I'm in

A posting from my (our) new house! It's late, I'm knackered, but I'm happy to report I'M IN THE HOUSE. There's still loads to be done, but at least I'm here. Almost exactly a year from when we landed in NZ from London. Poor Mia has moved 4 times in a year, but is coping pretty well. Joshka -he's lost interest in crawling and now prefers to p-u-l-l himself up on anything (usually me) and stay there until he cries or falls over. He especially likes standing on my lap, pulling on my t-shirt and rocking back and forth going HA! HA! HA! HA! HA!
see ya

8 months

Joshka started the day yesterday (the day he reached 8 months!) at around 5.30am -as usual, and I tried, in vain, as usual, to get him to sleep j-u-s-t a little LONGER. GRR. At around 6.45am, after having been crawled upon for an hour or so by Josh-the-speedy-chameleon (rock-rock extend arm...GRAB and pull, rock-rock...)I thought I may as well get up. So Mia (who was also in the bed) and I threw off the covers and left Josh in the middle of the bed. I took one step to grab a jersey for him, when I heard a horrible 'thunk' and then a shocked and loud cry from my little boy who had landed face first on the cold, concrete floor...stuck, with feet waving about in attempts to crawl out of his predicament. GUILT PANIC GRAB HUG KISS STROKE...he's ok - a little graze on his nose. He has full mobility, is the same grumpy, squirmy, wriggly boy when I change his nappy...still eating, drinking, pooing (5 poo's in one day!!??) da-da-dading and ba-ba-babing, smiling charmingly and leopard crawling into all the cupboards and baskets and under tables and chairs and almost down stairs... His favourite time of day is still getting undressed just before his bath. His least favourite time of day is still getting dressed just after his bath. So no serious damage done by the fall...by the negligent mother.

Oh, his 2 top teeth are making an entrance into the world too. Possibly the reason for his early and grumpy starts to the day? Only...he hasn't been teething for the last 8 months now, has he?

soon soon

It was great to be met by a very excited and animated Mia when I returned from a days painting...She ran to the top of the steps when she heard the dog bark and squealed with delight..."Mommy's home!!". "Hi Mia!". "No, I'm NODDY!"..."Oh, hi Noddy!"
Then Ben's mum came up carrying Joshka on her hip. "Hello my big boy!" "NO! Thats MR PLOD!" "Oh, right, hello Mr. Plod!" A big smile for his favourite-person-in-all-the-world-right-now - yes, that's me.
So I was led inside by Mia, I mean, Noddy, and Big Ears and Mr. Plod. Apparently I was Tessie Bear. Hmm.

It's all systems go at the house: carpet's going to be cleaned on Friday, fridge, washing machine and dryer arrive Friday, KINGSIZE bed on Saturday (!!) and I'm going to try and get my SA boxes delivered on Monday. In the meantime Ben's frantically painting and we're debating light fittings and curtains.

read it!

" I love Piglet because he's so pink for me to love..."

NOW Mia insists we 'read' her PRETEND stories when we put her to bed. (Pretend story = not read from a book...including Mia). I used to sometimes do a "Mia's Busy Day" story...but it seems Ben has become EXTREMELY good with making up stories about Pooh Bear and Piglet who go on adventures with their best friend, Mia. Now Mia feigns sleepiness just so she can get into bed to hear a 'tend' story - "read it!". (Ben made a rule that you have to be in bed for 'tend' stories.)

I'm not as good as Ben is in that department.

Mia moaned about my story tonight...what about the heffalump?!

It puts me to sleep, putting my children to sleep. I really have to concentrate to stay awake!

Well, I'm off to do more wall painting tomorrow - baby steps towards moving in, at last.

weed it!

well, I'm not a gardener. Not yet anyway. Maybe now that we have a house I might be able to manage it...But up until now I feel I am only qualified to weed. So, while staying here with the in-laws, with their huge expanse of lawn (with a lot of weeds) and time on my hands (ha ha - such a lady of leisure!) I am happy to offer my services in that department. It's not a sought after job, I'm sure, so at least I feel I can contribute something. Anyway, as with any task, I have to incorporate Mia, and to some extent, Joshka. So there we were, the 3 of us on the grass - Josh leopard crawling (fast) to catch me before I jumped to the next patch so he could catch me again, and Mia busily pulling out anything she could grasp in her fingers (I'm sure she couldn't have done much damage to the real grass) while giving me a high-pitched running comentary of what she was doing. I showed her a particular kind of weed - looks a bit like a clover to me - which I thought she could easily identify and eradicate. Her response: "OH! That looks like an orchard to a mouse!"

