Melbourne Cup

I was really excited when my tickets arrived for the Melbourne Cup on Friday last week. 

I quickly set to dress shopping, and realised that I actually had a dress in the cupboard, so just went out and bought a fascinator for the occasion. If any of you follow me on Facebook or Instagram, you also know that I set to finding out how the heck all you girls get curls to stay in all day (seriously one of my life's biggest frustrations!). 

We had a wonderful day. The crowd was bigger than any I have ever seen in my life. The noise was amazingly loud, and we got a wonderful position on the lawn, near the finish line. It's funny, as a girl who is originally from the country, I just kept wondering how on earth there could be a crowd this big and I actually not recognise ANYONE!! 

We didn't take many photos. I had no pockets in my dress, so the Mr was looking after my phone, but we took a few photos, most of which are covered in little fingers... WHOOPS! But here are the pick of the bunch.

We had such a wonderful time. And returned home by 7pm, completely exhausted and with feet full of blisters. We are so wonderfully grateful for the opportunity we had to go, and hope to get to go again some time in the future.

Oh... and in case you were wondering... YES! My curls did stay in all day.

A morning at Essendon Traffic School

Last week on Friday, Oliver's kindergarten arranged an excursion for each of the groups to head to Essendon Traffic School. We spent two whole weeks counting down the sleeps until traffic school. We were so excited that we could hardly contain it! 

Finally Friday of last week arrived. We woke up, we looked out the window, and our excitement was squashed. It was cold, it was grey, and it had been pouring rain all night with no hope of it stopping. We packed our lunches though, ready for anything and off we trotted to kinder only to be met with a big sign saying that traffic school had been CANCELLED!!  It was a relatively tragic moment for a certain little boy who had been desperately awaiting the excursion. But the cancellation didn't come as a surprise to his mother who had assumed such would occur.

Thankfully, the excursion was re-scheduled for Monday, so for Oliver, all hope was not lost, and it meant only three more sleeps until we were able to go. 

It was a LONG weekend...

Monday morning arrived, and the sun was shining! Excited and ready; off we went to kinder, put on our name badges, jumped on the bus, and headed off to traffic school!

It was blisteringly cold. But we listened to the instructor tell us all of the road rules we needed to know, and went on a walk around the track to practice them. We learned that when we get to the side of the road, we need to stop, look, listen, and think before we cross and we learned that when we are in the car, there are special rules we have to follow with the different signs and lights.

We were then fitted with helmets, or at least Oliver was, and chose the deadliest tricycle in the whole place to ride around on for a while.

We forgot that you have to ride on the left hand side of the road, and we forgot the right way to go around the round a bout, but we remembered what all of the signs meant, and also had lots of stops for petrol too.

 

Thankfully there was tea in the shed too, so nobody's mum froze in the icy cold wind. 

We all then got back on the bus, very tired, and drove back to kinder. We were so glad for the rain staying away so that we could have such a wonderful morning out. We had a wonderful time, and would really recommend it to anyone who is thinking about going. It promptly rained tiny little razors of ice on us however, as soon as we stepped off the bus; soaking us through and leaving us in need of two minute noodles and tea to warm us up. Along with dry clothes and underwear!

We're now counting sleeps until the crazy hair disco. Two to go!

using your imagination

Today was awfully cold and wet here in Melbourne. I spent the majority of my morning looking for, and subsequently hanging out in, a laundromat. But it was full of good company and I met a few sweet others who had broken washing machines as well, or simply needed to use the dryers.

This afternoon, my kids seemed so bored sitting around watching television so I made them get up and go do something else. After a little while we heard them opening two packets of UNO stacko. We started to stop them, but thought... what the heck, let them go and create some mess, some fun, and see what they come up with! 

**Please excuse my iPhone photos, sometimes these action shots don't happen if you have to run off to find a camera!**

This is a castle for a queen according to my kids. I love it how they can make up an entire scenario with their imaginations and run with it. After they knocked this down, they made a throne for the cat. She ran away as soon as they made their intentions known.

This is something I think I can learn from my kids. Your imagination is the only limit you set for yourself, and if you put a cap on it, you are only limiting your potential. So many times I focus on the "what if's" in my mind rather than running with my ideas and the possibilities that they hold. In my kids' case, if we had put a cap on their imagination, the cat possibly wouldn't have a throne...

What do your kids do when it is rainy?

winter

 

You know that winter has officially arrived when the frosts start. This was the frost that we had on Thursday morning here, we've had a few better ones since.

As much as winter chills me to the bones and makes my arthritis ache like no tomorrow, there is something amazing and beautiful in those little icicles that sit on our grass every morning. It really makes me sit back and think about the beautiful world that we live in.

The other way you know that winter has officially arrived is that it becomes soup season. Each week, after I do my groceries, I love to make up a big batch of soup and this week was no exception.

This week's soup of choice was zucchini and potato. 

(3 Zucchinis, 3 Potatoes, Onion, Garlic and chicken stock all simmered and then blended up.)

It was supposed to go into the fridge to make up some lunches this week. But it looked and smelled so fantastic that we ate it for dinner that night. 

I really am a sucker for soup.
What is your favorite flavor?

adventuring

Saturday turned out to be a beautiful day here in Melbourne. So after calisthenics photo morning finished up for Miss-R we packed a picnic and headed out to Werribee Open Range Zoo for an afternoon in the sunshine and fresh air.

