6 years ago

Isabella was born a little after 5.30pm on July 8th. She weighed 5 pounds 14.5 ounces.



Isabella on her first birthday.



Isabella about 2 years old (who incidently in this photo is a dead ringer for Tahlia - or I should Tahlia is a dead ringer for her!)



Isabella riding her new bike at her 3rd birthday party at Harbour Park.




And at her 4th birthday party celebrated at our house with her kindy friends.



Last year when Isabella turned 5.

I will update with the latest photo soon!

I can't believe my 'baby' is 6 already. She is having a nice holiday so far. Last week she spent with Michael and they went to the movies, bowling and bike riding. This week has really only begun but we are going to the movies tonight with her friend from school and Bella is EXTRA excited because it's her first 'night' movie! Hehehe.

I have my Dad and step-Mum coming tomorrow and then my step sister and two neices coming on Saturday. Can't wait!

Some photos from our weekend

Tahlia and Isabella 26/4/2009

It is rare to get these two in a photo together.

Even rarer to have them both with a smile!

Tahlia makes a mess in Bella's room.

Note the lump under the white and yellow blanket?

That's Tahlia's baby - asleep :-)

Tahlia enjoying a sausage on a stick and some red drink!!! Mmmmmmm!
Now that's some good parenting!

Isabella solemnly marching with her school at the local ANZAC Day parade.

Lest We Forget.

School holidays are nearly over!

Tomorrow is a pupil free day for Isabella.

Now tell me why is it they need so many pupil free days? In my day.......

Seriously I don't recall having one every single term! As a student it probably rocks - but as a parent it's just another day of juggling how on earth to combine work and a child who no longer attends daycare.

Michael's mum and dad were happy to help. We dropped Bella out there tonight and I will finish work early tomorrow to collect her.

Then back to school on Tuesday.

Unfortunately the weather was pretty awful for her week off with Michael. They did go and see Monsters vs Aliens at the movies and played many many games of Uno though!

Thursday (my day off) was the first sunny day in a week. So Tahlia played hookey from daycare and we all went to the Lagoon for a swim. Although the sun was shining and it was pretty hot, the water was a little chilly but the girls didn't seem to mind.

Yesterday was another hot(ish) day so we pulled out the shell pool and filled her up. The girls took their swimming babies in and had a ball. These are the photos I'm hopefully attaching to this post. We are seriously considering getting a pool at the moment so hopefully when summer comes again we'll be ditching the shell pool for something a little bigger. Stay tuned!

Tahlia spent the day in knickers (or knickies as she calls them) yesterday and not one accident! I've labelled her a few pairs to take to daycare tomorrow - so fingers crossed she'll be easy to train.

I've got to say it's pretty quiet with only 1 child in the house. Tahlia is behind me on the girls desk which is set up with the broken computer flat screen and old keyboard and mouse. She is tapping away earnestly. Of course the TV is going in the other room - Dorothy and the Wiggles and Tahlia is wearing her Dorothy tutu.

Well its just past 8pm - time to get this bedtime show on the road.

Until next time!

PS this formatting crap on this blog is FRUSTRATING! If anyone can point me in the direction of a html for dummies website that'd be great...

Easter 2009

Well that about sums up Tahlia's Easter.

Within half an hour of waking Easter Sunday morning she had devoured more chocolate than in her entire life!

Her vocab has a new favourite word......................'chocolate'

Isabella and Tahlia 'hunted' for Easter eggs. Isabella was a little disappointed that there weren't many eggs to be found and none at all outside.

I explained to her that it was too wet for the bunny to leave any outside and furthermore, I had asked him (her?) not to leave too many because I knew that there would be plenty of chocolate.

And boy was I right!

Pity I've given up chocolate - I could be having a FEAST right now.

Michael suggested we just let them eat and eat and eat to a) get rid of the chocolate and b) let them get a belly ache so they may want to give up chocolate for good! Hehehe!

Kia: the photo shows the girls getting stuck into the Easter chicks you gave them. Thank you!

