Hello the Outside World

The kitty has had a big couple of days. Friday he went to the vet to be vaccinated, micro-chipped and castrated. He recovered very quickly, came home and ate and played as per normal. Gosh his little shaved .. er... area... looks peculiar though. Saturday we gave him his very first collar. It's still on him too, although he got the bell off. (Bertie Wooster the badass had his first collar off in under an hour, and then went on to 'lose' several collars in his short life.) And then today, Sunday, we let Basil outside for the first time. He had a very big look around, and frankly, he thought I took him inside way too soon.



It was very interesting out there.



See the big block of vacant land behind Cherub in this next picture? The neighbour's shed was actually the fence between our properties and now it's all been demolished we're left with this gaping hole. So handy for robbers. On the bright side, the boys had spectacular fun this morning playing in the mud there. Climber's white Dunlop Volleys are now officially the Worst Shoes In The World.



Seeing as there's no real way of keeping the kitty confined to our property he will only be going outside with supervision at the moment. One visit to the vet is quite enough for the time being!

Basil The Cat Q&A

WHAT'S WITH THE NAME?
Our last kitty was called Bertie Wooster, which was a name I absolutely LOVED. It was really hard to think of a name that could live up to that, especially because Cherub kept nagging me: he needed the name NOW. So I was harassed-ly flicking through my mental library of well-known literary or real or film/tv characters and Basil Fawlty cropped up. Basil seemed like a good name. When he's naughty I can do my Sybil Fawlty impersonation. Basil! We most definitely do not say Bay-sil in Australia.



WHERE DID YOU GET HIM?
We got the new kitty from a breeder in Macclesfield, which is a long drive from our house, all the way to the Dandenongs. His breeder was recommended to us by Bertie's breeder, and I'd been watching the ad for him for a couple of weeks while I agonised over whether we could afford him, in light of the great motorcycle disaster. Of course, we can't, not really. But he was still there after a couple of weeks, so I figured it was meant to be. He is, after all, a lilac burmese.



The family who sold him to us had 3 very nice boy-children and such was their rapport with my kids that the Climber and their eldest boy exchanged email addresses and have been sending each other little messages all day. It also turned out that the family ran an online toy shop so I was able to buy the kids a Sonic Screwdriver at the same time, because I have started letting the kids watch Doctor Who this year. It scared them so much the first time that Cherub was glued to my lap and Climber was awake from 12.30am to 2am that first time, but they've got the hang of it now.


Doctor Climber attacks a Dalek-Cherub with the Sonic Screwdriver

WHAT SORT OF CAT IS HE?
Basil is a Burmese cat, they make extra good pets because they are so friendly and clever and affectionate and playful. Even better, he is a lilac Burmese, which considering the whole purple fixation I have going on, made him fairly irresistible to me. He even has a purple nose.

HOW'S HE SETTLING IN?
Really well, considering he's just been ripped from his home, his mother and his many kitten friends and siblings. He seems to have a really sweet nature, not so much of the bad-ass attitude of the last puss. He's successfully acquainted himself with the litter-tray (after having an accident on the sheepskin rug I'd given him to make him feel comfortable). He's eating, he's cuddling, he's slept on Cherub's bed, he's played. He's just lovely actually. He's not 100% at home yet, but he's doing really well.

WHAT'S HE LIKE?
Teeny. Soft. He has a croaky meow like a creaky door. Extremely pretty. Smoochy. Still a bit nervous, but getting braver.



ARE THE KIDS HAPPY?
Oh yeah, baby.

The family fridge gets a make-over.

Defrosting the fridge is Fixit's job. Always. As is fitting a new door seal, although it is my job to order the door-seal from the internet.

(He said don't show a photo of me wearing that stupid Harley shirt, people will think I like them. He doesn't okay? He got the shirt free from his previous place of employment, and wears it only for doing chores.)



