Last Days

At the end of the first week of holidays a friend of the twins from kindy ( and LDC before that) came over for some cooking. The plan had been to make cheese...kindy have been learning about it - from the cow tothe fridge - and how cheese is made. One of the kid's parents run a fantastic italian cheese shop near the school - so kindy went on an excursion there. they also watched a youtube clip on how to make paneer - which got Kit all fired up - he typed up the recipe from memory - it is one of his most adorable bits of 'work' - so we just ahd to do soemthing aout it these holidays. Unfortunately the son of the 'cheeseshopowners' had to cancel - so int he end the kids I had made pasta and decorated cupcakes - it was a lovely day.
Making paneer
For Hannah's dance concert the little girls all need curly hair. I don't know how to convey my reaction to this piece of news. I was informed of it by a 'ballet mom' - not someone i know well - I am so NOT a 'ballet mom'...anyway - it is not an overstatement to say that I hyperventilated at the thought of it. I recall when hannah was about 4 I had to apologise to the therapist with the flashcard of a hairdryer - there was no way any child of mine would recognise that picture! Anyhow 'ballet mom' was quite hepful in calming my nerves and demonstrating soem bizarre hair ritual apparently known as 'rag curls'. I think she knew how the curls were going to turn out...
On the Saturday morning as we dawdled through our day we decided to go ahead and make the paneer - milk and lemon jouice - who'd ahve thought. We usually have Friday as Curry night inour house - we moved it to Sat night in honour of the big block of cheese the family made. DH was so impressed with t he results that he temporarily took on the idea of moving onto making cheddar - until he sat down with the Cheesemaking book we'd been lent - cheesemaking is pretty technical it seems and requires some specialist equipment too. Finished paneer and rag curls
More bird's nest than curls I'm afraid. Not sure where to go from here - might give it one more try otherwise I am going to get her hair cut in such a short bob that noone can expect me to produce a head of curls for the concert.
We took the twins to hte national capital for a holiday. All was going well until onour first evening we arrived at a very old friend of ours' place for a bbq - we'd been there less than 30 minutes when Hannah threw up - all over her fatehr. We got out of there quicksmart - luckily with a packed meal to take home - Dh sat up with little brat until midnight while I had a kip and then we swapped. We sat beside ehr and each time she woke up and vomited - one of us was there to make sure she 'spat it out' and that there was a bowl handy so as not to destroy the hotel carpet. Poor little darling was so stoic about it all. The next morning she hadn't been sick for a bit and had drunk quite well and kept it down - so off we drove to Floriade - the spring festival with about a million tulip blooms on display. It was fantastic - of course just after we arrived Hannah threw up again. Still we soldiered on - thinking it was the car that had made her feel sick again and not wanting to brave another return journey just yet... Now many mums of kids with DS have got fantastic photoes of their kids with tulips. A little tribute toour joureny through Holland as Emily Perl Kingsley so famously wrote in tryng ot dscrie the exepreience of being a special needs mama. Now in Sydny I live in 'little Italy' and I am pretty sure that Hannah spends a good amount of her time in 'Italy' but she and the rest of us also spend a good amount of our time in holland - the land of widnmills, tulips and Rembrandts. I ahd already told DH that I really wanted some nice pics of little miss with the tulips. After the vomit episode all I could say was - at the first garden bed of tulips we saw: "Quick - take a picture before she gets sick again - I want my tulip photo!!" Come rain hail or vomit I was determined to get my tulip photo.

From up on her Daddy's shoulders (which is definitely one of her favourite places to be)she can see a rainbow of tulips...
In a sea of tulips I spied Mum's flower - I love when her memory so sweet creeps up on me...and the irises were just beautiful.



Kit at the Dusty Boots Show. they had buskers at FLoriade - the stunt man asked for volunteers - and Kit raised his hand - the guy wanted some 'cuteness' on stage - so no wonder he chose my Kit. Dusty played the digeridoo and got Kit to play the clap sticks. He did well! and had fun.
Lake George Zebras
As we were driving into Canberra past the inland Lake George (which ahs not had a lot of water in it for years now) I told the kids to look out heir window for the zebras. Dh claimed to not know what on earth I was talking about - but htese zebras have been a bit of a hit this year - some wag put them in the middle of the lake (where it is dry!) and so fromt eh road it looks like the grass plains of Africa - with a group of zebras on it - rather freaky if you don't know that they are fakes. Anyhoo - they weren't there so DH was ragging me for being wrong (some men never learn!) - so imagine my joy and surprise to see them - at FLoriade. hannah was thrilled with them. One of her favourite sayings a thte moment is 'want that one NOW!' and she kept repeating that phrase as she and I checked out he zebras. I told ehr to speak to Daddy about getting them for her. SO when he and Kit joined us she was very unhappy to pose in photoes witht hem - she wanted her Daddy to take the baby zebra and it's mummy home - not have a photo of them!
In the afternoon Hannah and I went back to the apartment where she tortured me with palying with ehr dollys and dancing to Hi5. We also managed to go for a walk to Manuka which is a nice part of Canberra. While Hannah recovered at the apartment Kit and DH roamed around the sights of Canberra - they went to Questacon and Parliament House. On our last day after breakfast out the boys went to the Australian Mint and Han and I checked out the new indigenous wing of the National Art Gallery - it was fantastic! Today we took it easy as we were all a bit tired and happy to chill out and recover from all the excitement of our minibreak/illnesses. Kit had a sibkidz event in the morning which he loves going to and little brat did great for her ST - put lots of ends on her words - b, p, t and s. Still has trouble saying k and ch and sh and g but they'll come .... eventaully.
And so our holidays are almost over. I have begun reading my Agatha Christie Omnibuses - I read a whole heap of them whilst I was pregnant - and am quite enjoying re-reading them - so goodnight - onto the Sleeping Murder.