We are in our new house. We haven't unpacked everything of course, but we are living there. Its very exciting and very...dirty. I can't believe how dirty they left it. I would be too embarrassed to leave a house like that for some stranger to know how I had lived there.

So we have been cleaning it, scrubbing every wall and every surface. I keep finding new things to clean. I am not a domestic goddess by any stretch, but I don't like to be surrounded by other people's grime either, so we have to clean it off so we can let our own grime grow there!

They also stole our curtains. The ones we paid for, its on the contract and everything. There is a little box with the word "curtains" written beside it and the little box is ticked. So they will need to bring those back, as soon as our solicitor comes back from holidays.

The old curtains won't match our new walls once we have finished painting. I can't remember what colour the old curtains were but I know they won't match since the walls are currently "puke blue" and "dirty pink" and we are painting them cream. But I still want our curtains back because we paid for them and the lady was a bit of a cow, so she can't have MY curtains. If she hadn't left the place so filthy then I might have let her keep her dirty old curtains but a week's worth of sugar soaping walls has made me feel less than charitable.

Steve has been outside pruning all the trees and shaping them. And he has taken over the pool cleaning duties, yay. Its very exciting. I have been taking "Before" pictures so we can look back and see how much we have done.

Its nice to be a homeowner, but there was really nothing wrong with renting, I just didn't like our old house and when we were looking for a new rental place we realised that it would probably cost the same each week to pay off a mortgage.

The best part of it is that we don't ever have to deal with another Real Estate agent ever again in our lives if we don't want to. YAY!!

I want to be married. I don't want to get married, I want to already be married so its out of the way. I don't want to plan a wedding and I don't want to have The Big Day, because whatever I do has to live up to this great big expectation of what The Big Day means, and it might not come up to those expectations and then I will be disappointed and think back on it with regret. And I don't want that.

I keep putting it off so I can lose weight, because I don't want to be unhappy with how I look on The Big Day. But I don't seem to be all that serious about the diet and exercise thing either. I was on the Lite n Easy and enrolled at the gym ($240 for 6 months - I have been 3 times).

Sometimes I think I would like something small and tasteful, just a nice little ceremony with a few friends and then out for a boozy lunch. But what if we do that and then I regret that we didn't have my one opportunity to be a Pwincess for a Day?

aaaaargh. I even annoy myself sometimes!!! I definitely want to be married before we think about having another child. But I wish it was just over and done with already.

Here is my latest creation, isn't she sweet? I don't know why I made her, I just felt like it. Baden likes to take her shoes off and hurl them across the room. He is definitely a toddler now, he throws everything and has started doing headbutts. If you pick him up he hurls himself backwards and he climbs on all the furniture and just laughs if you tell him to get down.

He is such a cheeky little blighter, his smile makes me melt though so he doesn't get much discipline. I hope he doesn't turn into a brat, he was such a good baby, he was an effortless baby. I don't know why but I thought that would mean he would be an effortless toddler.

Effortless Toddler...oxymoron!

He is learning new things every day. He says "zizz zzizz" and points at something. It means "What is that?". Today he wanted to know what the teapot was, so I gave it to him to play with. It kept him amused for about two hours! Of course I had to go and fish it out of the toilet when he was finished with it. Everything ends up in the toilet these days. Luckily we don't really drink much tea round here!! Although even if we did before we wouldn't now, lol!

oh look at that, I started writing about one of my creations and ended up talking about my other creation. It doesn't take much to get me on the subject of my little bloke, I love to rave on about him!

We move next Wednesday. How exciting. It has gone so fast!

I can't wait, I am so looking forward to being in the house where I have imagined us living so many times.

Next christmas we are going to be the 'hosts' for the family christmas and I have started planning already. I will be the Hostess with the Mostest, lol, well maybe not, but I do enjoy planning things.

We are going to get lights to put up on the house every year as well. I am going to stick little cup holder hooks under the eaves so we can just hook the lights up easily every year. It's all planned. We have been laying in bed at night and talking of all these wonderful things that we want to happen in our future. It reminds me of when I was pregnant and we were feeling so lucky and so excited about what was happening to us.

I am so happy that Baden is going to grow up in a nice normal house in a nice normal street. I really feel like this is a big achievement for me. I wasn't sure if it was ever going to happen and its all I have ever really wanted. I remember when I used to want "a back yard and a dog", but I think I just wanted those particular things because it was a sign of a normal life.

Looks like I made it! It wasn't easy at times, but here I am. Yay!

And just for fun, here is a pic of a little scotsman I know. He won't wear a normal hat but he doesn't mind this one.

Tomorrow we are off to a Christmas party at one of Steve's friends houses. They get together every year but this is the first year I have been, not sure why I haven't been before, I think one year I didn't feel like it, the next year I was pregnant and miserable with "afternoon sickness" the next year I didn't want to take the baby out at night, but now we are finally going!