Mopping the floor after the fridge is defrosted is usually my job.
Fair's fair.
I'd rather mop than defrost.

Deciding to clean up and re-arrange the magnets was not so much a job as an exercise in fun for me.


Numeric and alphabetic order, if you don't mind.

I like a fridge full of magnets and photos. Especially those alphabet and number magnets, I couldn't wait to have children so we could get some.

Well, all right.

That's a slight exaggeration.

I'm a big fan of Judy Horacek's work. I also have some tea-towels and an apron by her.



We already owned these very cool penguin magnets and I quite enjoy finding them in different positions on the fridge following Cherub's sporadic magnet-play sessions.



The cat magnets were some retail-therapy in the wake of Bertie Wooster's continued disappearance.



They are no longer sitting in a neat line, though. They were dispersed around the fridge-face the instant Cherub discovered them.

I decided to put this photo of Cherub and my cousin into one of the magnetic frames during the course of the clean-up. No point to having a magnetic frame if you don't put a photo in it, hey?



By the time I got round to photographing my handiwork the Cherub had vetoed this decision. In his opinion it was no good, because you couldn't see all of the photo.



I do like that he took matters into his own hands though, rather than just whining to the management.



I also think his love of magnet re-arranging may have come directly from me. Can you spot the kitties now?

Meanwhile, the Fixit genes are strong with this one.

In which I say Rest-in-Peace but hope I'm proved wrong

I feel slightly guilty to be constantly banging on about the missing badcat, but it's pretty much the main thing going on round here, in my mind at least. I had an enormous big private weep for him last night and maybe that helped a bit. Today I was at least and at last able to shrug off the inertia of my sadness and start to bring my house back into order. I swept and mopped the (disgusting from last night's Great Fridge Defrosting) floor today and this led me to the discovery of a couple of little catty toys (a jingle ball and his favourite, a pipe-cleaner) and then I looked down at the cat-food dish with the dried food in it (in case he arrived back when we were out) and I thought well, I may as well pack that up too. So, in the spirit of cleaning up, I want to commit to the record:

• That Bertie Wooster used to love Climber's football socks and used to steal them - and only them- out of Climber's sock draw and leave them in odd locations round the house. Occasionally we'd catch a glimpse of him carrying the enormous socks in his little cat mouth, with his I'm on a very-important-mission walk.
• That if we ever saw him having an absolutely ballistic play with something, it was probably a pipe-cleaner.
• That his favourite daytime sleeping haunt was on top of the boys' wardrobe, curled up on the sheepskin rug that I used to put the boys on when they were babies.
• That he and Cherub had this great game they never tired of playing where Cherub used to run around the backyard trailing a skipping rope and laughing his head off, whilst Bertie leapt at and pounced on and chased after and caught and then let go so he could start it all again.
• That he had worked out Cherub and Fixit only let him sleep with them if he stayed on TOP of the doona but if he slept with Climber or me he could snuggle under the doona, which is pretty smart when you factor in that Fixit and I share a bed.
• That really he preferred sleeping with Climber or me because he liked that under-the-doona option, and used to alternate every couple of days between us.
• That he knew Climber was for cuddles and Cherub was for mad-kitty berserk fun.

And that the 18 or so months that he had been with us was not nearly long enough, so we still really hope he comes back.



I haven't yet stopped jumping for phone calls and door-knocks but I suppose that will happen eventually. But maybe now I can shut up about it. You know, unless there's some good news. Thanks for listening and thanks for kind comments and thanks for sympathising. It has actually helped carry me through.

Still No Badcat...

...but in the interests of sibling fairness I thought I'd post evidence of the other haircut.