undercoat on

Having Mia obsessed with Winnie-the-Pooh does have its advantages. She was reluctant to finish her porridge this morning…but her ingenious mom came up with a cunning plan to get it all down the hatch. “Look who’s come to visit!!” (holding up a spoon of porridge)…”It’s Pooh!!! Knock knock – IN HE GOES! And who’s this? Piglet! IN HE GOES! H-e-r-e’s….TIGGER! And who’s this? ROO! And Kanga…and….EEYORE! um…here comes Rabbit! Boing boing, in he goes! And Owl. And Small. And rabbit’s friend…and rabbit’s relation…(2 bites left)….and who can THIS be knocking at the door? Christopher Robin! Hello Christopher. And the l-a-s-t one? It’s MIA, of course! What a big party.” That’s 13 spoonfuls of porridge (Rabbit’s friends and relations are a big help and can fill in a lot of gaps). Excellent! I had Henry Pootel up my sleeve if I needed one more bite. (Henry is what Christopher Robin and Kanga decide to call Piglet after Kanga forced him to have a bath because he had hopped into her pouch pretending to be Roo…and now that he is so clean he doesn’t look so much like piglet- the wrong colour!- Henry Pootel for short.)

Upon getting dressed in her pink tights which matched her pink polka dot dress, which matched her pink stripey t-shirt underneath, which matched her pink sandals, which matched her pink hairties, Mia went to tell Jojo, “J-O-J-O! Look at me! I’m booful!”. AND, “Won’t Daddy be (im)pressed with my pink dress which matches my pink stockings and sandals!!” – if only she knew how much Daddy IS NOT impressed with pink and is only putting up with it because he hopes she’ll grow out of it by the time she’s…4? Maybe? But he does admit she looks pretty sweet in pink. Pretty IMpressed never the less.

Mia discovering our strawberry patch in the garden of our Rotorua house: “ Ah! How lovely! I love strawberries!...Are they for eating?” Yes, indeed. We ate a strawberry each, before the birds got there. The undercoat is finally on the entire house! It’s a finicky job – our ‘character’ home has a lot of little wooden skirtings and awkward bits to paint. – but, it’s getting there. Shouldn’t be too long now. Yay!

please let the sun shine down on me

Brrr...it was warmer in winter! Ok, so the plants have had their water, bring on summer please!

Remembrance Day

Tomorrow is Remembrance Day – the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month…but today is MY remembrance day. It was today, 5 years ago that I suffered a subarachnoid hemorrhage*, or a stroke – a bleed. I am one of the lucky ones to have walked away from it the same person I was. I didn’t die like a third of people do, nor have serious disabilities like another third of people do. No. I am relatively unscathed, apart from perhaps being a bit more tired than I used to be.

So today I am grateful. Grateful to be alive. Grateful to be alive and to have been able to have two children. Grateful to have had a natural birth for both of them. Grateful that I am alive to still be with my husband, and friend, Ben – who is much more than that, of course. Grateful for both my parents who are alive and well, as well as my two grandmothers who are in their 90’s. Grateful to be able to laugh and chat with my friends all over the world, Grateful for the internet and email and text messaging and telephones. I am sobered on this day, every year, to what could have been- what might have been. I’m extremely grateful and humbled by modern medicine – to my neurosurgeon at King’s College Hospital in London. Considering all the places I have traveled to, and all the remote places I have been, I am eternally grateful for having been in London on this day, 5 years ago, and to have had Ben with me to take charge, call an ambulance…call a taxi…and be there by my side when I needed him. Today I remember that I am lucky to be alive and I am happy to still be here. I am thrilled to witness how my children are exploring and experiencing the world. Today I am reminded that even if I’m feeling low, at least I am feeling something .It makes me happy to be alive.

Actually, for the first time, I have not been reliving the whole thing. I think it’s perhaps because I am not living in London anymore, where things could trigger the memories. So for me it’s refreshing to have arrived at today without angst and dread.

I’m grateful to be here. And loved.




