Tuesday, May 26, 2009

My baby turned 4 today

Where has the past four years gone? I cannot believe that this time four years ago I had a little bundle in my arms less than 12 hours old. It feels like a life time ago and sometimes I really struggle to remember what it was like at the time.
(This pic was taken when Lach was 4 weeks old. All of his new born pics are on the external HD packed away in a cupboard somewhere)
All the years of personal struggles, battling my own demons and the like has totally been worth it when I see this gorgeous face.


Happy Birthday Lachie Jocky John - hope you had a great day. Love you buddy-boy.

Mummy xoxoxo

Monday, May 25, 2009

Woooooooooooooooooooooooo Hooooooooooooooooooo

I had the crappiest day at school today - sick as a dog, aching head, aching ears, aching body, coughing worse than seasoned smoker - just feeling miserable in general until I came home to this:
Congratulations to the winner of the Bella! challenge;Scrappergirl!
Congratulations to everyone who participated too! We can’t wait for the next Cyber Crop! Also, Joanna wanted me to mention those that were highly commended; JaimieR and Fess. Congrats guys!Please PM me your details Scrappergirl so I can post your prize! And thanks Bella! for sponsoring our Cyber Crop!
Cassie BellemoreAssistant Editor Scrapbooking Memories l Australian Editor Creating Keepsakes
And what was it for you ask? It was for this .....

All the basic elements - c/s, patterned paper could only be black or white, the LO had to be outside of the square - i.e. die cut shape (either pre-made or hand-made like this one was but I cheated and traced off another sheet I had here lol), there had to be button clusters to accentuate the journalling and there had to be a strong link between past and present. Embellishments were allowed to be other colours.
I also completed a LO for Anne-Marie Cox's challenge (a SM Master for 2009) and have to admit that this was my favourite out of the two. The pic doesn't really do it justice I don't think:
This LO was based on a sketch designed by Anne-Marie and she requested that we use paint on our LO's. I had fun flicking the brush and even stole Lachlan's plastic ruler to make the grid hehehehe.
All in all, not a bad weekends work considering how under the weather I was. Hopefully I will start to feel better soon - no point going to drs because I can't get in until next week at the very earliest (insert rolling eyes here lol).
On another note altogether, a very very special friend celebrated her birthday yesterday. Happy birthday hun, hope you had a great day. love you lots and heaps and much.
Cheers,
Sarah xoxo

Sunday, May 17, 2009

Rounding up another weekend

Well another weekend has been and gone. Where did it go she asks early on a Monday evening - don't worry about the weekend, where did today go???
I spent most of Saturday in bed, my head stuffed full of a cold. My ears are still playing up tonight, I can't get my right one to pop - very annoying, everything sounds different. Feels like there is a whole heap of fluid in there, you know like when you hop out of a pool. Might have to go get it checked out tomorrow if it isn't any better.
Sunday was pretty quiet too - just chilled out around the house until late this afternoon when I set off over to the sheds to check out what the boys were up to. Just a typical weekend - the two little boys helping the big boy do jobs around the place:
In other news, teachers (that's me) in Qld are striking tomorrow. I hope to spend the day at home with my boys nice and quietly trying to get over this flu. I did consider going to one of the mass meetings tomorrow in Toowoomba but given how unwell I have been, my principal agreed with the thought that a day of rest would be wiser.
Hopefully I will be back here tomorrow or Wednesday with some show 'n' tell.
Cheers,
Me xoxoxo

Sunday, May 10, 2009

Happy Mother's Day and some show and tell

Hi everyone
Hope everyone who is a mother out there reading this had a great day celebrating your special day.
My day started at 5.30am with a lovely (not) wake up call from Mitchell and Lachlan yelling out Happy Mother's Day mummy, look what I made you. They both made stuff at school/daycare. Gotta love those little tiny little projects made with innocent fingers and lots of love.
Lachie told me days ago that he had hidden my mother's day present under his bed but it was a secret lol. Mitch has been whispering to Tony about his school project all week.
They melt my heart.
I went out scrapbooking last night at my LSS and came home with three projects either done or almost done. One of the LO's is a direct lift from the latest SM magazine but as soon as I saw it and found the same papers hiding in my stash I knew that I wanted to use this design for this LO of Tony.
My first attempt at genuine minimalism and have to say, I like it:
This one is still a work in progress. Not much more to do but not really sure about how I want to finish it off. Love the Jenni Bowlin scallop paper and the PP from Scenic Route - so please I treated myself to a little online retail therapy this week hehehehe.
Hope you all have a great week. Take care.
Me xoxoxox

