Two years ago today....

Tonight at tea time we were talking about how this time two years ago we were on the Gold Coast for Noah's wish with Make a Wish.

We had planned on going the week before Easter so that we came home on Easter Saturday. That would have given us a weeks holiday before Aaron and Jay had to go back to school. Noah had other plans though :( A couple of days before we were meant to go Noah got really, really bad gastro. We ended up having to take him to hospital as he couldn't keep anything down.

I knew there was no way we would be going on the trip and rang Make A Wish in tears telling them we couldn't go. I knew they would let us go another time and expected it to be in about 6 months or so. We had been looking forward to it for almost a year as the volunteers had come to see Noah almost a year before, approved the wish and asked us when we would like to go. We told them that we thought it would be best to go at Easter time when the weather was cooler and we had school holidays. The volunteers said that because Noah couldn't communicate a wish himself that we as a family could choose something that we knew Noah would get something out of and that we could all enjoy together. We chose a holiday as we wanted to have some really happy memories as a family together, rather than all the hospital and Drs visits that the boys were used to (since then Noah hasn't been admitted to hospital once, except to have his adenoids and tonsils out! Pretty amazing as he had been in hospital 30 times before that!).

When Noah got sick the lady from Make a Wish was so nice and said that it happens all the time - they are used to kids being sick and it didn't matter and we could go anytime we wanted - even if it was a couple of days later! We then changed it so we would leave on Wednesday instead of the previous Saturday. Noah was feeling a lot better by then, but still wasn't 100% but I wasn't sure if he would actually feel much better, so we decided to go.

It was the best holiday. The boys had a fantastic time and still talk about it today - even though Harri was only about 18 months he still remembers it (the video of it helps) and always talks about going to 'The Wiggles house again'.





Make a Wish were so wonderful. They organised a limousine to take us to the airport and pick us up, we had a hire car for the week and got to stay at a lovely hotel and they even gave us money for food. We got to go to all of the four theme parks for free and at Sea World Jay and I were treated to a free helicopter ride.

At Movie World the boys got to have a special character meeting with the character of their choice. Unfortunately Noah slept all the way through that as he wasn't feeling well that day!

Although Noah wasn't feeling great the whole week, he still had some really happy times.

When we got back we felt overwhelmed with how much Make a Wish had done for us as a family. It was a hard decision whether to ask for a wish in the first place. I had thrown out the application three times before finally posting one off. There was no way that we ever could have afforded to go on a holiday like that and were so grateful that we didn't have to worry about anything. On 'Wish Day' The Examiner ran a story about Noah's wish. Jay now thinks he is so famous! :)

A year after Noah's wish one of the volunteers rang and asked Aaron and I if we would speak at the Make a Wish ball that year. It is the organisation's biggest fundraiser for the year. We were very nervous about doing it, but agreed to do it as we felt there was never enough that we could do to thank Make a Wish for what they did for our family. I have forgotten how to embed a video from YouTube, so if you want to check out a DVD clip that we made and played at the ball you can go here.

They said it was a record for fundraising that night - raising over $13,000! They say that the average cost of a wish for children in Australia is around $10,000! Every few months I get a newsletter from Make a Wish and I love reading about the wishes that different kids get. One day (when I have more time!) I would love to be a local volunteer for Make a Wish - it would be so great to be a part of granting a wish to a child and their family.

Easter Activity

After school today we had a Primary Easter activity.Wet started off playing pass the parcel. The kids passed it around and each time the music stopped on them they had to unwrap the layer and answer the questions to do with Easter. If they didn't know the answer they had to look up the answer in their scriptures. They also got a little prize when it was their turn to unwrap.

We then played some games in the hall - egg and spoon, an egg race where they had to push the eggs along with their nose and a version of 'octopus' where the catcher was the mother hen trying to catch her chicks.


After the games the kids had a great time going on an egg hunt outside. Harri was sooooo excited!

We finished off having hot cross buns and of course they started to rip into their eggs as well. I'm not sure how many of them will eat their tea tonight! :)

Mum's group

Today I thought I would make an effort to go to the church 'Mum's group'. I am always flat out with appointments and things on and it is usually just another thing I have to go to, but I knew that Harri would really enjoy it - especially as it was at the park today.

