Week Eight

I've become Queen of the Lunchbox. 

I've always been awesome at lunchboxes, but seriously, the amount of people who contact me for lunchbox ideas... 

I don't think what I do is that hard, but I'm pretty serious about two things, budget and unnecessary packaging. Our oceans are full of shit and we put it there because we love wrapping things in mountains of fucking plastic. 

Don't even get me started. 

Anyway, I have reusable containers, sandwich wrappers and a can-do attitude. I usually do a big bake up on Sunday for the week.

Some of our favourite lunchbox fillers include: 

Corn Cobs

Banana Choc Chip Muffins

Zucchini Slice

Pizza

Cheese and Salami

Crackers 

Sausage Rolls

Carrot Sticks 

Mini Croissants

And this week we added sushi to the repertoire!  Mushroom is STOKED! They weren't eating sandwiches so I asked him what he wanted and he said sushi. After watching a youtube video, I became a total expert. 

As you can see, I'm awesome and pretty much the best Mum ever.

Molly  has continued to be a pain in the arse at bedtime, asking for more cuddles, drinks of water, medsen (medicine) as she's 'sick'.  Anything you can think of, she tries it.  Juffin falls for her bullshit every time of course, but he can usually manage to settle her whereas I get frustrated AF and start yelling, only exacerbating the situation.  At least I can recognise my failings. I may Queen of Lunchbox but I'm definitely not winning any awards in the patience department.  

It's been raining on and off here for almost a week which is fabulous but hell for a cloth nappy mama with no dryer.  We've strung laundry up all over the place but it's so humid, things are not getting properly dry, especially my nappies. There was a break this morning and we managed to get some sheets and towels dry but rain started again around lunchtime so we had to make a mad dash back under the cover.  

I went out last night for a mate's birthday and had a fabulous time.  I love the margaritas.  

Gorgeous

Clearly I was looking beautiful and behaved like a lady.  

I assumed I'd have a hangover this morning.  I mean look at it.  But I dodged the proverbial bullet.  Sometimes I'm arsey like that.  Those times are few and far between now that I'm on the wrong side of 35.

I ran into my beloved hairdresser who is currently enjoying mat leave and not doing hair at all.  Which is why mine looks so amazing at the moment.  I may have tackled her to the ground and held her and her baby hostage until she agreed to do my hair. 

Just kidding. 

I did think about it though. 

I freaking love my hairdresser. 

She messaged me that night and we're on for March. I'm so freaking excited, I can barely contain my shit. 

I had a week off from exercise and food tracking after another week of not losing.  I'm annoyed that I let the weightloss plateau get to me so much.  I know it's normal, I know that movement on the scales isn't a true indication of how my body is changing.  I know that my clothes fit better, people have noticed, I can see it in my face.  I just let my head get munted.  I had to give myself a break.  

And a crunchie.  

I bought myself a new sports bra and tomorrow, I'm back on the horse.  

BOOOBBBS

I had a conference call with some school buds and we locked down the details for our TWENTY year highschool reunion.  Yes my friends, TWENTY FUCKING YEARS!  I am so AGED!  One of our school mates said he couldn't make it because it's his daughter's 18th that weekend.  I mean, Jesus!  I'm actually old enough to have an 18 year old child!  

I have no idea where those 20 years went but I am clearly exceeding expectations.  I'm fat, broke and still not famous but I don't think I've ever been this happy.  My kids are healthy, my man is lovely, I have great friends, a good job, my Mum and Dad are fab and my siblings are kicking goals all over the show.  

Life is good.  

Week Seven

It's been hotter than the ninth realm of hell here this week.

Like apocalyptically hot.

I've been doing my evening workouts after 9pm because in the afternoon it's still over 30c and I can't seem to get my butt out of bed before 6 on a weekday.

Inside crafting activity-facial hair

When it's this hot, life is infinitely harder and whilst I love taking my kids outside and getting to the park etc, it feels like actual torture. So we've been cooped up inside watching movies, playing with playdough and drawing.

Suddenly my kids love drawing.

It's really bizarre. 

I bought them both some cheap scrapbooks from Kmart and they've filled the pages with all sorts of pictures.  Molly's don't have much form, big circles and squiggles but Mushroom has been drawing people, objects and lots of different animals.  This week for show and tell they had to draw an animal and explain what it needs to survive.  He drew a lobster. 

