I did fully intend to write up a review of my lovely Sling bag made at Sewjourn, for Nikki’s Review Round-Up Competition. Somehow that deadline slid out the window while I was distracted by kilters, but get yourself over there and vote for a winner anyway, won’t you?

In lieu of that, and of anything else of substance for the blog this week – please accept an offering from last week:

Anticipation:

Installation:

Sandpit is Go!:

My Dad built, and then he and Dermot installed, this long-anticipated addition to the backyard.
The weather even came to the party with a couple of brilliant days earlier this week (I love this Winter-with-a-promise-of-Spring time of year so much). So the kids got to hang out and build sandcastles as much as they liked.

Well. Two of them liked. Mr Fifteen-and-a-half-months-and-I can-climb-out-of-my-cot-now seems to have some kind of bizarre sand-phobia! We’re working on it.

On Monday, I came home to my package of goodies from Susie’s very Useful Swap. I hoped to blog those today, but the day has got away from me (again), so I’ll just have to give you the what I sent version, and leave the what I got part for later. Dreary old Melbourne weather has made photo taking a bit of a pain of late, so please overlook that and marvel at the fantabulous oven gloves and fingertip mitts I made for my swap recipients (I’m not quite sure who got which yet, though I know Suzie has the fruity ones. I love that fabric – I picked it up from Earthgirl fabrics at the Stitches & Craft show). I checked out a bunch of oven mitt tutorials online, and ended up basically using Suzie’s method – simple and effective. ‘Nuff said.

My personal favourite is in the top left, that cream and green flowery print. I’m making a set of gloves for our kitchen in the same fabric this weekend. This weekend, when I go away to Sewjourn with some other crafty peeps. Yes, that’s right… kid free for two whole days and nights! Sewjourn! Yippee yay! I am loading up the boot of my car with far too many projects, and it won’t matter whether I achieve a lot or a little, it will be nice just to be able to leave the (good) scissors out with no danger of someone chopping off a finger

(And to finish a whole cup of coffee before it goes cold.)

Oh, by the way, if there happens to be anyone (a cross-stitcher type anyone) out there who owns the Dimples Designs Wee Beasties part 6 design (Blue-eyed Darner dragonfly), I would be forever in your debt if I could get a copy of the key… mine has gone awol, and I kind of need it if I’m ever going to finish the darn thing!

There’s nothing special about tonight, except perhaps all of the above apply. This week is kicking my butt even more spectacularly. Husband in Sydney, School holidays, and kids all sick. Monday night I had a miserable Niamh in bed with me with a suspected ear infection (though she did seem okay by morning, after medication and a night with Mum). Last night was Ro’s turn in with me, and tonight, well… he’s currently napping fitfully on my lap (one-handed blogging, y’all!) and won’t go down in any bed. This is after the excitement of a few hours ago when his big brother coughed until he vomited. Awesome times.

Blah. Let’s have a little recap on some of the good stuff that’s happened since I was last here, shall we? Good then. Point form ahoy:

We moved the babe out of our bedroom and in with his sister. This was monumental. And, of course, led to him finally, finally sleeping through the night. I should have remembered that from last time, really. Ok, so I did remember. I was just really reluctant to boot my baby out. So the sleepless nights – all my fault. Obviously. Next!

My blog turned five. FIVE! That’s a really long time to be saying nothing much at all. Less than 400 posts total… gosh, I really am a crap blogger! (But really… I have got to say, blogging was way less pressure back in the days. Now… I don’t know. Every now and then, I see a favourite blog go ‘pro’. Or ‘pro-ish’. Suddenly there’s Sponsorship. And Product Placement. Cash for Comment. Or competitions to enter, but only if you ‘Follow’, and Twitter and Facebook about it. Often, the original, entertaining, unique voice of said blogger is lost amongst it all. At which point I mercilessly drop them from my feed.) Ok, sorry. Rant over.

My best girl turned four. Way, way more exciting than the blog turning five. Niamh is such a party girl, she always has been. We had pretend party play for weeks around these parts. Culminating in a totally fun, but also totally soggy pink-and-green party at the Bundoora Children’s Farm. Kids don’t care. Rug ‘em up, they’ll have fun no matter what. And we did.

I am quite bad at point form-ing my thoughts!

Someone introduced me to the Sookie Stackhouse series. Thanks, Someone I read the books almost without coming up for air (don’t worry, I still managed to clothe and feed my children. Just.) Then I went out and bought Series One of True Blood on DVD, and we watched that over a week, then rinse and repeat with Series Two. Totally loving it. Series Three, of course, isn’t on in Australia yet, so we’ll be (cough, cough) waiting for that for a while.

After 44 months of breastfeeding, I finally closed up shop. (That’s non-consecutive months, obviously. I meant the total for all three children). I truly thought that would be harder for both Rohan and I than it was, but I just knew time was up, and we just… stopped. Now he goes to bed with cuddles and a few sips of water, and even (sometimes) for Dad, not me. Another monumental step. (And I just realised I can burn my maternity bras now. Or, you know, just bin them. Probably more environmentally friendly that way.)

There’s probably more good stuff. Just can’t quite drag it out of the brain cells right now. Between up there ^^^ and here, I managed to get Ro back into his bed, and the clock ticked over to Thursday… Must. Go. To. Bed.

Oh, but before I do, I also managed to get a few crafty bits and pieces in:

I finally finished off the doll stroller seat for my friend’s little girl:

Seen being test-driven here by our recently arrived good friend Gracie, another Bamboletta sweetheart to keep Molly company.

