At the Lake - Easter Weekend

Here is Jamie after he had taken his Poppa for a spin on the Lake.


After a ride on the "Skurf" board..

Did I ever mention the $1000 worth of marine accessories we won? When we insured the jet ski we went into a draw. And we were the lucky winners! I was in the newspaper and everything, a photo of me receiving the voucher. Amongst the things we got were some cool life jackets. The Skurf board however, was bought at a garage sale!

Jamie's Graduation

Here is a snap of Jamie and Cruz from their graduation at the end of February. It took some serious photo shopping and I'm still not sure its quite right!

House Update #1

Our working plans are complete - we picked them up last Thursday. We will submit them to the Council this week some time.

Jamie also dropped them off to our builder Chris today. He is going to do a quote for us, but we probably won't get it for a month.

Easter & such..

First up, I must tell you I have no photos to post! Sorry. I did take the camera with me on my Easter travels but I didn't get snapping.

We had a great Easter weekend. We started off by having friends around on Good Friday for breakfast. Me and Jamie cooked breakfast for 10 adults in our tiny kitchen with 3 frypans running! It was a great start to the weekend.

In the afternoon Jamie & Lachie went up to Lake Rotoma with the jet ski. I stayed home so Fletcher could have a nap and also so that we weren't running around like headless chickens before our dinner with Mum & Dad and the Wintersons.

It was great to catch up with the parentals over yorkshire puddings....& brownie & icecream...

Saturday - another lake day!! It was such a great day. The weather just got better and better. Me Jamie & Paul had lots of fun zipping around on the jet ski and towing each other on the sea biscuit etc. I had a nice swim after my last sea biscuit of the day. I didn't want to leave!! Maybe we'll get one more day like that in before its too cold.

Monday we went up to Galatea where a friend of Jamie's from work lives. They had got us a bunch of firewood so we went to collect that.

In other news....

* I am getting braces to put on my teeth at the end of April. Its to correct my bite and make room for a tooth coming through.

* Also at the end of April, I will be looking after our niece Chelsea every Friday, while Mel goes back to work.

Lachie's awake! Better go.

Remember this?

Remember this?

I've been leaving it so long between posts, I have to check my blog to see what I wrote last!

I got home from work about 12.30pm, and Jamie just went off to work - the 2pm til 10pm shift. He is loving work. He got called out at 2.30am Saturday morning and had a great few hours tracking people down...then he went and cut firewood for the morning! That was probably a good thing because it kept him going for the rest of the day.

Lachlan went to his Nana and Grandad's on Friday afternoon - a spur of the moment thing. Nana called in to say hello and he asked if he could go home with her. So he did! Uncle Paul & Auntie Mel brought him home on Sunday.

Looking forward to Easter weekend - we'll just be around I think. Hopefully the jet ski will get a run.

Lollipops!

How cute is this kid??!!

Today me Jamie & the boys had a day out. We went to Tauranga and took the boys to Lollipops Play land. It is a great little set up there. Unfortunately my boys weren't feeling too adventurous, so we mainly stayed off the fun looking climbing tower with tunnels and slides. They were more in to the merry go round, the digger, the ride in cars and the play house.

It was our first Sunny Saturday in a few weeks. Me & the boys headed out this morning about 9.30 while Jamie slept in from his night shift. We spent a good while at the play ground and then came home via the sushi shop. I might make sushi my Saturday treat. A store opened in town a few a couple of months ago, though I only found out about it 3 weeks ago (shows how much I go to town). Anyway every week I go there I think the sushi gets better! Hopefully they do well so they don't close down (like the squillions of eateries at that premises have).

After the boys naps me Jamie & Lachie went over to the Harbour for a cruise on the jet ski. Fletcher went to his friend Connor's house. Lachie was supposed to go to a friend's as well, so me & Jamie could have "couple time" but they phoned back and cancelled. Anyway, it was lovely out on the water. Jamie thinks the jet ski is running well since its service at the beginning of the week. And I backed the trailer down on to the boat ramp! Luckily its really wide...

We got our TV out of storage yesterday. We can only watch DVDs and VCR though because there is no cabling to hook up the TV in the bedroom it is in. That's OK though. So I watched "Becoming Jane" last night, which wasn't very worth while.

Jamie's last night shift tonight, and then a few days off! I'm off to bake some cookies.

An Update!

It is very quiet at my place at the moment - all the boys are asleep - Jamie included!

Jamie has been on night shift since Monday night - 7pm til 3am. He has been going really well - caught his first crim with the dog on Tuesday night! Its a bit of a mission keeping the boys quiet in the mornings - although Tuesday & Wednesday we were out of the house as part of our usual routine anyway. In our new house our bedroom is the farthest point from the kids living room so that will be great.

Speaking of new houses....we have booked in Chris Ballantyne to do the build. He has a great reputation for good workmanship. Also a property developer bloke we know (Lance) has offered to project manage the build for a small fee. He is building a house across the street so that is going to be incredibly convenient! Lance has already done a job for us - we have to get our house plans signed off by Ian Lysaght, the Coastlands developer. Jamie met with them last week and it didn't go so well - they didn't seem very happy - but Lance just phoned to say that he has spoken with Ian and everything is all go!

