The first day of my kayak lifeguard course has gone well. My stomach, back and legs are all slightly stiff, rather than just my arms and shoulders, evidence that I'm mastering the new strokes we practised correctly.

It was the first time I'd left Emma (awake) for more than 2 hours since her birth - it felt really odd! Despite Mikey being quite unwell Brendan coped brilliantly! Probably too well - I won't feel too nervous about leaving them again in the future :)

Right now I should be practising various knots for towing people and stuff like that. Instead I've been Googling the Blue Blubber Jellyfish and am relieved to find it's harmless. There were thousands of them all around us today with either our paddles bouncing off them or them bouncing off our kayaks. A big thing on tomorrow's timetable is practising "wet exits" (where you roll your kayak upside down and then exit from there by doing a forward roll under water) and rescues. Apparently we need to keep practising the rescues until the rescuer is good at them - as the others have even less experience than me I'm expecting to spend a fair amount of time floundering about in Cabbage Tree Creek mouth in a panic. At least now I know I only have to worry about the bull sharks...

Should I survive I'll report back tomorrow! In the meantime I'm off to rest my aching body

This afternoon I left Brend with the kids at a park on the Wynnum Esplanade and headed for home in my kayak.

Approaching Manly Yacht Club I noticed some fins and splashing in the distance. Fortunately I could see from quite a way off that they were dolphins - but as dolphins feed off the same bait fish as sharks this isn't necessarily encouraging, according to the guys at the canoe club!

Anyway, curiosity got the better of me and I was rewarded by 20 minutes or so of front row seats to wild dolphin behaviour - awesome!

Each time I felt I was getting quite close I'd back off out of respect for the dolphins. However, the one in the photo above left came and sought me out, interested to examine this strange creature floating on top of it's world. What a treat!

Unfortunately it was a little choppy and I needed my hands primarily to control the kayak, not to take photo's. Added to that, my waterproof camera is a little point and shoot, with a delay, getting decent photo's proved impossible. After attempting a few shots I simply sat back and enjoyed the experience. If I kept still in the water they'd lose interest, if I started paddling slowly in their general direction they'd come back for another nosy at me.

8 months ago when I got my first sea kayak (a sit-on-top, fortunately I was in the rather more stable sit-inside today, which did leave me feeling more secure with the whole experience) this was the sort of encounter I was dreaming of - hard to believe it's really happened so soon! Cold weather (relatively speaking) aside, I think I'll be going out more frequently again now.

Today was Emma's last day of babyhood, tomorrow we'll have two toddlers. When I think back to this time last year, experiencing early labour, wondering how on earth I'd continue to meet Mikey's needs while meeting those of our new baby, I feel so blessed. Emma's first year has been hard work, yet worth every bit of it. She's such a sunny little person, in fact some days as I watch them play I wonder if we have the happiest kids in the world.

As I type this I can hear her stirring through the baby monitor, letting me know that soon she'll want another breastfeed, perhaps letting me know that she too isn't quite ready to let go of her babyhood. As I cuddle her tight tonight all I can do is hope that my hold conveys my confidence to her - the amazing toddler years are ahead and bringing her through them to be happy, confident and independent, as her big brother is, will be our shared goal.

So I'm off to wrap presents, to reflect on past and future, and on how blessed we are that a year ago today our little Emma-Bear entered our lives.

Today was a brilliant wildlife day, but a photographic disaster. This morning at one of our local parks there was a herd of dugongs grazing on sea grass around the mouth of a canal, periodically coming up for air. I've never seen so many so close by before and found myself wishing the kids were old enough to appreciate what they were witnessing.

Sadly I only had my little pocket Oly with me, and despite being close by the dugongs were too far for its zoom to handle. When I got home I discovered that my pc no longer wanted to talk to the camera and with no time to fix it I left the camera behind when we headed out to a second park this afternoon.

For the first time there (Wellington Point) we saw dolphins, also incredibly close by! And no camera... Once again, the kids are simply too young to appreciate what they were seeing. Hopefully the local wildlife doesn't disappear before they are old enough to do so.

