baby alexander: two months old

baby alex is 2 months old!

during the last month he has spent the majority of his time eating... he has really filled out a lot and no longer is as skinny with his long limbs. he is looking around a lot.

the day before he was 7 weeks, he was weighed at an appointment and came in at a whopping 5.5kg! it was around this time that he started to offer us a lot of smiles, madeline and joseph love it so much because he smiles at them and looks at them when they are talking to him. as a mummy i love that alex knows my voice. if someone else is holding him and i talk, he looks around for me.

we all went on a plane to melbourne and alex ended up with a cough and a snuffle... after a blessing from daddy and grandad when we arrived home, he had his longest sleep to date!

at alex's 8 week appointment, he weighed in at 6.2kg. not long after, he started to coo at us, in response to us talking.

we are so obsessed! ♥

oh my heart!

sorry in advance to anyone that follows my blog, because you're going to be spammed continually with pictures of these three adorable children of ours... but oh my heart! i got them all dressed for church today, looking all christmassy (can't get that hat off of madeline's head haha) and then tried to get a pic of them afterwards, which failed miserably. insert eye roll here...

they were in the car, complaining that i was talking too long and didn't want to cooperate, until i busted out the old, "come over here for a photo, smile and you can have icecream when we get home." they actually raced each other to the seat and then smiled sweetly before joseph groaned, "can we go nooooooow?" i just love them, their smiles and their "vibrant" little personalities.

sundays are for family, fun and most of all - photos! ♥

christmas in elfenbrook

a week or two ago, the owners of madeline's dance school posted in their parents page that the school would be participating in the annual ellenbrook christmas pageant "christmas in elfenbrook" and asked for volunteers to be part of their group as they danced their way down the main street. maddie was thrilled to pieces and instantly said she'd love to do it, so i put her name down... i must admit though, i actually thought it was unlikely she'd get to be in it, as she was one of only a handful of kids who only do one class - and therefore only had one costume from the concert... which is what they would be wearing.

to my surprise though, a sheet came out with their allocated costumes and positions in the parade and there she was! i actually had a laugh with one of the teachers, who said she'd internally groaned knowing she had to put the tutus in, as they are so huge they require extra space around them, and therefore only allowed for three of them in their line, instead of the five in all the others. oops.

i was incredibly proud of myself, as i managed to do her makeup myself this time, full stage makeup, with the heavy eye shadow, liner (with added glitter at little miss's request) and bright red lippie. (maybe i can do this dance mum thing after all. haha. also, maybe not? i am the least dance mummiest person there is!)

we had a great time at the parade, watching all the people go by, (my favourite was the gingerbread man below, oh and of course, my daughter! tehe) eating icecream (we tried the ones that are little balls in a cup, if you haven't tried them, you should, they are yum!) looking at the stalls - and buying crystals for miss madeline... it was a fun afternoon.

the adorable gingerbread man

and miss madeline in her bright blue tutu... such a good colour for her! if only the makeup didn't make her look like she is twelve all of a sudden! i can't cope...

merry christmas elfenbrook! we love where we live!

it’s beginning to look a lot like christmas

between a trip to melbourne and school open days and well life, we've been very slack and didn't get our christmas decorations up until last night. the kids were nearly dying by then so we couldn't have possibly put it off any longer if we wanted to live a peaceful life. i loooove having the decorations up, even if i am a "okay it's boxing day/ day after boxing day let's take them down" kind of person. i am always on the lookout for super cute decorations to add to my tree and this year, i found these gorgeous gold glittery swans. so in love!

i didn't put out absolutely everything this year, in fact i left quite a few things packed away, but i am so happy with what's out... including this teeny nativity set (most of the pieces around an inch high)

and these cute chalkboard painted wooden signs i picked up a few years ago, along with a musical box nativity set... it's the best and the kids love it. i'm kind of regretting showing them that it plays music though, not going to lie...



my favourite thing is seeing the lights of the tree shining in a dark room... i remember as children, mum and dad would leave the lights on all night on christmas eve and i would sneak out numerous times to check if there were any presents yet, so now i do the same for my kids.

i quite simply just love christmas - and everything about it! ♥

madeline: lb1.4 open night

just when i thought i couldn't possibly be any prouder of this girl... she goes and takes home the citizenship award for her class at her open night! i received an email from madeline's teacher, miss hannah, earlier this week, asking me to confirm that doug and i would be able to attend open night, as she would be receiving a class award... much to our amazement, it was the citizenship aware, given to the most consistently outstanding student in the class. what an achievement!

to make things even better, madeline's best friend in the class received the other class award, so their were smiles all round. it's been such a wonderful year for her and i could not be happier for her after how hard she has worked and how well she has applied herself.

hooray maddie! you are simply the best ♥

joseph: kindy 1 open night

guess who made it through kindy?! this kid!! i can't believe my little blue eyed babe has made it through in one piece and is now offically on his way to pre-primary next year. what a champ!

we attended the kindy 1 "open night" this evening, where joseph hid behind me and wouldn't join his friends, as he'd spent the morning sick and hadn't even been able to go to school... but being the mean mum i am, i made him go so he wouldn't miss his kindy grad. to be perfectly honest, he wasn't pleased with the situation, but i am glad i did. each of the kids had their picture on the class screen one by one, with what they want to be when they grow up. joseph said: when i grow up, i want to be a hot wheels driver. absolutely no surprises there! he is obsessed.

after the class (minus my child - insert eye roll here) sang us a song - baby shark (i hope someone looks this up 20 years from now and is just like oh what fresh hell is this!! haahaha) we got to look around the class and see their work and art and take some pictures in their little photo booth. what a cutie!

the kids even had a "guess who i am" art piece hanging up. we easily guessed josephs...

i am 4

i am a boy

i have a baby called alexander

♥

i am so excited for my big boy and everything he has ahead of him. i hope all his dreams come true and that perhaps one day, he'll get to be that hot wheels driver! 

melbourne family

of course a trip to melbourne called for family lunch with all of doug's extended family. it has actually been years since we have seen some of them, so it was an amazing, loud catch up! i love his family and feel super lucky to have gained them when we married.



dougs cousin sala (the oldest of the paramore great-grandchildren) made a grab for alex the minute we arrived and put up a good fight to anyone that wanted to take him away... that is truly one of my favourite things about being part of a polynesian family, how much love they have for children - and especially the babies!

this is doug and his fave cousin matt. he was one of the groomsmen at our wedding. these two are hilarious together and i was so happy to sit back and hear them reminisce about this and that.

this is oliveta (named after dougs mum oliveta), she also was getting a good fill of our sweet babe

and this photo had everyone in fits of laughter. doug's cousins have all always joked with him about the fact that he's the only redhead in their generation... only now they've started to have babies with red hair themselves. so... for entertainment value they chucked all the red heads in one photo. 

and this gorgeous kid! he is the cutest! if you find photos of doug as a small child, he is pratically his twin, to the point where some of the cousins refer to him as mini doug. i just wanted to give him the biggest cuddle ever, but he was so shy!

and this. this kills me. this is the four year old page boy in our wedding photos. i can hardly deal with the fact that it's been almost  years since that day. he's named after matt (the fave cousin) and doug and is a great young man. we had a lot of laughs with him too.

it's days like these that make me wish we lived closer, but i know we are all exactly where we are meant to be. melbourne family, we love you! ♥