Rainy day fun

So here I am again - suprising myself at another blog entry. I never intended to blog so frequently - but even without the nudge from my blog crazy sister in law, I would have tonight anyway. Simply for the fact that my family are constantly doing things that I want to remember 5-10 years from now. Today was one of those days, one I'd like to look back on. It probably wont interest anyone that reads it, but its full of memories I want to keep.

Today was a very exciting day for my kiddies. We decided that this year we would enrol them in swimming lessons. We have been visiting the gorge pool so often, one of my kids is bound to sink any day now. I had organised for the three bigger ones to be in the same swim group - primarily for Lani's sake as this would be her very first activity outside of school and something she would do without me. I wasn't positive she would even get into the pool, but I was crossing my fingers. The kids have been counting down all week for this morning. The lesson was at 9am.
Lani had a bad night sleep so I let her sleep in until 8.20am. Once I woke her up, it was craziness all round trying to get her ready in time. We arrived with a couple of mins to spare. The kids were still buzzing as we entered the pool and waited for their names to be called. I noticed when I snuck a glance at the group sheet, that Lani's name wasn't on it. My heart sank as I had a feeling she wasn't going to be able to swim. I asked the manager (who is lovely) and she apologised saying she misunderstood me on the phone. I think she is such a busy woman that she didn't take down all the details correctly. Anyway, she explained that there was no group for Lani to swim in but that the boys could go ahead with their lesson. I looked at Lani and knew she'd be devastated to miss out. There was nothing that could be done for her, so I told the manager none of the kids would be swimming. It wouldn't be fair on Lani to sit and watch her brothers. I was proud of JJ who before I even told them they would miss out said "We can't swim without Lani." They were disappointed - and so was I. I felt sad for nearly an hour for them (I can be a bit dramatic with my emotions, especially when it involves the kids) Its one thing to get my head around things and my kids recovered quickly but I was still trying to catch up! We decided to use the lesson money and take them to the aquatic centre instead. They love swimming so they were happy with the solution. I still wasn't sure what I was going to do about lessons but for today I just wanted them to have some fun. My grey cloud of despair finally dissipated when Lani squealed with delight when she found out we could go on the waterslide. It was such a fun day at the pools. We stayed for a few hours and bought hot chips for lunch. On the way home we stopped past woolies and bought a tub of caramello ice cream to bring home (we discovered this icecream the night before at the Rogers and loved it) Not the best choice for me who ate 7 double coated tim tams the day before, but.....hey, its for the kids - I can sacrifice!!
I nearly forgot....earlier, on the way to the pool, Sisi was busting a move in the back of the car. She was so funny and I remembered I had my camera on me (since I wanted to take a photo of the kids first swimming lesson) I grabbed it and tried to get some footage of her. She didn't do quite the same moves and laugh hyterically like before, but my silly boys made up the difference.

 So after the pool, we came home, Sisi slept, we ate ice cream and hung out a bit. Mum called to say hello and asked about our day. I told her what happened with the swimming lessons and she asked how kids managed to survive 30 years ago before they had private lessons. She reminded me that we never had lessons as kids, our dad taught us to swim and then we had lessons at school. I've always loved swimming, its my favourite form of exercise and I did laps for years. I also swam through and after my first three children. I got slack after Sisi. I've always wanted to go back and only recently have started making plans to get back into the pool. So I realised that I'm a good swimmer and I never had lessons. Mum suggested I teach them instead. I wasn't too sure at first since I don't know proper techniques etc but she pointed out that I can borrow books from the library and look up info on the internet - so now I'm excited! I've been teaching them bits and pieces anyway. At the aquatic centre JJ swam around 8 metres in the deep pool (for the first time) and Benny did around 3 metres. Its a start and it means I'll get back to the pool myself which I'm really looking forward to.

It was still wet outside when Sisi woke up so I thought of something fun I could do with the kids. I grabbed a pen and started drawing - I wish I had have taken a photo of us - I never thought about taking one for our blog silly me. I did take some videos of the kids though. Haha, I just had a look at them, they're all so funny I don't know which one to choose!

After being silly for a while, we played our version of 'mousetrap' Its one we used to play as kids with mum and dad.

While I was cleaning up the kids went outisde to play. I went and had a look and this is what I found them doing..

Its very serious work..

Since they're not allowed to play with the dangerous tools in the shed - they have made their own with bits of wood, rock and masking tape. I love the way they've set up a work bench for themselves. Aparently they're making a snowman for Lani to put in her room.

Then something very strange occured - I had a odd sensation, one I don't remember ever having experienced before - and it wasn't the first time during the day it had happened.

I felt like going for a run  ?!?!

The only thing I've ever craved is chocolate...... in all its wonderful varieties, so this was completely new to me. Craving exercise....I must have gone mad. I know for others who may be reading this (Lisa and Angela) this probably happens to you all the time. For me, its huge (again being dramatic) After the last week of morning runs and other intensive exercises, I was really looking forward to the weekend off. I told Job of my peculiar urge and he said he'd watch the kids while I went for a run  - Awesome!  He had already been this morning. He jogged around our block 7 times. When he got back, he was curious to see what sort of distance he had covered so on the way home from the pool, we set the odometer and drove around the block. It works out to be just under 1km - 960m I think. It means he ran close to 7km this morning!!! Crazy.....he is so much fitter than I am. He challenged me to try and make it around the block once without stopping - that would mean nearly 1km. I said I would be happy with half of that and ran out the door before my kids noticed my absence. Unfortuntely for me, in my haste I completely forgot to stretch. I could feel my legs cramping up as I made my way around the block but I could hear my husbands words ringing in my head and I really wanted to get all the way around the block without stopping. I could even hear my sister somewhere in there telling me to suck it up. I kept running and eventually it didn't hurt so much. I did a full lap!! I was so excited. For the last 10 years I haven't jogged any distance greater than 50m and here I was doing a kilometre - I was so happy that I did another one. The kids joined me for the second lap. The pain returned in my legs and I felt the full effect of not stretching before hand combined with running on concrete. I felt good though - at least I took a step in working off one of those 7 tim tams (and the caramello ice cream) - Kyms going to whip my butt when she finds out.

I'm very impressed by my hubby who has made it a goal to run up to the western junction and back (9km) We'll be doing a marathon in no time! I'm curious now to see what the Kym, Mariah and I run in the mornings. We jog rings around the football oval. I'll be counting my steps on Monday.

So pretty much the rest of the night I've been walking like a cowboy.

How on earth did I manage to blab on about that for so long - this was meant to be a short blog....now I'm sure no one will be interested in my ramblings!

We had dinner. I started making chicken kebabs when my boys came into the kitchen horrified that I'd forgotten to make the promised 2 minute noodles. Back to the fridge went the chicken.

After dinner we had some music lessons and reading time. I'm teaching JJ the theme for Mario brothers on the piano. Its a bit complicated so we're playing it as a duet, something just for fun. Benny who has started learning the guitar did some piano tonight too - we did the first line of the theme song from 'club penguin' - a computer game the boys love (we'll eventually to get to Mozart)

hmmmm - I'm still waiting for these videos to upload. Maybe this post wont go up tonight afterall.

**So now its Sunday evening. Lisa gave me some tips at church today for uploading videos. I tried lots of different things, including converting the videos to three different formats but none of them seem to work. Either I'm more technologically challenged then I thought - which is completely possible, or our computer wont allow it. I found a way around the problem though, for some reason I can post them on my blog if I upload them onto youtube first. No one can view them on youtube, its just a way for me to get them on my blog.**

Adios Amigos :)