Apparently Santa visits and gives out presents to each child. Does it make me a grinch that my child will have one of his books that he already owns wrapped up and given back to him? tee hee, oh well, too bad! At 16 months he doesn't know what Christmas is so this is probably the last year that we can be a bit stingey! I really didn't feel like going out and buying him a piece of cheap junk just so a strange man in a red suit can give it to him. If it makes any difference its a book he hasn't played with for a while...does that count for anything? ;)

I have joined the ABA (Australian Breastfeeding Association) and the first meeting is tomorrow. I am looking forward to it. Baden is now 16 months old so its kinda surprising that I didn't join earlier, but to be honest I never felt like I needed to. We had no problems so I couldn't see the point. But now that he is a toddler I am feeling a little bit (only a little bit though) of pressure to wean him. Its nothing obvious, just a feeling of not being comfortable breastfeeding while we are out and not being proud of it like I used to be. I have no intention of weaning him yet, so I have joined the ABA to be in the company of people who don't think breastfeeding a toddler is weird or different or...anything.

That's all. I just need a bit of real support and encouragement, or maybe I just need to be around people who are still breastfeeding past one year. In the real world there aren't many. Actually, there aren't any that I know.

We went to Story Time at the library today. This is the third week we have gone. Baden really came out of his shell today, he wouldn't sit on my lap, he wanted to explore. He went to the box of books and went round handing them to people and saying "deer-go" to them (here you go). Its amazing what these little people pick up. He went up to everyone today and seemed very curious. He likes people, he will wander away and then come back for a very brief cuddle and then he is off again. He likes to check in between adventures.

He loves twinkle twinkle little star, its his favourite. It looks very similar to the hand sign for 'milk' though so at the start it was a bit confusing, but we have got the difference sorted out now!
When we got home he had a parcel! It was a book sent all the way from New Zealand. Thank you Grandpa!! The Very Hungry Caterpillar is a great book and is an absolute prerequisite in any kid's book collection. So we sat down and read that and I noticed that it was first published in 1969, the year I was born. I thought that was pretty cool.

I have been starting to feel guilty about Baden eating so much food out of a can, so I spent the morning cooking him lunch. I made him roast chicken, kumara and peas and corn. I mixed it up a bit and added some chicken stock. It was beautiful, I tested it.

He took one mouthful and SPAT it out. hmph. What an ungrateful brat. For dinner he can have his food out of the can again. Hope he knows how to use the can opener, ha ha ha ha.

I have made a little friend for the lamb I made. Its a little rabbit. These little toys are so easy to make and so cute. Now I want to make another!

Today I have to go and take our deposit cheque to the Real Estate agent. Settlement is on 14th December and we are going to move in straight away. First thing to do will to be put the Christmas Tree up! We are slowly getting excited about it after walking around like stunned mullets for the past week. We wanted this house so much and kept missing out on it and now we have it.

I have been knitting toys for the past couple of weeks. I made this little lamb and now I am making him a little bunny friend.

The little stud dog goes home today, he has had an extended holiday because his owner went away. He is such a good little dog, he fears nothing, he is not the least bit concerned about our big german shepherd and will quite happily tell him to bugger off. It's so funny, he is a true Westie in temperament, his coat is perfection and he is so affectionate. He isn't trained at all though, he won't even 'sit' on command. I have been trying to teach him but he isn't interested at all, lol. I am going to miss him.

Baden found my lipstick. I have no idea where he found it, I haven't worn make up for ages! At least someone gets tarted up around here, lol.

In other news, we got the house, the cooling off period has just started for us. So if everything goes well we will be in our new home before Christmas.

And the dogs have definitely been doing the business, so hopefully that means there will be puppies here soon. Dogs gestate for 63 days, so that means the puppies will be born on 14th January. That's if she is even pregnant. I hope so.

Been very busy this past week. My little dog has come on to heat and the little stud dog is currently visiting. So I hope it works this time since I have been trying to breed her for over a year now. Something always seems to happen, last time I waited too long and missed her ovulation, the time before that I was pregnant and just too busy to bother and the time before that we used a different stud dog and we got the timing perfect, then took them to the vet to get artificially inseminated and the stud dog had no blimmen sperm. After all that effort, blood tests, the whole gamut. So this new little stud dog is a proven mater, but there doesn't seem to be much happening out there at the moment.

In other news, we have bought a house, we are nervously waiting to hear that the contract has been signed by the vendor before we celebrate too much. We have put in two previous offers on this house, neither was accepted, but now this latest offer was verbally accepted and we signed the contract, so we are on tenterhooks waiting to hear that its all happening.

Melbourne Cup Day

I haven't been blogging lately because I have been hanging out on a knitting website.

I have also been going to my knitting and crocheting classes on Monday nights and learning heaps. I am currently crocheting an owl tea cosy. If it turns out I will probably give it to my mother-in-law because she is the only person I know who still uses a teapot.

I am also knitting a golliwog at the moment.

