Monthly Cross Stitch WIP

After 3 months (March 28 2011)

After 4 months (April 28 2011)

Term Two

Yesterday was the start of term two of the school year. We are now 1/4 of the way through the year. Its rather scary. Within the next two weeks we will be attending an open day for the primary school we are hoping to send Jasmine to next year. They even start taking enrolments this term for next year as well. I can't believe she is already old enough for us not only to be thinking about where she will be going but also old enough to enrol her! Later this year we will also do the application for Lucy for three year old Kinder. Where has the time gone?


I think Jasmine will just love school next year. She loves to learn and loves being around other kids her age and school will give her both of those things five days of the week. Some days I think she would have no trouble fitting in there this year!


It is going to be odd once she does go. Well, for a little while at least. I'm so used to having her home. I guess this year at least Kinder is for four hours at a time and that helps somewhat but that's only three days of the week and not five. 


It just seems so weird to me that she is almost five. I don't feel old enough to have an almost five year old most days. Of course there are days when I do, but who doesn't? 


All being well her BFF from Kinder last year will also be at the same school as her next year. As will most of the kids she is at Kinder with this year. That should really help her adjust better to the change than if she didn't know anyone there at all. I believe the school also run an orientation program in term four. I plan on finding out more about it and possibly sending her depending on what the times of it are. I don't want her missing Kinder to attend, and I doubt she would want that either. 


We are both hoping that this will be the only primary school she will got to. I changed schools are fair amount growing up and hated it. It was always hard to adjust to new people. Maybe that was just me though. Jasmine is far more of a social bunny than I. Either way, I still think its better for her not to chop and change schools if possible. It should be the same for High School. With any luck she will make friends at this age that she will go to primary and high school with and have for life.

Why Complain?

About a public holiday when you don't work and thus it doesn't change your day to day living???


ANZAC Day was yesterday. Yesterday was the day after Easter Sunday and is normally the public holiday for Easter. Instead it was a public holiday for Anzac Day. Make sense thus far? Today is also a public holiday. For Easter. A little confusing but it has left us with a five day weekend. 


A forum post yesterday sparked this. Someone claims that Anzac Day this year was a joke as we had a five day weekend. She could not seem to understand that yesterday was the holiday for Anzac Day and today is Easter Tuesday. We (those who work, not her dole bludging butt) apparently forced the government into the extra public holiday because we felt we deserved it. This means that Anzac Day is nothing more than a joke and an excuse for a day off work.


WTF?? For starters, no one I know complained about Easter and Anzac Day coinciding. Secondly, Anzac Day has never been and never will be a joke! I'm sure all those who arose early yesterday to attend dawn services were sitting around laughing about it. *insert eye roll here*


Every year we if Anzac Day falls on a weekend we get a public holiday for it the following Monday. Every year the day after Easter is a public holiday. This year Anzac Day was a Monday, so instead of only having on public holiday for the two, we still had two public holidays. One for Anzac Day, and one for Easter.


Sadly, this was not the only dumbass comment I heard yesterday about Anzac Day. Some moron on the radio rang in and ranted over the annual football match between Collingwood and Essendon. This also apparently makes it all a big joke. This idiot then went on to say that he doesn't care about Anzac Day anyway and has no true feelings towards this country. Why bother complaining about something you don't care about? If it doesn't affect you in anyway why do you care? Perhaps these two people just need to take a moment and be thankful that they have the change to say and do what they want in this country. Afterall that's what Anzac Day is for us to do. To give thanks to those who fought for us to live freely.

I am very behind

In updating here. Its been hard with Jasmine on holidays. My normal routine has been thrown off. Kinder starts back up on Wednesday and so I should hopefully be back to posting at least twice a week. Well at least that's the goal but as we all know I suck at keeping goals.


One goal I have managed to keep up with for almost two months now is eating well. The results are now starting to speak for themselves. Pants that did not fit in any way on March 1 now fit. Some are even a little bit loose on me. That's about 1.5 dress sizes in under two months. I would like to keep that up for a little while yet but I know that it will slow down. Then again now that the weather is cooler my walks on my days off the treadmill are now longer. Almost twice as long and that has to be helping somewhat. At least I hope it is. I should be able to wear my post-Jasmine jeans this winter and I can't wait. That is my first goal. To be able to wear them. Once I have reached that goal I will make another one. Just one at a time. Nice and slowly.


