Day 181 - Happy

Maddie is not a happy shopper, nor does she like to sit in a trolley any more, these two things combined make for an awful shopping experience for me and who ever I am with. After the movies on Friday we attempted to check out some stores in Tuggeranong, but Maddie was particularly uncooperative so we only managed the cheap store on our way out. I was looking for fairies for Maddie's fairy garden, and it seems she was looking for toys for Tucker. Maddie was adamant that we needed to buy this purple toy bone for him insisted that he did need it when I told her otherwise. As she fell asleep in the car, it was forgotten about until I grabbed it today. Turns out Maddie was right, Tucker did need that toy, as he absolutely loves it, his tail went nuts when it squeaked and he was still playing with it when we got home after doing some grocery shopping.

Day 180 - A Big Day

We have had a massive, exciting and sad day today, which started off with a trip out to Majura Park's Toys R Us for a Monsters University Party. I thought that it would be loads busier than it actually was so Maddie and I arrived about 20 minutes early, which was before they were even setting up, so we had to kill some time shopping for toys and birthday present ideas. There was green screen photos, colouring, tattoos, balloons and lollipop giveaways before it finished with a raffle draw in which Maddie won a colouring book.

I'm saying that Maddie won the book, but whether or not she was actually the winner is up to interpretation. The number would have been Grace's but seeing as she left to go to dance, her parents gave Maddie the ticket. It really is a bit of a funny conundrum. Poor Grace totally misses out as Maddie is so excited that she won it and loves it, although at this stage she has no interest in actually colouring it in. 

So the exciting thing happening this morning, in the freezing cold rainy, gloomy weather is the extensions roof going on. Max, the roofer up the top is a total photo bomber and of all the photo's that I took of the roof today, he has managed to get in every single one. This is one of the earlier shots that I took, and I hadn't noticed he was posing until I had taken a few and was actually paying attention. 

Scary for me, and I am sure him too, when I was walking past out to the shed to pack some things for Amy, who moved into her own place today Max had a bit of a slip and slide on the roof. When I turned around to see what the thud was, he was sitting down having a bit of a chuckle about his trip. I had to keep walking so I didn't freak out, it sure did make me nervous after that. Especially as I climbed the rattly ladder to have a look at the almost finished product. The roof looks awesome and is totally making the extension actually look like part of the house.

Seeing me take photo's of the exciting developments of the roof, Amy said that today's blog should be all about her, seeing as she is moving out. After saying that though, she refused to participate in having her photo taken. How Rude!!! So this photo shows Dad and Nathan loading her ute up, while Amy stands around to watch, I wonder how much of her moving she has actually had to do. Woo Hoo! The shed is empty, now I can start filling it up again and get some clutter out of the house. Well after I work out what we are doing with the floors in there anyway.

Day 179 - Movies Again

After the success we had seeing Monster's University I took Maddie to the Movie's again today to see Despicable Me 2. The guy that we ordered our tickets and drink from made a mistake so he up-sized everything for Maddie, which meant that the popcorn was almost bigger than she is! It looked pretty funny on her lap while she sat there eating from it, and she hardly put a dint in the bucket. I don't know if it was because the movie wasn't really suitable for her age group, or if she was just so excited to see Leah, but today Maddie didn't manage to sit still very well and was a lot more active while the movie was on. Still, the movie sure did have some funny moments, and awesome jokes in it for its adult audience.

Day 178 - Delivery

The roof sheeting and all of its compartments were delivered bright and early this morning all ready for installation hopefully on Saturday. I actually helped get the sheets in position by attempting to pull them towards the house while the delivery man pushed from the truck end while simultaneously lowering them on the crane. The power and phone lines that connect to our house make it very hard to get anything into the driveway area but this trucks liftie arm thingo extended out a few times and actually made it loads easier.

I couldn't believe how long the sheets were, in this shot they were pretty much pushed up against the garden bed just in front of the gates, and extend almost the whole length of the driveway. Thankfully they aren't too heavy and Drew and Nathan were able to move them out the back with the help of a couple of trolleys.

Day 177 - Motivation

After quite a few mentions of House Rules by the Morgan's Nathan and I sat down and actually watched it last night. It is so awesome seeing how fast they can totally transform a 'zone' and it inspired me to get out and do some more painting today. I really like the 'Smurf' colour that Nathan chose to go with the house colour. Just one coat has completely changed the entire look of the house in this area, and now I'm itching to choose the carport colour so that I can see all the new colours together. I'm not convinced that it is a good idea to have another colour going though, seeing as I have 4 different paints in use at the moment.

