Newborns

I wonder if I will ever be able to look at a newborn baby again without a heavy heart? I hope so because I adore teeny little newborns! I keep coming across gorgeous photo's of babies and they make me long for my newborn baby, although she wouldn't be so newborn now. She'd be a rolly polly happy smiley bubba.



That is Millie when she was about 4/5 months old I think. The photo was taken by my awesome friend Davina, see her blog by clicking on the link in my blog roll. At another visit to the hospital (it hasn't gotten any easier going there) this week we found out that there is no gynocological reason that we cant try for another baby when/if we are ready. We just have to sit tight now and wait for the results of the autopsy, our appointment for this is early August. Be bacl later with some happy snaps of our visit to the snow! Was sooo much fun!

As promised...

A few weeks ago I posted a picture of the bunkbeds my clever husband was making for jackson and promised a picture of the finished product. I think they look great and they are soo sturdy they are not going anywhere for a long time. I dont let Jackson sleep up the top, they are too high and he is too little. He adores his new bed though and can often be found hiding under the covers of the top bunk!




My children are loving the camera at the moment!

Jackson's old bed was a very cute little toddler bed. When we moved his new bed in to his room the plan was to move the toddler bed into Millie's room. This meant moving Lola's cot out of the room. This is a job I was really dreading. It turned out to not be as difficult as I imagined. I think because there wasn't a big gaping hole where Lola's cot was, we put the toddler bed there. It's strange how some things I anticipate are going to be very difficult turn out to not be so bad and then sometimes grief turns up in unexpected places and knocks the wind right out of me. Just because I want to remember, here are some pictures of 'the girls' room. It can look much prettier than this but I didn't fix it up before taking the pictures, I wish I had but anyway!




I am having a wonderful week with my Aunty and Cousin. They have taken Jackson to the movies (god help them) and Millie is asleep so lucky me gets some precious time to myself, LOVELY. We are planning a trip to the snow on Friday and we are all soo excited!

Fifteen Facts

hmm hard one, Can I think of fifteen facts about me that others might find interesting enough to read in order to participate in this weeks Blog this challenge?

1. I owe $25 000 in HECS debts (OMG), I just received my statement in the mail the other day. My husband had no idea and nearly fell over when he saw that. What do I have to show for it - 2 1/2 degrees, one in Social Sciences, one in Education and 1/2 a degree in Adolescent Health and Welfare!

2. I adore musicals! any musical! I want to be in a musical! I also LOVE those very tragic dance movies that come out every now and again. They make me want to dance again. (Just add bubbles and I think I am the STAR of a musical or dance movie, unfortunately there is some very scary video footage floating around to prove this!)

3. I dont like anything 'cutting edge'. Not technology, design, fashion or music. I love everything that is old, classic, vintage, pre-loved.

4. My favourite pair of shoes at the moment are my... wait for it

GUMBOOTS! $20 from Bunnings and I love them!

5. I only like even numbers and I think that is why I am having a bad luck year this year, because it is 2009! I cant wait for next year.

6. I only like round, curly and whimsical shapes in design. I dont go for anything square or pointy with a hard edge.

7. To help me get to sleep at night I day/nightdream about what i would do if I won Tattslotto.

8. At the moment I am coveting a new kitchen, at the very least a new floor for my kitchen. I want floorboards, at the moment I have black tiles and they are a nightmare!

9. Last year I very nearly died. We were staying at a caravan park in the Barmah forest with no mobile coverage. I was 4 weeks post-partem and had a massive Haemorrhage. My mother-in-law rushed me to the nearest hospital about 1/2 an hour away. Brendon was out on the boat so had no idea any of this was happening, when we arrived at the hospital he was greeted by a doctor telling him how lucky he was to still have me as they very nearly lost me. I lost consciousness just as we arrived at the hospital and I remember being really annoyed as I was coming to as I was having a really amazing dream. I later found out that when you lose consciousness you experience a feeling of elation, I think that must be what I was feeling.

10. After the above experience I decided that I wanted our family to be able to have holidays whenever we want so we went out and bought a caravan. We LOVE holidays by the beach, we live for them!

