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 Cycling down to the cityPosted under Thomas by Christian on March 2, 2010 @ 8:19pm Thomas and I decided that we wanted to cycle to the city again. Last time it was a marathon effort (for me, anyway) because we were both relatively new to our bikes. This time it was much better because we had both developed better biking skills and knew what it would be like. After the hilly parts near our home, and once we got on to the Linear Park cycleway, it gets very much flatter and easier. The park areas get more open, there are wider paths and it is very much more attractive. This time, we called Ann after 45 minutes of cycling, and told her where we would be in 15 minutes - approximately the time it would take her to get to us. After an hour's cycling, we were collected by Ann - just up the road from Thomas' school. It had been a 16Km ride, and once we loaded our bikes onto the bike rack at the back of Ann's new car, we were quickly heading home for a barbequeue. Volunteer in the gardenPosted under Family by Christian on February 26, 2010 @ 8:20pm Tonight we had a dinner from garden croppings. We have planted lettuce which was ready to eat and very tasty, and of course our herbs have always done well and we added some basil to the salad. The best thing is that this year we got a high yielding volunteer of cherry tomatoes, very vigourous and tasty - we are constantly cropping the tomatoes and have used then for ratatouille and other tomato-based dishes. When Thomas was younger, he used to go into the garden and pick tomatoes - often before they were ripe and sometimes picking every tomato off the plant. So we told him "don't pick", and then he knew the fruit as "don't pick" instead of tomatoes. Last year we got a great volunteer plant (productive/desirable 'weed') in the same flower bed, but it was Thai basil, which we also enjoyed eating. This year I have been collecting seeds and will plant them, instead of depending on the luck of the compost not completely killing all the seeds and clippings that we put in. Trying out the new sat navPosted under Daniel by Christian on February 21, 2010 @ 8:41pm Ann was not pleased that I had bought her a Tom Tom sat-nav for "her birthday" and pointed out that it was more for me than her, but anyway we decided to take Ann's new car out for a guided journey up into the Adelaide hills, at the mercy of a miniature computer voice and electronic maps. We were a little concerned a few times when we were taken on a "short cut" that was very winding, although picturesque. Although Ann's new car looks like a four-wheel-drive, it is only 2 wheel drive and we were concerned that we might end up treated in the same way as our first sat nav experience in my father's car. It must have been around 8 years ago, but my father had a new BMW X5, and we set up a route to take us from a countryside hotel in Cornwall to the nearest town - the sat nav gave directions down farm tracks on the "shortest" route, and a few times we were very concerned that we would reach a dead end and get stuck - but the Germanic voice (between telling us off that we had left the prescribed route) managed to get us to our destination. It was similar today, in that we saw beautiful and quiet parts of the Adelaide Hills that we would have never tried (because there were no sign posts...) and eventually we came to our destination - Lobethal. We stopped at the Markets and had a look around at the usual crafts, paintings, hand spun wool and foods. We were particularly interested in some baby kit-bags with very clever pockets. We lunched and left, the Satellite Navigation system giving us directions down some back streets. We then heard an echo from the back - Thomas was repeating every direction given to us by the system. When Thomas first experienced a sat nav voice, it was in Austria, and he was very excited about the directions and kept on repeating the directions - and he was doing the same today. Then Daniel piped up and started copying too - I got a three way echo. I guess that will have to be something we have to live with for the next few years. Adelaide Fringe Opening ParadePosted under Family by Christian on February 21, 2010 @ 8:32pm We decided to something that we have not done with the boys before - to go to a large public gathering. We decided against taking Daniel, but we took Thomas to the opening of the Adelaide Fringe, which was a large parade along the streets of Adelaide, some were the actors/artists/players of some of the shows were advertising their shows, there were also local businesses and charities, and even Adelaide City Council. We arrived at 6:30 and found a shady patch of grass near the parade route, and watched a local Salsa dancing school getting the crowd to follow steps from the teacher on the back of a truck full of speakers, with dancing girls in feather headdresses and tassled bikinis encouraging everyone to dance. Thomas was not up for it, so we kept our little space and then watched the parade trickle by. Thomas was very cautious, but eventually stepped forward to the kerb so that he could gather some of the free gifts and flyers being handed out. His favourite gifts were a glow stick (from the council, dressed for street cleaning!) and a glow bracelet from one of the many burlesque girls going past. Some of the floats were just bizarre and nonsensical, but in all it was a visual spectical, enjoyed by around 90,000 other Adelaide people. We left at 9:30, and I lost a bet when we arrived home, because Thomas was still talking and not tired... Massage in a dodgy areaPosted under General by Christian on February 15, 2010 @ 9:25pm Today I had to eat my lunch quickly so that I could use my break to go out and get a massage in the red light district of Adelaide. Hindley Street is right behind my office, and I can see the massage parlour from my desk, so I went down to have some of my tension relieved. I was given my relief by a small, young chinese woman - and at one time I was