Documenting Delight: day one hundred and twenty one {zonked}

Documenting Delight: day one hundred and twenty

Harper attended two birthday parties today. Back to back. I didn’t think she had the staying power but with the aid of lollies and birthday cake, she soldiered on.  What a party animal.

{Spreading our love of books}

Back in February we started My Little Bookcase’s The Little Book Adventure. This month saw us working on Project two, Spread your love of books. The brief was to borrow a book or collection of books from your library and leave a note inside detailing what you liked about the book. Cool concept hey?

As we make our way through this 10 month adventure I am enjoying completing the tasks in partnership with Finn & Harper. It isn’t about me whipping up activities and presenting them to my kids, both projects so far have pushed me to get them involved from beginning to end. This is as much their Book Adventure as it is mine.

So after a month of getting to know our latest batch of library books we sat down to have a chat about the things Finn and Harper liked about the books we borrowed. As we chatted I jotted down their responses. While Jackie from My Little Bookcase kindly provided us with a letter head, I knew that I want to somehow combine our letters with photographs. When I suggested the idea to Finn & Harper that they use the library books to play a game of peek-a-boo I thought Harper would go bananas for it and I would have to drag Finn through the mini-shoot. How wrong I was. To my great surprise, my boy who usually shouts “Put the camera away Mummy!” at any sighting on my beloved Canon, completely hammed it up in front of the camera. Harper on the other hand was completely disinterested and rolled around on the floor whenever my camera came near her.

{The one and only shot I got of Miss Harper}

Once I had the shots I added the letter underneath the image using photoshop, printed them and attached them with bluetak to the inside of each book.

{Letters attached to the books}

{All bagged up and ready to head back to the library}

The books have been returned and I can’t stop thinking about the little surprises that are waiting to be found by a small collection of Canberra Kids.

Documenting Delight: day one hundred and nineteen

{This one's going straight to the fridge}

Documenting Delight: day one hundred and eighteen {Australian War Memorial}

War, soldiers, artillery and military vehicles have all been at the forefront of Mr Finn’s mind since ANZAC day. Requests to visit the War Memorial in the city since that day have been coming in hourly intervals so I thought today I would surprise him with a visit to one of his favourite hometown attractions. His face when I told him of our plans = pure joy.

We spent three hours inside and outside of the Memorial. For us, that is a huge excursion but it was all so effortless and enjoyable that I myself didn’t want to leave. Love ventures out like these. On top of the thoroughly engaging exhibitions, when we entered the building a friendly staff member advised us that they would be commencing an interactive storytime session for under 5s this morning. Oh yeah!

This was our morning.

{This photo captures Finn's nature perfectly. All the children were performing actions in the storytelling session but Finn was just patiently waiting for everyone to sit down and for the quiet/non-moving part of the story to re-commence}

{Flying the helicopter in the Discovery Centre}

{Reading the statue plaque. Upside down}

{Big morning. Just need a little rest}

Documenting Delight: day one hundred and seventeen {with friends}

Ahhhhh I love playdates with my dear friend and fellow blogger Kate from Living,Loving, Laughing. Not only do I get to see our four kids together, four toddlers who genuinely like each other and who create fun and laughter as they interact but I get spend time with a friend and a mother I admire. Parenting toddlers is hard work. On top of that being a stay at home mum, at times, can be quite isolating. I am thankful for friends like Kate, who I can draw practical tips from, soak up their wisdom and partake in short bursts of stimulating conversation, you know something a bit removed from the toileting, eating, sleep habits of our precious little ones. Added bonus, I always know when Kate and her kids come over that I have my photo for the day sorted. Cuteness x4, how could I not get something worth documenting?

{vegemite pinwheels made by Kate}

{cream cheese, grated cheese and tomato sandwiches. On circle bread. Apparently the key to getting kids to eat sandwiches is staying away from those boring square shapes ;) }

{Eli sharing with Harper. Total sweetheart}

{All great playdates end with a dance off don't they?}

Documenting Delight: day one hundred and sixteen {ANZAC day}

Today was ANZAC Day in Australia. As this public holiday approached I had plans to take the kids to the Dawn Service at the National War Memorial. They certainly get up early enough to make it but the more I thought about it, the more I came to the conclusion that this year wasn’t the right time to introduce them to such a solemn ceremony. I would want them both to have some level of understanding about the importance of the day plus the ability to remain relatively quiet throughout the event. Between Finn’s constant questions and Harper’s current favoured saying (“I’ve got a SNOT!”) the chances of them remaining respectfully quiet were about zero.

