You GUYS!!

I had my follow up ultrasound on Monday and guess what?! 

My cyst has gone!

It's GONE!

That means no fucking surgery!  WOOOO HOOOO!

My GP said today that ultrasounds are hard to read so cyst may have been run of the mill ordinary variety and resolved itself OR it ruptured and didn't cause me any grief.  I'm not sure that that's entirely accurate but whatever, I'm so happy.  The thought of having another fucking surgery was making me want to curl up and rock in the corner.

I'm now being pro-active and have booked a consult to get checked out for the mirena. Bring on IUD contraception and hopefully minimal issues.

I wish I could say that I freaked out for nothing and that I feel silly but I've been this way for 36 years and that shit ain't about to change now! I live for the melodrama!  Not really, but I'll never stop overthinking things.  It's just me. 

In other news, I have baked up a shedload of Christmas treats and managed to control myself, which is amazing, let me tell you.  I have literally been through 4 dozen eggs in the last fortnight.  My fridge is heaving.  I love feeding the masses. 

The 5 year old has turned into total shitbag and 20 month old just copies whatever her brother does, so also total shitbag.  Threats of no presents and Santa not coming have fallen on deaf ears and I feel like a shithouse Mum as never manage to follow through on threats and bloody kids run rings around me.  Or, in turn, I'm super tough and then their Father just bends straight away.  It's frustrating as all hell.

I'm afraid that after taking 37 mins to ride just under 8km, I have decided that bicycling is so not my thing and I won't be doing it for exercise again unless under extreme duress.  People can fucking run faster than that.  I can only imagine what my wideload arse looked like from behind but I felt like I needed a sign on my back warning people of the slow moving tank up ahead.  Still.  I'm making progress and I wasn't sitting on the couch. Surely that's a win?! 

And despite being a little more organised for Christmas this year, ie kids and Juffin, I'm still not completely sorted gift wise. 

I'm not at all worried..... 

Tomorrow I will attempt to make sour dough, from scratch, for the first time.  I've been feeding my starter daily since Sunday and it's pungent and frothy.  I have no idea what I'm doing but it feels like the holy grail of bread making and pretty sure I'm in way over my head.  I will keep you posted.

I'm making the children wear ridiculous Christmas outfits
24/7 #BestMumEver

Weekly Wrap 1/12

It's December 1st!  Huzzah!

In news this week...

Juffin managed to procure himself a VR playstation headset.  He is now the biggest nerd Earthside. He has stayed up far too late most night's this week waving his arms around the lounge room and yelling enthusiastically for me to come and watch.

I tried it but it made me queasy AF so I'm out.

He looks cool.

Said no-one ever.

I had a pity party earlier in the week but then got over it.  I do that.  I mostly use this blog as a way to vent and it helps me feel better so thank you to those who reached out and sent me some love.  It's so appreciated.

I signed up for the Casserole Club I have to go through a Police Check yet but can hopefully start sharing our meals with some elderly neighbours who need them.  I need to send some good karma out into the world.

Miss Molly continues to be a destructive whirlwind and nothing is safe. There are too many shenanigans to name, but tonight she managed to get into the sudocrem and spread it all over the coffee table.  I was on the phone and Juffin had his back turned for 2 seconds.

She's a menace.

Mushroom was never into shit like she is so we're definitely having to step up our toddler proofing game.

I went and saw Bad Mums 2 (I refuse to write Moms #sorrynotsorry) on Tuesday with some gal pals and ate popcorn and laughed my arse off.  I love laughing raucously in the cinema with abandon.  It's good for the soul.  It was a silly, ridiculous movie, but there was a heart moving moment and like the emotional fool that I am, I shed a tear.  Who can help themselves?  I've always been a wimp in emotional scenes.

I bought the kids some Christmas gear last weekend to wear to kindy over the coming weeks and Mushroom whinged and moaned about having to wear them but then cracked up when they were in the wash and he couldn't wear one!

Turd.

