Archive for May, 2011

17 months old


25 May

Posted in Development, Toby's second year | No Comments »

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Toby is using more and more words, and has a really pleased look on his face when we understand him. He uses the word ‘stuck’ on it’s own, or calls out ‘Mummy stuck’ to let me know he needs help. It happens most when trying to get in the back door and the wire door closes on his leg.

Toby is sleeping 11 – 12 hours at night (he still wakes a lot) and 45 minutes to an hour and a half during the day. His day nap has been slowly moving from 10:30 am and is now generally around midday.

Toby seems to be becoming less destructive in general, and trying more to manipulate tools instead. His is much more aware of the things he wants, and will hold something and repeat “mine” if he thinks that Nathan is going to take it away from him…which is generally what happens anyway.

Looking for creatures


22 May

Posted in In the garden, Nathan the preschooler, Toby's second year | No Comments »

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In an attempt to tame the garden, we bought a whipper snipper recently (Andrew jokes it was my Mother’s Day gift). After an afternoon with the new toy, our front lawn and nature strip look much neater, so I was back to battling with the roses in the mild afternoons that we had last week. The boys found a rather messy, and unique, way to entertain themselves.

Nathan and Toby love looking in the drain at the end of our driveway where it joins the footpath. Many times I have asked them to leave the cover on, but they always take it off. On Thursday when I was busy trying to cut dead wood out of a very prickly rose, they got to work on the drain by taking the cover off the entire length (4 sections of cover) and were digging in the moist dirt they found in the drain. I asked Nathan what they were doing, and he told me they were looking for creatures.

There were probably some little beetles in there….I didn’t look. But they really hit pay-dirt when they found a big, fat worm. Longer than our worm farm worms and nearly the thickness of my little finger, they kids found it really interesting. They found about 5 in the drain all up and one in the ground when we dug it a little in preparation to relocate the drain worms.

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Sea turtle top


16 May

Posted in Nathan the preschooler, Sewing | 3 Comments »

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I am now retiring this pattern, for now anyway. I didn’t plan to make Nathan yet another top with this pattern, but when he wanted a top with an airplane appliqué like Toby I relented and compromised with a sea turtle appliqué. Like the aeroplane applique, it is another free pattern from Helping Little Hands.

So here it is. I have mum to thank for doing the French Knot for the turtle’s eye….thanks Mum! The outer fabric I used on this jumper was a cotton French Terry with 5% Lycra and it was very stretchy. I found it quite difficult to sew until I realized that releasing the tension on the machine foot helps to stop the fabric stretching as I sew, and I have now read that using a walking foot might help….time to find my walking foot, I think! The only bit that I’m really quite unhappy with is that the hood stretched so much when sewing the binding on. On the other hand, I am really happy with the stitching around the pocket openings, sleeve hems (can’t see them in the photos since Nathan has them rolled up to deal with the extra length of the size 104 top on a 95 cm tall boy) and bottom hem. I have been lusting after a coverstitch machine for ages, but I think I am getting better at sewing knit fabrics without one (though I am never happy with the results from using a double needle on t-shirt hems).

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Fifty cents


08 May

Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments »

I just bought five chicken carcasses (for making chicken stock) which weighed in at about a kilogram, for fifty cents. I have been astounded at how much chicken carcasses cost near where we live. The most expensive I have found has been $2.50 a kilo, but usually it has been around $2.00.

Fifty cents…..what a bargain!

Responsibility to nurture


07 May

Posted in Parenting styles | No Comments »

Being parents gives us the responsibility to nurture, not the right to control.

I came across this quote tonight. It was attributed to Dr. Laura Markham, and I really like it. I Googled her to see what she does and discovered that she is a clinical psychologist who specialises in relationship-based parenting.

The battle zone


04 May

Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »

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A battle zone is what the garden is at the moment. Every day the kids and I spend some time in the front garden, making war with the roses. I do think that roses are lovely flowers, and I particularly like the ones that have a strong scent. I even like the look of rosehips in the garden after the flowers are long gone. However, I hate growing roses, and that might seem an odd statement given that there are at least 16 rose plants on our property (maybe even 20) and more on our common ground. I hate the black spot and aphid problems that they get before they even start flowering, but that is nothing compared to my hatred of pruning them.

I acquired seven rose plants when I purchased this house some 12 years ago. The tenant who lived here for 9 years more than tripled the number of roses in the garden. I have since given some to loving homes, and now that autumn is in full swing it is time to wage war with those that remain. I have scratches and splinters in my hands after my first pruning sessions. I try so hard to concentrate on not being spiked by those sharp prickles while part of my mind is trying to keep enough attention on the kids to see that they don’t run onto the road or do anything else dangerous. For the most part, the boys run around the garden, do loops from the front lawn, down the driveway, along the footpath and back up to the front lawn by using past a few rose bushes. Sometimes they get stuck on the prickliest of the roses as they push past them. Toby is obsessed with picking the remaining flowers and rose hips off the plants (and eating the rose hips), while Nathan just wants to cut things with either the secateurs or pruning saw.

I think it is going to take me a long time to prune the roses how I think they should be pruned (in contrast to how they have been pruned for the last 9 years), and there are a lot more scratches and splinters in store for me. Then again, I do have a gardening fork or two in the shed…..though some of the bushes are so fierce that I probably couldn’t even dig them up without injury to myself! Eh, I may as well just plod along with the pruning. Wish me luck……or at least some patience and perseverance.

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Aeroplane appliqué


04 May

Posted in Sewing, Toby's second year | 1 Comment »

I'm just cheeky.

Yet another light jumper for Toby. This time I used a dark colored fabric that will hopefully not look dirty as quickly as the other two I made. I used the same fabrics as those in Nathan’s airplane top, but reversed them and have the aeroplanes on the inside this time. To liven up the plain outer layer a bit, I decided to try an airplane appliqué on the front. I found the pattern here on this helping little hands blog. I’m pleased with how it turned out, despite sewing it to the wrong side of the navy layer before getting it right. Nathan is now asking for a top the same, so I am resigned to making him another hoodie, though (he doesn’t know it yet) I am going to do a sea turtle appliqué instead of an aeroplane, with some bright yellow and blue sea-theme jersey on the inside.

The photos below are complete with yoghurt remains from breakfast and dribbles from Toby’s drink bottle.

Aeroplanes in the hood.

Yet another new top

Apple Ear


01 May

Posted in Funny things, Toby's second year | 1 Comment »

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While we were traveling back to Melbourne in the car, we lost some altitude and my ears ‘popped’. Toby grizzled and pointed to his ear, so I gave him an apple and told him to take a bite, chew chew chew and swallow to help his ear. The apple would help his ear, is what I told him. So he took a bite and then put the apple on his ear. I guess it was pretty easy to misinterpret those words.

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