For real.

This is it.

Masterpiece 

Did you know that lobsters have teeth but they're inside their stomach?  Fuck.  Neither did I.  I had to do some research re lobsters because other than being a crustacean I had no fucking idea. 

Having a child at school is teaching me things.

He seems to be loving school now, though it can be a bit boring Mum, so hopefully the love affair continues.... bahahaha. Is anything in parenting stable? 

Also on school, who's kid is in the yellow house? 

Seriously.

The yellow house should be banned from being a house colour at schools. They should only have dark colours. 

Purple, black, blue, green, red.. these are fine.  Yellow?  No fucking way.

You should see the state of his shirt and he's only worn it 4 times.  It's absolutely impossible to keep a yellow shirt on a five year old clean.

He wears this shirt once a week and look at it.

 Ban Yellow House!

Just LOOK! 

I soak this fucking thing in napisan, spot treat it and it still looks like this!  I'm not letting him wear it anymore.  I know that it's cooler than the polo but legit looks like he just rolled around in dirt in it and that's straight out of the washing machine. 

And don't even get me started on the white socks!  O M G!

What do they do?  Roll their ankles around in the mud?! 

I changed up our menu at home a bit this week and made mongolian beef, which everyone gobbled.  It's nice when you don't get I don't like it, this is yuck Mum, after you slave away for 40 minutes trying to find something that four different people might enjoy eating, that isn't pasta. 

I also tried changing up the lunchbox snacks and made apple muffins last week and that's been a big fat fail.  Everyone enjoyed them warm from the oven but nobody seemed fussed in the lunchbox so guess what, banana fucking muffins it is! 

Healthy snacks 

I prepped myself some bean dip and some hummus and have kept on track with the snacks this week, although I keep forgetting to buy lettuce or baby spinach so my salads have been a bit light on... hahah.  I don't seem to have the capacity for memory anymore and missed an appointment at Specsavers despite receiving a reminder text on my phone the day before.... brain is clearly fried and probably due to my girl child.  

Molly has been all over the place with her night time sleeping the last week or so and I am missing shut-eye desperately.  I had to have a nap today. 

Last night was probably the worst night in a while and it didn't help that I went out and got home late and that's when she started.  We administered drugs but she took ages to calm and then, of course, the other one woke up so I had to go and deal with him before getting back to bed to spend a restless night listening to her sobbing in her sleep and trying not to roll over on top of her.

My alarm went off at 4.45am to do the hill and I felt like vomiting but I made myself get up and go.  Everyone was sleeping quietly when I left but I teed up some more drugs in case she woke up again.

I don't cope well with being tired but Juffin, Juffin is a million times worse. He woke up this morning, saw that I was gone and decided to ring me on the hill to yell at me for leaving him all alone to deal with our sick daughter and wouldn't it be nice to get a good night's sleep in the spare bed.... I was flabbergasted.  I didn't sleep in the fucking spare bed at all!  I settled Mushroom and went back to our bed where I also dozed in and out and got kicked in the guts by the sobbing tiny girl that we made together.

Funny that men don't remember these things. 

I wish I'd slept in the fucking spare bed.

I may have said some choice words. 

Ok definitely said some choice words but Jesus.  If she was that sick, I wouldn't have done the damn hill. 

I got home and she was still pretty miserable but shovelling banana into her face so I wasn't convinced that she was really that ill.  I called house call doctor, apparently he tried but was just on hold for ages... (no fucking comment).  I sorted kids out, told cranky guts to go back to bed, and had a shower and a much needed coffee.  I then had my smashed avo and feta on sourdough which Molly decided to get in on, and then played dead on the couch whilst the kids watched ABC kids and we waited for the Doctor.

Doctor finally arrives, checks her over and says there's nothing obviously wrong with her and she's now been napping for nearly 4 hours.

Tonight is going to be F U N! 

Week Six

What a week!  I managed to fit so much in that I feel more exhausted than normal.  And I usually feel exhausted.  Mum life, am I right? 

This week saw me sell Molly's cot and change table, Mushroom bring home his first big school homework, I got my IUD inserted, Mumsy visited, and we finally ditched Molly's dummy.