So, proposed timeline for the house is: final drawings done in March, plans in Council in April/May, costings done after that.....should be ready to go by August/September.

On the potty training front, things are going very well. After two days of staying home doing "intensive training" we were out much of the weekend. Lachlan did great - he went to the toilet at the Ohope Craft Market on Saturday, then at Riley's house, then we went out for dinner to friends' and he went on their toilet too!! And of course church on Sunday. He hasn't had any accidents since....Tuesday. However, we are still working on the POO front! But he's doing so good with everything else, I'm not stressing about that (which is a miracle for me!). And all with the help of the book "Potty Training in Less than a Day" by Mr Azrin & Mr Fox (although it was a bit longer for us!)

Thank you Grandma, for the potty training present, which arrived yesterday. I was at work but Lachie phoned me from home to tell me the wonderful things he got. I just checked on him to see if he was asleep, but he was gazing at Mater (still fully packaged)!

Here are the boys the other night playing nicely together with the blocks. Note Lachlan's red undies!!

Fletcher

This morning Fletcher was out much of the morning with Dad while me and Lachie potty trained. In the afternoon we dug out Lachie's bike from the garage - Fletcher was more interested than Lachie I think! Anyway he is great at holding on and loves being pushed around on it. He even managed to get himself on the seat! Here he is watching Dad and Cruz playing around. I thought all the pictures were so cute I had to put them all up.

Fletcher is proving himself very err... strong willed. He was having hissy fits over sharing the bike with Lachlan. Then tonight he had a hissy fit over dinner - then I realised he wanted to feed himself. So he held the spoon and graciously allowed me to guide his hand & the spoon from the bowl to his mouth!!

Potty training Part 2!

We have had another day of great success! By the end of today Lachie has been telling us when he needs to go potty - tonight after dinner I even sent him off by himself! The other great thing is that it seems he has transitioned to the toilet! He has been great using the potty, and I don't mind it. Its just that going out of the house gets a little tricky. I didn't really want to take the potty to church on Sunday!

Anyway, ages ago we bought a seat insert for the toilet seat. I gave him a try on it this afternoon and he loved it! We even went to the gas station and the library this afternoon (just for half an hour) and we had no accidents!

I hope tomorrow we will have more of the same!

One Way Ticket to UndieVille

At long long last I have decided to toilet train Lachlan. I tried several months ago but quickly decided that I was not ready! But I realised I really needed to get on to it after he turned 3. There is no going back now!

Jamie took Fletcher out most of the morning so me and Lachie could have some one on one training time. There have been a number of accidents, but lots of success too! Most notable of these being that he did a poo on the potty, and also he told me that he wanted to go potty and once he was on, did the business! He's done so great and I am so impressed with him!

More of the same tomorrow!

The Final Countdown...

yes, hum the tune with me now. I think I used to finish a step aerobics class to that tune. Knee repeaters everybody!

Anyhoo..

Jamie is home tomorrow. He graduated from his course today! I am so proud of him and can't wait for him to be home and start work! Although the week's holiday before that will be great too. Jamie over-ran his goal to be a dog handler by age 30 by three days. (I think it still counts!)

Finalised our house plans this week - got the quote from the architect today for the working drawings. We will talk to builders next week....it's starting to happen! It would be nice to start soon, but we have discussed September as a start date for the build.

Did a smidgen of work from home just now....also we are thinking about starting a family trust so I played around preparing a few documents for that.

Beautiful Fletcher

Yesterday morning me and Fletcher went for a walk. It was a bit chilly, so together with a sweater and pants, I put proper shoes on him for the first time ever! He thought he was pretty cool. After his nap yesterday afternoon, he brought the shoes to me and wanted them on. Doesn't he look cute?

Here he is on Sunday afternoon, after a biiiiiig nap. He's so gorgeous I just had to get out the camera.

At the Lake ...Again

Well its all quiet at my place.

We went up to the lake this morning, this time with the Wintersons & Dean & Gaynoll. The weather was a bit iffy, but in between the showers it was great! Nice not to be up there allll day though.

Lachie is staying with his grandparents for a few nights from today - so I left him at the Lake with his grandad.

Fletcher is having a sleep after a big day and I should be getting ready for Megan's 30th birthday party tonight. It is a uniform/costume party so I am going in a soccer uniform. Martin & Sarah are looking after Fletcher for me and I am also going to spend the night at their place. Hopefully I enjoy the party even though I am going SOLO!

We are back!

Its been about two and a half weeks since I have posted. From the 29th of January to 2nd of February we enjoyed a trip to Poppa and Grandma's at Havelock North with our cousins. Here are a few pictures.

Other than that we have just been doing the usual routine!

More again soon.

At Ocean Beach

We spent a couple of hours at the beach. Lachlan wasn't very cheerful that day, so there are no photos of him!

At Poppa's work

On Lachie's birthday, we went to the stockyard where Poppa works (Stortford Lodge or something..). It was really interesting to look around, and also to watch the stock being auctioned!

Lachie's 3rd Birthday!