Sneaky Veges

We have instigated a new dinner plan in the household. We are starting each meal with a raw salad. We pop the bowl in the middle of the table and everybody is allowed to serve themselves. My reason is twofold ...I LOVE salad and everyone else does not eat enough veges.

O5 usually complains..."Not MORE Salad...sigh"...but then proceeds to grab great hunks of lettuce/beetroot/carrot /whatever else is on offer and munces through the lot.

A3 has progressed from a single baby lettuce leaf to about 10 assorted salad greens, plus tomato.

C3 LOVES Salad and will happily munch away on anything and everything from Feta Cheese,olives, capsicum, to any kind of greens...including celery and then completes his feast by drinking the remaining dressing from the bottom of his bowl.

E1 screws up his face, chews for a while and then we usually find goopy salad hidden in his highchair later...by the time he is three he will be eating a plateful also.

I have found since we began this that the rest of my mains are now about 1/3 smaller and I *think* I may have lost some weight. Bonus all round.

J is graciously eating Salad but I know he really is hanging out for a big juicy steak...roll on summer BBQ weather and he can have both!

The kids are also getting sneaky veges in our fabbo homemade, wholemeal pizza.

This one was Mediterranean...had spinach, feta, olives, red onions, mushrooms, fresh basil and parsley and so forth on it. (Basically leftovers from the salad the previous evening)...MMMMM....

Dress Up

A few months back Jess and I went to a fabric sale at a groovy boutique in Grey Lynn called MOA...I finally broke into the stash of goodies I got and made A3 these two cute summer dresses.




I was hoping to get some pics of A3 in at least one...but she was not obliging... so here they are.

Note... lined bodice...and zips! Yes, it is true...I dug back into the recesses of my mind and pulled out fourth form sewing and voila I remembered how to put in zips.

Total cost per dress...80cm of fabric $2, zip from the Sallies 20c...way better than a bought one I reckon.

Curious George Monkey ooh, ooh!

Here are some more pics of A3 and C3's Curious George Party as promised.

They LOVE the movie and either will often will say "I'm Curious George Monkey ooh, oooh". (How DOES one notate a monkey sound????)

The other cake...Yes we have no bananas

Mayhem...but the carpet survived...phew!

Picasso monkey cookies

A3's fav pressie...Doll house

C3's fav pressie toolbox and tools

3 Year old parties are the greatest cos the kids are sooooo excited, everything is new and fun and they get the whole cake/present/party games... Yes I DID do the PC Pass the Parcel...it hurt to do it...but I caved to societal norms. I DIDN'T do loot bags...just a treasure hunt which amounted to the same thing but the kids actually had to work for the little goodies.

And the Choccie Fishies go to...

Kate...for guessing Bad Jelly....."I'm the strongest worm in all the world because...da-dada-da-dad-dahhh! becasue I eat mud!"

Sharon..for correctly guessing the cake was a Yellow Hat...I shoulda know a hardcore CG fan like Sha would get that one!

Mmmmmm...Cake

A and C had a rockin' three year old party...can you guess the theme?

I'll give you more pics tomorrow.

On the Beach

We are trying to have family time on Daddy's days off...since they are less frequent now. A couple of weeks back Spring seemed to be kicking in...kinda like this

"Come on, wake up everybody, I am going to be very good and shine all day and I won't hide behind any clouds" (choccy Fish for getting that quote...which is most likely paraphrased by moi)

So off we dashed (after an hour of organising and grabbing all manner of things for every contingency) over the Kaimais to the Mount

The sun was still shining but there was a rather brisk Easterly, so we donned jackets and marched intrepidly onto the sand to have our lunch.

Hmmmm....Wind, Seagulls, Sand...not exactly Miss A3's favourite.

The boys however took the oppportunity to chase said Seagulls, eat sand and generally break free.

The wind eventually got the best of them too...so we went across the road to the playground...always a safe bet with four young'uns.

Roll on Summer when we can spend lots of hours at the beach, sans jackets and shoes and with generous dollops of sunscreen.

Arghhh...I give up

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I have been trying for days to get my images to upload from Photobucket...see the problem???

Can anyone point me to a better imagehost?

Are they Identical?

My supercute C-almost 3 and beautiful A-ditto

I have a whole heap of photos to share...but Photobucket is evil!!!!! Will keep trying so come back tomorrow for more.

Never on a Sunday

Today is Father's Day...but J had to work. His new job entails at least 50% of the weekends. We are slowly getting used to it...anyway I digress.

The kiddoes and I *were* going to go to church...really we were...but as it happened three loads of washing and a threatening sky put paid to that idea.

We rang Grandad and Opa...even A and C managed a very tentative little conversation...the first time for either of them, my babies are growing up.

Everyone seems to be finally on the mend so I decided today all hands would be back on deck to get the necessities sorted in the morning.

However,by the time we got to hanging out the washing and E was taking things off as soon as the rest of us could hang them, A was determinedly hanging things in her own unique, artistic way, C had skived of to the bedroom to play with the cars and O...actually he was working hard Bless him...I just wanted the job done so I made the decision to bring the late afternoon video session forward just a wee smidgeon...like 6 hours.

I have this constant tension in my head between wanting to get the work done MY WAY and in some semblance of efficiency and wanting the children to develop a work ethic and the skills to be useful and appreciated teenagers-spouses-parents. Today we achieved a bit of both and then when the work was done the sun had come out so we went for a walk.

O pushed E in his very own new stroller...just for him (thanks Oma and Opa) and I pushed the terrific twosome. We walked for about 6 km, stopped at a playground, grabbed some chippies and scrambled under an obliging tree to wait out a passing shower on the way home. O only complained after almost 1 and a half hours of walking which I was impressed with, A and C threw nary a tantrum between them and E was super cute pointing at all manner of things and excitedly exclaiming, "Duh, duh, duh."

To top off a day in which not one of the rascals was sick, screaming or stubborn, J finished work early and was home at three...yaaay!

We will do Father's Day in earnest tomorrow...but today for me was a rare balance of work and play...we enjoyed each other and we enjoyed exploring more of our little town...

And O is thankful we live on a plain!