One of us blinked; I knew if we did Grunge would grow up – I just didn’t think it would happen so soon.

She’s growing in to a very caring and loving kid, she wraps her arms around my neck when she wants a cuddle or when I sneak in to her bed when she wakes up for a snuggle. She likes to sit on the kitchen bench while I cook and is always wanting to be involved stirring, sifting or measuring. Her favourite things are butterflies, fairies, our cats, my measuring tape and her best friend Max.

Grunge understands numbers and can count to 30 by herself and can tell me any number that follows one I ask about (as long as the answer doesn’t end in 0). She loves swimming and dancing and can recognise her own name in print.

Miss 3 is scared of pretty much everything; we’ve had to leave concerts after she’s freaked out and had to bribe her to go on the bus/tram/train. She’s shy with new people… even with her favourite people.

She tells me a few dozen times a day that we’re going on a train to see Mickey Mouse in November and a few dozen more that she loves me.

I’m the luckiest person in the world to have her in my life.

It’s a five day weekend – that’s two more days off than usual and I’m happy as an emu in a parade as I’ve had my beautiful Emsie for 3 and a half days

It seems Summer got the memo that its gig was over and quickly headed North after putting on some glorious 30+ days last week. Autumn checked in bring some awesome wet weather; enough to wet the ground for me to reseed my backyard. The trampoline now has a moat around it and I’m not sure how we’re going to get our trojan horse in there now.

We got to celebrate iMa’s Birthday in style on Friday, well as much style as a wee poppet with an ear infection can muster. It was pretty ironic really, we’d been to the ear, nose and throat doctor on Tuesday who referred Grunge for a hearing test as she’s got glue ear (fluid in her ear drum) and it could be effecting her speech. So we’re heading to the Cora Barclay Centre in a few weeks for pediatric hearing test and another one two months later. The ENT also checked out her giant tonsils which he thinks she’ll “grow in to” as they’re adult size already. So yeah, small, tired kid with a sore ear didn’t go down too well on Friday so we organised a visit from the locum who organised some antibiotics.

We spent the rest of the long week end quietly until today when Grunge took a trip to her Aunty Sharapova’s house while Em and I went and saw Alice in Wonderland 3D in Gold Class. The movie was great and the food we ordered was too. We used to head to the cinema every week and I miss that; watching movies at home just isn’t the same.

So what’s coming up? Easter next month and we’re still unsure what we’re doing. We’d like to head to Mum’s again but it’s a *long* trip in 4 days. Hearing test for Grunge this month and hopefully a tour of the school we want to send Grunge to.

After wading through a sea of “To-Do”s for the past 6 months I’m finding myself with time on my hands; well one hand really, the other hand is still pretty weak from the surgery I had a few weeks ago. I’ve got my fingers grappled securely around the spare time all the same.

So, January has obviously dosed up on some speed I’m sure of it – it feels like Christmas was just a few weeks ago (oh, no, wait it was…)

We road tripped up to see half of my family for Christmas just out of Wagga Wagga. My brother, sister-in-law, niece and nephew moved around the corner from my Mum just this year so we got to see their new house and spend time with them. Christmas was awesome Grunge sat, played or slept for all of the 24 hour drive without any problem and we arrived home safely just before 2009 hung up its hat.

New Year in our household was celebrated with a little bit of Dang Dang and Mochi Ball action with Unki Baa and Princess Mish. We’re lucky to have an awesome brother and sister so close who share our love of Mario Kart Double Dash and Cooking Mama 1 & 2.

Thinking about it – Mochi Balls may actually be stalking us; one of my new favourite shows “I Survived a Japanese Game Show” had a challenge with Mochi Balls in one of the first episodes. This week also saw the return of Dog the Bounty Hunter to Go! so we’re super happy! Thank you TiVo!

Three days in to the New Year was Emsie’s 31st Birthday. Grunge and I made it an extra special day and Emsie got some awesome presents – and well, so did I for my unBirthday!

*fast forward* Grunge went back to daycare, Em and I got sick, Em saw the ENT doctor, my Mum came to visit *play*.

So my Mum came to look after us while I was down one hand. My Mum is Awesome. I can’t list everything that she did for us as I’m afraid I’ll miss something. Some of the big things were… building Grunge a play room and redesigning my studio; adding storage to my shed; removing the spiders from said shed; fixing my lawn; planting and bordering our gardening outside; cleaning all my windows; organising my laundry; baking cakes; rescreening the back doors; building a sophisticated cat entrance to my laundry; fixing my spare toilet; organising my pots and pans cupboard; making more cakes; babysitting both Grunge and me; sweeping out our garage and front porch; weeding my other gardens; cleaning, cleaning and more cleaning; and cooking and freezing some meals for Emsie and Grunge. She was only here for two weeks and she did so much! It was very sad to see her go, Grunge is a great big Nanna Kez fan and would ask for her as soon as she woke up. I got to spend a lot of time chatting to her and it was unreal to come home to her being at the front door.

