Attacked by an Octopus!

Jalen walked in the door after school with a sad look on his face. I asked him what happened and he spun around and showed me his face. They were playing 'Octopus' and he fell over and he said Tennyson accidentally stood on his face! He also had a bleeding lip. I got the camera out and he quickly said 'I'm not going to smile!'.

Big Brother

It's funny watching Noah's reaction to Kobe whenever they are close by. Noah's vision isn't great, but whenever Kobe is around he always looks at him - usually wondering what all the noise is, coming from such a little thing!

Soon he will have to get used to him crawling over him and pulling at his face like Harri used to when he was little. It's strange watching your baby develop so fast, and then seeing them do more than Noah.

Noah has been assessed at being at a 3 month old level, so Kobe and Noah are almost at the same stage already. We always refer to Noah as being our 'baby in a boys body' and we love him that way. People will sometimes make comments like they are 'sorry' for us, but we aren't sorry we have him. We always say that he is the best boy out of the 4 of them! We always know where he is, he never answers back or argues, he never fights with his brothers and never chucks a tantrum. Aaron always complains though that he also never helps to clean up his room (which is also our bedroom!), but then one day Jalen quickly reminded Aaron that he also never messes it up!!! :)

The 'Little' Things

This afternoon I just about freaked out when Kobe decided to start rolling onto his side. Having a child with a disability you forget that babies are supposed to be doing things like smiling, 'talking' and rolling and when it actually happens you think they are soooo amazing! :) It makes you really appreciate all the little 'normal' things that they do.

Swing

Today Di had Noah's indoor swing up for him to use, so I thought I would see what Kobe thought of it. He loved looking at the beautiful mobile that Di had bought back from Malaysia, earlier in the year.

Grandma is Home

Today Mum came home after spending two weeks in Sydney with Chrish. I asked the boys if they wanted to come to the airport to pick her up and Jay and Harri both jumped at the chance. Harri was excited to see her and straight after he gave her a cuddle he asked her if she had brought down Uncle Chrish's Mario Kart game for the Wii! I think he wanted to come to the airport just to make sure she didn't forget it!

Mum said Kobe had grown lots, just in two weeks. He was so cute - chatting away to her.


Lots has happened in two weeks, and she was going home to meet little Lachlan. Hopefully in the next couple of weeks Chrish will also be down.

Purple Hats

Tonight at church we had our Relief Society, Gratitude Dinner. The night was based on the following:

The Years Of A Woman

Age 3: She looks at herself and sees a Queen.

Age 8: She looks at herself and sees Cinderella.

Age 15: She looks at herself and sees an Ugly Sister (Mum I can't go to school looking like this!)

Age 20: She looks at herself and sees "too fat/too thin, too short/too tall, too straight/too curly"- but decides she's going out anyway.

Age 30: She looks at herself and sees "too fat/too thin, too short/too tall, too straight/too curly" - but decides she doesn't have time to fix it, so she's going out anyway.

Age 40: She looks at herself and sees "clean" and goes out anyway.

Age 50: She looks at herself and sees "I am" and goes wherever she wants to go.

Age 60: She looks at herself and reminds herself of all the people who can't even see themselves in the mirror anymore. Goes out and conquers the world.

Age 70: She looks at herself & sees wisdom, laughter and ability, goes out and enjoys life.

Age 80: Doesn't bother to look. Just puts on a PURPLE hat and goes out to have fun with the world.

Everyone was asked to either wear a purple hat or something purple to go along with the theme of the night. It was all about feeling happy about how we are right NOW and not comparing ourselves to others. It was a great night that Kym had organised for us. First of all we had three different workshops - Annette took one about using accessories to change the way we look, including makeup (thanks to her beautiful model - Sarah!). Bonnie took one on healthy eating and exercise - giving us some very graphic examples of how much fat and sugar are in different things -not something that I wanted to know after pigging into chocolate last night! Ellen talked to us about how our attitudes can make a big difference in how we are feeling.

After the workshops Kym gave us an excellent presentation about how we shouldn't compare ourselves to others but be the best person that we can be and set goals. We then headed into the hall for a beautiful three course meal that was made by the men and served by the Young Men!


It was nice to catch up with Jade and Sarah on my table, as I haven't caught up with them for a long time.


Everyone had lots of fun eating and enjoying each others company.


During dinner the Young Women put on a fashion parade for us which highlighted different times in our lives, from childhood, growing up, getting an education, getting married and having children.


Annette cracked us all up at the end coming out with her purple wig.


We finished off the night with some beautiful cupcakes with purple icing.

Getting Fast

Jalen has been practicing his Stacking Cups flat out for weeks. His teacher now runs a Stacking Cups Club on Fridays during lunch time at school. Heaps of kids have caught onto the craze at school and now has stacking cups at home, so they all bring them along and have relays and contests with them. Those who don't have them can still come along and join in. Jay is so excited about it as their class are the 'club leaders' and come up with ideas of what to do for the following week.

Jay and Harri have been watching the DVD that comes with the cups and learning the different techniques. Jay was very proud to show everyone in his class how to do 'The Cycle'. He often has a crowd around him every morning, watching how he does it. He thinks it is great! His teacher has said that his handwriting has improved a lot lately. I'm sure using the cups so much has been helping with his motor skills.