I've talked about selling things on facebook before, like what a shit fight.  I'd had no bites for the cot and change table so I reduced the price somewhat and someone commented same day.  I didn't get my hopes up but this person's Mum actually came, paid and took the cot and change table away the very next day.  I was astonished!  I should have gone out and bought a lotto ticket.  Juffin managed to get pants on before 9am and helped load up her ute and we waved goodbye to cots, toddler beds and change tables forever!  Huzzah!  Miracles do happen.  I felt like running out and spending the money on booze to celebrate but, you know, adulting.

I forgot that I also managed to off load some nappies to a friend of a friend as well so we're slowly getting rid of shit.  Halle-freaking-lujah!  I go through phases of just wanting to torch it all.  I know I'm not alone.  I think I have 10 items of clothing that I actually wear on a regular basis, not including my work uniform, and I'd love to just get rid of everything.  Juffin is such a hoarder and still has clothes that he hasn't worn since we got together,10 freaking years ago!  If you see a fire over Annandale one night, don't be alarmed, it just means that I finally lost my shit and burnt all the useless DVD's and CD's that we're unable to play.....

Mushroom seems to have settled into school quite well.  After the shock of having to go five days a week, we're getting into a bit of a routine and we have a list of jobs that he has to do in the morning.  Hooray for putting away the cutlery and brushing his own teeth!  He's very methodical and likes to see his progress so we've done up a little chart for him to tick off after each job.  It seems to be working but we fall down at the putting socks and shoes on... of course.  What is it with fucking kids and putting shoes on FFS?!  Maybe it's because I wrote shoes and socks?  Probably.  Not that he can read yet... 

We haven't been late once and from this week I'm reducing my hours at work to continue working 3 days but finishing at my old time of 4.30pm.  This way Juffin can drop Molly off on her daycare days so I don't have to go in and back twice in the morning.  We've talked about moving her to the centre down the road but she's so happy where she is so this is what we'll do for now. Mushroom loves after school care, like really loves it, so hopefully this arrangement works for us.  Fingers crossed! 

IUD insertion was on Wednesday.  Juffin had the day off too so we cleaned up the house a bit and then headed into GP. I have to be honest, I was expecting pain.  There was no pain.  I mean it's as comfortable as having something inserted into your uterus should be, but it wasn't awful.  I didn't cry.  I gritted my teeth a bit and it was uncomfortable sure, but I didn't want to cry out with pain.  What can I say?  I guess I'm just used to having things put inside my vagina, HAHAHAHAAH!  But seriously, it was fine.  And things have been good since.  A bit of cramping that first 24 hours, but nothing like usual period pain. I know it's early days yet, so I will keep you posted! 

Mumsy arrived on Wednesday night for a short visit and we ended up drinking 2 bottles of wine and staying up too late.  I love my Mum.  I wish we could afford to visit her as I feel so slack with them always having to come here.  I need to make visits more of a priority.  I miss my family. Living away sucks. 

Sunrise behind us

And finally, the highlight, ditching the dreaded dummy!  Molly is obsessed with the dummy.  Ever since my hospitalisation, she's relied on it more and more.  We only gave the dummy for sleep time.  She never had it any other time.  But she was asking for it.  Constantly.  She also had it in her mouth the whole time she was asleep!  I didn't even realise this until I went to check on her one night and heard her sucking away.  I mean seriously?!  Mushroom used to spit his out and that was it for the night, Molly, not so much.  After a shit night on Thursday night, with her waking up because she couldn't find it and then refusing to go back to sleep, I decided enough was enough. 

Mum and I did the hill on Friday morning and Molly was in my bed when I left.  With her dummy stuffed in her mouth.  When we got home it was gone, and I assumed that Juffin had put it in the usual spot.  After dropping Mum off and doing some shopping, we got home and Molly said she was sleepy.  I hunted high and low for that fucking dummy for nigh on half an hour to no avail and that's when I decided to finally ditch it.  WHAT A PERFORMANCE! 

She cried for an hour!  An hour!!  I had to sing, cuddle and pat her like a baby.  It was horrendous. And then she slept until school pick up when I had to wake her up.

Of course.

Friday night she asked for it a few times but went to sleep without issue, and then SLEPT THROUGH THE NIGHT! 

And what about Saturday you may ask, well, she did THE SAME THING! Asked for it a few times, then said, No dummy for Molly, Molly a big girl and mucked around a bit and went to sleep.  Didn't see her again until 6.30.   

I swear.  Parenting is a kick in the arse.  Nothing is ever as bad as you think it will be, but then other things will floor you.

