Mia's First School Concert

For the last two months, Mia's playgroup has been practising for their concert.

It was quite an emotional "first" for me!

The theme was "splish splash" and all sorts of songs about the sea, swimming, pirates, etc. The kids had to all be dressed in jeans or jean skirts with white t-shirts, and then they got given cute sailor caps and scarves, they looked adorable!

We arrived early so that I could sit right in front.  It was all very informal - the stage set up, and then all the parents sat on picnic blankets on the grass.  Cute décor was put up all over - the school really went to lots of effort to make it special!

Hubby and my sister, Aunty Boo joined me to watch the concert.  Before the kiddies came up on stage, the teacher said that if any kids are upset, the mommies are welcome to go stand by them, or else the kiddies can come down and sit with their parents.

Then the kiddies all climbed up onto the stage, some staring wide-eyed, some smiling and waving, some standing still, some jumping up and down in excitement.  Poor Mia looked like she had been crying, and she looked very overwhelmed. Luckily she caught my eye quite quickly and gave me a wobbly smile.  Oh my heart!!

Teacher Nadia then sat right in front of them to do all the movements with them, and the music started. Mia just sat and stared, sometimes with her bottom lip quivering. Oh I just burst into tears! She was being so brave, fighting the battle against tears and meltdown - and winning!  She caught my eye again and I smiled and did thumbs-up and did the same movements as the teacher was doing, and that got her going a little bit.

 

Some of the songs she took part in nicely, and others she just sort of sat and stared. However, she didn't need me to go stand by her and she didn't try and get off the stage - none of the kiddies did - they were all very brave and looked so cute.

After the concert, each child got given a medal with the school's name and 2014 printed on it, and a party pack - they were very excited about the party packs, it was obviously used as a bribery tool. :-)

Once that was done, everyone had a picnic, and the kids ran around and played together.  Very special. I'm a proud mommy!

xx

My 90 Day Challenge Results!

So I completed Season 5 of my 360XBT challenge.  Due to being sick, having sick lil girlies, and lots of sleep deprivation during this time, I didn't take part in the exercises as much as I had hoped or planned to.  But that said, I'm super happy with the results!!

I lost 7 kg and 8cm off my waist, 16cm off my hips and 5cm off my thighs. Yay!!!

Here's the piccie:

I joined the next season again, because, simply - how couldn't I? I'm loving the eating style - whole foods, healthy foods, and enough food! I love the community of the FB group chat, lots of inspiration, motivation and priceless info, each day I learn something new.

During my pregnancy, I picked up 20kg. I have now officially lost 15kg of that, over the past 6 months, of which about half of that was on the 360XBT plan.  5kg to go, and hopefully a lil bit more after that, plus some firming and toning. Bring it on!

I'm excited to be part of this community over the holiday and Christmas season - always a difficult time with regards to eating right and exercising, so this will help me stay on track.

I'll share some fave recipes soon!
xx

Family Photoshoot 2014

We had our annual photoshoot with my friend Karin two weekends ago.  As always, she just captures perfect special moments and emotion, just love these photos. Special memories forever! ♥

Find Karin on her website or on Facebook.

I just adore all the piccies, Karin got the perfect combination of the girlies on their own, of me with the girls, Wyn with the girls, four of us together, me and Wyn together...  Here's a collection of my fave ones. Will be printing some to give to grandparents and to put in frames on the wall! ♥

Happy 6 Months, Ella Jill!



 My dear sweet girl,

Happy half-year my darling! 

 

You are such a happy, friendly and content baby. We are enjoying you so much! I love to kiss you, and hold you, and watch your awe and wonder at the fascinating world around you.

 

You just love your big sister. You watch Mia all the time, and she makes you laugh when she talks to you.  We love the excited little kicks you give when you get excited!  You love to watch Nala the doggie too, and you've started reaching out to touch her, mostly very gently, but the other day you grabbed her ear and gave her such a fright!

 

We are going on your first holiday next month, can't wait for special relaxed time together. Your first Christmas coming up soon, oh what fun.  Baby girl, lots of special memories and lots of love and fun coming up for us!

 

You just love bathtime. You bath in the big bath with your sister, and you love splashing and touching the bubbles. You don't even mind if you get water in your eyes. Once you're out of the bath, you love to still watch Mia while she finishes her bath!

 

You have completed our family, we love you to the moon and back.

Love,

Mommy

xx 

 

 

Mia got a playhouse!

