School is on!

Today was the first day back at school for our kids - and the first day ever for Lani!

                                                Here's the kids before we left for school

We try to walk as much as we can - especially this year since three of us need to do more exercise! (Job, me and Benny)

We dropped JJ at his grade 3 class first . We didn't need to look after him at all as he was swept away by his good friends who showed him everything he needed to do. (sorry about the blur, can I blame my hubby??)

Next was Benny in grade 1. He was the biggest suprise for us. It took him nearly the whole year last year to settle in. We had a very shaky start to 2010 with lots of tears and quite a few faked sickies. His teacher from last year had a quiet word to this years teacher anticipating that he may have some difficulty settling in to grade 1. But, we dropped him off, said a quick hello to his teacher, gave him a kiss and a wave and he was fine!!!! Amazing...Hallelujah!!!!!

Last of all was out little Lani. Underneath my brave exterior, I was nervous for her. She found kinder quite difficult for much of last year. My kids are so used to being with me all the time that they have some separation anxiety......actually that's probably not acurate - more like post traumatic stress!! They each need to go through a bit of trauma before they learn how be be away from mum....and survive. Benny is getting there but Lani is just at the beginning. It was a difficult morning for her - lots of apprehension when she entered her class room. Took a while to get her inside..

...and she wasn't too impressed with the thought of letting go of my hand either...


In the end I had to ask for the teacher to take her. I pried her little fingers off my hand :(  Said goodbye in my most confident voice and gave one last big hug. I hate the feeling that I'm abandoning her but I also know that she needs to grow and learn how to stay without me. Its hard and I know it will take some time. JJ and Benny helped prepare me - I don't think any of my kids could be as challenging as Benny was (that's a whole other blog!)  So as much as my heart breaks and I look forward to 2.50pm for the bell to go, I'm grateful that she has a lovely teacher who I know will look after her.
Finally the afternoon comes around and I am waiting outside her classroom. The kids come out one by one....walking casually to meet their excited mums and dads (I've never seen so many parents at school pick up before) Then I see my Lani and she sees me. I didn't have the camera on me to take a picture as I wanted to keep my arms completely free for the big hug I was waiting for.... - and it came. She came running out to meet me, arms outstretched and face beaming with pride. I was so proud of her. She and the other kids told me that she cried on and off through some of the day but apparently from lunchtime she felt better. The boys also enjoyed their first day and so we had a celebratory dinner of Lanis' favourite foods - mini pizzas and blackberry slice with rainbow ice cream. I even put some candles in it for her to blow out. I felt happy, relieved of the burden that she may struggle for months in prep. The worst was over!

Straight after desert she looked up at me with her sad face and asked "do I have to go to school again tomorrow?"
  

Our Anniversary

Yesterday was our 11 year wedding anniversary. I wanted to blog about it on the special day but I was too tired last night, by the time I organised some photos to stick up it was too late. I didn't want Kym kicking my butt too bad in the morning so I needed some shut eye! - So here's how the day went.....

I went for my morning run with my personal trainer (aka kymbo) got home and my lovely hubby gave me a shoulder massage. He offered to make me breakfast but since I just got home from a workout I only felt like a juice. While I was in the shower he juiced me some carrot, celery, apples and banana.

I was horrified when I got out and found him pushing the fruit down into the sharp blades tongan style (with his fingers) while catching the juice in the tiny bit of plastic designed for pushing the fruit into the machine..

He managed to keep all his fingers and made a healthy antioxident rich juice - great start to the morning!

I tried my best to say 'yum!!'
I'm so used to chocolate flavoured beverages, its just going to take a little while to adjust to the healthy stuff.

Sisi had some too...


But the main prize went to Job who drunk the lot....

                                                    

    

       .....and apparently it gave him superpowers??
   

Then we had a visit from the Rogers (minus Joe who was at work) and they had a gift for us. Charlotte drew us a beautiful picture and Kym and Joe are shouting us a romantic dinner tonight at the gorge restaurant. I'm so excited, I can't wait. We get to go kid free - which means no Sisi! We never go anywhere without her because she carrys on something chronic, but Kym and Joe are happy to look after her....so good luck to them!!

