Surprise visit

Jen returned unexpectedly on a flying visit from California on their way through to Australia and then to NZ where they will settle. Tilly and the other kids from Thursday playgroup (who could make it at such short notice) had enormous fun playing with Hunter. Helena (little monkey on the right) has grown so much and is speaking so much more. It's not often you get to say hello again to someone you thought you had said your goodbyes to!

Art

Butterfly or dragonfly, she couldn't decide. Either way I'm mightly impressed. Of significance to Tilly was the spot she drew so it could 'wee wee out'. Haha.

For those who pray....

I have a prayer request. Little one seems to like snookling up under my ribs, bum down low. I've been told the likelyhood of the baby moving into the right position might be low as there isn't a great deal of amniotic fluid. I don't know. Who knows what that means??? I know the baby has been in this position for quite some time now, and seems pretty happy with it! Ha. I've also been told I can give birth bum first, as long as the feet stay up above the bum like they are now and the baby is no bigger than Tilly was at birth. Not feeling great about that prognosis! Just need the baby to turn, then all will be well. I wrote a big long story about it here last night after returning from the clinic and decided to delete it this morning and just come straight to the point. So, turn baby turn....

Belly update

Was getting ready for church this morning, Steve had the camera and was snapping. I'm into my 32nd week. Bit over it if I might say so.

Coz I'm brown...

Sitting here in the air conditioning right now. Tills has just finished watching Playschool on which there was the classic song, 1 grey elephant. (1 grey elephant balancing, step by step on a piece of string, he thought it was such a wonderful stunt, that he called for another.... elephant) She's got the pipe of the vacuum cleaner on my bed and balancing while I am being instructed to sing the song. Then she suddenly says to me, "I'm a brown elephant mama." Then she rubbed her arm with her hand and said, "coz I'm brown mama and elephants are grey, not brown." Yesterday I told her she had lovely brown skin (as opposed to her pink freckly mama) and she said back in Chinese, "I'm black like baba." In Chinese there isn't really a phrase for dark skin or whatever. It's just a direct use of "black". And I don't really like it much. I don't like the crazy obsessions of the women here to be as "white" as possible either. People tell her in Chinese fairly often that she's black. I respond that black is good and would you rather have my skin? Crazy ideas, but anyway. It's summer and she's got a tan!

Home among the gum trees

Tilly and I made a gum tree today for her kookaburra. I put on her Australian Songbook CD today and it got her all fired up for all things Australian. It's great to listen to. Especially "Kookaburra sits in the old gum tree.... " I was sitting with her and she was trying to put Kookaburra on 'trees' but none of the so called trees would hold him up. So I asked did she want me to make her one. As you can see, I'm NOT crafty. This is our gum tree, it's one of those ones that has the really long green leaves, like in the back of Poppy's yard. What's that called? A Wallangarra White Gum? Probably not, but anyway... There is water below for crocodile (yes, eventually all the Aussie toys came out to play), and Koala sits precariously at the bottom of the trunk right by the croc. Rainbow lorikeet is in the tree too. She loves the gum tree. If you look closely she's made a bridge over the water and Bilby is trying to cross it, without getting bitten by crocodile. It's the end of the day and the gum tree is still standing. But the animals have since fallen out, perhaps eaten by croc. She did hold crocodile up to show him her caterpillar painting that is hanging on the wall behind the tree. "Can you see my caterpillar crocodile? You see him? Mmmm, that's my caterpillar."

Some motherly advice

While baking yesterday I thought I'd impart some great motherly advice to Tilly about how to run your kitchen. My kitchen is great; bright, airy, and by local standards biggish... by Western standards it's small I guess. Me: Ok Tills. When you cook, you need to be organised. Once you've finished with something, wash it up and get rid of it. That way you can keep the kitchen clean and organised and it's easier to get stuff done. Tills: Wow mum, that's a good story!!! Me: It's not a story love it's a fact....... Tills: Hahahahahahaha, mummy.....