrid year 9 stuff) I went to get Freya at about 3 pm. She was lovely & happy to see me, giving me a big cuddle & wanting to put her jacket on. They had made some biscuits and she took one, and then asked for another, which I carried, and then as we were going out the door she wanted another... and when I declined, her head rotated 720 degrees and she SCREAMED absolute blue murder, while the creche manager was trying to have a conversation with someone at the door! I carried Freya to the car, & was trying to load everything in, and being short of hands I ate the biscuit - Freya howled and reached out towards my face as if she was going to mine the biscuit out of my mouth. We finally got into the car & she settled down, and said she wanted to go to the park... soooooo... off we went. She was much happier from then on, & Kate & Chloe turned up. After a bit of playing in the FREEZING wind we all headed back to ours for a while... the girls were pretty well behaved but occasionally got a bit freaky.

Not much else to report...

...except that when I walked out into the back yard today, my friendly magpie came swooping down right by me, so I gave her a piece of my bagel.  She was quickly joined by the baby & the male, who aren't as friendly but were happy to receive some bits of bagel.  A couple of big babbler birds were lurking nearby, hoping for some crumbs but I think they missed out.

Just a wee update....

To this post about Mogro.

Funny dream

Last night I dreamed that I had two teaching jobs, one at Mt Doom SC and one at a private school, much closer to home (a bit like St Brutus's Academy). At the beginning of term 3 I went to work at the private school, even though I knew they still wanted me to work at Mt Doom. It all seemed nice at the new school, but then the kids all went feral & there was an enormous fight!

Not quite sure what to read into that...

Wednesday

Freya woke up crying at 4.15 this morning. I went in to comfort her, and along with a slightly leaked nappy, I had to deal with the urgent search for her many small toys which she took to bed last night. "I want my little pink froggy". Well I had a hard time finding it Sweetie, because you hid it under your big Maisy. And you also hid your yellow frog, little lamb, piglet and little leopard cub. We are really going to be in trouble when I get you that life size toy ant, flea circus and soft toy microbe.

Anyway, she went back to sleep but was really cranky in the morning. She was most upset when I took her cereal away, after she'd been playing with it for about five minutes. Nassssty Daddy. We dropped Reb off at the train, she had to push past all the penguins that have come to Melbourne for winter, and then went to creche. Freya was really happy to look at the bunnies (in fact she asked twice to see them for longer), and then we went to the other room where all the kids were playing. After a couple of minutes Freya turned to me and said:

"Daddy, can you go to work now?"

Another fun day...

Foggy and Freezing this morning! Read in the paper that it's been unusually cold this winter... although we haven't really had any frosts.

Dropped Reb off at the train & Freya at creche... as usual she was enamored with the bunnies & was most unconcerned when I left. Spent the morning doing some housework & trying to get my head around some school work - pesky unit I am considering which just doesn't agree with me. Nerves & stuff. Perhaps I will do something else, altho I need to do something more biology oriented.

Later on I did some work in the shed, put my bike pump back together (it works well again) and repaired the base of the old clock Freya dropped on the floor. The mechanism is a bit stuffed too, and beyond my abilities to repair. Was interesting to see how it worked though. Fixed up a couple of extension cords and had a bit of a tidy up. By the time I had finished it was time to pick Freya up, and the sun had finally burned off the fog, & it was a nice clear day.

At creche Freya was just finishing her afternoon tea, but before she gave me a hug she carefully took her cup & plate to the carer to put away... good wee girl! Then I got a big hug & we looked at the rabbits again before going to the park to meet Kate & Chloe. We had a good time at the park, Freya was a little bossyboots when another little girl wanted to get on the equipment - with a big frown & her growly voice she said "Wait. It's Freya's turn."

After the park we headed to Bunnings. Freya was quite keen on the idea, which was nice! When we got there I committed the mortal sin of eating the grape she had just declined - "I HAD IT FIRST!!!!"

Freya didn't want to ride in a trolley so she walked around with me, saying "We at Bunnings!" and carrying one of the 75mm coach screws I had bought. Later on she wanted to take it to bed! Home again, & played with her new (salvaged) trike... it's a bit too big for her, but we had fun pushing it around the yard.

Usual bath etc... when I tried to sing one of her songs she said "Stop singing Daddy!". Oh well.

Looks like we won't be rushing to bed tonight...

Freya finally went to sleep this afternoon, after the traditional just-in-bed-with-a-new-nappy poo, which MUST NOT BE SPOKEN OF, rather one should play and chatter quietly for as long as possible, wreathed in the stinky vapours, before Mummy & Daddy become suspicious & come to change the nappy. She chattered for a while longer before dropping off, the exact time of which is unknown because I took a short nap, based on the following extremely logical argument:
1. Freya may not go to sleep at all. Therefore, I can lie down on the couch for a little while, and if she doesn't go to sleep then we'll just get up.
2. If Freya does go to sleep at all, I'm sure it won't be for very long, and I'll wake up when she does.
3. I was feeling a bit tired.

Unfortunately (sort of) my second proposition turned out to be a tad flawed. I woke up about an hour later, and she was still coma'd. That's OK, she often sleeps until about 4 pm at home. But tick tock, tick tock, come 5 pm she's still asleep! Half her toys are scattered across the floor, and she's the wrong way round on the bed, on top of the duvet, with a platypus on one side of her head & a horse on the other. Might wake her in a min...

