Happy Birthday to me

I’m one billion and three

I look like an old hag

And I smell like baby wee

(but I have had a pretty nice day in which I had three and a half child-free hours alone with my husband so I’m okay with it).

I am quite excited.

In the UK we regularly (read almost always) did our shopping online and had it delivered. Now, I don’t mind supermarket shopping, generally. I think I am quite lucky in that regard (or maybe it is Beefcake that is lucky) because I get quite a decent shopping high from doing the grocery shop. Not the equivalent to going and buying myself something expensive and shiny and pretty but large. I think it stems from my maternal drive to feed and care for my family. Once I have shopped I know that our house is filled with things I can use to nourish and nurture my brood all for a low, low budget price. In my mind I am a housewife superstar.

Where was I? Oh yes, excited.

I quite like shopping but I am excited because Coles now do online shopping in Adelaide. Quite apart from the fact that I can shop in my pj’s and rest my pelvis* I still find that I achieve almost** the same little high from filling my imaginary online trolley as I do from trawling the aisles in search of a bargain. I shopped tonight. I sat on my couch, recovering from an incident in which Pudding and Grub both jumped on me while I was on the floor and made me cry with the pelvis ouchie, and I did the biggest shop you can imagine. It’s been a lean month due to moving and putting in a new kitchen and it is payday tomorrow.

On a completely different note. Every night this week, Beefcake has had a meeting from 5:30pm until 8:30 and then from 11:30pm until 1.30am. It has sucked the arse. In a large, large way. Each night the small children have become more and more agitated as I try to prepare dinner and get them off to bed without the large beardy one. They are most put out by the change in routine. So much so that even Rhubarb has expressed distress at the craziness that takes place between 5:30 and 8pm, stating that he doesn’t think he can take much more of it. Poor baby, his life is so hard. I am please because tonight was the last night of the crazy. Back to a normal working day tomorrow and then Beefcake is on leave for two whole weeks. Yay! He has promised me much DIYing and fantasticness during his holiday.

Speaking of which, we found a fabbo acrylic surface that is all space age and stuff to use in place of tiles for the splashback today. Looks like glass but is not. We are seriously considering it but it will cost a bit more. Given how excited we were when we went to look today it is miraculous that we didn’t order it on the spot. We have shown great restraint.

I am rambling now. There is not a coherent point running through this post. Oops, the baby*** has woken up.

Bye.

*A regular shopping trip is a bizarre and torturous race for us. I must walk relatively slowly so I don’t hurt the pelvis but we must hurry because walking around like that makes the pelvis sore and we have, at most, an hour before I begin to start limping (and whining).

** I may have saved “a few” things that were too “hard” to get online to buy in the real supermarket on the weekend. Yes, I am sad, why do you ask?

*** When does she cease to be a baby? I personally think that now that she is one she is a toddler but part of my brain is obviously unwilling to admit that.

The birthday party yesterday was quite fun. I dressed Grub up like a dolly in her special new birthday skirt and her birthday shoes along with a white designer t-shirt (that was given to her recently and I put on her because I was afraid we would never have occasion to wear it otherwise – playgroup and expensive designer labels just don’t go that well together).

She looked exceptionally prettiful.

This is her in birthday outfit showing Beefcake that she had found one of Pudding’s battle chopsticks. She was pleased.

Then there is this one of her having had a little stack in the kitchen. Note pretty birthday shoes. Stylish with first class ankle support. Just what you want. As you can see, Pudding had been “helping” me with the cake decorating.

Here is the cake. A bumble bee for a busy bee of a girl. I think it turned out quite nicely, despite any assistance I may have had. Regular guests at our family birthday parties are accustomed to these creations of mine. Sometimes they are more successful than others. This is a very successful one. Make of that what you will. I will just say that Rhubarb has had both an accidental gay pride pirate ship and a wizard’s hat that made everyone have green poo so on a sliding scale the bee is an outright masterpiece. Talented, I am.

Finally, the grub:

Despite the fact that she quite liked the flouncy skirt (and kept showing it to people) she is, I fear, not the kind of girl to eschew dirty and dangerous activities in favour of sitting about and looking like a pristine china doll. She spent half of the day attempting to climb the slide and the other half banging things with a toy hammer and playing in mud. Oh well. She likes dollies too so I suppose it all balances out.

Off now to continue what has been an absolute fail day as far as healthy diet goes. The leftover brownies and cake and lollies have called to me and I have not let them go unanswered. I figure I may as well continue on this way and start afresh tomorrow. Better to get it all out of the way now. You know, so I won’t be tempted tomorrow.

As promised (but rather later than I had originally intended) I present to you the evidence that we are hardcore DIY ninjas.

This is the before picture. As you can see, it was a well-equipped, luxury kitchen. Note the sleek lines of the stylish appliances and the quality cabinet-making that have been used to create this prince among kitchens. You are all wondering why we needed to replace it, aren’t you? Only a fussy and demanding shrew would not be satisfied with cooking in such a kitchen.

