A Mayana Fix

Because I know I’ve been slack with photos of our Berry since we’ve been away…

Mayana discovered the joys of running under a sprinkler!

Mayana and her buddy Topsy! They’re best buddies and can’t get enough of each other. Mayana no longer calls all dogs Jack. They are now, “Doggie”, but she can also say Topsy and Sam, which are two of Nana and Pop’s dogs. She’s still not sure about the Jeda, their third dog. Topsy is by far her favourite though.

BUBBLES! Definitely one of Mayana’s top five favourite things ever. Quite often we hear her sleepily mumbling, ‘Bubbles’, as she wakes up, and it’s the first thing she asks for when we get her up.

Mayana got to meet her new cousin (my cousin’s daughter) Keira Isabel last week. Can you believe she’s only six weeks old!? She weighs in at less than two kg’s lighter than our 15 months old Mayana-Berry!

Mayana and Nana make the daily treck down to the shed to see what Pop’s been up to.

She’s really enjoying her time with Nanna.

Our clever little bean is no longer merely a destroyer of towers… no, she can now build them too!! Her record so far is six blocks high… and she gives herself a big clap after each successful stack.

Sometimes the spaghetti just tastes too good to waste time using a spoon!

For some reason Mayana thinks Nana and Pop’s shower is the place to be. Any chance she gets she sneaks in and just sits there.

She is getting cheekier by the day. This photo really captures her personality. She had just completely emptied her cupboard of cloths, and climbed up the three lower shelves to sit up inside it. I must say I was quite shocked to find her there! She was incredibly proud of herself.

You might notice that she is getting bigger! We are definitely noticing a big difference in her height, and yesterday we weighed her (with clothes, wet nappy and shoes on) and she was just on 8kgs. I’d guess the clothes, nappy & shoes would be worth 100-200g, but even so, whatever Nana’s been feeding her seems to be working!

She’s been a very good girl while Mama & Papa are at school, and not creating too much mischief for her Great-Nana. She especially enjoyed having Keira here for the week and being able to visit “bubba” each day. She’s also spent some time at Great Aunt Nelly’s video shop, ‘helping out’.

We had a mini-drama on our first weekend here. She started running this crazy temp, and cried and cried, wouldn’t eat, just was not herself at all. It was Saturday night, and when she wouldn’t even calm down in the bath I knew there was something wrong. I followed my gut and took her up to the hospital. She turned out to have quite a bad urinary tract infection. Poor little bunny. After a 10-day course of antibiotics, she’s doing much better. We have to make an appointment for an ultrasound next week just to check everything out. Of course out here, that means a 1.5 hour drive to the nearest town-with-an-ultrasound-machine. So wish us luck with that!

Hope you enjoyed your well-overdue Mayana fix!!

The Project

Just for a complete segue from craft, babies and teaching; I thought I’d share with you my Pop’s very exciting newest project.

He’s always doing something… be it building kitchens, creating amazing gardens, selling cars, inventing hydroponic gardening systems, rescuing battery-hens and raising them to be champion free-range layers… he’s always got some little scheme up his sleeve.

At the moment it’s a project on a bigger scale than usual. My grandparents have purchased the town’s old cordial factory. For the past decade or so (probably more!) it has been sitting out there, empty and dilapidated. Until, for whatever reason, it caught my Pop’s eye and imagination. So at the moment, he is in the process of a long-term project (fluctuating between 2-4 years in duration, depending on Pop’s mood) which will eventually see the factory become a liveable dwelling. A very unique, one-of-a-kind house!

So far, he has replaced the exterior corrugated iron with colourbond, and the roof is in the process of being repainted. One end of the shed, which is destined to be the loungeroom, has new interior colourbond walls.

It has such potential, and I’m looking forward to seeing what comes from it all. The plans change daily (it wouldn’t be Pop otherwise) but the work is well underway, and I’m looking forward to seeing what comes of it all!

So here are some recent progress pics. I don’t have any ‘before’ pics unfortunately, but I’m sure my Nanna has taken some, so I’ll see what I can do.

Here’s the ‘so far’ pics….

The front… painting still in progress

The back of the shed. LOTS of tanks on this property! These ones will be removed to make way for a big back deck. There is a MASSIVE tank under the slab of the smaller shed that’s on the property which will more than suffice for residential use.