Our kids are growing up! Mikey turned 3 six weeks ago and in just 2 weeks we'll no longer have a baby in the home. It's hard to believe.

The kids are awesome together, the play and have such a good time. A sibling with a close age gap (2 years) was the best gift we could have given Mikey. Naturally they have their fair share of disagreements, but the good times far outweigh these.

Mikey had his first birthday party this year. The plan was for one in our garden, but the weather interfered and we ended up having it at a local indoor playcentre - the kids loved it. 3 is definitely a great age, the age of reason is being tentatively entered and words like "please" and "thank you" even get offered spontaneously on occasion.

Em is a rather different child from our sensible and cautious Mikey - we've nicknamed her "Kamikaze Baby". She'll nose-dive off anything, any height and if we don't catch her and she bumps she just sits up and giggles like a mad thing. I suspect her toddler years could be slightly more intense than Mikey's were (a thing I wouldn't have believed possible a year ago :) ).

Once again I'm returning to our blog with far too much news to get down - perhaps when my kids reach school age I'll finally have some spare moments to myself again. Not that I'd have it any other way, I love being busy!

Our new home in Thorneside has had its fair share of renovations since we moved in, but we've still got plenty to do. The new bathroom and playroom downstairs are both complete but not fully painted. The backyard is refenced, but we're still pulling glass and concrete out of the flower beds (??!!). This next week we hope to carpet the kids bedrooms, not because we don't find the timber flooring attractive but because it's rather cold on the feet in winter.

Unfortunately my Dad's 3 months with us are up so Brend and I are now project managers, a scary prospect considering our lack of renovation experience!

Life in Thorneside is pretty good. The parks are lovely and there are a couple with beach frontage onto the Bay. We've joined another nice playgroup and are living walking distance to both our church and Mikey and Em's best friends. We now get around the neighbourhood by bicycle with the kids in a bike trailer which we're all loving.

Koala's continue to come and visit our backyard and Aussie bird life is nothing short of spectacular.

Right now I'd better get on with placing masking tape around the playroom in order to continue painting... hopefully next time I blog we'll be a bit closer to completing the downstairs living area!

I've started blogging over at Global Bird Trekkers. It's nice to have something to contribute to outside of the kids! Not that I don't adore the kids, but this will give me a welcome break occasionally. Thanks Gwen and Jackie for asking :)

Finally we are not only settled in Thorneside, but have an internet connection sorted as well. The first month in our new home has been an interesting one. Brend's been away to a couple of mines in Queensland and is currently in South America so hasn't spent too much time in it sadly. We have yet to finish unpacking.

From the kids' point of view the move has been a great success. We've had a number of koala's visit our garden, as well as kookaburra's and many rainbow lorikeets each day. Mikey's becoming quite the little Aussie wildlife buff :). The kids love the extra space we have and Mikey's getting into gardening in a big way. The plants are in danger of being watered to death. He believes each of them is either going to grow him a mango or a strawberry. Hopefully he won't be too disappointed when some tomatoes, lettuces, corn and plain old flowers appear as well.

We currently have a weird spiral staircase going from one of the upstairs bedrooms to the downstairs study - a total death trap. We're hoping to get it removed ASAP so that Emma can have her own bedroom too. She adores Mikey's bedroom, but he's not so keen on her wrecking his train track each time she enters.

Brendan's home on Sunday so we're counting down the hours to that. My Dad is still staying with us at the moment, and we're getting Mikey's kitten on Sunday too. A full house for sure :)

Tonight is our last night in the first home we've ever owned. It was also Em's first home, the place we brought her home to after her birth. It's amazing to think that we've been here only 18 months, yet so much has happened. We love the area, and are moving just 3 suburbs away (closer in to Brisbane) to Thorneside. The Bay will be even more accessible from there, walking distance from our new home. The kids will have a bigger garden and a rumpus, and any visiting grandparents will have their own living area downstairs. But more on that after we've moved in tomorrow.

For now we're frantically packing and hoping to have time to take final photo's of Em's first home before we leave tomorrow. On that note, I'd better run...

Yesterday I joined the Redlands/Wynnum Canoe Club for a paddle out into the Bay. Not far into the trip it started raining gently. Combined with the rising sun we were treated to the view of this rainbow.

As usual I had to turn back early (for Emma), but with the rainbow ahead of me almost the whole way back to the clubhouse even the return trip was enjoyable.

I'm hoping to take my kayak fishing with Mikey's little rod sometime this week - watch this space!

Today Mikey fell into the toilet. He's been taking himself off lately and if I attempt to check he's ok all I get is "Mummy go away!". So today while I was busy in the kitchen he went off for a pee. And then decided to climb onto the toilet to reward himself with a sticker for his chart :) Unfortunately at that point it all went horribly wrong and he ended up in the toilet bowl with a bruised knee and ankle.

Sadly it would have been too cruel to run off and grab my camera so the story will have to passed on by word of mouth until his 21st birthday :)

Since moving to this area in October 2006 I've been excited to get out onto the Bay and do some exploring, learn more about the wildlife here (Moreton Bay is a Marine National Park - just from the shore we've seen dolphins, turtles, dugongs, a humpback whale on migration as well as numerous bird and fish species) and about the sea. As I fell pregnant with Em the month after we moved here this was all put on hold.

For Christmas my Dad very kindly gave me a kayak which enabled me to finally get out on the Bay - joy! However, due to my lack of knowledge of the sea I felt a bit apprehensive about venturing far on my own, so I've joined the Wynnum Redlands Canoe Club. The members I've met so far have all been friendly, and I've learnt quite a bit already.

From our new home I'll be able to take a short cycle down to the clubhouse each Saturday morning for my weekly paddle where I hope to learn more about the sea, currents, etc, see some of the wildlife the others have seen while paddling (especially dolphins closeup) and stay away from certain other wild inhabitants (ie. bull sharks) in the area.

Wow, has it really been so long since I last blogged? "Emma is now 3 weeks old..." now reads "Emma is now 8 months old and crawls like greased lighting"!

How to catch up on over 7 months, and most of Em's lifetime...

The time since Em was born has been chaotic, filled with family visitors as well as wonderful. Life as a family of four is a constant learning experience for all of us, but going well. Mikey and Emma adore each other and are playing together more and more as Emma's understanding of things grows.

Since Em's birth we've had Brendan's sister Mandi spend a couple of weeks with us, then Brendan's mom stayed for 2 months which was heaven. My Dad then came for nearly 3 months, and is coming to stay for another 3 from this Saturday - woohoo! It's been fantastic having grandparents around. We'd like to "import" them permanently :)


Em has two teeth (bottom middle) which appeared just before and just after her 6 month birthday - she doesn't seem to be in any hurry to push any more through just yet. She started crawling at 7 and a half months, a month younger than Mikey did but is less interested than he was in standing up and furniture cruising.

Mikey's now a toilet training graduate and loves "giving the thirsty trees a drink" when we're at the park :). The "terrible two's" also seem to be a thing of the past. He's a very loving big brother to Em, and loves helping Mummy with things like vacuum cleaning (to the point where we got him his own mini hoover). Climbing and trampolines are all the rage right now. He's also started to really enjoy other kids his own age and is developing friendships which is so sweet to see.


Brend is still travelling a lot, the three of us miss him when he's away. Fortunately he's usually home for weekends (aka "Daddy Days"). Recently he's started taking charge of them on Saturday mornings from about 5am-7:30am while I either take my camera out or go paddling on the Bay (more on that to come!).


As for me, I'm still a SAHM (stay at home mum) and hoping to keep that job title for quite a while to come. Mikey will be attending Kindy for a couple of days a week as from next year, but we have no plans to start Emma going for another couple of years to give her the same start Mikey's had. We're busy getting Mikey's name onto school waiting lists at the moment (seems like we should have done this already - what happened to my baby?!) as we finally know where we'll be living when he starts school. We've sold our townhouse in Ormiston and in 2 weeks time will be moving 2 suburbs up the coast to Thorneside, to a highset home with a lovely backyard for the kids. Exciting times ahead!