An eternally young baby

Got an SMS from a number I didn't recognise this morning, announcing the birth of one Zachariah David. Took me a while to work out (not so quick these days) that my cousin Cecelia in Canberra had her second son! What a date for a birthday! He'll never live it down :)

Congrats Cecelia and Mick!

A year old

Look at that charming little thing in pink. She turned one last week. That last year has sped by. It's been fun. Not every moment of it, but mostly.

And now look at her. Not quite walking by herself. Almost there. Definitely climbing and cruising and hassling her brothers and chasing after the cats. She waves, blows kisses, asks for "More?" all the time, loves her Arrowroot biscuits ("bih?") and is her Grandfather's girl, all right.

We didn't have a big party for her birthday. I felt guilty, as usual, since both boys had biggish dos. But we were totally partied out. My dad's 75th in December. Then Christmas. Then a stressful January settling Elora into child care and returning to work, then Atti's birthday, then Chinese New Year, then... So we took all the grandparents out to yum cha and that was it. No cake, no singing, no cousins. (Although, it happened to be my mother's birthday that day so my brothers took her out to dinner that evening. We gave it a miss since it was a school night.)

And her birthday present? Three needles in the thighs. Poor thing!

Forgive me, Elora! We'll make it up to you when you're older.

February flash

How on earth did the last month just disappear? Well, I do know how February flew by. I've been back at work full time. I'm sorry folks. I hadn't forgotten about you there in blogworld, just haven't had much time to write.

Well, actually, I have written some posts, but I got stuck on a big one - the Australia Day long weekend was crazily eventful for us - and the other posts have been queueing up as drafts. So be prepared. I'm going to do the cheating thing and back-date posts for a while. RSS readers be warned. It'll be like whizzing through time.

Anyway, today's most marvellous news means that hopefully in the near future I won't be quite so exhausted and will have more time for crafting and writing (and sleeping)! I have been given the "OK" to work part time, starting at the next pay period (another week) provided that the paperwork gets done in time. Yay! I'm so deliriously happy. or maybe that's just the tiredness. If all goes to plan I'll be having Thursdays off each week and finish early two days. Not the best scenario finance-wise, but what I was really hoping for. We'll just have to stick it out this year and keep our fingers crossed that Atticus will get into pre-school next year (a quarter of the cost of child care)!

Cheerio.

Happy Chinese New Year!

Year of the Rat.

Just a quiet-ish family dinner at my parents' place with all and sundry.

Lucky me!

Things bode well for the coming year. I've won not one, but two giveaways recently. I feel like the luckiest girl around!

I received this most delightful package in the mail the other day. All the way from England. Monica from Quilt While You're Ahead had a give-away in January and I was one of the winners!

A nice magazine, fat quarter of gorgeous floral fabric that Atticus immediately appropriated as a "blanket" for his Dog (but I managed to get it away just before dinner time) and a beautiful hand made brooch (detailed picture on Flickr). Thank you so much, Monica!

I also just won this contest from one of my favourite online fabric shops. The prize is unbelievably generous. I am astounded. An entire Fat Quarter bundle. For those non-crafty people, a fat quarter is a quarter of a metre/yard of fabric, but instead of being a long thin strip across the width of the fabric, it's squarish (half of a half metre/yard). Can't wait to receive that package in the mail from America.

Big grins around here right now.

A successful week

For the past few weeks I have been really dreading going back to work. I think I've mentioned it before.

Well, it's been a week now and things are going really well. I thought I'd be utterly exhausted every evening but I haven't been. I've been tired, but not overly so. And during the day instead of being stressed and overwhelmed, I've actually been the opposite. Energised and relaxed. I think it's the change of pace. No kids to worry about (as much). Different people to talk to. Things to make my brain work.

Also, today I really felt settled, like I hadn't been away for a year. Amazing how quickly that happened. I feel useful and productive again. I hope this feeling lasts!