We had a pretty good Easter yesterday. Lucy certainly loves chocolate. She had a small amount of her bunny from the Easter Bunny but decided she wanted more. So what did she do? She went and managed to reach one of the eggs she got from my mum, opened it and ate it. Total chocolate lover.


Jasmine is now spending two nights with my mother-in-law. She stayed last night and will stay again tonight. I think it might be the longest she has ever stayed away from us her whole life. Both her and Lucy will be staying for two nights next month when Rodger and I go away for our wedding anniversary.


I have an idea for what I'm going to post about tomorrow and so I might go and make some notes about it before I forget and sit down with a blank mind. Yes, I know, that is somewhat normal for me. haha!

Poor little Sad Sickie

Poor Jasmine has been sick all school holiday's thus far. It is now Tuesday of week two and she is finally starting to feel a little better.


She started the holidays with a cold. Simple enough. It didn't really effect her too much. She was a little more tired than normal but other than a runny nose she was fine. She was supposed to spend last weekend with her Nanna. Friday morning she decided to get up at 4:30am. Even though I sent her back to bed, I don't think she went back to sleep. We put her crankiness on Friday down to the fact she was up so early that morning.


So off she went to Nanna's on Friday afternoon. Rodger, Lucy and I went to do the grocery shopping then came home and relaxed. We had dinner and put Lucy to bed, then sat down to watch some TV. At about 8:30pm the phone rang. It was Nanna. Jasmine had thrown up and needed clean pjs. Rodger took some over. Apparently as soon as he got there Jasmine decided that she was coming home. Good thing too as her temperature had started to rise. Some Nurofen bought it back down.


Saturday morning rolls around. Jasmine is now running very hot. So as much as she wanted to, we said she could not go back to Nanna's. All she did all day on Saturday was lay on the couch and watch TV. Her temperature was up and down all day depending on how long it had been since she had last had Nurofen. 


A trip to the doctor on Saturday afternoon confirmed it was a virus. While a virus is good as it runs its course fast, part of me would have preferred a bacterial infection as that can be treated with antibiotics and Jasmine would have started to feel better sooner. With a virus its just up to her body and the virus.


Sunday she was feeling a little better. Her temp stayed down between Nurofen doses and she had more energy. Yesterday (Monday) I was feeling not so hot though. I was all achy and my legs felt like they were made of lead. Blegh! I'm feeling better today but still not 100%. Jasmine had a better day. Although she was very tired by the end of it. She went to bed at about 6:30pm and was asleep 10 minutes later. She slept till about7:30am this morning. She's still tired today. I'm hoping that its just the virus leaving her body and that by tomorrow she will be 100% back to her normal happy full of energy self. 


I'm hoping that by tomorrow I will be feeling full of energy again too. Being sick is no fun no matter what your age is. I would make a really bad hypochondriac. I hate being sick. I don't see where the fun in it is. I don't like being lazy and doing nothing all day. I like to have the energy to be able to do things. And I hate having to remember to take medication. I'm really bad about it and often forget. I sure I hope I never get anything that requires daily medication to stay alive. I'd be a goner....

Only 32 years?

On Monday a man was sentenced to a non-parole period of 32 years.


What was his crime?


He threw his young daughter off a bridge in revenge against her mother.


I would like to know how 32 years is enough? He robbed this child of about 80 years of life. Why should he get to be free after only 32? As far as I know he has never shown remorse for his crime. He was deemed sane by the court. Yes, he is already 37 years old but why should his age stop his from getting a life sentence. The mother of the child sure has a life sentence. For the rest of her life she must go on knowing that her child died at the hands of her father. A man that every little girl should be able to trust with their life. 


I listened to the judge hand down the sentence. It was broadcast live on the radio. His crime was described in chilling detail. At the time he had another one of his children in the car with him. This child begged his father to go back and get his sister. That little boy will forever have those memories. Not only will he have to grow up without his sister, he will have the memory of his father throwing that little girl off the bridge. No child should ever have to witness such an atrocious act.


I honestly don't care how good of a man he may have been before that day. It does not and should not excuse him for what he did! 


Sadly the justice system is full of cases like this. Far too often we hear light sentences being given because the offender "had a bad childhood" like its some kind of excuse or reason to commit a crime. What about the victims of these crimes? They will feel the impact of the crime for the rest of their lives. They are innocent and deserve justice to be served. I fully believe that all that should be looked at is the crime and the impact the crime has had on the victims and on the larger community. Of course as with everything there would be exceptions to this rule, otherwise it would not be a fair justice system. Especially when it comes to determining the offenders mental capacity at the time of the crime.