Last week Mia's birthday present from my parents arrived.  It's a wooden playhouse. We call it "the pophuis", as we weren't really sure what to refer to it as in English, and that's what they call the playhouse at school too, so Mia knows it as a pophuis.

We need to still have it painted - the home owner's association where we live requested that we paint it the same colours as our house.

It's 1.3m off the ground - we're planning on putting a sandpit underneath it.

It's already completely full of furniture!  Mia chose to have her play kitchen and her play dressing table there.  Then we used her birthday money and bought a little doll's bed, a little carpet and some hanging décor.  Mom-in-law will make curtains for the two windows.  Her little patio set is outside on the small veranda.  Super cute!

We've already had our first tea party in the pophuis, Nala the dog also comes up the steps to investigate, and Ella spent a happy half hour in there this weekend, happily sitting in her Bumbo watching her big sister play!

I am planning to make a fairy garden somewhere around the pophuis, have been finding awesome inspiration on Pinterest, looking forward to putting the plans into action and involving Mia in it too.

Lots of fun times to be had in this pophuis, I know!
xx

An update on Ella's world

All about Ella:

 - She's 5 months and 2 weeks old.  She weighs around 8kgs already and I've had to start packing away the 3-6 months clothes already, she's bursting out of them!

 - She adores watching her big sister, whether she's playing in the garden, or just sitting playing on the tablet, Ella just stares and stares.

 - She's been sleeping in her own room for the last two weeks.

 - She loves our Moms&Babes class every Thursday, she's so good during the whole class, enjoying each activity, from the aeroplane movement song, to bouncing on a big ball, to the massage. Really fun for both her and me!

 - Her face lights up when she sees me and her pappa.  Precious.

 - She's enjoying eating! Loves fruit especially, and sucking on ribs and bacon!

 - She's (mostly) very easy to put to sleep.  Her awake time is on average, two hours, then she has a nap.  Usually an hour nap in the morning, then midday is her longest sleep of between 2-3 hours, and then a short late afternoon nap.  I literally just wrap her in her blanky, put her in her cot with her dummy and leave her and she goes to sleep.  Sometimes if she cries I just turn her on her other side and then she goes to sleep.

 - Unfortunately, she doesn't sleep well at night.  She goes to bed around 8pm, then wakes up at 9pm, 11pm, 1am, 3am for a bottle, and then awake for the day between 5am and 6am.  That's on average.  Then we've had a few nights where she's been awake every single hour through out the whole night.  Difficult!  Most of the wakings I just turn her around and give her dummy back and she sleeps again.  Sometimes however, after her 3am feed, she thinks it's playtime and we've had nights where she's then awake for an hour and a half then... eeeek!!

 - She enjoys sitting in her pram with a few toys, watching the world around her.

 - She's a content baby, mostly.  She happily lets other people hold her, usually.

 - She can sit on her own for a couple of seconds at a time.  Actually holds her balance very well, think she's not far from doing proper upright sitting.

 - She was literally sick with alternately snotty nose and cough for 8 weeks.  Two paed visits, and two gp visits later, it had eventually become a secondary infection and she was diagnosed with bronchiolitis.  At the same time, I was diagnosed with pneumonia and Mia with upper respiratory infection.  Ella and I were on antibiotics and Mia on cortisone syrup. It was a hectic week, but we got through it and luckily all better now!

 - Mia made her laugh so much, when I told Mia we're going to all bath together and we can put a fizz ball in the water, Mia said to Ella, "we're going to be all fizzy!" And Ella laughed and laughed, so for 5 minutes Mia didn't stop entertaining her with "fizzy!" and bursts of laughter followed. My heart!

 - Ella is not such a snugglebug like Mia was.  She often doesn't even want to be held when she has her bottle, I have to put her in her cot and hold her bottle for her.  She also doesn't like it when she wakes up and I want to lie in bed with her - she gets very cross - she wants to be upright.

 - Ella doesn't like the UbbaBubba sling at all.  But she does like being swaddled for sleep time.

 - She's not keen on her dummy during awake time, even if she gets upset.  Only likes her dummy for sleep time.

 - Her hair and eyebrows are darker than Mia's were at this age.

 - She's fascinated by Nala, so cute how she watches her.

 - I love the way she reaches out to touch our faces, and the way her hands gently come together when she's exploring a toy.

 - This precious little person has completed our family.  We're all so in love!