I also found the last ever photo taken of Bertie Wooster, balancing and walking -with ease- on the outside of my car door. Sniff. I'm stopping all the leafletting now. It just makes me feel worse. I've rung vets and shelters, put up posters and leafletted over 300 neighbours. I've visited the RSPCA and the Lost Dogs Home and his name is on the Missing Pets' Registers. But thinking I should do more is kind of killing me; I trudge along local streets worriting and calling and trying not to cry. If he comes home now that would be a flaming miracle but not one that I can really hope to effect. I have to let go. The kids don't want to discuss it, and when we did mention that Bertie could be dead Cherub got distressed and told us not to talk about it because it scared him.

I put up a flier at some not-so-local shops and a woman came up to us and said Oh you're Bertie Wooster's owners, I got your flier and I checked my shed, he's so gorgeous, I hope you find him. And Great Name! as she walked off. Someone else who received a flier in her letterbox rang me, saying straight off she hadn't found him but had wanted to ring me because she had a short-haired oriental cat too, and could imagine how awful it must be to lose him. Slightly strange but also rather touching. The sympathy of strangers. Actually, every time my phone rings with an unknown number I get het up, only to crash afterwards. I hope this isn't apparent to prospective tap students calling me. Same thing with unexpected doorbell rings. We had one last night and I raced to answer it with a thudding heart only to find one of those dudes trying to tempt me into changing my electricity/gas supplier, and I just said straight out I don't want to talk about electricity! and he said Okay and walked off without trying any other angle. Unheard of. Whether I've just discovered the perfect line to repel this sort of caller or whether my inner turmoil was apparent on my face I don't know, but you are welcome to test it yourself next time one of those people comes a-knockin' at your door.

When Do You Give Up Hope?

Bertie Wooster has been missing for nearly 6 nights . This is a very long time in the life of a cat who has never gone AWOL before. Being the hopeful Pollyanna type I just kept thinking he'd be back at any moment. Every time I left the house I would re-enter it expectantly, straining my ears to hear the padding of his little feet and a boisterous meow demanding food NOW! It has finally dawned on me if he could have come home, he would have by now. He's micro-chipped, he's desexed, so I just thought he'd either come back or that someone official would have called me. On Friday I put some notices up at the local shops, and tonight the whole family walked the nearby streets calling him. Tomorrow I'll call some vets and I think I'll do a letterbox drop asking our neighbours to check their sheds or garages for a little locked-in Burmese. I should probably have done this 3 days ago but I just thought he'd be home by now.

He's left such a gap. I miss his purry little presence in the bed at night as he snuggled down next to me, I miss his slightly grumpy presence of an evening as he lay in front of the heater getting so hot he became cranky and flicked his tale in an irritated manner before finally dragging himself up and re-settling on one of our laps. I even miss the really annoying way he would trip me up and deafen me in the kitchen whilst I cooked because he thought I ought to attend to his stomach before those of the humans.

The boys are okay so far, they're fleetingly sad if they think about it but it's only really tonight that the he might never come back scenario has been raised, rather bluntly, by Fixit-the-Pessimist. I suppose he had to do it, given that in my heart of hearts I really thought Bertie would return to us. I don't really know what to say to the boys, to be honest. I hate admitting to myself that we might never see him again, much less to them. I can't even bring myself to pack up the forlorn cat-food dishes, because that might make it real.

Looking Back

I missed the anniversary of my blog again! If I was my blog I'd consider breaking up with me.

When I started this blog 3 years ago, Cherub was a happy little 2 year old, still sleeping in a cot and just moving on from saying lots of words and little sentences to having proper conversations. Climber had just started school and was performing in his first school concert as well as doing his first ever school holiday program - soccer, it was. I only had the one Kiddy Tap Class and a couple of Grown-ups' ones and Fixit was still a Motorbike Mechanic.

One year in to this blogging malarkey and 6 year old Climber had been losing his baby teeth, performed in another school concert and done some more soccer clinics. Cherub was a 3yo, going to creche a couple of times a week but pretty much my constant companion, and a delightful one he was too. I'd started a second Kiddy Tap class, and Fixit was still on the Bikes, but wanting out.