Now, I just want to preface the photos of the kitchen that we have put in with a note that it is not finished. We must tile and there will be  a rangehood (currently in box in Rhubarb’s room), wall cupboards and another large pantry thingemy and a table that Beefcake and I are planning to create that will mould around the fireplace. I will try to update as we get stuff done. This is only the first bit. The bit we absolutely had to have to function as a family in this house. The rest will come bit by bit as we can afford it etc.

So, drumroll please…………………..

The new kitchen.

Oops, it is covered in mess from Grub’s party today. Nevermind, you get the idea.

I love it.

I especially love the dishwasher – and my oven. The oven love is a sort of a muted joy because it is still not wired in. The gas stovetop works but the electrician must come and assist us with the oven part. I had to do the baking for Grub’s party at my sister Patchouli!’s place. Can’t bring myself to be too sad about that though because I have a kitchen! The electrician might want to move his arse though because I imagine I will not be as cheery about it in a couple of weeks time.

I will post about Grub’s party tomorrow as I am knackered.

Must sleep now.

Byee.

Delicious little Grub,

On this day, one year ago, you came into this world.

Your birth was the most profoundly joy-filled and peaceful experience of my life.

Born in the dining room of our home, the whole family watched you enter the world.

You swam from your comfort inside of my body and into my hands.

I have held you in my arms ever since, although often now you will stray away from my reach as you explore your world.

You are bold and strong-willed and independent.

You are always busy. My little bee. You love to run and to climb.

You are musical (we’re not sure where that comes from). You will tap out a beat on anything and you’ll play anything that makes a tune and sing along.

You have brought such joy to all of our lives as a sister and a daughter.

You were the missing element to our family.

Now that we have you, we feel complete.

Happy birthday little G.

You are one year old today.

Mama loves you.

Whatever you do, do not attempt to put together an Swedish kitchen with your husband unless everything is going well in the marriage. If we didn’t like each other a lot it could have been all over.

There has been a fair bit of swearing and frustration and bickering about which way something is supposed to go. My hands are swollen and sore from having a screwdriver in them for the past four days straight (let’s not even talk about the pelvis), I haven’t been getting much sleep but I do have a few splinters .

We have been hardcore kitchen building.

But I’m actually pretty impressed with us. For the most part we worked harmoniously as a team. We didn’t fuck anything major up. Beefcake only threw a few tantys and I remained hysterical calm and serene throughout the process.

We did a pretty good job and today I have finally unpacked most of the boxes that go into our kitchen. It is not completely finished. We must tile above the benches, we must finish off a couple of other things but we have a usable kitchen and dishwasher. I can feed my family something other than toast and I do not have to wash their dirty dishes. Such joy.

And it is beautiful. I will post pictures tomorrow hopefully but for now I am just totally exhausted. I deserve some internet time and a cup of tea, I think.

Really, I’m not sure where my time goes.

Right now I am “looking after” the children. They are watching Playschool. Well, Pudding is watching Playschool, one hand in my cardigan pocket the other feeding his plastic builders ruler through the buttonhole as he nags me to put a youtube episode of 80’s transformers on for him. Thank you Beefcake for introducing him to that. Grub is slowly but surely unpacking the large bookcase in the corner, taking special care to tear dustcovers as she goes. Oh, hang on, now she is trying to scale the tv cabinet in an attempt to grab a dvd she has spotted. So, yes, the term “looking after” should be applied loosely here.

The problem is, I am finding it increasingly difficult to find two unencumbered seconds in which to write anything on my blog. By the time I have my hands free in the evening (which by the way never happened last night as Grub insisted she be held ALL NIGHT) I am too exhausted to talk or think or blog.

Pudding is feeling poorly. He…

….Slight break there where I was forced to dash across the room and rescue my precious, precious iphone from pudgy little hands (it is good for banging on the floor by the way) and then kiss and console very pissed off baby.

Yes, Pudding. He has a high fever. Probably the Swine flu. He is very lacklustre, demonstrated by the fact that he is sitting next to me as opposed to leaping about between the couch and ottoman shouting about pirates or boxing. Poor litttle love. His usually fair complexion is positively ghostlike in it’s paleness today. I hate it when he is sick, although I should be grateful that he is being still and quiet it’s too unnerving for me.

The big kids have gone to their Dad’s as he has returned from his European holiday. It is a public holiday. Everyone else in Australia is off work but Beefcake works for a UK company so he is working upstairs.

It is cold.

Time is up.

Being yelled at by baby. Must be held and boobed. Pudding saying Mummy, Mummy, Mummy, Mummy on repeat is now half on my lap.

I have no photos or anything interesting to post. It’s a wonder that I have bothered to write this but I am filled with guilt at the post free days on my blog.

There will be no proofreading. I’m living on the edge.

The end.