I'm such a good Mum that I'm yet to capture them both in all in their cheap Christmas glory but we have the Kindy Christmas Party on Monday so I'll flood you with cheesy pics then.

This week I also put my baking hat on and made our Christmas Cake, some choc salted almonds and an Orange Almond Cake for Juffin.  He's complaining that I never bake him anything which is totally untrue, but I had some oranges that were overripe so I thought I'd shut him up.  Honestly, luckiest man alive!

We had a productive day today.  I got the fruit shopping done before 9 this morning, and I got a little bit excited that I was able to buy the bags of lebanese cucumbers again.  Healthy eating has got me consuming those suckers in record time so I was glad to pick them up in bulk for cheaper. It's so good to get in and out of there so early, we missed most of the rush and despite a few meltdowns over strawberries and kiwi fruit, it was mostly pain free. Sometimes the mornings just work.  Not often.  But sometimes.

They were cuddling nicely until I tried
to take a picture...

I got all the washing folded this afternoon whilst Molly was sleeping and have two loads ready to hang tomorrow provided the weather is clear.

I have to hit the shops some time over the weekend and get Mushroom a plain red polo or similar for Monday and get a 5th birthday pres for his mate's party on Sunday.

I've completed my Christmas shopping for Juffin and have to finalise the order for the kids.  Juffin is in charge of getting the Mushroom's big pres and I'm still undecided re Molly's.... but I've never been this organised for Christmas before guys!  It's totally unbelievable!

We put our tree up tonight and Mushroom serenaded us with We Wish You a Merry Christmas over and over again as Spotify wasn't connecting so there were no real carols to listen too.  I suspect that Juffin sabotaged in some way as he hates the carols but I will loudly sing them unaccompanied, so bah humbug to him!

I may have overdid it somewhat....

ANDDDD to make my week I managed to score a bunch of a Tupperware at a fraction of retail price so I can 'Tupper' up my pantry!  I'm so excited!  Modular Mate heaven!!!

Hope everyone had a good week and are all gearing up for a safe and happy holiday season.  Bring on the prawns! 

The Grinch

Yesterday I turned into the Grinch.  Big time.

As we've discussed before, I'm not the best shopper.  Soul sucking comes to mind.  This is only worsened by the fact that Juffin is the world's most ridiculous shopping partner.  So my whinge this year, on top of my general 'I hate shopping' rant is 'I hate shopping with the Juffin' rant.  I HATE it.

At one point I nearly took off my beautiful engagement ring and threw it at him.

The 'end of our relationship' hate.

Think Sauron in the Lord of the Rings hate.

That's how much I hate shopping with the most indecisive, unapologetic, frustrating human being on the face of the planet.

Things are only exacerbated by the fact that our little Christmas savings account has been raided several times over the year leaving us with not much in the way of dollars to pay for things.

I'm being naughty and doing gift vouchers for my nearest and dearest but only because they're all going to be in Brisbane this year and my bro is taking the presents down for me and has limited space.  I also didn't want to pay for postage.  I know, I'm an awful, awful person.

My niece however, deserves a present she can unwrap and hold (not that the rest of family don't but she's 4 so it's more exciting for her.  Ok, that's not very fair on the rest of my family but I'm sorry guys, you know I love you!) So I was in one of the department stores, you know the one, with the giant red circles, there are people jostling everyone, kids screaming, sticky unknown items clinging to the bottom of my shoes.  I am pushing my angelic, sleeping child down the too narrow toy aisles, trying to remember what my sister told me was the 'must have item' this year.  I was failing.  I turn to ask for support from Juffin and lo and behold he's nowhere to be found.  I'm faced with an aged lady clutching a fluorescent pink my little pony who's trying to squeeze past my sizable arse and my huge pram.  "Sorry, excuse me," she says as she pushes past in one direction, I turn and try to lift the back wheels of the pram closer to the shelf as a kid coming from the other direction pushes past, "S'cuse me!" he bellows.  I'm about to have a coronary.  If all these arsehats wake up my child there will be blood in the aisles.

