A Gift On A Budget

Jessica was off to a birthday party on Saturday. Now the child in question is one that has EVERYTHING and I mean EVERYTHING. I have never seen so much 'stuff' in all my life! Not even at a Target toy sale. So what do you get a girl like that, plus we had a seriously limited budget this week.

Well my girls believe that presents should be thoughtful and made these days. The made bit is usually by me though. As Hayley likes to cook, tea towel aprons was the winner. I'll do a little more on these tea towel aprons this week. They are cheap, cute & reversible.



I have been a little addicted to these cute little aprons and can't help myself stalking the tea towel section of every store checking out the latest & cutest tea towels. So with a 3 pack of tea towels, basket & a couple of miniature utensils we were set and best of all, we didn't spend over our $15 budget.

Fantastic Fun Fishing

During the Easter break we had the fantastic opportunity to stay at Joan & Lee's unit at Sunshine Beach. While the sunshine was missing for many days it really didn't matter. We had an absolute ball. The fish were biting, waves were rolling and we just had the best time.







Lucy very 'bestest' friend James came to visit us with his mum & little sister for the afternoon and he caught his very first fish. Now that was exciting! It was freezing cold and a massive storm came rolling in but it didn't dampen anyone spirits or enthusiasm.



The best part for me was I got to curl up on the couch with a great book and read away to my little hearts content. Not good for me to be in the rain now is it. Someone has to be at home keeping the home fires burning don't they.



Ashleigh turned 22 that weekend so every one came up for a roast dinner with us. It was just a perfect week.





The bush walks round Noosa heads are amazing. I only went along because on Hastings Street is the very best ice-creamery in the world. It's sorbets and frozen yogurt and is all made fresh on the premises. AMAZING!



Ashleigh & I are heading back to the unit (thank-you again Joan & Lee) for a mother daughter retreat. When I asked Ash to go away with me she's like "weeelllll yyyeeesss, but what's the catch". It's tough being the oldest of six. You don't live at home and are an easy going kid, you can get kinda over looked. But not that weekend. Ash, me and the ice-creamery! You will forgive me if while I'm away that weekend that I could assume that the eagerly anticipated rapture may have occurred because her and I will be in peaceful heaven.

Missionary Photo Take 2!!

Poor boy. He is so off his face with the medication he let me take the photo. He has actually never even had a panadol in his ENTIRE life. Not even as a baby. Hates any medicine so has always just sucked it up. But I had to put the mortar & pestle to work and grind it up & mix it with the custard. Must go, he phoned from downstairs to come down & change his ice pack.

EAT THE FROG FIRST!

A little while ago a women in our ward gave a talk, I guess, was about procrastination. One of the stories she told was about 'Eating the Frog First'. It really resonated with me and I started applying that to my life and to our life as homeschoolers.

There are certain subjects that Maddie doesn't enjoy, mostly maths and copy work so we sat down together and looked at the schedule, which I might add was set 100% by me as I load the workboxes. More often then not it would be met with certain resistance as she would try to negotiate her way out of doing the work she really didn't want to do.
If she did do the least loved work first she would take FOREVER!

So after watching this clip and explaining the principle behind it , we now swallow the frog first. The kids get it better now as we looked at how they felt during the day when they knew something unpleasant was going to come like it or not. This simple principle has really made a difference to us all. We sat down worked out what OUR frogs were, because each of us was different , then put them on the top of the list. It is amazingly liberating.

Now when I have to do something & I try to fob it off I think."NO SWALLOW THAT FROG".

The Missionary Photo!!

It is 12 more days until the Mission papers are submitted. I took THE 'missionary' photo that goes along with the mission paper and after having taken it silly me goes "would you like to get your eyebrows tidied up and I can take another one?" What sort of a monster mother I'm I . He's like "do you think I need it?" What was I thinking! Clearly having 5 girls has got to me in ways that I could never have expected. He has been jabbed with vaccinations, going in to hospital tomorrow to have his wisdom teeth out, crowns done, medicals, not to mention that he just a really well behaved 18.7year old that hasn't even lost a point for driving and I'm pointing out scraggy eyebrows!!!



