Dirt Therapy

The boys were driving us insane.

School holidays.

The kids get cooped up in the house.
They start bouncing off walls.
Especially Sam.

So our backyard makeover got urgent.
The boys needed dirt therapy.

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These ran through my head for the last year or so as I weighed up the pros and cons
Why do up the backyard?

• We'd like the kids to be more outdoors
• Our home has more paved areas than grassy areas
• Kids are safe and within cooee of us at home
• We can have people over who have kids - we'd like them to burn their energy outside
• I can kick the ball with Sam until JUST before dinner time
• The garden has a lot of wasted/dead space
• We can camp in the back 
• We can have chickens

Why not do up the backyard?

• There's already a park near by
• Spend money (I was raised not to spend too much money)
• How do I know what I want, what we need?
• More maintenance, mowing
• Uses lots of water
• A risk that the grass won't take and it'll like a tough mudder track

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So we started by ripping out the old pavers and garden boxes.

The digger driver was amazing. He carefully laid each paver into the bucket.
This meant we could keep the pavers. We gave lots to our neighbour Varunee.

Here comes the top soil.

The boys 'helped' compact the soil.

Sam learning how to cut pipe with a hack saw.
A good lesson in slow-and-steady wins the race.

 Sam learning to wheel barrow.

 Jimmy helping fill the sandpit.

The turf gets laid today. 

Hopefully we can roll around on it in a few good weeks.

Gravity is small?

I had to pull up on Sam for saying that gravity is small.

Gravity IS small in space. I guess.
But here on the surface of the earth gravity is largely the same.

So I managed to start a conversation about Forces.
And how the same gravity applied to different masses (our bodies) produce different forces.

I don't think he got the multiplication just yet, but I get the feeling he's on his way.

And then Jimmy started to write his name too, because he was missing out.

I'm BACK!

It's taken 13 months but I am back!

This is what kept me for so long.

Our daughter Naomi came into the world.I started my own busyness.
I started my new job.
I got anxious.
I got depressed.
I got help.
I got better.
Naomi turned 1.

I am back.
Can't wait to tell you all about it.

Thanks for all those who asked me about coming back.

A Morning Went By QuickLeigh

I wrote a new story. 

https://steller.co/s/4nDaHMRexc9

Scooter Stack!

Well I feel like a bit of a goof.

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Had a great brekkie with the boys this morning.

We just had our floors polished upstairs. Massive feat moving furniture out and then back. Had great help from our neighbours and friends (Larry, Chris). We moved in downstairs with Jenn's mum for a couple of days to escape the dust and smells. Lots of in your face family time. Now the floors are done and we're about to move back in.

 And I decided a little celebration was in order.

So I took the family out out to the local Abode Cafe. It is always great to go there.

I love the coffee, the atmosphere, the service.
Jenn and the boys love it too. See Jimmy here loving his fried egg n avo on toast.

I had the mixed mushrooms.



Best of all, us boys can scoot there!
(I don't have a pic from our scootering this morning so here's one from yesterday's Southbank adventure for illustrative purposes. )

But on the way back, I must have been busy minding the boys. Before I knew it, BAM!

I was on the ground.

I stacked it going over the side of the footpath. Of course I manned up, got up and kept scootering, while blood dripped off my hands. 

Now I've got to move furniture with cut hands. So a couple of bandages to keep out the dust and donned rubber gloves to do clean the drawers and windows.

I remember falling down was much less of a big deal. 

Ditto bleeding.

Am I getting old?

Or just getting soft?

Scootering around the library

Sam and I went to the Corner of the State Library today to hear Engibear read the Engibear's Bridge book. Gee there were a lot of kids!

Torill the bridge engineer also jumped up and told us about how she builds bridges and how she tests them. 

 Sam tried to build his own.

Sam got to hang out with Engibear some more. Engibear was quite busy signing books and talking to the kids, we were lucky to get a photo with him.

 We had lunch outside, watched the Citycat ferries go by.

 And then back into it again after lunch!

And then after that we went scootering around the library together. We're doing that again in a flash. 

Our good neighbours Debbie and George gave us Daniel (their son's) old scooter. Now I can keep up with the boys. We went over the Kurilpa bridge and back again. 

A few times I was kinda worried the boys might trip and fall into the water. 

Don't tell mummy!

Bundy Strawberries

So here's my latest Steller Story: