Hi there fellow Minti-ites,

Sorry haven't been on for a while, I've been quite busy. My girls are now very active and keeping me on my toes (Aaliyah is 3 and Krystana will be 2 in a few weeks), and I'm now 22 weeks pregnant, so that alone keeps be busy enough lol. Found out a few weeks ago that we're having a little boy.......so that's definitely going to be different lol.

I also doing a few things to help out with the family budget. It's not much, but I deliver both Homecare and Penny Miller catalogues - you know, those ones that are left infront of your front door and then collected a few days later, and if you want anything you just fill out an order form in the catalogue and receive it 2-3 weeks later. Add doing that to raising two children, growing a third, and trying to keep ontop of house duties (failing a bit in that department lol) and I'm a pretty busy Mummy lol.

Brandon has just finished a PCA/PSA course (ie, the course for people who want employment as an orderly) because he was told that the hospitals are crying out for orderlies, but apparently that has changed and the state government is make budget cuts which means they're not employing atm. Brandon's pretty down about it because it seems that everytime he does something to better his employment opportunities there's no work for whatever he's just done so he's not able to use his new skills & knowledge. He even did a few days work experience in a hospital and loved it.

Aaliyah is going to Kindy next year and is pretty excited about it. I can't believe it's only a few months away now before she starts "school" for the first time - time has just flown and she's just grown so quickly. It will be odd not having her home a few days a week. Providing the Baby is born on time or late, I'll even get a few weeks where it's just me and Krystana at home for a few days each week.

Anyway, that's about all the news I can think of. Hope you all are having a great day.

Had an interesting day today lol. When I woke up at 6am this morning it was still very dark outside and the power was out, but I could just glimpse flashing police lights through a crack in the curtains. So I decided to have a discrete peek outside. As I proceeded out the front door and up the driveway, the realisation that there was a very large power pole, and very long power lines, laying across the top of the driveway and within the garden sent me straight back inside again! The lines were just laying there, not looking dangerous at all, but I was not game enough to take any chances. I immediately rang the power company and just as they answered I noticed one of their trucks turned up, search lights on, to assess the situation, so someone had managed to inform them already. The reason for the fallen power lines? Apparently the Eucalyptus tree out the front had lost a major limb during the heavy rains and squalling winds during the night (apparantly they reached up to 120Km/hr!)

So for the next 8 hours there were power company trucks coming and going from infront of my house, and my girls LOVED watching the whole affair. We had a crane lifting and moving the old power pole, as well as removing what was left of it still in the ground, and positioning the new pole. We saw the traffic controllers re-directing traffic and lots of men in bright yellow safety gear walking around doing stuff and re-doing stuff. I felt sorry for them all cause it was still pouring down with rain alot of the time and they had to work despite it all.

By just after 2pm our power was reconnected and things were returning to normal. We've just been told that it's supposed to get rather windy again tonight! lol

Hello Fellow Minti-ites!

Sorry it's been awhile since my last blog but things have pretty much gone on as normal here. However, today I found out there is change in the air! Hahahahaha We are expecting the pitter patter of little feet for the third time here at our house.  I'm only about 5 weeks prego, so is still very early days as yet, but we're pretty happy and excited here. Krystana will be 2 by the time #3 is born, so we thought that's a nice gap between them, and we have thought about having about 4 in total. So pretty pleased here - now just gotta think about how to explain it to the kiddies hahahaa.

Aside from that, today we were looking at a school to put Aaliyah in for Kindy next year. We're thinking about putting her in Dale Christian School here in perth - as we like the smaller, more intimate classes of a private school, and they also incorporate our Christian faith into every bit of their curriculum which is important to us. We only found out the other day that the deputy principle of the school goes to our church and is the wife of a man Brandon has been chatting to every Sunday morning - talk about a small world hahahaha, considering the church we go to is a good 30 minute drive from where we are (the school is another 10 minutes or so away). The teachers and principles were really nice and gave us the full tour of the school, which teaches from Kindy all the way through to year 12.

Anyway that's about all the news I have. Hope you all are have a great week!

Cheers,

Pia.

Yep, today was Aaliyah's 3rd birthday - 2:50am this morning to be precise. It started off with both girls waking up just before 7am where they were ushered into the loungeroom to behold a number of balloons blown up and resting on the carpet, just waiting to be played with. When they saw them, both Aaliyah and Krystana squealed with delight and "dived in" lol. Within about 30mins the first balloon popped, but the rest managed to survive the day lol. At 8am they had a breakfast of strawberry jam on toast, with a glass of milk to drink. I was thinking about cooking pancakes, but Aaliyah's not too keen on them yet (but she LOVES toast).

After breakfast it was time to go back to normal play until Daddy woke up about an hour later - then it was present opening time hehehe. The first 3 presents were mostly winter clothes, as she'd gone through a recent growth spurt and most of her winter clothes no longer fitted. There were a number of super cute outfits lol. We also bought her some pretty hair accessories and a new hair brush - which she loves. Her hair is long enough to do things with, and every night now she goes to bed with her hair plaited.

Her last and biggest present from Brandon and I was her very first bicycle! Yep, my little 3 yr old is the proud owner of a real bike, with training wheels! And she absolutely LOVES it! She spent alot of the day playing with it and jumping on and off it - and we are trying to teach her how to ride it, which she's starting to pick up on. She can't move the pedals very well yet but she has worked out that she needs to use them to get forward motion - add that to the trying to steer the bike and she's got quite a task ahead of her, but I don't think it will take her long to have it all figured out!

Grandma (my Mum) was next and gave her a lovely new outfit. It was really good because it coordinated with some of the clothes we bought her so that was good.

Nanna (MIL) came over about an hour later and also gave her a new outfit and porcelan angel sitting on a half moon and praying - it's beautiful and Aaliyah loves it. At the moment it's hanging on their door until I can find a new place to hang it.

The rest of the day was spent playing and generally enjoying herself. At dinner time we enjoyed a lovely lamb roast, with roast carrot, onions and potatoes, and vegies from the freezer, covered in gravy - DELICIOUS and entirely cooked by Daddy hehehe. To top off the day, dinner was followed by Birthday cake! A lovely Black Forrest Cake from the Cheesecake Shop around the corner....MMMMM!

Following this it was bath time, then a quick story and prayer time, and bed! After such an exciting day it didn't take long for either of them to fall asleep lol. It's now 10:15pm and even Daddy has gone to bed lol - must've knackered him out too! lol