I love that the zoos here in Melbourne are all about promoting animal conservation and fighting extinction rather than just putting animals in cages for people to stare at. This teaches our kids to value the animals that we have and look after them for the future. They even have a project where you can recycle your old mobile phones to help save the gorillas. A good idea for all of you who have just upgraded to the iphone5!! I have a few envelopes around here that I intend to fill. It gets rid of all those old mobile phones laying around too!!

We enjoyed eating our picnic lunch out on the grass and the kids loved the fact that there were lots of other kids willing to play with them. Apparently everyone else had the same idea as us and the carpark was actually full when we got there. The zoo staff are wonderful though and were parking cars in a field close by. Even though there were lots of people at the zoo, it didn't seem crowded which meant I wasn't stressed out all afternoon about losing the kids.

We went on a safari after lunch. For those who haven't been to Werribee Zoo, they have all of the animals in BIG enclosures sorted by their country, so there's an arabic enclosure, an african enclosure etc. This is included in your ticket price and they book you in at the gate making it very family friendly, no massive pushy lines and no extra money to fork out for safari bus tickets.

Miss-R noticed as we were going through past the giraffes that one of them was licking his nostril. She tells me that this is because he has no fingers to get out the boogers. (SO CUTE!!)

There are a lot of endangered animals at the zoo and the zoo does have lots of breeding programs to try to build up their numbers which is great.

The zoo also has an area set up called the village dance party. There's a big screen, music, dancing and pots and pans to play. This was lots of fun for the kids after our safari. 

We also got to look for dinosaur bones.

All in all, it was a great afternoon out and with the zoo not being far from our house it wasn't a long drive and I am considering becoming a member of the zoo so that I can take them more often not only to Werribee zoo, but also the others around Victoria.

Do you like to go to the zoo?
What is your favourite animal to visit?

a sunny saturday

Well at least that is the forecast... so today I plan on taking my kidlettes on an outing to the zoo.

 source

On weekends and school holidays the kids get in for free, so it's really quite an affordable adventure (and its just down the road too!). 

I'm sure I will have many photos to show off tomorrow too.

What are you up to today?

Do you have any awesome school holiday activities?

midweek musings

When I step outside my house at the moment, I smell Spring and it is beautiful.

Spring time makes me think of New life. Promises. Warmth. 

We go for our morning walk and we smell flowers growing and freshly cut grass. We hear birds chirping and frogs singing to each other. We see our noses all red from the crisp air as it is still quite cool here when the sun is behind clouds.

We go for a drive and a few streets away we can see the baby lambs in the fields.

I go out in our back yard and I see that the trees are growing new shoots.

New flowers are growing on the branches too.

Our beetroot is also getting bigger and should be ready to move into the garden bed in the next few days.

Springtime makes me think about how grateful I am for the four seasons that we have. After the cold, fruitless winter, comes the spring, the promise of new things to come. The promise of growth. The promise that it wont stay cold forever.

We're still wearing our jumpers and track pants, but Spring brings the promise that soon we will swap our boots for thongs and our jumpers for singlets. For now I am enjoying the smells and sounds and sights of the beautiful season that is upon us. I am enjoying the promise of the growth and fruitfulness that is to come.

What is your favorite thing about Springtime?

Sunday Snippets

 

Joining in with Tinniegirl for Sunday Snippets.

hump day...

Wednesdays are generally a fairly busy day for me and Mr-O and today is no exception.

 We've been to story time at the local library for some stories, singing and craft...

We've been and done the week's grocery shop, every little boy's favorite chore...

Now we've sat down and had a deliciously healthy lunch (well mine was, Mr-O had noodles), and I'm enjoying a cup of chai while I write away and he watches movies having a little rest.

 I also have to read some of this before we walk to the school to pick up Miss-R. 

I also made a promise to Miss-R that I'd make her a new skirt for her casual dress day on Friday at school for the end of term. I was thinking of this one.

I won this pattern last year on Toni's blog when it was released and I am yet to use it. This might just be my chance... especially since I bought a bunch of new patterns yesterday that accidentally fell in my cart when looking at them online.

Good news on our heater, it should be fixed soon! Hooray! Last night was apparently Melbourne's coldest night in 8 years, no wonder all 5 of us (that's counting the cat who snuggled in) were in our bed this morning!

Anyway, I best be off to be a good girl, read my textbooks so I can get some crafty time in later. 

Hope your Wednesday is wonderful.

winter warming...

We're heading for a top of 12 degrees Celsius here in Melbourne today. Normally I would say that was fine - we live in Melbourne, if I wanted tropical I should move to Cairns or something. But this is the extent of heating we have at the moment in our house...

Excuse my dodgy photography - a fan heater isn't exactly the most wonderful model.

It's been one of those annoying, niggly weeks here at our place. Our dishwasher died on Friday as well as a bunch of other annoying little things. But the icing on the cake happened yesterday.

Yesterday morning we awoke to the wonderful smell of electrical smoke in our house, smoke alarms went off and the power went out. We grabbed our coats and raced out the front and called the fire brigade who came along and after some investigating, told us that our heater malfunctioned - the fan broke or something (I don't pretend to understand these kinds of things) causing a small fire (I think) Pretty sure when we turned off the heater it went out, they didn't need to break out any hoses. 

Basically - our house didn't burn down - hooray!! But my heater is broken - poo!! I am grateful that the house didn't burn down, don't get me wrong - so so so so so grateful!! I will be changing my habit of leaving the heater on low overnight in winter and just turning it off. Not worth the risk!

So Mr-O and I sit here in front of my little fan heater. We'll put on our jackets and scarves and beanies until we are warm. I'm sure once the sun is out we will be more able to keep the house warm, so long as we don't leave this room...

Hope your day is full of sunshine and warmth...