Day 176 - Sleepless night

Maddie did not want to sleep last night, it turns out that is because she is unwell. After quite a while of trying everything I could think of I asked Maddie if she wanted to sleep on the couch. Sure enough almost as soon as she was comfortable and covered she was sound asleep. I cant say that I slept well on the other end of the couch with her though. Poor little girl is all blocked up today and very unhappy.

Day 175 - Cake Hunt

Maddie and I have been discussing what she wants for her birthday again today, and she has stuck with wanting a chocolate cake, but now she wants it to be pink. Today to pass some time we checked out some cakes on Pinterest, with this one being her favourite. Some people really do have some awesome cake decorating skills, I can not imagine the time that would go in to making something like this. 

Day 174 - Movies

A weekend off any work on the extension, gosh we seem to be having a lot of them, in fact more off than on these days Nathan.. Anyway... Today we took Maddie to see her first movie, Monsters University in 3D. We were nervous about her talking, yelling, fidgeting, and wanting to leave before the movie was over, but once we realised it was 3D all those worries were replaced with a new worry of whether she would actually wear her glasses. It turns out, that not only would she wear the glasses, she loved them! Maddie almost managed the whole movie before needing a bathroom break, and sat reasonably still and quietly for the movie. I was pretty impressed and she loved it and wants to go back tomorrow!

The movie experience must have been exhausting though, as she put herself to bed at about 6pm after asking when we would go see another movie. Its a shame there aren't many good toddler ones out at the moment.

Day 173 - Hilarious

This funny picture popped up on my news feed today, and I had to have a little laugh, someone made a bit of a mistake there! Poor Sam, I really, really disliked him as a Wiggle, well until I saw his Goatee then I liked him a little more, and when he was booted out of the Wiggles, I liked him a whole lot more. Its such a shame he wasn't reinstated as he could actually sing unlike the new girl yellow wiggle. Now there is someone who grates my nerves!

Day 172 - Play

This morning we met Leah and Grace for a few hours of play at Lollipops, where it was confirmed that Maddie is most definitely her Nathan's daughter. She shows no interest in the nice small slide, or the jumping castle soft slide any more, but rather takes off for the three big coloured slides. It turns out though, that they aren't fast enough for her any more and she has graduated to the speed slide that is almost a vertical drop. Leah thought she saw Maddie go down it, but I brushed it off saying she never had before and that I didn't think she would, but I was proven wrong when she came walking out with a staff member, as she slipped the wrong way and hurt herself a little going down it. Thankfully she recovered quickly before she went off on it again.

After the play we had a little look in Toys R Us, where it was proven that Maddie really does need a toy kitchen as she refused to leave these ones as she was too busy making lunch for us. It was pretty cute and she was so insistent that she had cooking to do, so she was very upset when I wouldn't allow her to play all day. Maybe a birthday present idea if I can find some room somewhere, the one in Costco is awesome and I have been eyeing it off for ages.

Day 171 - Music

After 4 outfit changes, and a couple of tantrums we only just made it to Maddie's Dance class on time. Despite taking a lot of photos today I did not manage to get one good one, as they are either all fuzzy or someone is in the way. This is the best of a very bad bunch of photos. It does show how quietly Maddie will sit on the mat for music time though. She is really improving with her sitting time, still not great at listening but she has learnt to sit still for mat time finally.

Day 170 - Survival Week

This week for Maddie's swimming lessons was different as they were doing a survival week. It was awesome to watch and Maddie seemed to love it as she actually behaved for most of the class. She looks like she is super happy holding onto this empty juice bottle which she used as a floatation device on her belly to either swim normally or back float.

Day 169 - New Trends

Spent too much time browsing Pinterest again today, particularly looking at all the things that people do with pallets. I think I am becoming addicted to either the awesome bright colours or all the things that I want for our place that are made out of pallets. I absolutely LOVE this vegie garden, definitely for the colours in this instance.

Day 168 - Dentist

I finally dragged myself to the dentist today to have my top right wisdom tooth taken out. The dentist told me about 2 years ago that it needed pulling but I kept putting it off, who wants to have a tooth removed really. Anyway last Friday it actually started to hurt so I made the appointment, and thankfully I did as on Saturday it actually started to crumble. The dentist was worried that it would be a problem to remove, but it only took him a few seconds to free it thankfully.