Two years in and Bertie Wooster had joined the family (although he's currently been AWOL for 2 nights and we are missing him, send Go Home Vibes to him, won't you please), Cherub was a big 4 year old Kinder Kid who could ride a bike with trainer wheels, Climber was 7 and in Grade 2, learning to manage his distractability in class and playing soccer all winter instead of just in the holidays. My Tap School was growing nicely and Fixit had changed careers from the Bikes to the Planes, and at this stage it was not going too badly...

This year, Fixit is trying to steer his course through the disaster that is his aircraft apprenticeship and holding out for a transfer in the near future. Meanwhile my Tap School is doing pretty well and the Kiddy Classes are now my best earner instead of the little side project I started so that my boys could learn! My children are 5 and 8, in Prep and Grade 3 respectively, and this feels like the Golden Age! Nappies are a dim, distant memory, and when I look back on the days when they were both small I feel slightly staggered by how much work it used to be: all that cleaning and feeding and wiping and tending and lifting and carrying and soothing, all the live-long day. Someone should tell all those parents with young 'uns that it actually DOES get easier! It really does. Have I told you about how we can sleep-in on Sundays because the children can just look after themselves for a couple of hours? Or how if I need a lemon for dinner I can send one or both of the kids out to the lemon tree to get it for me? How Cherub will always put my pyjamas and slippers away if I ask him? How Climber took on listening to Cherub do his home reader in the car on the way to school because we forgot the night before and wrote the comment in the little book and everything? It's bloody great, I tells ya.





It was funny looking back to the past three July-posts. In one sense things haven't changed much: school concerts, trivia nights, school holidays -and school holiday programs & haircuts. Here it is July again and I am just recovering from the school holidays and about to belatedly get the boys' hair cut (having mucked up their usual school holiday appointment), I'm helping Cherub's class prepare for their first ever school concert, and casting about for people to join the team for the forthcoming Trivia Night, etc etc. But on the other hand, the boys have grown so much and come so far since the day I posted my first blog entry. The changes in them continue to astonish and delight me. Every time I wish I could bottle them now, right now! because they're so lovely, they grow and become even more wonderful. I'm very glad I started this blog, because in a way, I have bottled them.

Vive Blogging! Joyeux Bloggiversaire a moi!

Bad Bad Bertie Brown

The other night we watched Bertie Wooster speed-slink past the loungeroom door, and we knew. That guilty run of his means only one thing: he's caught some prey and he's hotfooting it to our bedroom to whack it round for a while. Before leaving it there to rot.

Sure enough we followed him into our bedroom to find an enormous rodent lying dead by the bed. It was a big mouse, big enough to be a small rat or a little marsupial. Much to Bertie's disgust, Fixit wrapped up the dead mouse / rat/ marsupial and put it in the outside wheelie bin. After which he closed all the windows and locked the bad cat out.

However, an hour later we walked into our bedroom again, only to find an identical large rodent in exactly the same spot. Leaving us to wonder: could Bertie have opened a wheelie bin and done a spot of retrieving?

We checked. No. Large Rodent #1 still there.

He'd gone and caught an identical rodent and placed it in the same spot. Just to teach us. I think it was his way of giving us the finger, frankly.

Homework

This week saw Climber take his turn as the class "VIP". He got to sit on a beanbag during listening time instead of the hard old floor and was allowed to stand at the front of every line with a partner of his choice. In return he had to complete a couple of activities from the list of VIP options and fill in a double page all about himself in the VIP book.

Now, I'm pretty sure his teacher won't read this so I'm going to make a small admission here. I did a LOT of work on Climber's VIP week. When he said he wanted to do a magic trick I researched (to the tune of $9.95 for a book of magic tricks) an appropriate, fool-proof pick-a-card-any-card trick and then I made him practise and practise till it ran smoothly. I also organised a guest speaker for his class. (I have family in high places at the Melbourne Museum.)