I've done the hill twice this week but not much of anything else.  I have a bit of a cold and ended up eating salt and vinegar chips yesterday as I just wanted to be able to taste something. I should have just made some tom yum soup but I'm trying to have a better attitude towards food, no regrets! 

Is there anything more glorious than diving into a cold pool
after mowing the lawn?  

Week Five

I missed out on doing the hill this morning.  It threw off my whole day.  I was quite literally an unproductive blob.  Something about dragging my fat arse up a hill on a Sunday makes for a productive day.  I hope the week doesn't follow on from today's tone... but hooray for rain! 

We had our first full week of work and school and we survived... however, we did have takeaway.  And that shit me to frickin tears because I can't stand spending money on shit food, and I should have been more organised, note how I blame myself because I do 99% of the cooking... I can't even because I'll lose my shit so yeah, it's on me. 

Wednesday was not fantastic as I had to work a little bit later and didn't finish until after 5 but Thursday was worse as I was there until 5.30 and then had to pick up Molly and finally Mushroom as Juffin had a training thing.  I didn't get to the after school care until 5.50.  I started to tear up as I was driving down the road to get him thinking shit, I haven't seen this kid since 7.30 this morning.  Awful. 

And again, I know that people do it all the time but fuck, it sucks.

The cost is basically the same for dropping afterschool care and adding a daycare day.  My options are to drop 2 hours and work 4 days school hours and put Molly into daycare for an extra day, but Mushroom will still have to go to before school care on a Wednesday, or keep the same 3 full days and drop 2 hours and finish a little earlier so my afternoon isn't super hectic.

Plus side is that Mushroom loves after school care so at this point, rather than lose a home day, I'll just drop 2 hours and finish at 4.30pm every day.  This way I can still work the extra time if I have appointments etc and I don't lose my Molly days. 

Will see how we go...

I took Molly to the shop the other day so we could pick up some baking supplies and grab my mirena ready for next week.  As we were at the Chemist at Domain, I thought I'd duck into Specsavers and try on some glasses as I need some better ones for the drawer at work.  Do you think that my daughter would co-operate with sitting in her pram without screaming for 2 minutes?  No.  No she did not. I cannot get anything done with her at the moment.  She is beyond painful. 

Our Mum's the best!

At nap time now she gets out of bed and knocks on her door yelling out Hello Hello Molly's here.  Knock knock!  On Friday it took her over an hour to settle so, you guessed it, by the time 2.50 rolls around she's still out to it and I have to wake her up to go and get Mushroom.  I thought of getting my elderly neighbour to just come over and sit on the couch for 10 while I collect Mushroom.  It might seriously be a plan. 

Juffin has been making lunches thank God and he put some clothes away...

I managed to make a cake that I was being paid to make without losing my mind, though it was touch and go there for a while.  I was in way over my head and will be sticking to cupcakes from now on.  I just don't have the creative flair and skill required for really pretty, technical cakes.  Fondant is not my friend.  I think it turned out ok, she seemed happy with it.  I just know that it wasn't what she wanted but I just couldn't deliver. 

I sold the cot and change table this morning so that's finally gone and we have some more casheroni for the sister's wedding fund!  A successful facebook sale with the buyer showing up at the time allocated, with cash and taking it away.  Wonders will never cease! 

I refused to buy food this week as our freezer is stocked and pantry pretty great, but we keep running out of stuff an its annoying me.  I went to make muffins today and there was no self raising flour left and my flour tub fits nearly 4 kg in there and we were out!  Obviously I improvised with some plain and baking powder but damn.  I may have to shop after all.  Stupid groceries and their ever increasing prices.

There were some incidences with a huntsman spider/s, we think there are two, I sliced my ankle open on the screen door trying to drag a mattress outside that Molly had emptied 300mls of water onto... Juffin's helpful comment of, well it was good that it's only water, didn't make me feel any better... ps fuck off with your unhelpful comment, and a water park visit (of which I took zero photo's.. so unlike me!)

I started Black Mirror on Netflix, listened to DZ Deathrays a lot this week and also got stuck into my new book Taboo by Kim Scott.  Here's to spending more time relaxing without a screen in front of my face. Especially after watching Black Mirror... dayum! 

I have my mirena in on Wednesday and my Mum comes for a day or two.  Bit excited!!  Need to get wine... hahahah!