Over my little pity party

Woah don't know what got into me yesterday but wow what a pity party. I never set out for that post to be a sympathy vote, I was just trying to work out what I was feeling and why I was feeling that way.

And guess what???

I still don't have the answers but after going through some of my photos I realised something. It doesn't matter to anyone else other than Tony, Mitchell, Lachlan and myself if I work. As long as I find a happy balance between the two, maybe everything will be able to co-exist ... most of the time anyway.

And at the end of the day, take a look at these photos of the boys I snapped the week I was on bed rest. Do these look like children who feel abandoned, neglected and unloved???

Have to laugh at the picture where Lachlan is frowning - he is not upset but rather pulling faces and looking at his reflection in the mirror - the eternal drama queen is our Lachie.

They look pretty happy so I must be doing something right.

Til next time

Me xoxo

Saturday, May 9, 2009

Why???????????

I was reading the lastest issue of Creating Keepsakes scrapbooking magazine last night (yay for happy mail waiting in the PO Box on a Friday afternoon lol) and there was a section of Layouts about being a mother.
When I started reading them I had mixed emotions - I went from sad to depressed to angry to jealous all in the space of 30 minutes or so. I was sad because most of the LO's featured were of stay-at-home mums.
At first this sadness was because of the fact that I am one of those mum who chose not to stay at home but returned to work on a part-time basis (average of 3 days per week to start off with for 18mnths) until eventually I started back full time last year. Reading these Lo's made me sad at first because it got me to thinking - what have I missed out on because I chose to go back to work instead of being at home?
Then I got all depressed thinking that in same way my choice has had a negative impact on my boys lives. What will happen in 10 years time if they turn around and say to me 'like you care, all you ever did when we were little was work'.
After the depression came anger - anger at myself, anger at the world, anger at society and the stereotypes that are still placed on gender roles - yes we have come a long way but I still don't think we have fully broken down the walls between all of the roles and lastly anger at just the situation. I chose to go back to work for a number of different reasons.
To be honest with you, I never had any intention of going back to work so soon after Mitchell was born but at the time I was in a very difficult situation. After being on contract at the one school for 3 years I was finally offered permanency at a school about 90kms from Dalby plus another 30km from where Tony worked and we lived (120kms in total). While it was great to be finally permanent, the school was located in an area that at the time was crippled by drought (and still is to a much lesser extent) which meant that there was very little possibility of Tony getting any work out there - not much call for Farm Managers during a drought. Anyway I took the job - I would have been an idiot to refuse to accept permanency as it would have been a blemish against me for a looooooooooooong time with Education Qld - and made the decision to live away from home during the week and return at weekends.
As fate would have it, I fell pregnant about 3 months into the new school year. When transfer time rolled around, I applied for a compassionate transfer back to Dalby and seriously thought given my circumstances that it would happen. Sadly it didn't. So I took extended leave knowing that one day I would have to face that horrible decision all over again only this time what would I do with Mitchell given there was no formal daycare facilities in the area and we were both reluctant to leave him with 'just anyone'.
When Mitch was 5 months old, I received a phone call from one of the Deputy Principals at Dalby SHS wanting to know if I would be interested in job-sharing with someone coming back from maternity leave. What a dilemma - here I am a new mum with a 5 month old and not really wanting to return to work but also knew that this would probably be my best chance of getting back into Dalby. I stressed about this decision for weeks - I didn't want to go back so soon but I knew I didn't want to return to the other school and be separated from Tony (and possibly Mitchell depending on what arrangements we made) each week. I was given a 100% verbal guarantee that if I took the job-sharing spot, I would be transferred that year.In the end, hearing that got me and I took the position working 2 days one week and 3 days the next. We found a place for Mitchell in an excellent daycare centre and he loved it right from the start.
Unfortunately government departments don't always live up to their promises and I was not transferred as promised - more political game playing that went over my head.
So once again I was stuck - working on contract at one school while still being attached to the 'permanent school'. By this time I had made up my mind that I would rather resign than return to the school where I was considered 'permanent' - I didn't want to drive 240kms just to get to and from work each day. Fair enough people might do that in the city each day but trust me, country driving is a completely different story, especially when you add kangaroos, emus and wild pigs into the mix. Luckily my contract was extended for the following year but fate intervened again and I was pregnant for the second time. I applied for a transfer once again and was assured that my circumstances would all but give me the much-wanted transfer.
It didn't so again I was faced with some tough decisions. I accepted another contract at Dalby SHS, just hoping to keep my foot in the door so that one day they might just give up and transfer me. In the end it took until 2007 for my transfer to officially come through.
So why bother working if it was all that difficult some of you might ask? Well to be honest I suffered from Post-Natal Depression (as well as ongoing issues since about the age of 15) and I didn't cope very well at all. To this day I struggle with my 'issues' but for me work has been the one thing that has kept me centred and grounded while everything else around me was crumbling. When I was at home I was moody and angry and there were days I was scared that I could have hurt the boys. I know deep down that I wouldn't have but it was always a subconscious fear that I would. Going back to work made me a better mum - I was happier, the boys were happier. The time we spent together was QUALITY - we did things together, I didn't shut myself away from them because I couldn't cope with them. We laughed, we played, we read stories, we sat in the sun, we played in the sandpit - WE DID STUFF. Before I went back to work, we did very little of that becuase I couldn't - there were days that Tony had to stay home from work to make sure the boys were fed and changed becuase I couldn't make myself get out of bed - what sort of mother did that make me? What sort of mother could do that to their child or children? I hated myself but at the time I couldn't and didn't admit to my problems, I kept them all bottled up most of the time and pretended that everything was ok becuase I didn't want to be seen as a failure or more importantly, a bad mother.
This is where the jealousy set in - why can't I be one of those mums who is happy to stay at home. Why couldn't I cope? Why couldn't I be content? Why couldn't that be enough for me? Why can't I ever feel happy about the decisions I have made instead of questioning them at every other turn. Why can't I accept that this is the way I am and the way I always will be and that if it works for my, what is the problem with it? Why can't I stop questioning???

