Santa Claus is coming to town....

Well, last week did the obligatory trip to see santa and have a photo taken. Of course as any parent who is being honest with themselves will tell you, when your child is only 8 months old (or anything less than a year I think) then this trip is totally about you. THEY don't even know who Santa is besides being this big fat hairy guy in a really loud red suit - and he's probably sweaty and smelly to boot. after all, the poor guy is sitting in knee high black boots, wearing a full length suit and sporting facial hair that would rival a wooly mammoth - aircon or no aircon, he's gotta be dying in that thing!!

What's more, I spent forty minutes in line - FORTY MINUTES I tell you. Thankfully we had fun by amusing ourselves with the "catch me mum I'm falling backwards game"..... after forty minutes of this game - wherein charli girl would fling herself backwards, I would catch her, and she would giggle herself stupid - well you can imagine I was ready to leave charlotte in the pram to queue up herself - in the hopes that someone would snap a photo when she finally made it to the front of the queue. anyway, we finally made it there - see photo below.


I'd like to point out to Libby that I scored my photos for only $8. The trick was not to go to Myareyouahoplifter Santa where while I would only have had to wait 5 minutes due to his unpopularity, I would have had to take out a second mortgage on our property to pay for the photo. Of course there are other reasons not to go to Myareyouahoplifter as Michelle can attest to. After that debacle we now boycott the store.

Anyway - all in all very pleased with our first Santa experience - and she even smiled :)

Things I would tell my Mum this Christmas if she were here

Michelle you've inspired me. What a wonderful idea. Things I would tell my Mum if she were here this Christmas - oh my gosh, where do I begin?

Mum, meet your grand-daughter Charlotte. She is beautiful and I know you would love her very much.

I promise to instil in her all the wonder and amazement of Christmas that you instilled in me for all those years

I watch the DVD we made for you often. It still amazes me when I see you with me as a baby and my breathe catches in my throat for a moment as realisation dawns that I am now a Mum.

I keep in touch with my godparents often. They are my supports now that you are not here.

I miss you every day.

The nurses at Mt Olivet think you sent me a beautiful daughter.

One day I will finish this PhD. It will be dedicated to you - the strongest role model a girl could ever have.

Libby and I are once again as thick as thieves. We talk of you often. The physical distance between us does nothing to dampen our support of each other (though we could handle being able to have a wine together a little more often :)

Christmas has never been the same since you went away. I hope as Charlotte gets older I can re-capture some of that Christmas spirit.

I haven't spoken to Desley since you died - I hope you can understand why.

My friends are my family - I have some amazing friends. You would love them. They look out for me.

I hope that Scamp found you wherever you are. We miss him every day too. When Charlotte is being 'naughty' we think of Scamp. We're pretty sure she is Scamp re-incarnated ;)

I could write a book on things I would say to you this Christmas if you were here.

I love you.

The sands of time.....

Well it's been brought to my attention - yet again - that i've failed to post recently. I can't even claim to have been working on any of the multitude of projects that I have on at the moment - life has just been on top of me lately and haven't felt witty enough to post. So I'm going to post - but don't expect too much :)

Okay, so yesterday, due to life's weight on my shoulders, I decided it was time to buck up, get out of the house and do something carefree. So I bundled Charlotte up - she only slept for 40 minutes yesterday after being awake for 5 hours before lunch so she was ALIVE and kicking (aka overtired)... we jumped in the car and headed for the coast - my hopes being that she would drift off to sleep and I'd just take a leisurely drive through the sunshine coast hinterland. However, I made it as far as Mango Hill and she showed no signs of tiredness so I decided to drop in on my best friend's mum. She was most surprised to see us - having not seen us in about oh....7 months. She decided to join me on my trip to the coast but then we decided the coast was a big endeavour as it was already 1.30 in the afternoon. So we headed down the road to redcliffe instead and went to the lagoon - like a mini-southbank with sand and pools and shade sails - and the breeze coming off the bay was DIVINE!!! Here's a photo of my little one being amazed my a small frond of some sort from a pine tree. She studied this plant form for a good hour while Joy and i sat and chatted.... note to self - I should enjoy outings like this with a good book while she is still too young to run all over the place with me chasing her!!



And check out these colours - looks like we're holidaying in Hawaii....



not that anyone who has been to Redcliffe would ever mistake it for Hawaii - but it was lovely nonetheless....