On Saturday night I went into town to see a documentary called The Business of Being Born, by Ricki Lake, (yes the talkshow Ricki Lake). The documentary was brilliant, if a little scarey. It was about having a baby in the maternity system in america. I thought the Australian system was baaaaaad, but its nowhere near as bad as america, although unfortunately it seems to be heading that way.

I had to drive home in a storm, that was a bit scarey too!! I couldn't wait to see my little baby again. The movie showed babies being born and it made me think back to the day Baden was born. Such a beautiful happy day, we are so lucky that we had such a good start. But thinking about when he was born made me miss him like craaaaaaaaaaaazy, even though I was only away from him for a couple of hours.

I think I am addicted to him! I just love him so much!

Today is Melbourne Cup Day. I am not doing anything for it. Must remember to turn on the telly to watch it. I didn't do anything last year either. I am glad that I had plenty of years of going to the races and falling down drunk, because now I am quite happy to stay at home!

A day in the life of a busy toddler. Helping mummy clean out the fridge. Soy sauce goes into the bedroom, jam can go outside to the dogs, hmm, what to do with a packet of cheese slices? Decisions, decisions.

Bathroom next, have to empty the rubbish bin into the bath and play in the toilet.

ugh, the dye job turned out badly. The purple just wouldn't take well so the colour was a bit washed out and looked a bit grey. No problemo though, I just re-dyed the whole lot a richer watermelon colour. I have two uses for this wool. Firstly I could use it as part of my soaker idea, I realised that the white flecks are the only part that is silk after all so it would be okay. The actual 'yarn' part is pure wool. The flecks add texture to it. Its quite beautiful. The other idea is to use it as the base yarn for my next hedgehog, because the colour matches the fun fur yarn I am using, but I think that would be a bit of a waste. I can use any old wool for that..

thinking....thinking.

I have dyed this wool. I was going to knit a soaker for the Newtown festival with it, but then I realised that its got a bit of silk in it, so might not be all that great. Soakers are better if they are just wool.

So now I don't know what I will make with it. Its pretty though.

Here is the beginning of a blanket that I have decided to make. I have always wanted a blanket like this but I only learned to crochet last year. My sister-in-law taught me. I am going to knitting and crochet classes, starting next week, and I am really looking forward to it. I was supposed to start last week but I bruised my index finger, right at the knuckle - it was black and purple and very swollen, ow!

Here is my latest project, he is called a Huggable Hedgehog and is very cute. The front of him is knitted then felted.

Here is my submission for Mother of the Year. It's my kid, asleep on the tiles by the back door! He wouldn't go to sleep in his cot, he kept whingeing so we kept getting him out again, (we are both big softies). It's very hot tonight so I think that's why he kept protesting. So he finally found a cool spot to go to sleep. (And no, we haven't left him there!)

Here are the blocks painted and already played with!

These are bubby's new blocks that his Dad made him. Now I am going to paint them and we can start building! There are more than appear in this photo, the others were already spread around the house, a sign of things to come no doubt. Now that he is walking I find things all through the house. Just some off the top of my head are: the cheese grater in the toybox, an onion in the shower and the toilet brush in the dogs water bucket.

I took this photo of Baden today, out in our backyard. We went to buy a new camera this afternoon because the camera we have just annoys me, the shutter speed is so slow and the batteries are always going flat and I just miss shot after beautiful shot of my baby. So we went off to a camera sale and they only had one staff member working. We had to wait for ages to be served and then felt rushed so I didn't buy anything. We were there to spend around a thousand dollars and they have now lost that money forever. Serves them right. So I am going to go shopping during the week.

In this photo he has just picked a little yellow flower. He held it up to his nose and then he stood up and came over and handed it to me. Flowers from my little boy, I am a very lucky mummy indeed!

Here is a pic of Bubby's 1st Birthday cake for his party we had back in July. It was a very good day, he got so many presents I was quite overwhelmed and happy that so many people came to share the day with us.

I had two attempts at this cake before I got it right, and two goes at the one I did before that which was a 3D teddy. That one will go down in history as one of the world's biggest disasters and I think its pretty safe to say the no child of mine will ever be getting a 3D cake for their birthday :)

Knitted Jumpers

Teddy Bear jumper was the first thing I made him.

Little doggy jumper. I entered this in a knit-off and it won. I love to see my beautiful baby warm and snuggly in something I have made him.

Here are a few things I have made for bubby. A beanie in Manly colours (shame they lost, lol) and a knitted vest with a little train on it. I will post a few more pics of things I have made him shortly.

And here he is. I can't remember exactly how old he was in the first picture, a few weeks.
A lovely placid little fellow. Always got alot of comments on his hair-do!

And now, at 1 year old, hair has gone blond, and he is so cheeky.

Weeeell, its been a while since my last post but I decided to keep it there anyway.

Needless to say, I went on to have a beautiful baby boy on 31st July 2006 and we named him Baden.

He is now 14 months old and as healthy as a horse, running everywhere and getting into everything and is the apple of his mother's eye and the joy of his father's life.

So now this blog will turn to things involved in the life of a Stay at Home mum of one who is one.