lying down and she was right on top of me, putting her entire weight into her elbows to massage my shoulders - I was looking through the little hole in the massage table at her on her tiptoes. My shoulders were quite tense, as I spent some time at the weekend doing some construction at the back of our property - a little retaining wall on a steep and unstable slope. It was one of those times that the work was really hard, but quite rewarding and satisfying. This weekend Thomas and I also did bit of a long bike ride - Ann took us out in her new car, with the bikes on the new bike rack, and she left us in a quiet residential street, and Thomas and I then cycled home - it was great because we were exploring new areas and then knew we were getting closer to home. Nose pickerPosted under Daniel by Christian on January 29, 2010 @ 10:08pm Daniel often likes to give me a big cuddle, and sometimes he will grab my face and look at me very intensely. He will put both hands on my cheeks, and jabber at me, with some nodding and intense attempts and conversation. Today he was looking very closely, pushed my head up and looked up my nose. He then asked to get down, rushed off and got a tissue, and then asked to be picked up again. Then he shoved the tissue up my nose and was digging around up there with great enthusiasm. I was holding him so had a limited ability to escape, and the more I leant my head back to get away, the more access he had and so the more he tried to get whatever he had seen. It was not a pleasant experience for me, but everyone else seemed to enjoy it. Return to School - Year 1Posted under Thomas by Christian on January 29, 2010 @ 10:08pm Thomas has now returned to School for the start of year 1, and now his school work has become more formal lessons and less around structured play. His new classroom is bigger, he has been mixed with some new children, but fortunately he is with around 6 other children from his reception class, including his favourite girl and some of his closer friends. His new teacher is the most experienced teacher in the school for year 1, and she is very nurturing and has a great reputation. Thomas seems to have settled in so far. We will have to all get back into the routines... Dinner partyPosted under General by Christian on January 24, 2010 @ 9:41pm We had a dinner party last night for three other sets of parents whose children were in the same class as Thomas. Two of the parents also have a son Thomas' age, and one more son who is around Daniel's age. We have been meaning to do it for ages, and finally this weekend everything aligned and we got averyone over for a barbequeue. Marie came over to look after the boys, but we had an interesting situation when we were putting Daniel to bed. Daniel uses his dummy less during the day, and so he will frequently put it away somewhere - and when we had to put him to bed we could not locate any dummies for him to sleep with. It then ended up that all the other parents were helping us look for one in all the toy boxes, ride on toys, under cushions and inside cupboards. Eventually we asked the oracle, Thomas, and of course he knew where he had seen Daniel place it, and so the frantic search by all the parents was called off. We put Daniel to bed, and Marie watched a movie with Thomas as he was too excited to go to sleep. Ann and I have been preparing all week, with cleaning and shopping and arranging. I went to the Central Market in Adelaide to get some good meat on Friday, and Ann made 4 different salads on Saturday morning. We all started with Champagne, lots of gossip, and then an antipasto starter. As the wine and conversation flowed, I ducked out to the balcony to barbequeue the Coorong Angus (the best beef in the region) Scotch Fillet - but I was distracted by the conversation and unfortunately overcooked the steaks. Fortunately the salads were great and everyone had a good time. It wasn't until past 11pm when everyone decided to head home, after my white chocolate trifle and lattes all around. Marie had been kind enough to stay right up until everyone else left. Second ToothPosted under Thomas by Christian on January 22, 2010 @ 6:25am Thomas lost his second tooth last night. The tooth fairy visited and gave him a dollar, which was less than last time - in November he got a shiny two dollar coin. Cycling tripsPosted under Thomas by Christian on January 19, 2010 @ 8:35pm Thomas and I have been out for several rides in the last couple of weeks - almost every day that I have been home. He has been getting more confident on his new bike, the main hurdle was getting started and stopping without falling over. He can now get started without me holding the seat, and he even manages to look behind himself when riding, hold out his arm to indicate, can manage to keep up momentum to go up steep inclines, and even manage to lift off his seat to pedal up a hill. We take CB radios with us when riding, Thomas and I have one and we leave one at home for Ann. Last time, we called for Ann to go to the front of the house and walk down to the corner to look across the valley to see Thomas and myself in the distance, waving. Daniel was very excited to hear my voice coming out of the handset... I have upgraded my bicycle with a saddle bag and a drink bottle holder, so I no longer have to carry a heavy and sweaty back-pack, as Thomas also has a bottle holder and can stop for a drink when he wants. He made the mistake a couple of times of stopping for a drink at the bottom of a steep hill, so we then had to push our bikes up the hill - hopefully he has learnt for next time to keep going! One thing that we have managed to do is to go riding for a while into the distance, then turn around and come back, then ride in circuits around the paths nearest to our house - instead of what Thomas used to do, which was to ride as far as possible into the distance and then get too tired to ride home and spend the entire return journey complaining... |
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