The Bahamas - Visas One Day - Beautiful the Next
The joy of the bahamas has settled into our hearts.
We have done the initial visa processing and as luck would have it, we have to "hang around" for an additional 2 more days due to the extended backgrounds checks they now do on everyone!
To say that Maxamillion is literally wetting his pants with excitement is an understatement. It is like this world he never knew existed and he must discover every part of it in an instance. He spent about 2 hours in the pool yesterday with Flossy. Floating, diving, jumping.
I am busy doing a collage challenge - 1 magazine, 1 week, 1 book - I am a day behind but figure as we have had the trip extended I can catch up. I am collecting stamps and coins for my collage/jewelry friends and cardboard boxes from different foods for art projects with my Treehouse families.
But it is now back to the beach, the sand and the sun.
We have done the initial visa processing and as luck would have it, we have to "hang around" for an additional 2 more days due to the extended backgrounds checks they now do on everyone!
To say that Maxamillion is literally wetting his pants with excitement is an understatement. It is like this world he never knew existed and he must discover every part of it in an instance. He spent about 2 hours in the pool yesterday with Flossy. Floating, diving, jumping.
I am busy doing a collage challenge - 1 magazine, 1 week, 1 book - I am a day behind but figure as we have had the trip extended I can catch up. I am collecting stamps and coins for my collage/jewelry friends and cardboard boxes from different foods for art projects with my Treehouse families.
But it is now back to the beach, the sand and the sun.
Show Me Your Smile
I have my hat on and I haven't taken it off for 10 minutes. I am up on a table and I have just thrown my drink on the floor - can't get much more happier than that!
5:56AM
The coffee is on ... Thank you inventor of coffee machine... and everyone is still asleep! I confess this is my favourite (I put the U in just for Nanny) time of the day.
The Engineer had a week which was filled with talking to China. So just how do you video conference with China and discuss drawings that are numbered in Chinese characters? Well....you write the phonetic translation of the numbers up on the white board where the client can't see and then proceed to throw them off their game by being able to call for the various drawings in Chinese! Once again everyone loves The Engineer! Talking to China means coming home at 2am of course which means dinner at 2am and he only has this so he can have bread and butter pudding that I have made for dessert! Now for those that know him, you wonder, why wouldn't he just go for the pudding? Well, you don't pass up meatloaf, mash & peas.
A little appreciation....Hershey Bar, Origami paper and ribbons
At this time of the day, my father used to wake me, my brother & sister in the early hours each day by scrubbing his unshaven face across ours and then tucking us back into our sheets with the fluffy toys that remain on your bed because even though you are way too old to play with them anymore...there is still a need to have them there!
So yes...my fav time of the day.
What a whirlwind week! Miss Floss romped it in, in her exams. She got 50% more in her maths exam than I ever got (work that one out Keryn) and 100% in science (I think Mrs D would have fallen off her chair if that had happened to me). So she came home looking for a reward - "ALL my friends get rewards, dinners, clothes...for doing well....so how about it?" Well I went out on Friday and at great expense bought her a new lamp, wrote on the box in blue texta - Congrats on the marks luv Mum & Dad, then put it on the stairs where she would see it after coming home from babysitting...needless to say she was speechless and in this house that is a feat!
Of course her week was spent enjoying Spirit Week where more time and energy was spent on what costume she was wearing on what day ... celebrity, favorite celebration, crazy/mismatch day and...oh dear can't remember. I commented that more effort was spent on this week than last week during exams to which The Engineer then commented that this week she is mini me and last week she was mini him...he then thought about that comment and counteracted it with ...well she could have been mini you last week too but that doesn't explain the marks!!! .....in case you are wondering he is sleeping on the couch this morning!
The Engineer had a week which was filled with talking to China. So just how do you video conference with China and discuss drawings that are numbered in Chinese characters? Well....you write the phonetic translation of the numbers up on the white board where the client can't see and then proceed to throw them off their game by being able to call for the various drawings in Chinese! Once again everyone loves The Engineer! Talking to China means coming home at 2am of course which means dinner at 2am and he only has this so he can have bread and butter pudding that I have made for dessert! Now for those that know him, you wonder, why wouldn't he just go for the pudding? Well, you don't pass up meatloaf, mash & peas.
Maxamillion is still trashing the place, drawing on everything and would like everything served to him in a bottle ...the one with a teat not a cork! He brings us all a lot of laughs and is trying very hard to talk. He has speech twice a week, special ed once a week and is about to begin OT and have his speech upped to 5 times a week. We try to tell "them" that with the genes he has been blessed with, having him quiet for a couple of years is not a bad thing...but alas "these americans" don't listen and just want to fix! I must say with all that he receives in speech, physical and importantly medical - we are not complaining....we are very blessed to be surrounded by intelligent, active and informed professionals.