Why is it so hard to find the answer?

Tuesday, May 5, 2009

Update on the attack of the Easter Bunny and show 'n' tell

Well it is just over a month (at least I think it is a month lol) since the infamous attack of the Easter Bunny AKA Falling off a ladder on Easter Sunday - lol attack of the Easter Bunny sounds sooooooooooo much better.

So what does an attack from the Easter Bunny look like post-infection/enforced bedrest/2 weeks of daily visits to drs surgery for dressings and wound updates??? Wonder no more, check this out:
(LOL excuse the picture, I took it myself - never realised how hard it is to get a decent picture of one's own leg - lol especially when they are tree trunks like mine hehehehe)

I am finally able to go without any dressings at all ( BIG relief as I was starting to react to the different dressings and treatments the Drs/nurses were trying) - all I have to do now is keep a really close eye on the wounds and monitor for signs of regression back to infections and possible ulcerations. Hopefully that won't happen.

In all the time I had off, you would think that I would have got a truckload of scrapping done but I am ashamed to say that I did nothing, nudda, zilch. Being stuck in bed really didn't help and for some reason all I wanted to do is sleep and read and sleep some more. I think I got through 10 or 11 novels for the 5 days I was stuck in bed. YAY for me - I love to read!!

I did manage to get around to some scrapping on the weekend - a work in progress that I ended up pulling apart and starting over again. Not happy with it but it is another one for the albums.

Well that is all for now. Off to do some moping - feel really down in the dumps at the moment but can't seem to actually put a finger on what I feel so down/blah about. Maybe I just need to get over myself.

Til next time.

Me xoxoxox