Gave her funky trike a wash while she slept, but we probably won't get a chance to play with it today!

Mogro reunion

I kept Freya at home today as we were heading to the Monday morning Mogro sessions, for a quarterly catch-up. We went to a different play-centre than the usual Gastropops, and a fairly good time was had by all, although there were a reasonable number of budding thugs and psychos whose principal form of entertainment consisted of hitting things, throwing things, or knocking things over, preferably at the same time. Fortunately I didn't have to take any of them behind the bouncy castle to administer a sound thrashing (and anyway, some of these four-year olds are pretty scary looking these days!). Freya managed to avoid any of these mini-Godzillas, but did get her foot run over at one point. After an initial bit of shyness she was happy to explore all the cubby houses & toys. She climbed the big bouncy slide a couple of times, it's about three times her height! At one point Boog & Chloe seemed to be having a territorial dispute with some other kids from creche, and Freya was in her best "MOVE AWAY!" posture.

While I was comforting Freya over the squashed toe incident, these two little girls had a full-on, hair pulling scrag fight in the ball pit... I suspect they have a future in women's wrestling!  Great role models for Boog.

Home again, via Wasteland to pick up the Harry Potter tix for Friday... hooray!

Had some lunch, and wrestled coaxed Freya into her PJs for bed. There was some mild confusion about which toys she wanted in bed. Freya said "I don't want my baby cow." "OK", said I, taking the calf and heading out the door. "Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah! No! I want it!" And sure enough, not long after she was in bed she had a poo (that timing is not a coincidence!) so we had to get up for a nappy change. The following conversation ensued:
"Where's Mummy?"
"She's at work. Do you remember why she's at work? So we can have beer."
"What's she doing?"
"She's probably having beer right now."
Freya nodded. "She's thirsty."

Freya is now in bed going "Bow! Bow! Beeow!". Not much sleep to be had this afternoon! "Hello blickle-ickle-oo!"

She knows the drill

From a couple of days ago: I heard Freya, while playing in her bedroom, say "Geboff! Geboff my dollhouse spider!" and sure enough, there was a little spider on the roof. Freya didn't try to touch it at all.

She has been telling us stories about the rabbit & her kittens at creche, frequently saying "They can bite!", so I told her that about the spiders too, but I don't know if she took any notice.

All good fun until someone loses an eye!

While the idea of Freya snuggling into bed with us is rather cute in theory, in practice it never works that well. The only time she actually slept well was when she was sick as a dog. Normally she turns into a character from an Irvine Welsh novel, yelling "Ya wee radge, I'll gless ye!" and head-butts everyone. This morning was no exception. After an early nappy change at about 5.30, Freya proceeded to nut me on several occasions, while simultaneously kicking Reb & poking her with cold hands.

Once we got to a fairly civilized time, we read some books & then got up for breakfast. This morning we went down the road again to get bagels, and had another look in the pet shop. Freya was fairly exhausted come bed time, and she had a pretty good snooze while I helped Reb work on her reports (tres exciting I know!). We went for a short walk in the arvo, and found a plastic kid's trike in the inorganic collection - I'll clean it up tomorrow, if Freya doesn't like it I'll give it to creche.

After dinner and skype with Reb's Mum, Freya had her bath and we started reading books. She tends to get a bit crazy in the evenings, and jumps & flops on the bed. We often warn her not to jump around in case she bangs her head on the wall, and unfortunately tonight that's just what she did ... it was a big thump & she was not a happy girl. She calmed down eventually & went to sleep fairly quickly... I hope her head's not to sore.

Just testing really...

Here's a cute critter we saw on the barbecue one day...

More fun at home...

We took a trip down the 'Leigh this morning, and had a look in not one, but two pet shops, to Freya's great pleasure. We went to the park & played for a while, including seeing a couple of cute pugs, but Freya was a bit wary of the wee excited beasties. She had a good sleep this arvo, although she cried a couple of times when she had misplaced her tiny little soft toy piglet...

I tried to help Reb with her reports in the afternoon, and had a go at creating macros to expedite the process. Pleased to report that I have not lost my mojo... it seems to work pretty well. Just a few minor adjustments & hopefully it will save Reb quite a bit of work.

Once she was up, we retreated into the living room (as it's about 10 degrees Kelvin outside today... the birds are swimming through the air as it has liquified...). We had great fun dancing around the room with her ribbons, and playing other games which frequently involved Freya squashing Reb. I had a moment of being chronologically challenged, and filled the bath half an hour early, but Freya didn't mind, and we spent an extra 15 minutes or so reading books, which she really loved. One of Reb's colleagues has lent us a stack of Little Golden Books, some of which are a bit wordy, but Freya is quite happy to sit through some of them.

More wisdom of Freya...

At dinner last night, Freya said "There's a spot in my juice!". Reb looked & said "It's a sesame seed." Freya drank the juice & Reb said "The sesame seed will grow in your tummy!" "No! It won't grow in my tummy!" Smart chickie.

We had fun playing with her toy animals... they were dappelling (galloping) wildly around the place. After a few minutes Freya said "I'm a bit frightened!", but when I offered to stop playing she said no.

Now Freya has some great spider pyjamas... will have to post a photo.

Cold & miserable weather at the moment...