You might be able to infer from this that I take homework seriously. (You should have seen me with the normal homework sheet from last fortnight, nag, nag, boss, boss.) Possibly too seriously, seeing as the success or otherwise of Climber's VIP week will have no bearing at all on his academic career. Still, once a girly swot, always a girly swot. And may I just say: VIP Student week my arse. It was bloody VIP Mother week here at Chez Fixit except I didn't get to sit in the beanbag.

Anyway, apart from the fact that his teacher was absent on his presentation day, I hear everything went smashingly well. My Aunt M was a wonderful guest speaker and impressively, she came bearing a stuffed platypus and a stuffed echidna for the kids to look at, which almost caused pile-ups in the corridor. (Are they real? they'd ask in passing and Aunt M said Yes but they're dead. Actually she might have said stuffed instead of dead.) The magic trick was also a success. He found 'the card' and managed his patter as well. (You see how much effort I put in here? Patter, I made him do patter.) I also organised the photos for his VIP book for him. Oh allright, and gave him a few suggestions as to the things he might include. I may have made spelling suggestions too. Climber did actually say to me (more than once) : Mum, this VIP thing doesn't have to be perfect you know. But that's just crazy talk.


Then, as if VIP week wasn't enough, Cherub got to take home the class toy for the weekend. Harry the Dirty Dog. Poor Cherub. He's been soooooo desperate to get Harry. In fact, last week he burst into the saddest tears twice, once in class with his adorable teacher and again as I picked him up, because for the third week running, another child got to take the toy dog. When I asked the teacher what her system of allocation was (alphabetical? age?) so I could prime Cherub on when he could expect his go, she looked at my tear-stained child and mouthed I think he might be SOON over the top of his head. So an ecstatic Cherub bounced out of class last Friday and Harry came to stay with us for the long weekend.



When Harry comes he brings with him the Dirty Dog Diaries but this was an easy homework challenge for a blogging Mum. We photographed him at the pool, in the bed, meeting Bertie Wooster and at tap class. I think it's made for a very good couple of pages for the Diary.

Only problem is, I've done all this fabulous work and I won't get any feedback for it. It's not even graded so I can't cross my fingers for an "A". And then I thought, wait. I know where I can put my homework for some feedback.

The Night We Felt the Earth Move

So the kids were in bed but not asleep, and Fixit and I were sitting on the loungeroom floor (old habits die hard I suppose - the new couch is perfectly comfortable) when the ground started shaking. Our brains could not make any sense of it. At all. We just sat there looking surprised for a few seconds. Vibrations, quite big ones, coming up through our floor.

Fixit at first accused the kids of rough-housing on the bunkbed, but really we knew it was a tremor. He's felt one before, years ago, but I never had. The only information that came into my completely freaked out brain was that everyone needed to stand under a door frame. So we did. I mean, the shaking had stopped by then but we still stood under the door-frames, just in case. As you do.

The kids were completely unnerved, and I think it was worse in the top bunk because Climber was fighting back a few frightened tears. We went out the front door to have a look. What were we expecting to see, crevices in the front yard? Everything was quiet and we were the only ones who came outside in our street.

The instinct in that situation is to reach out to others, so Fixit rang a friend who lives nearby, and his parents, and I came down to the computer where I watched Facebook and Twitter light up. Oddly comforting to hear about it from others.

Still haven't seen Bertie Wooster, who had been quite the psycho cat earlier that evening. Did he know? They say they do.

The kids were soothed and sent back to bed. It took a lot longer for my jumping nerves to calm. The thing is, I think, that here in Victoria, we're a little bit scared of Mother Nature right now.

Bertie Wooster - Action Kitteh

Pictures taken by my sister on the fancy camera.

I've just discovered LOLcatz. (I'm a bit behind). Unfortunately I am no good at funny captions.