I take a deep breath and call the sister.  Ahhh, Lalaloopsy.  Of course.  Idiot Jess.  She chastises me for leaving my shopping until the last few days but I know that she was doing hers two days ago so whatever.  I manage to locate the dolls and marvel at their giant heads.  Why must dolls have giant heads?  I know that Barbie is nowhere near anatomically correct but even her head is on the largish side.  So weird.  After contemplating this for a moment, I pick two and then force my way out of toy aisle hell in search of the missing Juffin.   It will be a surprise to no-one that he's looking at Lego.  Star Wars Lego to be specific.  My 33 year old fiance is looking at Star Wars Lego.  Oh dear.  I berate him for going missing then ask him why he is looking at Lego that our son will not be able to play with or be interested in for at least 5 years (crossing fingers for never here but with a super nerd for a Dad the likelihood is high).  He tries to tell me that he's looking for Mushroom and that it's a good investment.  Wow.  Lego as an investment.  Now I've heard it all.

That was just the beginning.  Everything out of his mouth after that grates on my every nerve.  I get a mumbled 'I dunno' after every question.  I ask if he's hungry, 'I dunno', I ask if he wants to go anywhere else 'I dunno', are you an alien from Mars 'I dunno'.  We go to change the Mushroom's nappy and he just stands there while I go to the toilet.  Doesn't think to start changing him without me, that would be helpful and appreciated.  I am gritting my teeth so hard that my jaw is starting to hurt.  It's only been 90 minutes and I am ready to run away and leave this man forever.  FOR EVER!

Generally I can deal with Juffin's laid back attitude.  It balances out my ridiculously highly strung nature but shopping just does something to me.  It's the putrid combination of crowds, fluorescent lighting and ugly clothes.  It makes me nuts.  Add a shoestring budget, limited present options due to postage and weight, time constraints, and limited input from a mute partner and I turn into a psycho hose beast.  And I think the thing that makes it all the more worse is that it's all my own fault.  I have no-one to blame as I just couldn't get my shit together this year.  At least last year I had the newborn excuse, this year I got nothing!  I couldn't even be bothered posting on this blog, let alone being organised for Christmas. At the toy sales in July, why wasn't I there with all the other nutso Mum's rushing in and laybying my little heart out?  What's wrong with me?

It's not the end of the world.  Hilariously, now that I've hashed it all out on the keyboard, I do feel a little better.  I'm not going to leave him, despite my fervent desire to do so, it would just do me good to remember that I don't shop well with others.  Even my chosen life partner.  We'll sort our shit out and Christmas will not be a total disaster but, honestly, can I just get it the F together next year so I don't have to cry?  Third times a charm right?

Santa Juffin

The only thing that made me laugh today was turning Juffin into Santa.

That and my son turning the stereo off every 2 seconds for nearly the entire Drapht album.  Juffin was actually getting cranky.  I did nothing to stop it.

Shopping

I'm a traitor to the female population as I hate shopping.  Like really hate it.  So Christmas is like a super fun time for me.  Now, let me make this clear, I don't hate Christmas, I hate SHOPPING.  Say it with me, SHOPPING!  Ok, glad we got that cleared up.

There's something about shopping centres that just make me want to curl up in a ball and wail.  They're horrid, soul sucking places and I feel like the last few weeks I have spent all my damn time in them.  I love online shopping, online shopping is fun, and easy, and not soul sucking.  Physically walking about shopping centres with hundreds of other people is soul sucking.  I'll just say soul sucking one more time then we'll move on, soul sucking.  There we go.

By this stage,you're probably thinking that I'm a horrible grinch who hates buying gifts for people.  I don't hate buying people presents, I like buying people things.  I even like giving them the things that I have bought.  I just hate when you HAVE to buy presents and you have no idea what to buy them.  You spend hours wandering aimlessly looking at a million things and racking your brain for the perfect gift for someone who usually buys themselves the things that they want, or every gift idea you have is unbelievably expensive and therefore not feasible.  At this point you've been looking at the same crap for over 4 hours and you end up buying a piece of shit that you wouldn't even buy yourself just because you can't give them nothing.  To top off your super fun experience, the shops are bloody awful at this time of year and people are 'expletive, expletive' rude.  I have a damn pram, get the f out of the way!!