This is the only room that has been started. It will be the loungeroom. On the weekend, Pete, some of my cousins and a neighbour will help Pop install the ceiling.

This is the main part of the interior. It will become kitchen, dining and living space. It’s huge. Really. They’re going for the wide-open-spaces feel.

This will all be stripped and will become two bedrooms and a bathroom. I personally think that they could use some of the main space and make another bedroom, (especially considering the numbers that need rooms when family visit!) but that’s just me.

   This is a really awesome cabinet that my Nana picked up for $50 at a garage sale. I love it and wish it was mine!

This is a little room that was built on to the main building. It was supposed to be Nana’s sewing room but apparently Pop’s going to tear it down now. It does look very tacked on, I must admit.

  The gorgeous view! One of the best things about it.

From the front today. The roof has had its first coat, and Pop’s added the red trim. I thought it looked great before, but the red just really sets it off I think. By the way, the white railings is something the council put in a few years ago because some drunken fool came out of their car and rolled their ankle in the ditch when they couldn’t find the footpath. Makes a nice little entryway, no?

  The front window… And yes, Pop has already started his garden out the front there.

The front door. There is actually a door of course and I should have closed it for this shot but forgot, sorry! The glass louvers are originals which Pop kept from when he replaced the front window. He has a budget of $100,000 for this project – and that’s including what he spent buying the shed. For this reason he’s trying to ‘upcycle’ as much of the old material as possible. I think that will add to the charm of the place.

So there you go… Hopefully I’ll be able to add a few more updates in the weeks that we are here! To be honest though, we are all really hoping that Pop does as he promised and takes it easy and lets it be a long-term project. Slow and steady, and all that.

Hope your day has been wonderful!

I’m soooo tired!

Hi all!

Thought I’d check in.

That’s how I’m feeling right now. So, so tired.

Prac is going well. Very well really. I already know all the kid’s names, and I’ve already done a good amount of teaching. And you know, I’m doing okay!

The class I have can be a bit challenging – but then every class has its challenges. There are a handful of kids that you have to be on top of at least 90% of the time, otherwise they become very disruptive, and that is really quite draining. But we’re getting there, and it will be good for me to hone my behaviour management skills. Anyone got any good ideas???

From next week I will probably start taking 100% teaching responsibility, and the thought is partly terrifying but mostly exhilarating and exciting. I’m actually looking forward to the process of planning and implementing what I will teach over the next 3.5 weeks.

Anyway people, I’m off to bed… at 8pm, like a grandma. Except that grandma is still in there playing her computer and much more wide awake than I.

‘Night all!

And so it begins…

The next four-and-a-half weeks are going to be full-on I’m thinking. Prac starts tomorrow. I can’t believe how quickly it’s come up!

I have a year 3/4 class. It was initially supposed to be year 7, but the teacher has gone on some kind of leave so I got switched. It should be interesting, I’ve never taught below year four so it will likely be a challenge, but one I’m definitely going to give my best shot!

I haven’t done prac for about a year and a half, so I’m feeling a bit rusty and a bit nervous, but hoping that it will all kick in and come back to me pretty naturally. I know I’m good at teaching, I just have to find my mojo again.

We are all settled in at my Nana and Pop’s. Mayana is already being spoiled rotten, and I can tell she’s going to have a fun month here!

So if I’m sporadic over the next few weeks, please forgive me! I’ll do my best…

another new ‘do

I had my hair done yesterday. I can’t actually remember for sure the last time that I went, but I think it was before Perth.

It’s the first time in about six years that I haven’t gone to my wonderful Mel at Salon Unique. I felt a bit like a traitor, but I just really couldn’t get back to the Coast this time.

So instead, I went to a lovely lady named Shannon who has a little salon in the town where my grandparents live… where we start prac tomorrow (eeeek!! More on that later).

I went a little darker than I usually would, but with these really awesome briiiiiiight red (like the same colour as my glasses) foils in through the bottom. I love them! I also got a fringe cut back in, because I was looking through some old photos of when I used to have one and decided I like it and wanted it back.

I am quite happy with it all really – and she was the same price as my wonderful Mel, so it’s all good.

Anyway… here’s the new me:

 

You likey??