My week was a little wild - always too much to do. I keep trying to lose the Volunteer hat but it keeps getting back up on the hat rack...yes we actually now have a legitimate hat and coat rack! I am loving my new job in my music house, enjoying the families, enjoying the staff and enjoying working with one of my "newer" friends. She runs the joint! and runs it brilliantly. She is a phone girl and I am an email girl. She writes a letter in four sentences with correct grammar and I write a letter in two paragraphs and tell everyone how much I love them and then need to use spell check and grammar check! We get on extremely well! Bounce off each other and I am enjoying helping her make her dream of growing this wonderful music house into a reality. This is where Flossy takes piano and voice and this summer she will be doing guitar....She loves it all!
My week ended the best way it possibly could! With my friend. For the purposes of this blog she will be now known as The Goddess! Partly because we met in a class that she was teaching(called The Goddess Class) and partly because I think she is wonderful. We meet at Ikea because it is halfway between her house and my house (it takes us both an hour to get there). We have the $1.99 breakfast, then we shop, then we have coffee and a cinnamon bum (that is what my father calls them) and if we have time, we create. Although it took us almost two hours to get through the store (it is where I bought the lamp at "great expense") and we didn't even stop in the furniture sections, so no creating this week. We decided that Starbucks might be better (cheaper) next time.
Today we finish packing because we are off for a couple of days to renew the visas. Yes we are meeting up with the Easter Bunny in the Bahamas, celebrating the Maxillator's 2nd birthday and meeting our other aussie friends who are doing the same thing. Their little girl has told everyone that she is going to the Bahamas for a friend's birthday party! I am looking forward to watching Maxillator discover sand.
Then back to the real world again. Talking to China, going to school, drawing on the walls and trying to organize all of that into one manageable week!
This past week was Faculty Appreciation week at the music house. The students are encouraged to do an act of kindess towards their teacher. I put a great big poster board up with a statement "my teacher is...." and left some textas beside it! You should see it (reminds me that I should take a photo)...it is literally covered with words of laughter, thanks, gratitude...so simple but it made the kids happy to create it and it made the teachers feel a little loved too. Although the donuts I brought each day could have done both.
A little appreciation....Hershey Bar, Origami paper and ribbonsCommunicating with Art
Well yes, it is Wednesday but I had such a great moment last night that I wanted to share. I have been doing an eight week course with the Bereavement Center to enable me to work at the Treehouse. Put simply this is an organization that helps parents and children cope with the loss of a parent/spouse or sibling.
Last night I had my first experience. I was working with a little girl aged about 7 but she looked all of 5. Her Mum had died. She arrived in a very solomn state and did not say a peep for the first two hours (the night is three hours long) but I sat and talked to her whilst we made paper flowers.
She colored, and I misted the paper spreading the colors, dried them and attached them to chenille stix (pipe cleaners), with buttons and ribbons. As the bouquet grew so did her confidence and with every flower, she would give me a smile.
She left laughing.
Last night I had my first experience. I was working with a little girl aged about 7 but she looked all of 5. Her Mum had died. She arrived in a very solomn state and did not say a peep for the first two hours (the night is three hours long) but I sat and talked to her whilst we made paper flowers.
She colored, and I misted the paper spreading the colors, dried them and attached them to chenille stix (pipe cleaners), with buttons and ribbons. As the bouquet grew so did her confidence and with every flower, she would give me a smile.
She left laughing.
The best way to pay for a lovely moment is to enjoy it. --Richard Bach
It's Sunday and I am in New York
We are coming up to five years worth of Sundays...
So after spending many hours enjoying the thoughts and words of many friends I have met whilst in the USA, I have decided to join the blogging crowd as much for my own satisfaction as it is to provide a place where my friends and family can log in, see what I have been up to, comment and I wont (hopefully) feel badly that I haven't sent a thesis home outlining the comings and goings of our lives!
Today was no different than any other recently. "Maxamillion" occupies a large part of my time but I love it. He is such a happy little man. "Flossy" slept in today, after a night of babysitting and a week of exams. The Engineer is spending Sunday afternoon at the office talking to China.
But back to this grand plan of Sunday musings. Maybe nobody except me will be interested in reading it. That's fine. I feel that it will be a great place to meander. Chat about life and activities and put down in black and white my thoughts about this world and the people who live in it.
So after spending many hours enjoying the thoughts and words of many friends I have met whilst in the USA, I have decided to join the blogging crowd as much for my own satisfaction as it is to provide a place where my friends and family can log in, see what I have been up to, comment and I wont (hopefully) feel badly that I haven't sent a thesis home outlining the comings and goings of our lives!
Today was no different than any other recently. "Maxamillion" occupies a large part of my time but I love it. He is such a happy little man. "Flossy" slept in today, after a night of babysitting and a week of exams. The Engineer is spending Sunday afternoon at the office talking to China.
But back to this grand plan of Sunday musings. Maybe nobody except me will be interested in reading it. That's fine. I feel that it will be a great place to meander. Chat about life and activities and put down in black and white my thoughts about this world and the people who live in it.
Sunday water play!
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