Wonky Day.

I think we (the husband and I) knew it was going to be a wonky kind of day when, first thing this morning, I caught our youngest helping herself to candy at 8.30am. 8.30am!! Her excuse? Her older brother (#3) was already eating some so she figured she deserved some too.

🤯🤯🤯

We had to re-establish the rules for candy consumption plus sit with a crying child who thought it was all quite unfair that she got caught and her brother didn't.

Harry Potter is the flavour of the week in our home. Imagine four children running around indoors with a chopstick, I mean magic wand, in hand shouting "Expelliarmous!", "Stupefy!" Or some other spell at the top of their lungs. No one lost an eye, thank goodness.

Then our littlest discovered that someone had forgotten to drain the bathtub fully after bath last night. Fresh out of the shower, she hopped into the partially-filled tub, took a gulp of the water and had a splash in it too. Not sure if she still counted as being clean after that. 

By about 6pm, the husband came upstairs to tell me he was going out to get a 6-pack of beer. I don't remember the last time he's done that, if ever. It's just been that kind of a day. If we don't laugh (or have a beer), we might cry.

Saturday Outings.

Papa took the bigs to watch an awesome college production this afternoon. Our big girl was slightly under the weather but determined to go. They had a great time. 

The littlies asked to go to the games arcade and I obliged. They had a blast on the games and won enough tickets to bring home prizes for themselves and their older siblings.

Not our typical Saturday but one that was thoroughly enjoyed.

Garden Chats.

Once a week, we water the veggies in the tunnel together. 

"I want to go with you [to top up the watering can] because the praying mantis' eyes are scary."

"Can I touch the broccoli?"

"Mm! I like veggies!"

She was pleasantly surprised to find a little head of cauliflower growing. The faster-growing ones had been ravaged by slugs and snails, and she hoped aloud that the little cauliflower wouldn't get eaten. 

In the evening, she got papa to go out into the tunnel to pick her some salad greens to go with her cottage pie. Extra veggies, something none of the other children have asked for.

Our little man received his first birthday party invitation from a classmate today. He was so pleased! It's a little sign that he's slowly but surely settling into primary school life.

It's Book Week next week, and Book Character Day next Friday. After lots of prodding and encouragement, the children have picked out who they want to go as. We've got a week to put together three costumes!

Progress.

Our little lady has slept in her bed all night for the last couple of nights. No invasions. It's been amazing....all that space.

We attended our first Mainly Music session today with a friend and our little lady loved it and is looking forward to going back next week.

She's got swimming tomorrow and is just about getting used to her new teacher. All in, the week goes by pretty quickly.

After lunch, she peeled carrots for cottage pie

And we did some colouring in together as well. 

I'm realising that this little one enjoys structure and keeping things tidy. She only needs to be told once where things are meant to go. She tidies her bed as soon as she rolls out of it. She puts things away after she's done with them. She vacuums. That's more than I can say for myself, and I'm grateful for this girl and her attention to the little things. 

Parent-Teacher Interviews.

We had parent-teacher interviews in school this afternoon; the children were released from school shortly after noon and we had about an hour before the first interview. We popped across the road to the mall food court for lunch and made it back just in time.

Interviews went well and the teachers had good things to say about all three. Truly, it shows when a teacher has a good sense of the child and understands him/her, vs a teacher who doles out generic comments. All in all a good afternoon.

Our little man insisted on taking a picture of his family drawing for Papa, who couldn't be there.

Our dinner conversation carried on long after the plates had been emptied. Our youngest two were dashing around the house caught up in their own game, while the bigs stayed to chat. I don't even think we talked about any one thing in particular. I remember asking the husband how he felt about a colleague's funeral mass he attended this afternoon, and the bigs listened, asked questions and swapped their own stories from school. It was so ordinary but so precious at the same time. 

Transiting the little lady to her bed has made progress but we're back to nights of disrupted sleep again. Here's to a smooth night ahead.

Birthday Party.

Our little lady had been looking forward to this birthday party for months; our neighbour was turning 3! Her first birthday party without the other siblings present. She picked out a set of Paw Patrol PJs and Paw Patrol socks for her friend, plus a little box of paint sticks.