Instead we baked (& ate) ANZAC biscuits and watched the March on TV. This way we were able to field Finn’s many questions (“Why do all the men have different uniforms?”, “What makes the guns go bang?”) and introduce a few of the concepts of the day to both kids. As for the Dawn Service, maybe next year......

Documenting Delight: day one hundred and fifteen {sleeping like a baby}

Documenting Delight: day one hundred and fourteen

Dressing up as Station Officer Steele from his favourite TV show, Fireman Sam. Love you, my funny boy.

Documenting Delight: day one hundred and thirteen {home}

Now we are home. Five days away from Lachie was hard. I missed him and the kids missed him. I even caught Harper getting a bit teary on the phone one night when we made our nightly phone calls home. I appreciated the chance to have a holiday, to spend some much needed time with my extended family, to have a break from regular routines, and a five day stretch of not being responsible for cooking and cleaning in my own home, well that was sweet too. But all of these things were without Lachie and being on a holiday without him did feel quite strange.

I think he missed me too. When I returned I discovered that he placed the electric blanket from the linen cupboard on our bed (a job I was meaning to get around too). It must be love. That...... or he was incredibly bored.

{beach buddies}

During our holiday on the Coast we took a few trips to the local beach, one street away from my Mum’s place. How blessed is she? While I grew up living close to the beach, for Finn and Harper the beach and all that comes with it is a foreign concept. Let’s just say that they weren’t willing participants when I said “We’re off to the beach!”

So here is one of our beach visits. As far away from the actual water as you could get.....

Documenting Delight: day one hundred and twelve

Harper has a new best friend.

My younger sister, Ash, has joined us on the Central Coast for the weekend. I love that our home is in Canberra but I struggle that my family, all of my family, is so far away. I miss all of them; their warmth, their humour and their support. I wish that they were part of our day to day life, that they were just able to "pop in" rather than it be a huge organisational effort that it inevitably is at the moment.

Then I see moments like this and it just seems even sweeter because it doesn't happen every day.

Harper loves her beautiful Aunty Ash. Can you tell?

{Spotting a plane in his great grandparents backyard}

Documenting Delight: day one hundred and eleven

If you are a follower of this blog you will have picked up these points about my two children:

a.       They are very different, both in looks and personality. The term chalk and cheese couldn’t be more perfect when it comes to describing my two.

b.       I rarely manage to snag a good photo of the two of them together. They are often just not phyiscailly in the same space and when they are, Harper is usually mauling Finn with her over affection that he is screaming. Not great photo material.

So when I walked in on the above play scenario between Finn and Harper, I scrambled to get my camera and snapped away like a mad woman. My camera settings were all out but I had to let it all go and just make sure I captured this moment. It may need a little explaining: Harper is all about imaginative/role play at the moment. She mainly likes to take on occupations and act out their work tasks. This week she has been a hairdresser, a cafe owner and a doctor. Today though she was a make-up artist, applying lipstick on her brother. Ordinarily, this would be a pretty cute moment but it was so much more for me coming from my two kids. Finn prefers his own space, doesn’t like to be touched and whenever role play is happening he likes to set the scene. To allow the play to be directed by his younger sister, to allow her to touch him and by golly just the fact that they were playing together meant this was a huge deal.  

{Finn, looking quite tense but going with it regardless.}

While we have been at Mum’s, to my complete surprise, there have actually been lots of moments like this. Quiet, co-operative play. Screaming, crying, snatching? Nope, haven’t seen any of that so far. I’m sure my Mum thinks I am exaggerating the truth when I drone on and on about their play difficulties when we are home, as right now all she has seen are two siblings who love each other and enjoy each other’s company. Trust me Mum, I ain’t stretching the truth. Whatever is happening, I am watching it and loving it.

{Oh look! Another play moment!}

Documenting Delight: day one hundred and ten {holiday fun}

After yesterday’s terrible weather today we woke up to sunshine and warmth. When you are on holidays and progressing through Autumn it is essential to seize a day like this. We did, big time.

{anyone would have thought it was his first milkshake experience...}

{if you are a toddler at a cafe, scattering the sugar packets is a must}

{waving to Nana as the carousel went around}

{forgot the swimmers, but undies did the trick}