Spur of the Moment Beach Holiday

I'm going to tell you the part about our homecoming first. I'm doing this because our homecoming was disgusting and annoying, and whilst it is obviously a good story which relates to our trip away, I don't want it to be the final flavour of this piece.

So here is the disgusting and annoying end to our tale:

When we returned home from our spur-of-the-moment beach holiday, we walked into our house, which had been closed up and baked in the historic three-day 43+degree Melbourne heatwave. As expected the air was thick and hot, and although it was nasty to walk into, we were able to congratulate ourselves for having escaped actually living in it during the heatwave. But as I walked from room to room, throwing open the windows to encourage inside the mild cool change that blew around the outside of the house, my nostrils were assailed by a Very Bad Smell. Worse, it came from our bedroom. So I did the only sane and rational thing in I could do in that situation; I went outside to tell Fixit that I was pretty sure that Bertie Wooster had left a dead bird in our room.

My nose had not lied to me, and even Iron-guts Fixit struggled with the clean-up. He was heard to voice his intention to kick Bertie Wooster all the way back to Seymour. The maggotty remains of the bird were writhing under our bed and the smell was just vile. One day, two incense sticks, a vacuum and some bicarb soda later and the smell is still not nice. Thank goodness one of our new couches has a fold-out bed in it!

Now for the good stuff. We got to escape the foul Melbourne heatwave!!

Fixit's work stood him down unexpectedly this week, due to him having too many extra hours to his credit. So I made a quick phone call to my aunt and uncle, and they very kindly gave us the use of their beach-house. And although Barwon Heads and surrounds was suffering from exactly the same heatwave as poor old Melbourne, it didn't matter!!! Heatwaves at beaches are fun! Too hot? Let's go swimming! Or lounge around in the cool house watching tennis! Or eat takeaway food! Or have an ice-cream! (Climber lost a tooth into an ice-cream cone, but didn't swallow it, luckily.) See? Fun. And Easy.



My friend Jenny loaned us a beach shelter and some blow-up boogie boards, which were a smash hit. The water was completely refreshing and I swam as much as anyone, in Just Bathers, didn't need a Wussy Wetsuit! And we saw a Real Dolphin, an actual wild dolphin!!! A guy told me that the locals call it Archie and that it has been swimming into the river beach at Barwon Heads and frolicking round with the swimming people for the last few weeks.
And we saw it!
I was beside myself with excitement, it's one of my wishes come true to see a dolphin in its natural habitat. Sadly, I didn't have my camera ready because I was in the water at the time.

Cherub mostly floated serenely on the boogie-board, preferably with a parent pulling him around with the leadrope -like a little pasha- or played in the sand, but he practised his floating when I told him to.



Climber tried sushi (fussy eaters can come good, Climber is living proof!) and wave-catching. He swam freestyle in the river, jumped through waves in the surf, dug forts in the sand, or ran around the beach playing his own private and intense fantasy games. He is just lovely to take on holiday.



We made Fixit drive us to the nearby beach at Queenscliff to show him how ace it was. Twice. (River beaches are okay, but surf is much more fun!)



Best of all, poor tired, stressed, overworked Mister Fixit-McCrankypants gradually relaxed back into the Fixit we know and missed.

Catbook is stupid

When I admitted, slightly shamefacedly, to Fixit that I'd given Bertie Wooster his own page on Catbook, Fixit rolled his eyes at me in genuine disgust. Which lead him to say no wonder people think you waste too much time on that stupid blogging and I said which people? and he said doesn't matter and I said people whose opinion I care about? and he said probably not. Which was the point at which my suspicions were confirmed and I knew that it was Fixit's friend and eternal pain in my arse, the Bike Nazi. So I said has he even read the blog? and he said I doubt it and I thought but didn't say how typical it was of the Bike Nazi to pass judgement without even knowing the whole story - because if he's not into it, there must be something wrong with it, obviously.