Then it was off to the gorge, one of our familys' favourite parts of tassie. I packed a heathy lunch of salad sandwiches and fruit and a little bit of unhealthy rocky road that we made with the kids the night before as our family home evening activity. 

Yum!! Feel like some right now, that stuff was good...I realised when I ate it that it was the first bit of chocolate I'd had for a whole week......trust me, that's HUGE!



The kids found a brand new track that we had never been down before and it led down to a beautiful clearing surrounded by trees, so we decided to eat lunch there.

                                                 This is us eating our rocky road

                                         We even got to share with some of the wildlife           

                                                Turns out Peacocks love grapes.               

                                  

After lunch we discovered another new track and followed it up to the top of an awesome lookout. I absolutely loved it, it was a great workout to get up there, luckily we brought the carrier for Sisi. The View from the top was amazing, we were nearly as high as the house on stilts I always look at. Everytime I look up at it, I hope an earthquake never hits the area.

Sisi fell asleep on the way back down, so we found a spot for her to rest while we played with the big kids.

A fruit snack and then home time. We are so blessed to have the gorge in the heart of the city. I first visited here on a trip over with my mum. I was pregnant with JJ at the time - eight years ago and remember the stuggle to get up the steep hills (so not much has changed) 

I made a healthy stir fry for dinner and Job made the same face I made when I drunk the juice. We added some sweet chilli sauce to help disguise the taste.

The finale of the day was our cake. We wanted to have some sort of celebration with the kids but didn't want to ruin our efforts of healthy eating......

                                         so we had our first watermelon cake.

The kids had a turn to blow out the candels.            Turns out watermelon cake is a hit!

 

Great day. Still can't believe 11 years have come and gone. They've been full of highs and lows. Here's hoping that the next 11 years will bring more highs and not so many lows - and maybe another bub;)

Here's a look back...

   
                                                           and here we are today.

Sprints and Burpees

I didn't know what burpees were either until yesterday morning. Kym informed me they're an exercise the contestants often do on the biggest loser (so hopefully you're like 'oh' and not thinking 'der!') at my new found knowledge. Watching the biggest loser gives us so much motivation to be healthier. Its the perfect time to begin a new lease on life in the fat lane.
When we lived with the Rogers, Job and I experienced our first 'biggest loser season frenzie' of frantic night exercising and attemps at healthier eating. Gone went the chocolate biscuits and milo while watching TV. Gone were the fattening dinners. Gone were the late night trips to Woolies to stock up on whatever chocolate and ice cream they had on special. Living with 3 other adults, it was very hard to eat all the yummy fattening stuff, otherwise you suffered public stoning.......or were accused of the one sabotaging the others efforts as they were forced to join the binge! We even had a poster on the back of the bathroom door titled 'Winter Challenge' showing our weekly weight losses, gains and plateaus. Actually we were all pretty dismal at that effort. We lost some baggage in the first week or two and then had 10 more weeks of plateau :)

But this is a new season.

Kym and I have been going for morning walks/jogs for a week now. I walk to her place and pick her up, then we power walk to the footy oval together.

On the first morning when she jogged two full laps, I told her I'd catch up next year some time. I honestly couldn't envisage myself doing anything that slightly revealed running for the next month at least. Turns out the very next day I managed to jog half a lap. Not much I know - but big for me! I have been inceasing the length daily so now I can jog an entire lap. I walk for a quarter lap and then do another 3/4 lap - so I'm getting close to the two. Kym warms up by jogging along side of me, coaching me on to run further and further with a mixture of comments like 'you can do it' 'you're nearly there' 'no excuses!' and my personal favourite 'suck it up!' I'm usually too preoccupied with the challenge of breathing to reply. So once I just about collapse in a heap, she runs on.
This morning was a different story.
I walked to Kyms as usual but the house was all quiet and locked up. I realised she was still asleep. I wished I'd brought the key so I could haul her butt out of bed (the way she did mine the other morning she slept over) I tried knocking on the bedroom window, but no response. I didn't bring the mobile and so decided that I would have to go it partially alone today. Not completely alone as I had Benny. He came on his scooter. So off we went. We were nearly at the oval when I heard yelling behind me. Turns out it was a funny day to bring the camera.