My Mum Rocks.

There is about 16,000 things I should be doing now while I’m waiting for some uni tutes to download however I’m sure if I get up to do them then I’ll close the laptop and stop the downloads.

Can you guess what book this is?

Page 1 – “Muffet Lady”
Page 2 – “Sit down!”
Page 3 – “Eating, um yum yum”
Page 4 – “Incy Spider!”
Page 5 – “Argh!”

Grunge woke early today – very early… 5am! She was upset about going back to bed so I brought her in to our bed however she didn’t sleep and nor did we. It doesn’t feel like she slept at school today as she had a major melt down at the store… and in the car…. and in the loungeroom… so we jumped in to our bed and we read her Little Miss Muffet book about a hundred times Bedtime was a bit of a nightmare and she’s been up every sleep cycle crying. Poor Em has a conference call tomorrow at 6:30 so we’re hoping Grunge sleeps.

As usual lots going on with us – I’ve finally bitten the bullet and booked in to have the lump in my wrist removed; it’s pretty big now and stems for the opposite side of my wrist and is compressing the nerve and running right next to the artery. I realised last week on the drive to Moonta Bay that I had to drive two handed as it was aching. Thankfully it’s a small day surgery it’s just other peoples photos had me kinda freaking out

Oh it’s getting late and Em needs to get to bed… and I’m playing the world’s worst game on the DSi – Dusk Hotel Room 215. I can’t play something else until I finish it!

Next update will include a Santa photo

Mannum is exactly 1 showing of Finding Nemo from our house…

This weekend Grunge and I learned that Moonta Bay is one showing of Cars from our house

Emsie has been in Sydney this week – doing a course and visiting our other family and got back last night. Grunge and I went to Moonta Bay with Aunty Sharapova to eat cornish pasties.. and pretty much nothing else Grunge loved playing on the swingset in the backyard and collecting rocks. She slept in a big bed so there is hope for transitioning from the cot with the sides down to her big bed!

The trip was a good precursor to the long drive to Marrar – this year we aren’t going to Sydney as it adds an extra 10 hours to the trip.

Three weeks and one day until we go to Mums for Christmas

It’s been a while since I blogged – I think finally (and just before the silly season) I’ve started getting ‘Me’ time again… I can say this as yesterday while Grunge napped I put on Sims 3

The last few weeks have been jam packed with work, house stuff, yard stuff, bbqs (hooray), friends and family. Oh and some Christmas shopping!

Today was Grunge’s first day of swimming lessons in the Tadpole’s class. Previously Em or I would have to jump in with her for the Water Babies class but now she goes in with her backpack on her own. In the lesson today she swam underwater and picked up a ring – very cool stuff She’ll be in Tadpoles until she can swim without her backpack. She’s growing up so quickly!

This week Em is headed to Sydney so I’m playing single parent. Grunge and I also headed away for a few nights with her Aunty Sharapova

Grunge singing one of *my* favourites

Last night I had Grunge on the counter getting her medicine ready when she spotted a package of lamingtons.

“Doda!” she declared pointing to one.

“Yes, for Dakota tomorrow.” I replied. She looked from me back to the lamingtons…

“To mono” she repeated pointing to the closest lamington and then it seemed to click and she said “Mono!” (Elmo), pointed to the next one “Grover!” and the third one “Bird!”.

I guess the people on Sesame Street need lamingtons too….

Most people worry that their kids don’t eat; I’m the opposite – my kid doesn’t stop eating!

We were at the markets yesterday – it’s one of my favourite things to do with Grunge and after a full breakfast of weetabix Grunge ate..

1 banana
1 box of sultanas
2 pieces of dried apple
1 vanilla custard bun
1 chocolate milk
5 banana chips
and a lollypop

And that was all for morning tea!

Needless to say with such a full tummy getting her down for a nap was easy. Hooray

It was a year ago that we were coming to the tail end of our round-the-world trip and today Grunge wore the shirt I picked up for her in a Greece Zara store and it fits perfectly.  We were in our Toronto hotel room having been to see a Blue Jays game and hang out with some friends that we got the call we’d been hanging for – our VIPs Sar and Sparky had welcomed their Baby Elvis (aka Dashielle) to the world.

Happy 1st Birthday Baby Dash and congratulations to Sar and Sparky for surviving Dashielle’s first year

This week my cousin welcomed his fourth son Eli – congratulations to you both Frank and Kym

Lots of reasons to celebrate… what a better way to top the week off than with a vaccination!  Well, not really, and Grunge wasn’t too pleased either.  Our family Dr is pretty awesome, it’s more like catching up with an old friend when we visit him and this time he was so apologetic for having to hurt Grunge – “Awww, sorry little mate!” – but she did ok, she cried until she got an “ollo” (lolly) and was then happy enough to show off to the medical receptionists on her way out.  There is something cool about watching your kid grow in the eyes of someone else and them telling her they remember meeting her when she was a few days old.