Also, I joined in with Sooz’s Useful swap. My original plan involved crochet, but then I stupidly managed to sprain my crucial-for-crochet-right-index-finger. So since yarny stuff was out, I broke out the fabric instead. This is only a peek, mind you, but I’m hoping the recipients love these – I certainly do, and I intend to make myself one or two now.

Once my finger began to recuperate, I started back on those tricksy DPNs (to help the recovery, you understand!):

And emerged victorious, with a smashing pair of red fingerless mitts to bring some happy to the coldcoldcold mornings we’ve been having.

Ravelry details over here if you are so inclined. I love my mitts

And, folks, as Peter Cundall used to say, that’s yer bloomin’ lot.

The Steiner/Waldorf blocks (also affectionately known as ‘offcuts’ around here, thanks to Dermot being the son of a joiner!) were from Mum for Rohan’s birthday. They came from Winterwood, we visited for the first time last week. For the record – beautiful shop, beautiful, beautiful felt, but I don’t recommend driving from here to there and back again with a passenger prone to carsickness. Sorry Mum! (She couldn’t even drive us, since my car is a manual and I won’t let her drive it!)

Some months back, a small girl, perhaps two, pointed Rohan out as we meandered about the greengrocer, and made much of ‘the baby’. No, said her father, he’s not a baby anymore, he’s growing big, like you. He is so still a baby!, asserted I, clinging desperately to the fading days of Babyhood. My last.

But One brings definite change, doesn’t it? With the coming of One, not even I can deny any more – it’s over. No more baby. We’ve crossed the threshold and run face-first into Toddlerhood. (Rohan does have a tendency to run face-first into most things – hence the bruises, see above).

We had a small family celebration at the weekend. Robot cake was mandatory – our Ro gets “Ro-pop” quite a bit. His big brother and sister both made cards featuring robots. A RicRac discobot was on the cards, but in the end, none of my crafting plans came to fruition, and I decided not to beat myself up about it – he certainly won’t remember that his robot (or his quilt, or whatever else it was on that list…) came late!

Happy Birthday (+ 3), Mr Ro. So glad we made it through this year together intact!

(!!!Sorry!!! Not sure what came over me there!!!)

We had a lovely and far-too-chocolate-filled weekend at my father-in-law’s place in central Victoria. The kids got to run riot with the cousin they don’t see enough of, and I got bit more granny-squaring in, despite the (was it slightly derisive?) commentary from uncles-in-law. Pfft to them, I say. Also, there might have been a little bitty trip to the Bendigo Woollen Mills and Bendigo Spotlight somewhere in there… can’t remember… crafty amnesia has befallen me. (What stash diet?!)

Bunny finger-puppet project from the purl bee. A great little project for the budding crafter: Finn stitched his own, I just added the face and tail for him.

My creative space has Grannies in it. I was packing up my Grannies. They were stacked so prettily. Then everything went awol…

Sigh. It is the end of a long week. A week in which those toes learned to step. And then to walk. And (before that perhaps?) to climb to lofty heights. There have been near misses (but Facebook friends will have noticed that I stopped mid-near-miss to get a photograph!) It has been a week of solo-parenting. Which I will never learn to love, but which I am learning to navigate more smoothly. It will be a welcome relief when Dermot gets in the door tonight. Even more welcome if he gets here in time for me to rush off to tonight’s Craft Bonanza (or at least a little bit of it.) See you there?

I’m rejoining Kirsty’s My Creative Space meme. See more spaces over at her place.

So the wee boy recently raced past the 11-month post, which means I have been a non-blogger for four months people. Four! I think that may be my longest break yet, and people are starting to, you know, mention it. (Ok, namely Mum, but still…)

Also, I described myself to someone the other day as an ‘ex-blogger’, and then I wondered to myself whether the situation was really irreparable… so here we are, my blog and I – we’re entering into a trial reconciliation. No commitment, mind. We’re just casual friends. :)

In honour of it being my first post in 2010, how about some pics of a few firsts that have happened around these parts lately?

First day of Year Two:

First day of Pre-school:

First swimming class:

First (ever) pavlova:

(This was so, so very good. It disappeared very rapidly. I baked another a week later for Mum’s birthday, and that one didn’t even hang around for a photograph! Pavs are definitely my new go-to fancy dessert. Yum)

[Left] First two-wheeler (technically a four-wheeler right now, I suppose); [Right] Finally getting rid of those training wheels, hoorah!

First glimpse at Melbourne’s baby:

(And so worth standing in line for, even though I only have crappy pics. Better ones at that link above. She’s since been named Mali, which is Thai for jasmine, apparently.)

Life. It’s pootling along just the way it always does, blog or no blog. Nice to be back :)

(It truly has been stinking hot this week in Melbourne, for November anyway. This was the only way to sleep yesterday. Bonus points here for supercute handmade bunny cuddles! Minus points though for visible sweat/drool marks… I reheeally need to change those cot sheets.)

I’m not silly enough to believe it will be all fantastic from here on, but here’s hoping we’re on the way out of the doldrums.

Oh, and we’re getting better at this sitting up thing, too. And on the verge of proper crawling. Yea verily, all hell is about to break loose. Again.

Nine years ago, it was a memorable day for us.

We were married beneath a maypole in the Kooyoora State Park (which gives this post its second bushranger reference!). Until the day, none of our guests knew the actual location of the ceremony. (Technically, nor did we, for several reasons, but the most important of which was, we had no rain plan(!), and the morning of November 11 brought an absolute downpour.)

Good fortune prevailed, however. At least as far as the weather. If you ask me to tell the story of our wedding photographs, I might still cry.

Thankfully, memories and lifetimes are not all about the pictorial evidence.

Happy Anniversary, my love.