                            Here she comes! (About time she got out of bed!)

She told me she was exhausted from running all the way to catch up to us she wasn't sure if she could run the laps of the oval. 'Suck it up' I said :)
So we got to the oval and off we went, after the first lap we saw Benny standing there with the camera. Kym tried to take off to get a shot of her ahead of me.

As if I was going to let her show me up on what I knew were going to be pictures for my new blog!

                                                Suck it up Kymbo!

We had decided yesterday that we would do sprints and burpees today. So to the middle of the ground for sprints...

                          Come on Kymbo, you can do it! - no excuses!

 

Burpees....

More sprints....where's Kym?!!

Ths final burpees.....Kyms consequence for her terrible performance, two extra burpees!!

Kym: 'I'm so tired today.'

Me: 'Suck it up!'

Kym: 'You're getting on my nerves!'

Maybe I said 'Suck it up' one too many times this morning.

We made Sacrament!

We have been existing in another time zone now for the last 6 weeks - the sort of zone that puts your body clock out by a couple hours. I blame NZ. We were there just before Christmas.....maybe jetlag can hang around for a while... Anyway, due to the jetlag, we hadn't yet made a sacrament meeting in time for the sacrament. We vowed each week to make it, and each week we got closer. Last Sunday I refused to be late and ran inside the chapel door just in time for the last line of the sacramant hymn. In my hurry I left half of the kids behind. We all forgot about Sisi so Job ran back out to the carpark to get her. Well today we arrived 6 mins early! We were quite proud of ourselves. Turns out Saturday really is a special day. I ironed all the clothes and prepared some quite activities for the kids to play with during the meeting. It made all the difference. Sunday morning was smooth and breezy, even with the extra 5 Rogers around for the morning. I even remembered that Lani had a primary talk (another first) We wrote it out and practiced it at home. Last time she gave a talk she stood there trying to disappear into my neck while I gave it for her. Today she did the whole lot, nice and loud, and only sunk back into my arms toward the end.

                                                 Go Lani, my cute little girl.

Lani has really grown this last 12 months here is Tas. She has a wonderful primary teacher who she adores. Our house is filled with beautiful things that Sister Amanda has made for both her and Benny in class.

                 Chelsea gave the scripture today with some help from mum

But what impressed me the most was the way that two of my kids and my niece sat up the front, nice and attentive, showing reverence toward their primary president who was doing her best to discuss this months theme...

Sorry Lisa! :)  I'm sure they were listening.........on the inside.

Taispot - We have a blog!!

Welcome to the world of blogging! - Why thank you very much :)
Took you long enough! - I've been busy
Doing what - eating chocolate??! - Yep

Does it look like I'm having a conversation with myself? Sound a bit like the biggest loser? Well alot of my life could be taken from that show. Only yesterday morning I was attempting a light jog with my sister and told her I was getting puffed only to be rebuked with 'suck it up!' No sympathy during the biggest loser series...and no excuses!!!
So, in the theme of 'no excuses' here I am finally writing my first ever blog entry in our first ever blog - I named it Taispot - pronounced Tai...spot, not Tais....pot! Knowing me it may change appearance a few hundred times before I'm completely happy with it, and then some more when I get bored of it, but hey I'm beginning. So housework....you can wait, and friends and family who I haven't written back to yet...- you know I love you, but I'm hopeless at keeping in touch, and kids.......go watch a movie :)  Just kidding, they're all in bed (all 8 of them, 4 tais, 4 rogers) So here's to my first blog entry which has pretty much covered nothing in particular. (Gee, can't wait for the next lot of ramblings)