In other news:

• I've set up our new laptop and we are all systems go! Just have to check/learn how to burn. How wonderful to have a working burner again!
• I've got a new mobile ringtone "Blame it on the Boogie" - blue toothed from our laptop. Cool!
• It has been raining pretty much non-stop the entire long weekend :-(
• My baptism/confirmation/communion was great!
• About to go make lamb roast for dinner - yummy!

Hope you all have a wonderful Easter.

Love Suz

PS GGGGGGGGGGGRRRRRRRRRRRRRR I can't get the spacing to work!

Hairdressers

After I had a shower with Tahlia this afternoon, Isabella called her over to the couch to play hairdressers.

Tahlia is used to sitting in that position. Each morning that is where both girls sit while I do their hair. Tahlia and Bella are both excellant at sitting while I do their hair.

Tahlia had already had her hair washed (so it was wet) but Isabella still insisted on using the water spray.

I must admit she did quite a fine job. It is now that I write this that I realise I didn't take a photo of the finished 'do'.

Isabella has asked if she can do Tahlia's hair tomorrow.

Sure it'll save me a job!

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And in other news, Tahlia is still going to sleep perfectly and is now also sleeping right through. Well to 5.30am anyway. Normally I'd feel a bit ripped off about that - but I figure we usually get up at 6am anyway, what's a 1/2 hour earlier?

Besides I usually spend the time cuggling with her on the couch - so I kind of love it.

Isabella is going great with her swimming. This term she began learning to breathe with the arm action. I was a bit sceptical at first that she would ever be able to co-ordinate that all together but she has come A LONG way. I'm so proud of her!

I'm still unsure, however, how Isabella is getting on in school. She really doesn't say much about it and we usually have to play 20 questions to work out what she has done during the day. Michael and I are interested in speaking with her teacher during parent/teacher interviews in the next couple of weeks to get her take on it.

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18 March 2004 (5 years ago)

Isabella was 8 months old and I have written in my diary:

"Sleep thru - 6 nights in a row - a record!" "Milestone - you pulled up onto Lisa's couch."

18 March 2007 (2 years ago)

Tahlia was 8 weeks old and my diary says:

"Harbour park w/ Jen Mitchell and Hayden and for lunch. We all had naps. To Nana's - Bella played with Alishia. I have the sneezes. Aaachoo!"

Very descriptive, Suzanne! Actually it was a Sunday so there wasn't much room to write!

Well that's enough reminiscing for tonight!

Good night.

Pretties

Yesterday I took Tahlia and had her ears pierced. They look absolutely adorable! She did great really. There was crying but she had stopped by the time I got to the front counter to pay. Now when you ask her to show you her "pretties" she swishes her hair back and cocks her head to one side to show them off!

Isabella was about 12 months older when we got hers done. That involved tears from her and from me! No tears from me yesterday though. Wonder what that says about me?

The bottom photo is of Isabella's latest creation made at school. I don't know whether I love it or I'm terrified of it! What you do think?

Isabella had free dress day on Friday (gold coin donation to the bushfire appeal). There were drama's of course! Found out Thursday she had to have closed in shoes. The only closed in shoes she has are her school joggers (one white pair and one black pair).

I thought on Thursday night we had decided that she would wear a pair of 3/4 denim pants and top with her white joggers.

Friday morning TEARS! No she wanted to wear a skirt and she had NO shoes that would go with them.

Silly daddy caved and took her to Big W on the way to school to buy her a pair of closed in shoes that weren't joggers. He claims he just couldn't face having this argument with her.

Michael has been busy all weekend helping his sister move into her new house. Isabella, Tahlia and I went over to her friend's house yesterday afternoon. Isabella, Jade and Kimberley went to daycare together, but now go to 3 different schools. The girls had a gret time catching up with each other. Jade has a little brother who is around Tahlia's age so they were able to 'play' (read fight) together as only 2 year olds can!

That's about it for now...

Name that rash...

This was Tahlia this morning :-(

I noticed she was itching the back of her legs last night and so I dosed her up on Polaramine and rubbed anti-itch cream all over her.

She had an awful night.

This morning Michael and I freaked out when we noticed little dots had spread all over and she was very itchy.

Michael took her to the after hours doctor who diagnosed her with having an allergic reaction to something. He has prescribed prednisone! So it must be a pretty bad reaction.

