Tuesday, May 27, 2008

Warm warminess

Winter seems to be making its appearance around here lately. It's starting to get chilly.

But we have a great trick to ease the "climbing into icy cold bed" blues and I thought I'd share it. Because it's delightful. (Not as cosy as flannelette sheets but Dan won't have them!)
  1. Climb into bed and lie with your knees bent.
  2. Pull the covers over and make a cave with your arm at the entrance.
  3. Put a blowy heater in the opening.
  4. Bask in the warminess for a few minutes. Be careful not to block the vents of the blowy heater as it may over heat and switch off which means no warminess.
  5. Once you are warm, pull the heater away and pull the now warm sheets and blankets snug around you.
  6. Smile and congratulate yourself on your cleverness.
  7. Go to sleep in comfort.

Some people might tell you to get an electric blanket or something sensible like that. That might work. But it's not as fun!

Monday, May 26, 2008

My heart swelled

Tonight Dante performed with a group from his school in a Schools Dance Competition. Every year our school enters a few groups. Some of them are picked for the finals, some of them are not. Only a select number of kids from each class participate and finally this year Dante was chosen to be a part of it. His dancing has become good enough for public viewing, apparently!

They did an interpretation of Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak. Is there anyone out there in the Western World that doesn't know this classic children's book?

The kids were divided into three groups - the trees, the fish and the Wild Things. D was one of the latter. They had wonderful costumes!


One of Dante's friends did an incredible job as Max. Dressed in a furry suit of "Sully" (the main character from Monsters Inc.), he looked cute and added fun and vivaciousness to the role. When the curtains opened onto their performance, the entire audience simultaneously let out a huge "Awww..." and he certainly made the show.

We got to see the rehearsal beforehand:


And watched the actual show afterwards (at great expense - they make a killing out of us sucker-parents). Our kids were the first act of the night. And oh! they were so amazingly gorgeous up there on the stage. We had great seats right up the front. But since we got there just as the lights dimmed we stood to the side.

I giggled. I clutched Dan's arm, my face lit up with pride. Tears even came to my eyes. It was the most wonderous thing. I couldn't be more proud, not just for our boy but for all our kids.

It was a great end to a long day after a week of wretched illness.

Sunday, May 25, 2008

Saturday, May 24, 2008

Hello, world

Seems like I've been taking quite a blog break this year. I think the trials of working and bringing up three kids have taken their toll. Just recently we got into a bit of trouble with Dante's school for being late all the time. 25 partial absences so far this year (that's what gets recorded when you're late, even if only 5 minutes). But it did give us a good kick up the bum and we haven't been late since. Heh!

Now the problem is that I've become tired and run down and have caught some nasty bug that has knocked me about for a good week and a half now. I think I'm on the home stretch (certainly hope so). The boys are okay, the girl's ill (nasty rash all over her body and extremely clingy) and Dan's coming down with it, too. Ack! Winter is definitely here. (Or, as Dan would say, "Stupid Ice Weather".)

In other news, Dan's heading off to the Apple World Wide Developers Conference in San Francisco in June. For two weeks! (He's going travelling for a week afterwards). I'm so excited for him but wish I could go, too. Things will be interesting back here while he's gone.

Anyhow, I haven't been doing nothing during all this time. I've taken up knitting. I was knitting before but lately I haven't been able to put the needles down. Each night after the kids are in bed, instead of doing the dishes or folding laundry I sit down and knit. I went to a sock knitting class at the end of April and have successfully made a pair for Elora (sort of - they're uneven cause the first one was a bit small) and half way through a toe-up sock for me. I'll post some pictures when I'm up to date with my Flickr photo uploading!

Hopefully I'll get my blogging mojo back soon and you'll next hear from me within a month!