It has been great as I now have a lot more gym buddies - Jacquie, Emma, Tammy and Belinda have all joined in the last month or so. Harri is getting to know all of their kids in the child care and today at the park he saw Lillian and said 'she's my friend!'. I told him that she was his cousin and he said 'no - she's my friend!'. He then ran around with Eli the whole time and kept saying 'friend, friend' when he was trying to get his attention.

It was such a hot day again today, but Harri loved running around and having lots of friends to play with.

A visit from Deke

Another reason Jalen loves being in grade 3 is that this year his class have epals. Jay's whole class each have a child in a school in Canada that they get to email regularly throughout the year. Jay's epal's name is Chase. Jay's teacher has sent the Canadian class a Tassie Devil soft toy and the class from Canada has sent Jay's class a little teddy with a Canadian emblem on it, which the class has named 'Deke'.

Each night one of the kids from Jay's class gets to take Deke home for the night. When they take him home they have to write in the class journal what they have done with Deke as well as take photos. They then publish their work at school with the photos and put in a folder to keep as a record of Deke's time with the class. It is funny reading what some of the kids have done with this teddy bear! He has been lots of places around Tassie and has had his photo taken with Kookaburra's, up gum trees, and at the beach.

Tonight I'm sure Deke had a very interesting experience in the King house. He watched Jalen do some homework on the computer,

played on the Wii,

had a ride in Noah's wheelchair,

helped feed Noah,

and hung out with the boys.

Memories

Today we had a visit from Clare who just got back from an awesome trip to Hawaii with Sam. It was nice to catch up as we don't get to see each other very often anymore, and it was even better as she bought us back some Peanut Butter Cups :)

When I lived in the US I practically lived on Peanut Butter Cups! At an apartment block near where I lived was a vending machine, and I was always ducking over there to get some peanut butter cups at all hours of the day and night! Not good at all - and no wonder I came back a lot bigger than when I left!

After I got home you could get them for a little while at Coles, but they mustn't have been that popular as they were only around for a little while and now it is very hard to get them. Chrish always rubs it in though when he finds a shop in Sydney that sells them!

Thanks Sam and Clare for bringing back some great memories and helping me to feed the baby some sugar :) There are not many left!

School Fair

Today was Punchbowl Primary School's 'Easter Fair'. Jalen has been excited about it for weeks and this morning I said to Harri that after school we would go to the 'school fair' and Harri quickly corrected me and said 'no Mum - it's the Easter fair!'.

The boys had a great time doing the usual things - rides, jumping castle, games and food.





We gave Jalen some money that he could spend at the fair and he took off with his friends and we hardly saw him the whole time.

The funniest thing was that he came up to me and asked me for $2.50 so he could go on the little cars. I asked him if he had already spend his money and he said 'no - I just don't want to waste my money!'. He would much rather waste mine instead!! :)

Aaron took Harri and Noah home after a little while and I did a shift on the ice cream, fairy floss and popcorn stall. It was such a hot day and the ice creams in a cone were a disaster. As soon as we would put the ice cream on the cone it would start melting. Our 'crazy bunny' ice creams definitely looked crazy as their eyes were falling off and their teeth were dripping off! Jay and I walked home at 7.30pm with about ten containers of free fruit salad that we scored as it was left over. Now we will be eating fruit salad all weekend to get rid of it - guess it is better than the fairy floss, popcorn and jacket potato that I polished off! :)

Twenty Nine and Half Weeks

Everyone is asking to see photos of my pregnant tummy, so here it is! I hate photos of myself, so this is as good as it gets :)

I am now twenty nine and a half weeks and feel absolutely huge. It scares me to think I still have ten weeks to go (although it is most likely really 12 weeks) and wonder how big I will be by the end of it! I have low blood pressure so every now and then I have huge head spins, feel like I am going to faint and am really tired, but most of the time I feel pretty good.

I am still going to the gym regularly, but have had to change the classes I'm doing so I'm not getting my heart rate up too high. I am still doing Pump three times a week (weights class) which makes me laugh as I often hit my tummy when I move the bar up and down. I have had to lower my weights and take it easier which has been really hard, but the instructors are onto me all the time and also my body has pretty much told me what I can and can't handle.