Maddie had her first check up today too, the dentist said that she has good teeth and can not see any issues with them, hopefully she gets Nathan's teeth and not mine.

We both also had an eye test today and appear to both have good eyes. I figured that while Maddie was interested in what is going on with Nathan's eyes that it would be a good time to go see the optometrist to have hers checked. I'm not sold on Maddie liking the eye test but she was pretty pleased with the dentist experience and wants to go back.

Day 167 - I Can Relate

I joined a new group for garden inspiration today, and while I didn't see anything that motivated me today, I did find this though. I have to say that I can totally relate to this 'syndrome', getting comfortable and staying comfortable while you read is too hard to do.

Day 166 - Tyvek, Part 1

Today Mark and Nathan started to put the Tyvek up on the house. I always thought that it needed to go after the roofing, but the builder said that it could go on first. It makes such a difference to the structure and it is so cool actually standing IN the extension. I forgot to ask if the scaffolding made it easier or harder to put the wrap up, hopefully easier. I was thinking just this week that it will make putting the cladding on harder.

Day 165 - Day Trip

Today Maddie and I went to have lunch with Nanna, via the Christmas Barn of course. Maddie fell asleep in about 30 seconds flat after I hung up the phone to Nathan and she said something about Nathan not waking her up again. I couldn't believe my luck that she slept to Bredbo, so I was in shock when she went back to sleep for the trip between Bredbo and Cooma, and then slept the whole way back home again.

While we were in Cooma, we popped in to Aldi to see if they had some snow boots for Leah, and after having a little hunt I went and got some help and managed to find both Leah and I some nice light coloured ones. There were almost no Ski boots in either the Queanbeyan Aldi, nor the Canberra Centre store, so I was stunned to see about 100 pairs on the store floor and then to be told that there was about that much again stacked up in their storeroom. Sure was an awesome day, but I need to remember that when I go to Aldi with Maddie it is essential that I get a trolley.

Day 164 - Dance

Dance again today, the class only had 3 kids in it, so it was nice and quiet and so much less disruptive. Maddie loved using the ribbons instead of the pom-poms, and I think that they are her new favourite thing. Today at the start of the class to warm up, Maddie got to use the ribbons and run around pretending to be a fairy which she loved. Towards the end of the class, the kids did a performance for Elsie's class, and watched a performance that they did for her. Maddie is still not interested in pretending to be a cat, and is adamant that when Cass uses her 'magic wand' and turns the class into Kittens, that she is still Maddie and is not a kitten. Its pretty funny, I'm not sure if she is more anti being a Kitten or if the pretending to sleep is why she is so resistant to the magic spell.

Day 163 - LOL

This is a screen shot of a picture that Leah sent through today, another one of those helpful parenting advice things. I wonder how I can convince Maddie that this is correct, we are lucky if she has 11 hours broken sleep in a day, and she most definitely does not day sleep at the moment. In fact I don't think that since she was born that she has slept according to this, or any other persons idea of how long a baby should sleep for.

Day 162 - Hired Help

To get things moving along a bit faster, and get us ready for sheeting the roof, Nathan hired Rob a Carpenter to come spend a few hours on the extension. Rob ended up spending the whole day here for us, and in no time got the fascia completed, all the steel strapping in secure, all the battens in place as well as packing out the area where the door is going. It was so exciting going outside every now and then and seeing so much being done, and knowing how much easier he was making it. Rob also spent ages with me while I wrote down wall by wall what work needed to be done prior to us putting the cladding on. The Progress sure is exciting at the moment. 

Day 161 - More First's

For the first time ever, Maddie fell asleep on the floor, I still cant believe it happened. I used to be so jealous of all the mothers in mothers group whose kids just passed out on the floor, now their kids don't day nap, and mine is asleep on the floor. Gosh she looks daggy in her outside clothes, maybe they are just so comfy she couldn't help but fall asleep.

As it is the Queens Birthday long weekend we thought we would show Maddie sparklers. It was terrifying trying to teach her to only hold onto it in the one area and to make sure that she didn't burn herself by trying to grab it with both hands. She sure did love the experience though and asked for the rest of the night if she could do another one.