The welts are looking a little better this afternoon although I noticed she was still scratching when I put her to bed tonight.

As to what she had a reaction to? She was playing outside yesterday so I'm wondering if it was the grass or one of the weeds in our grass? In any case I hope it doesn't happen again, poor thing.

Now I'll have to try and convince daycare tomorrow she is not contagious!

P.S. the yellow water is from pinetarsol - it's not a big wee wee!

Wet wet wet

It's raining , it's pouring, the old man is snoring, and this old girl is OVER IT!

I can barely remember the last time I saw sunlight and today has been the worst of it.

I suppose the cyclone up north has a lot to do with it. And the winds!

Tahlia is obsessed with the rain. "Raining, pouring" she'll say over and over interspersed with "wet". An observer is our Tahlia!

We have been basically stuck at home the entire weekend due to the weather.

The girls have amused themselves by playing with their babies, dancing and watching DVDs.

Tahlia needs to be doing whatever it is that Isabella is doing and babies are a favourite. Isabella had her floor full of babies (and stuffed animals) on blankets this morning. Sitting in between two of them at a time and patting them to sleep. Tahlia was in on it too.

Isabella did some drawing, cutting and sticky taping whilst Tahlia was napping today. Naptime for Tahlia means Bella can play with things that are not usually brought out when Tahlia is awake. She really is quite talented artwise (not like her mother).

Isabella starts show and tell at school this week. Her first topic 'my favourite photo of me'. Well we have hundreds and hundreds of photos so I narrowed it down to about 10 she could choose from and this was her pick:

This was from a series of photos my Mum took in May 2007 for a uni subject. Isabella and her cousins, Alishia and Lakeda all dressed up as Princesses. Tahlia was not forgotten, here is her Princess photo:

Do I make 'em cute or what?

Ok sorry if the page previews a bit dodgily - I'm still working out the photo uploading thing.

Well it's getting late and Isabella is still awake. Not for long!

School days

Well there is no time like the present to play around I guess! Michael is putting Isabella to sleep although I suspect he has actually fallen asleep in there himself!

So on Tuesday 27/1/2009 Isabella had her first day of Prep. Prep has replaced Preschool and is the non-compulsory full-time year of 'schooling' before Grade 1.

As many of you have heard me bitch and moan about - Isabella missed out going to Prep last year by 8 days. 8 days!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Needless to say she (and I) was more than ready to go this year.

In fact, on Monday (which was the Australia Day public holiday and the day before her first day) she told Michael that we could drop her off for her first day.

As if!!

No way, we proud parents had been waiting for this day for ever, well 5 years at least! We were going to make the most of it. So up nice and early we all were. Isabella dressed herself and I did her two plaits resplendent with green bow hairties. Unfortunately the photos we took were pretty crappy and do not do her any justice.

She looked totally cute and grown up!

There were no tears from Bella or us, although I do confess to having a bit of a lump in my throat.

Michael and I both picked her up from her first day and I was totally amazed when I caught sight of her that afternoon. I just could not believe how grown up she looked.

That night we pried out of her as much as we could about her day. I swear she seemed about 5 years older to me!

Second day of school was a totally dfferent story - she didn't even want me to walk her in to her classroom. Seriously! I had to drop her at the gate (which I might add - before you call child services - is right next to her classroom).

Thursday and Friday, however, I insisted on walking her in!

It's been a steep learning curve:

• I learned how to hard boil an egg (for egg and lettuce sandwich). It takes 10 mins by the way!
• I learned how to iron skorts (not much fun!)
• I learned that the sticker dot next to Isabella's note thingy at school does not mean she is super special and fabulous - but that she is the oldest child of our family at the school
• I have learned that Isabella will not eat a full orange or a tub of yoghurt - but has no problems with her 3 Anzac biscuits each day!
• I have learned that most every day Isabella will come home with note that will require me to remember something new!
• I haven't learned how to get myself (in my car) in the pickup lane of an afternoon (that is on my 'to do' list)

I am so excited for Isabella starting her schooling. I have such fond memories of my school years and I thoroughly enjoyed going to school and learning new things. I hope Isabella feels the same way too!

Bye for now!