And I thought; Bite me, stupid Bike Nazi. Because he just doesn't get it. Okay, I admit and am fully aware that Catbook is stupid. And that Facebook is also stupid. But My Blog is our family chronicle. I'm glad of it now and will probably be even more glad of it in years to come. What's more, I've made friends through it, found inspiration, learned things, laughed, cried, bought or won or was given stuff. Don't talk to ME about stupid blogging.

*****

In order to further celebrate all things good in blogging, I am jumping in to support a new venture by my blog friend Tracey, Ms Peppermint Patcher herself. This is her blurb for her new business venture:

Imagine that... quilts are a new concept in quilted wall-hangings for children. By the inclusion of photographs children can see themselves right in the action. Allow your child to be taken into an imaginary world, allow them to tell stories of their adventures, allow them to enjoy the fun, allow them to feel the excitement.

This is a picture of a quilt featuring the young Tracey herself imagining herself as a real quilter.

I have already nagged her about the potential of this quilt for the adults. I fully intend to have Imagine That quilts featuring the boysies, but I would SELL ANOTHER ONE ONE OF FIXIT'S MOTORBIKES to have a quilt like this (but with me and some purple tap shoes, natch) and I'm pretty sure there's a market for booklovers, knitters, crafters, photographers.... Tracey says one thing at a time Stomper Girl. And I say Go Visit her Site or its Blog and nag her.

*****

While I'm jumping on bandwagons I would also like to urge you to visit another talented friend, also called Tracy but spelled differently. She is a co-creator of Fat Mummas and they make very groovy bags and kid's clothes.

This is the shop and this is the blog. If you want to nag her about Cherub's pants for me then please do.

*****

Also, one more plug, this one is for the lovely Megan at Glorydaze. She made my last bag, then I won a voucher for her shop and bought a new one. My only complaint is that I loved the old bag so much it was really hard to upgrade but the new one is completely gorgeous and has compartments and everything. Her shop. Her blog.

*****

Finally a big HELLO and thank you if you delurked for New Year. So nice to meet you! And Caity and Suse your interviews are coming, I swear.

Ringing in the new.

If I were to do a little precis of 2008 I would say...

Climber: Grade 2, and a little love affair - very good year.
Cherub: Kindergarten, huge improvement at swimming, finally picked up a pencil - very good year.
Bertie Wooster: arrived at our house, caught lots of mice and got loved to bits - a good year
Stomper: Tap school starting to do very well, got some real grown-ups' furniture at home - good year.
Fixit: Career change, tired, stressed, grumpy - hard year. (But we knew the first year in to the career change would be tough so our fingers are crossed that 2009 is easier and happier)

Anyway, because that's not such an exciting list, I give you instead a picture of my new dress, all silk and purple and art deco. I've been supporting the economy, as requested -and funded- by our Prime Minister. Shopping never felt so virtuous. The dress was on sale, half-price. I held it up to show Fixit and he completely ignored the loveliness of the dress as he gasped at the price tag and exclaimed Ninety nine dollars for a dress! When I tell my girlfriends this they roll their eyes and say $99 is cheap for a dress, especially a silk one. I love my girlfriends.



Last night we stayed in, being as I am a grinch about New Year's Eve festivities. I made a nice roast lamb dinner and sticky date pudding for dessert and hired dvds to be watched in comfort from the new pull-out sofa-bed. The boys of course were entranced by a Bed In The Lounge-Room and so of course we had to have bedtime stories all tucked in there together. Climber has already asked if he could sleep in it for a night, but where would Fixit and I sit to relax if Climber slept in the lounge, hmm?



Anyway, I would like to wish all who read here the very best for 2009, and give a special mention to my little network/family of blog-friends (you know who you are xx) whose friendship I treasure so much. And I thought I would also ask a small favour. I suspect there might be a few lurkers who also read here, so as a New Year's present to me, won't you please de-lurk and say hello or happy new year or anything you like, really. Go on, don't be shy.

Happy New Year to you all! Cx