*Background:
Subarachnoid hemorrhage (SAH) implies the presence of blood within the subarachnoid space from some pathologic process. The common medical use of the term SAH refers to the nontraumatic types of hemorrhages, usually from rupture of a berry aneurysm or arteriovenous malformation (AVM). The scope of this article is limited to these nontraumatic hemorrhages.


Frequency:
In the US: Annual incidence of nontraumatic aneurysmal SAH is 6-25 per 100,000. More than 27,000 Americans suffer ruptured intracranial aneurysms each year. Annual incidence increases with age and probably is underestimated, because death is attributed to other reasons that are not confirmed by autopsies.
Internationally: Varying incidences have been reported in other areas of the world (2-49 per 100,000).
Mortality/Morbidity:

An estimated 10-15% of patients die before reaching the hospital. Mortality rate reaches as high as 40% within the first week. About half die in the first 6 months.
Mortality and morbidity rates increase with age and poorer overall health of the patient.
Advances in the management of SAH have resulted in a relative reduction in mortality rate that exceeds 25%. However, more than one third of survivors have major neurologic deficits.
Race: Blacks have a higher risk for SAH than whites (2.1:1) (Broderick, 1992).

Sex:
Incidence of aneurysmal SAH is higher in women than in men.

Age:
Mean age of SAH is 50 years.

busy busy busy

I have a brochure, a logo, a corporate ID, a wedding invitation, a newsletter and a few websites to design. Crikey, better get a crack on then!
I also have a house with lots of walls that need to be painted before we can move in … not to mention 2 small children to look after. We’re still living out of suitcases rather than unpacking them and finding places for our stuff. I’ve been wearing the same outfit over and over again (top 3 t-shirts in bag, with top 3 trousers) – I don’t even bother putting it away – my laundry pile is my next day’s outfit.

But one thing about staying here with the in-laws, in the countryside, you don’t hear any traffic. Or fireworks. I just realized we didn’t hear even the faintest ‘sizzle’ of a Guy Fawkes fire cracker –not the merest glimpse of a shower of light in the sky – apart from the very bright and beautiful stars. And maybe the hoot of an owl, Ben told me that what I was hearing was an owl called the ‘more pork’. I thought he meant ‘mawpawk’ but no, definitely MORE PORK. Apparently that’s what it sounds like it’s saying. A bit like the ‘Piet my vrou’ in SA, just a bit lower in pitch. I keep waiting for the ‘vrou’ part, but no, it’s just 2 sounds: more pork. When we’re city slickers in Rotorua (Rotovegas), I doubt we’ll have such quality nightlife around us.

And there are enormous bugs here. Huge moths. They like computer screens. At the moment I’ve trapped one under some of Mia’s books that were handy.

pink

Zorro, the dog, had his teeth brushed today with Mia’s brand new, pink toothbrush. I heard her saying ‘open wide’…’that’s a good boy’, but I was busy in the kitchen and didn’t even stop to think what she could be doing. It was only when she strutted through the lounge saying, ‘I cleaned Zorro’s teeth – he liked it!’ (with her new toothbrush in hand) when the horrible truth hit me. It’s my fault for buying her a PINK one – she wasn’t nearly as keen to brush her teeth –or anyone else’s – with the green or the purple one, Ah well.

smiler

pop up flag

I learned an interesting thing the other day…I never knew why postboxes (at the end of your driveway or or garden or wherever) had little pop-up flags on them. I’ve seen them in movies and things, and I’ve seen them about, but I never knew what the flag was for. I suppose it’s because I grew up in S.A. and I imagine it’s unheard of there (I was certainly in the dark)…but if you want the postman (or postlady, as is the case here) to PICK UP some mail to be posted, you pop up the flag. FANTASTIC! I wish I’d known sooner – I wouldn’t have agonised about getting the kids all packed in the car (if I had one at my disposal) just to zoot off to the post office to post a cheque promised 2 days before. I suppose it’s a bit of a necessity out in the countryside, but I am really impressed.

Somehow I can’t see it catching on in South Africa.

Joshka now has 2 little bottom teeth and a very red cheek. He is a champion crawler and is nearly up onto his knees from the leopard crawl. He’s still doing a pretty good impression of a mop…dribble dribble slide slide. He is very much into sharing at the moment – finds great delight to try and put his teething rusk into MY mouth. I tried to coax him to sleep tonight with a dummy, only to have him pull it out and try and pop it into my mouth all the while grinning and giggling.