Day 160 - Caterpillar

Maddie made a caterpillar out of some of her balls today. I have to say I was pretty impressed with her skill, doing it on her own and telling me what it was. I wonder why she chose to make a caterpillar though, I don't think she saw one while she was playing outside, and we haven't read the Hungry Caterpillar in ages.

Day 159 - Progress

After a trip out to Rodney's, child free I picked up some more things for the fairy Garden. This is the progress as of today, I have finally found a few small plants and today I found some awesome pretend moss rocks and a moss mat. I wish that there were more hours in the day today so I could have done some more. Maddie is really enjoying moving the fairies around and digging in the old garden looking for baby rocks. I on the other hand am totally over digging for baby rocks, so I am planning to go and buy a bag of fish tank rocks before I do too much more work.

Day 158 - Questacon

Today was Maddie's first trip to Questacon and she absolutely loved it, she ran around for ages and was hardly still which made it hard to take a clear photo. I am pretty sure the only time Maddie stopped the whole time we were there was when she was checking out the microscopes and slides. Unfortunately Maddie's behaviour is challenging at the moment so we had to leave after her third warning while she had the biggest tantrum that I have experienced in public so far. It seems to have worked though as Maddie calmed down and seems more upset about not being able to say goodbye than actually leaving.

Day 157 - A Forgotten Treasure

Maddie and I went to explore Homebase in Woden today in the hopes of finding some paddlepop sticks. Its been ages since I have been into Woden let alone Homebase, I am actually not sure that I have been in there since I helped them out with stock for a week when I was 18. Anyway, the shop is filled with awesome craft things, home decorating things and so much that we can use in Maddie's big Fairy Garden when we are ready. I think I fell a little bit in love with the store today, we will definiately have to go back more often. 

I am totally in love with wall art at the moment, I just had to take a snap of this owl, I love the colours in it, I just dont think that it will go with the house, which is a shame as it is so cute!

Day 156 - Starting A New Project

We finally started work on Maddie's Fairy Garden today, and to say that Maddie is excited is an under statement. She had a great time collecting pebbles, and planting the Viola's and then proceeded to drive me crazy continually running off with the fairy and the gate. Perhaps I should have explained the concept of looking but not touching a little more thoroughly to her, but then she wouldn't have been able to do any planting, and I suppose the garden is supposed to be for Maddie. It is crazy hard getting the plants that I want for the garden and I have to keep revising my idea's of what is and isn't going to work. Hopefully the end product looks good.

Day 155 - I Cooked

Tonight, I actually cooked, I am not doing so much of it this year it seems, as we are often having smoothies for dinner but tonight I thought that I should try something different. The recipe is something different not the actual cooking concept. The Chicken and Chorizo Pasta came out pretty tasty, although I am not convinced that it is as healthy as the website thinks, as this huge amount supposedly serves two and has so much chorizo in it, that you couldn't actually avoid it. I am not sold on it, but it was easy to cook and clean up after and Tucker sure did love his left overs.

Day 154 - Time Waster

I have spent a lot of time these past few days playing Candy Crush after Leah and Simon suggested it. The game is highly addictive and I am not so sure that it was a good idea to start playing it, but it sure is fun!

Day 153 - Craft

While Nathan is off work recovering from his eye surgery I am having a break from the books also and making the most of my time off doing some craft and some reading. I finally finished the first page of an album that I decided to make last year for each of Maddie's Christmas'. I am pretty pleased with the finished product, but seeing as it took me so long, I can not imagine that the next page for her second Christmas will be finished any time soon.

Day 152 - Fairy Garden Gate

Pancake Parlour for lunch today, OMG I cant walk properly after eating 'IT' but it sure was tasty. While we were walking over to the Canberra Centre for some shopping we had a go on the carosel, well Maddie, Grace and I did, the others didn't seem so keen on going round in circles after our lunch. The aim in the centre was to check out the snow gear in Aldi, but Maddie was very uncooperative so we didn't last long. I suppose if I didn't spend so much time looking at the Fairy Garden things in Little Sprout that she may have coped a lot better. Still thanks to the Morgan's hunting skills we managed to get Maddie a pair of snow boots and a snow jacket that should help to keep her toasty.

This was the last gate that Little Sprout had, so I had to take it. I will have to get back there to get some more things soon, its such a shame that I hate going to the city on my own they have some awesome shops. I just always end up losing my car, and these days with Maddie in tow, I do not think that she would like to hunt for it for an hour.