Obviously someone who throws their child from a bridge has some sort of mental issues, and these were considered and thrown out by the jury so should not have been taken into consideration come sentencing. 


There will never be real peace for this family though, no matter how long he serves in prison. He condemned them to a life sentence the moment he threw his child away.

Lucy and her Dolls

If we had to pick which one of the girls will be coming home pregnant at fifteen it would be Lucy.


Why?


Many reasons.


She loves to clean up after others.


If she spies something on the floor that doesn't belong then she will pick it up and put it in the bin.


She loves helping with the washing. Her favourite thing to do is to push the buttons on the washing machine to make it start. This is always followed by her clapping her hands and saying "yay!"


Her dolls. She loves her baby dolls. She is forever hugging and loving on them. She takes them for walks around the house in her little doll pram. Her use of a plastic toy knife on Baby Freddies' privates does concern me a little though but each to their own. 


A few weeks back at Music she was beyond cute with a baby doll. She was walking around holding it and rocking it when she spied one of her other favourite toys.... a vacuum cleaner. She stand there, looks from the doll to the vacuum and back again. Instead of doing what I would expect most kids her age to do which is to dump the doll right there on the floor, Lucy shifts the doll slightly so she's holding it in one arm, picks up the vacuum and starts playing with it. While she does this she looks at the baby doll and grins.


Yup. That one is coming home pregnant at a young age.

Jasmine and Tink

A few Sunday's ago Jasmine hit yet another major milestone of life. She got her very first pet.


Since we are only renting and can't get anything fun like a cat or a dog we ended up getting her a pet mouse. Rodger's first suggestion was a reptile of some sort but not only do they require a rather large set up , I really do not like them.


She's named her cute little mouse Tinkerbell, though generally we all call her Tink. Tink is small and very fast and therefore we do have a few rules about her. Jasmine is allowed to have her out of her cage but only if Rodger taker her out and if Tink is then put into her clear exercise ball. They day we bought her home we almost lost her getting her out of the box that we bought her home in.


Jasmine is doing a really great job of looking after her, She has her out to play almost everyday. She does need to watch it if Lucy is around though. Lucy loves Tink! Pick up her exercise ball and throw it kind of love. Poor Tink. Lucy must scare the living daylights out of her.


Every night Jasmine helps to change Tink's food and water. She's being really good about it. Thus far she hasn't lost interest but we are assuming that she will on and off at some stage.


Mice only live for about 18 months to two years ad so even if she does completely loose interest in Tink we won't be left to look after her for decades like we would a reptile. If I wanted something that would depend on us to provide for it for 20 years we have have another baby!


The cage we got for her is a great one. You can add onto it so if at any stage she wants another mouse all she has to do is add onto the cage she has at the moment. Unless of course we can't find the parts for it. Only time will tell.

Kiss my ass April.

I hate April.

Why?

Because it all starts in April.

In April my mind starts with the memories. The "this time x years ago". This year the x stand stand for three. Three seems harder than two for some reason. Maybe its because Jasmine turned three just eight days before Lucy was born. It makes it seem like so much longer than three years.

Sometimes it feels like it all never really happened. Like it was all just a really bad dream and I was just someone on the outside looking in at it all. 

I some ways I wish that were the truth. That is was all just a really bad dream that I'm still yet to wake up from. I knows its not though and all this pain and hurt is just something I have going to have to deal with for the rest of my life.

The only think I like about April is the fact that the Royal Children's Hospital's Good Friday Appeal always falls near Zac's birthday. The year he was born it was just before, this year its after.

Each year when we give to the Appeal it is for Zac. We can't give him a birthday present but at least we can give this.

This year is a special one. Yarra Trams had 80 spots available for people to put their face on a tram in support of the Appeal. I cost $250, all of which goes to the Appeal. I sent in Zac's picture and was lucky enough to be one of the first 80!! I think its pretty awesome. We should find out soon which tram and route it will be on. Personally, I would like it to be on a tram that runs past the Royal Children's Hospital or even the one that runs into North Balywn, right near where Rodger and I met. I think either option would be perfect and might just make April that little bit easier this year.