11. Our family recently moved (8 months ago) from an inner-city Melbourne lifestyle, living in a small 2 bedroom unit (4 of us) to a 1000m2 block in an outer Melbourne suburb with a big 4 bedroom house. It was the best move we ever made and I love our new life out here. We have amazing views of Mt Dandenong, heaps of room inside and out. The best thing is the difference in traffic. The slow moving traffic used to drive me crazy when we lived in Hawthorn!

12. Pre-babies I worked as a youth Drug and Alcohol clinician. It was an awesome job but too hard with small children as it was shift work. Plus I didn't have the emotional commitment to the job anymore, my babies got the best of me.

13. My first kiss was with a famous racing car driver. He wasn't then of course! My family love to tease me about this and I find it terribly embarrasing every time it is mentioned.

14. My dream for my family is that old cliche of packing up our life and travelling around Australia for an extended period of time, teaching my children by having amazing experiences, seeing things for themselves up close and meeting fascinating people with awesome stories to tell.

15. I LOVE Blogging! It is my support group, my counselling, my outlet! Thanks for reading xx

2 month anniversary

Tomorrow will be two months since my lovely Lola was born. I guess I thought I might be less sad at this point but really the missing is still just as strong, actually maybe stronger now because life is moving on all around us but we still dont have Lola. Can anyone give me a ballpark figure on when things might start to get easier? That would be great people, a coment below or even an email would be appreciated with a timeframe.

One of the positive things to come out of this, maybe Lola's gift to me, is that I am drinking in every little bit of Jackson and Millie, I am not taking any moments with them for granted. Yesterday I had a small but beautiful moment with Jackson. It started absolutely pouring down with rain outside, he turned to me and with the cheekiest grin on his face he said he wanted to go out to the garage to see his Dad. I started to say NO but then thought, why not, so he'll get wet, he can just get changed. I said ok but you need to put your jumper and gumboots on. Jackson agreed and giggled the whole time he hurriedly put them on. He then ran out into the rain but kept looking back to me waving and giggling. It was just too too cute.

Millie brings me just as much pleasure. I am one of those annoying mums who asks their babies for kisses all the time (my favourite thing in the world is my babies kisses). Millie finds it terribly boring though so in order to encourage her every time she does finally pucker up I throw my arms up in the air and say 'Yay for kisses'. So now every time Millie goes to give me a kiss she throws her arms up and yells 'Yay' only she does it just before the kiss so I miss out on the actual kiss every time! Bless her.

Tomorrow my wonderful aunty is arriving to stay with us for one whole week. She loves and misses Lola just as much as we do so spending the day with her tomorrow is just perfect.



I love this photo because it represents all the maternal figures in my life supporting me and loving Lola xxx

Another new book...

A friend told me about a book yesterday that she thought I should read it is "An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination" by Elizabeth McCracken. The story is the authors experience of going through exactly what I am going through right now. It is funny that she told me about this yesterday as I had gone into a book shop to look for something like this and had no luck! For some strange reason I have been craving reading other womens experience of having a stillborn baby.

I started reading the book last night, many times already I have thought "wow, that sums up exactly how I feel". However there has also been things that McCracken did differently to me. As I read about these things I felt guilty, as if I had done the wrong thing. An example is that McCracken and her husband chose not to have any photos taken of their baby boy whereas we went so far as to have a photographer present. I love and treasure the photos we have so why did I feel guilty about having them when reading somebody elses reasons for not having photos? I dont know the answer but maybe it is because when you go through something like this you have no point of reference on what is the right and wrong thing to do, you just do what feels right at the time and hope you have made the right decision in the long run.

I plan on spending my weekend reading, crafting, keeping all snuggly warm at home with my babies and hubby and anticipating the arrival of my aunty on sunday and my cousin on monday. Sounds like a fabbo plan to me!

Have a great weekend everybody xxxx

Happy Birthday MUM

Hope you are having a great day, we are all thinking of you over here in the east xxx

Have you ever

made a hot chocolate with as many marshmallows as you could possibly fit on top? You should try it, it is YUMMO (and probably the reason I still look pregnant rather than the recent pregnancy, how long can I get away with using that as an excuse?)

I made a very exciting purchase today (while out shopping for the billion birthdays coming up in July)



watch this space for my first finished project!

You can buy the book here