Shopping with an infant makes shopping even more fun.  Not.  Getting bloody organised to go out is hard enough.  I literally start getting ready 2 hours before we have to get out the door.  Especially if the Mushroom is still awake.  If he's awake then I get cried at every time I'm not paying attention to him.  He'll be happily playing on his mat, or in his bouncer, I take my eyes off him for one second to check the nappy bag situation and then it starts.  Rockstar.  No shit.  So then we start the whole song and dance, whilst I try and cart him around and organise bags and nappies and prams and the kitchen sink (I was just kidding about the kitchen sink....)  If I haven't had a shower at this point then that can take even longer.  I've even put his bouncer in the bathroom and left the shower door open so he can see me.  It's a little weird but it works for now and much better than coming out and finding a screaming mess because I dared leave his sight for 5 minutes.  Little darling.

So getting organised, right.  I have to check the nappy bag, make sure there's at least one nappy for every hour of proposed expedition.  At least one change of clothes for Mushroom, in case he pees on himself or has an accident as he's prone to do.  Two wraps, one to wrap around him as it's cold in the shops, one to put over the pram so the fluoro lights don't make him crazy.  Wipes, bottom balm, baggies for used wipes, wet bag for dirty nappies.  Spew rag.  A toy.  His red book, in case we have medical dramas whilst we're out.  Mum's purse, keys, lip balm, paracetamol, water bottle and a spare shirt for Mum in case we have shoulder spewies.  Yes.  I have to carry around all that shit.

When we finally get all that crap together, we have to start the car and put the pram in.  In North Queensland it's always a gazillion degrees, so you have to cool the car down before you put your baby into it otherwise you will cook them.  I'm not kidding.  If the car's been out in the sun all morning, it's nigh on 45c inside that thing.  You could fry an egg on the bonnet.  I usually let the car run for at least 5 minutes whilst I pack it up and then put the Mushroom in there just before we go so it's not too bad by the time we depart.  You can see why it takes me 2 hours to get ready.....

Once we get to the shops, the Mushroom will decide whether he wants to be good or be like his mother  mother and start with the shopping anxiety.  Bonus is that he likes his peanut thing on the pram and 99% of the time he's happy in there looking about with big eyes and watching me whilst we wheel around and try to navigate ridiculously overstuffed shops full of crap.  I try to keep my happy face on so he doesn't get upset...  We usually only need to visit the parent room once or twice for feeding or changing, but generally he'll go to sleep better when we're out than if he's at home... no idea what that's about.  Obviously gets tired from checking everything out! It's amazing how he can sleep with all that bloody noise going on around him!

Our shopping ventures usually end with one of us in tears, any guesses who that is.  Give you a hint, it's not the Mushroom. I'm so over the whole shopping thing.  It's impossible to shop properly when you've got a pram as you can't carry everything and some items require a trolley.  I bought something for my Dad which had to be carried and I was trying navigate the pram, hold onto said gift and juggle the giant nappy bag and other bags of shopping also.  I've even ended up using the pram as a trolley and carrying the Mushroom but that always ends badly as the pram is even harder to steer whilst loaded up with crap... oh the joys!

The moral of this story is, I'm not going back to the shops with the Mushroom by myself.  Either the Juffin comes too or I leave the Mushroom at home with his Dad and venture out alone.  After several successful forays, I've only got 3 presents left to buy and I know exactly what I'm getting so whilst it should be an easy expedition, there is a certain maniacal edge to fellow shoppers as we get closer to Christmas and it's making me quite afraid.... The worst part of the whole sorry situation is that I can't drink a bottle of vodka on Christmas Day to make up for all the agonising shopping ventures.  Boo bloody hiss!

Mushroom - The Christmas Elf

Next time:  'Is he a good baby?'  Argghhhh!!!!