She was a little disappointed to arrive and realise that she'd have to share her friend with the 20 other children at the party. She managed, though, and was happy to end off the party on the bouncy castle with him. 

The other siblings were grateful to each have a party bag from the party, even though they didn't attend!

Her favourite part of the party

Dinner Date.

Mother/son dinner date with my little man. Happy meal, of course!

Bed "Bugs" & the Matariki Light Trail.

We have been working with our littlest lady on having her sleep in her own bed through the night. She's good at falling asleep in her bed, but crawls up to join me at around midnight. It was good for awhile, but we're at a point where sharing a pillow with a 3.5 year old is more constant tussle for space and less restful.

She'd lodge her protest with the following argument: But Daddy gets to sleep on your bed, why can't I?

We've had a sticker chart up for almost a week, but no stickers on it as she was, try as she might, unable to separate herself from me for the entire night. Physical touch is really important to this one. Our big boy even offered her money as a reward! The whole family has been in on this.

We had a breakthrough last night, though. She wasn't happy about it but she stayed in bed after I carried her back to her own bed at 3am. She woke with the sun and climbed up to snuggle, as agreed upon. Yes!

After dinner, we visited the Matariki Light Trail. Being the first day, it was quiet and not too busy. The children had a great time.

They spent the most time at this interactive section of the trail.

Lunchboxes.

First day back to school and we're back to daily lunchboxes. Our big girl made up this week's schedule. It's taken us many discussions over the past year to finally settle on a menu that everyone is happy with and can be excited about.

Things changed a little when we added one more to the primary school mix. Having a little man who enjoys his hot food meant getting thermos tumblers for everyone and planning for him to bring a hot meal at school at least once a week. 

He's declined burgers and hotdogs, so he'll have a homemade cream of chicken soup with pasta in his thermos tomorrow, and something else the day after. Bulk cooking and portion freezing during the holidays goes a long way in making things a little easier during term time.

Prata!

We marked the last day of the hols with roti prata for lunch. Papa asked the children what they'd like to have after mass, and this was their unanimous response.

They got front row seats to the prata man making their lunch.

All smiles.

School starts again tomorrow. 

Onward to term 3. 

Matariki

It's Matariki, the Maori new year. We observed the occasion with a campfire and marshmallows. The children picked out a potato,wrapped it in foil and finished baking on the coals..Papa introduced the children to "loaded potatoes" which they loved.

A windy evening which was a bit too cold for comfort for some of us.

With the school term starting next week, we spent the morning getting haircuts done at home, and the usual prep and freeze for lunchboxes.

The weekend will fly by and school will resume before we know it.

Outside Days.

The husband's immune system has finally succumbed to a bug, just as the rest of us have recovered. That's meant that he's stayed home the last couple of days while we head on out to enjoy the remaining days of the winter break.

Beach trip, yesterday:

They created a shelter to keep them dry in the intermittent showers.

Today, it was good to see them all over the walls this morning:

The husband's hopefully on the mend. We picked up some UMF12+ manuka honey for him as well to speed up the recovery. 

Family Games.

It's a sign everyone's on the mend, when they're able to stay up for games. Twas good to play together again.

I made an avocado quick bread this afternoon using some avocados we had on hand. I'm surprised by how yummy it was. Breakfast tomorrow!

Wintergarden.

On possibly the one sunny day we'll get this week, we headed to the Parnell Wintergarden for a walk. 

Everyone was happy to see lunch:

We're currently listening to an audio book of Charlotte's Web, narrated by EB White himself. Our big boy got out the viewfinder to look through the slides of the movie ahead of the audiobook. "Where's Charlotte? Why didn't she come back from the fair?" Aha. We haven't reached that part yet in the audiobook but it looks like we're going to have one heartbroken boy soon!

Winter Break.

The winter break began quite unceremoniously, with most of us in various stages of unwell. The weather has also been cold and wet, perhaps making it a good time to stay home. 

our big boy welcoming his sister home last Friday.

The highlight of the break, so far, was probably our fire pit. We toasted marshmallows and hot dogs on it and we had a great couple of hours outside.

Our neighbours brought over some beef stew and rice yesterday evening, which was a godsend, especially since they didn't know we've been unwell.

Flu season has hit us hard and it's been a painfully slow road to recovery.