This boy has had this mission planned since FOREVER! He then informed me that there could be a little hick-up and that is the First Presidency may be on vacation when his papers hit Salt Lake. This would mean the eagerly anticipated Mission Call (where in the world you are going to serve your 2 year mission) could be delayed. When he was telling me at first all i could hear was delayed & vacation. I reply "who is going on vacation, they can't go on vacation right now, it will have to wait! OH the First Presidency!! Well OK then.



I am so glad that we only have one son, because this comes with just as much anticipation as having a baby. We are blessed to have a son who didn't just wake one day when he was 20 odd and think not much else is happening so I might as well go on a mission. We have one that at exactly 18 years and 8 months to the day he can submit those Mission Paper. He saw the bar had been raised and aim right over the top for it. He is a blessing to our lives.

YOU CAN NOT SWALLOW YOUR TONGUE!!

The reason for my extra computer time is that I have had some sick little people at home just now. Lucy's epilepsy has been less than stable shall we say, Jess has a throat virus & today we have Caitlin, the married daughter here sick as well, being ever so careful not to invoke a seizure as that would mean the chance of a drivers license would be set back about another 2 years. The computer is next to the couch so they are there and I am blogging away happily in between calls of "mum can you get me, and feel my head!"

Recently in our local newspaper they ran an article on how a mother had picked her daughter up from daycare & whilst traveling home the 1 year old had a seizure or febrile convulsion.
The article was so poorly written and so full of dangerous miss information I had to do what I have never done before and write a letter to the editor. This is some of what I wrote.


"I just want to say how disappointing it was to read the story “Mum’s skills save baby”. While the essence of the story about the need for first aid training is important and the scare Mrs ............ must have experienced is very frightening, you have allowed her to perpetuate a dangerous myth about seizures. While the child’s tongue would be “stuck in her mouth” because that is in fact where it is meant to be, it is a myth that that has anything to do with a blocked airway which is what the mother implied in the story. People do NOT swallow their tongues! People reading this could assume that you do in fact have to hold the tongue down so as to not swallow it. This is a dangerous myth that parents of, and people with conditions such as Epilepsy have spent a long time dispelling.

You also generally don’t have to administer CPR to someone having a seizure. The blueness in the face is caused by air being dispelled from the lungs during the actual seizure. You place the person in the recovery position and make sure the person is free from harm and time the seizure. Once it has ended the person usually begins breathing on their own and will more often just go to sleep. Don’t give CPR during the seizure. That is very dangerous and actually quite futile.

I have 2 daughters with epilepsy, one 20 & one 5, I have been doing this for a long time (20 years), have had to call 000 more times than I can count and have had to administer CPR as they have failed to begin breathing at the end of a long seizure. Mrs............ "auto-pilot" as she put it, may have been more dangerous than 000. I’m not sure if it was the way the story was written as both the journalist and the parent are only speaking from this one experience, but I can tell you that it was a very misguided, inaccurate article. I hope you will run another story in the near future to dispel the very dangerous myths and inaccuracies that occurred in this story. I am not inferring as a contradiction to Mrs ............. story but just a story on what you should do and highlight the information from the Ambulance Paramedic.


It has taken years for people to learn that when a person is having a seizure you don't stick a spoon in their mouth or anything similar. I was shocked that this story even made it to the paper and obviously they do not have a fact checker.



Some time ago I wrote an article for an American blog site Or So She Says on Epilepsy Awareness with facts and more information on our story & Epilepsy itself. It is handy to have some knowledge and it has links to other info if your interested.

Fulcher Friday

Well Friday is quite often park afternoon with the Fulcher's. This photograph was taken a little while ago on one of these Friday adventures and I have been dying to use it. Peet Fulcher of Peet Fulcher Photography is like 15 but is developing into an amazing photographer. Spend a few minutes on his blog and just have a look at what this kids can do eg:



He tackles a lot of technical stuff because this is just one of his hobbies at the moment, but boy he is good!! Also now when I pop over to the Fulcher Family blog it makes me want to curl up with Dorothea Mackellar and read Our Country too.
Dorothea Mackellar - is one of Australia's best loved poets and her beautiful lyric poem "Our Country" is just echoed in their way of semi rural Australian life.



I'm so looking forward to getting out on the weekend with my new camera. Don't you just love Australia!