This year I decided that as well as some materialistic gifts we would also donate to charity on behalf of a few people. In return the organisation sent an e-card to the gift recipients notifying them of the charitable donation in their name. I searched through the options available but in the end I decided that cataract eye surgery for an adult had the most impact as well as the option to supply ten children with glasses. So feeling good about myself I paid on line and waited for Christmas. Then the big day arrived and that afternoon at my sisters house I enquired as to whether or not she had checked her e-mail. She said she had but said nothing further so I asked if she got an e-mail from CBMI. She checked her e-mailed but then informed me that she had not even opened the CBMI e-mail but had simply deleted it! I should have known… she deletes forwards without even looking at them. I sure hope my sister-in-law opened her CBMI e-card… but I have a sinking feeling she may have done the same… DELETE!

Well today is Christmas so I’d like to start by saying “Merry Christmas”. I hope the jolly fat bastard (also known as Dad) got you some great presents. Luke and I haven’t bought each other Christmas gifts for the last 7 years or so because seeing the kids faces light up as they open their gifts is enough joy for us… plus I’m a tightwad when it comes to money! So what ever your plans are for this day have fun,drive safely, enjoy your family, roll your eyes at the drunk relative making an ass out of himself and remember… Christmas is more than just a pain in the arse driving from one relatives house to another… it’s the celebration of Christ’s birth so if you don’t celebrate the birth of Jesus feel free to send all your gifts my way and I’ll celebrate for you!

Recently we went up to the Sunshine Coast and had a great day enjoying good food, great waves and early Christmas presents… thanks papa Eric!  But every now and then in life you see something that seems to be forever burned into your memories… replaying over and over in your minds eye.  That’s what happened to me that day and I want to share it with you.  Picture this: I’m walking up stairs from the beach up to the grassed area when I happen to glance right… oh God… look away, LOOK AWAY! Too late, the image of an elderly man in speedos is forever printed in my brain.  “That’s no so bad” I hear you saying and I would agree.  It’s the beach and dick togs or budgie smugglers, what ever you’d like to call them are quite common.  What isn’t common are ill fitting loose speedos combined with raised knees climbing stairs thus flashing “meat and potatoes” for anyone who happens to be looking in that direction.  It was truly a sight I could have done without!

My children were lucky enough to get an early joint Christmas present… a trampoline!  That’s some great thinking from my mother-in-law because now I’m enjoying trampoline bliss.  That would be the bliss of having a quiet home because the kids are outside tiring themselves out jumping up and down and up and down and up and down etc etc etc.   It’s one of those safe round ones with the high mesh walls so once they are zipped inside I’m free to relax, until they ask me to jump with them that is.  That’s when I come face to face with the simple fact that I am no longer a teenager and 15 minutes of jumping finds me in need of a rest.  My husband also faced this sad truth in a more literal sense.  He was enjoying the trampoline with the kids but when it came time to exit he stepped out and fell face first into the ground.  I regret missing this classic fall so this account is second hand but what I did see was a battered and bruised husband come limping in the house in search of an ice pack… well two actually! A swollen and scraped face as well as a scrapped shin was really not that bad considering his 6 foot 1, 90kg body took a swan dive into grass from a metre up.  So only after having the trampoline for a day our first injury has occurred and I’m expecting more to come but for now I’m enjoying the bliss.

I was at the post office the other day and after I had paid and received my change I started to walk off.  But as I went to put my money away I realised he had given me a $20 note instead of a $10.  I was at a cross roads and had about two seconds to decide what to do.  Do I count this as a blessing and walk out of the shop with $3 more than I walked in or do I go back and point out the employees mistake?   I felt like I was in a cartoon with a little angel on my right shoulder and a little devil on my left. The next person in line stepped up to be served so it was now the moment of truth… I interrupted and explained what had happened then I handed back the $20 note.  I left the post office with the correct amount of change and a smile on my face. I was glad I gave the little cartoon devil the flick but for a split second I was temped to simply walk out.  What would you have done?

My seven year old just performed in a class play for us parents and I have to say… it sucked!  The kids were great but the school doesn’t have an enclosed hall or even a drama room so they performed out on the concrete slab near the drinking fountains.  We were under a tin roof straining to hear the children perform when it started to rain.  At this point the children were singing “Puff the magic dragon” and the stereo kept cutting out but the kids continued on as if nothing was wrong.  However something was wrong and when Luke pointed out the problem I could hardly believe it.  There was an extention cord running from a storage room to the cd player and it was in the open being rainned on.  It got worse though because it wasn’t just one ten meter extention cord it was three or four extention cords all joined up leaving two joined sections sitting in water on the concrete!  No wonder the cd player kept cutting out.  Obviously public schools have such a tight budget that health and safety issues get pushed aside.  If this performance was done in a private school I’m sure they would have been in a drama room performing on stage with lights and an audio set up that wasn’t likely to electrocute someone.

As a baby Claire was always in front of the computer with Luke and at age two she was playing computer games by herself and loving it.  Now she’s about to turn eight she’s a little tech head to the extreme.  If I’m on the computer and I get up Claire seems to appear from nowhere and slides into the computer chair even before my knees are straight!  Anything electronic she loves, like Luke’s new mobile phone.  She got her hands on it and within a couple of minutes she had set the alarm and placed icons that can be scrolled through on the display screen by touch… Luke didn’t even know his phone could do that!  It was great but Luke didn’t want the alarm set so he handed it back to Claire and with a few clicks and five seconds later she handed the phone back to her father.  Luke came to me and said that he didn’t think she had turned it off so he then spent the next ten minutes tracking down what she had done.  He then turned to me and said “well what do you know, she DID turn the alarm off!”  It’s a bit scary how tech savvy kids are today.

Well it’s that time of the year again when Christmas cards get sent out… thank God I only know a handful of people! However with both girls in school the card count this year has been high due to the fact that they are friends with everyone in their class.  Claire wrote her own cards but Natalie needed help and with 24 friends I was in it for the long haul.  After the first five I was starting to loose my patience, why does she write letters backwards and with added strokes?   I tried to tell her that an “e” does not have a crown on top of it but she wouldn’t hear it, she said “I like it that way, it’s the way I do it.”  I then told her the alphabet is not open to interpretation, just write it properly!  But of course to Natalie everything is open to debate, even the way we write.  So I let it go and said a silent prayer for Natalie’s teacher next year… she’s going to need it!  Continuing on with the task at hand I sticky taped candy canes into her cards and sealed the envelopes.  Then it happened, as I was licking an envelope to seal it I sliced my tongue. Yes that’s right, a paper cut on my tongue! This festive and jolly season also comes with a dark side…Christmas card injuries!

In the sandpit after school last week my three year old nephew started building a sandcastle.  Soon he was joined by another three year old boy who also started making a sandcastle.  I was watching them watching each other as they worked without talking.  Then Aiden ran over to me calling “Aunty Nee Nee, Aunty Nee Nee come and see how big my castle is.”  So over I went for a closer look and made a remark about how great it was.  The other little boy looked up at me then back to his castle and shot off out of the sandpit calling “Mummy, mummy come see my big castle.”   Aiden immediately knocked the boys castle over and said “mine’s bigger”  as he built his castle up some more… I couldn’t believe it!  Is the “mine’s bigger than yours” built into boys from birth?