Bless his cotton socks

"Mum!" Two more sleeps 'til my surgery!"

He's excited about his surgery? I remind him that he'll probably not feel very well after it, that he'll have a very sore throat and need lots of medicine. He'll be in hospital for a day and a night.  That he'll be a bit sick for a few days.

"Yeah, that's all right. I've always got a sore throat." He pauses thoughtfully. "So.. When do I get to start eating lots of ice cream and jelly??!!!"

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I hope it lives up to his expectations?!

If you're on FB or Instagram with me, you'll recall my questions recently about tonsil and adenoid removal. The date for surgery has come around very quickly for Angus. He's a pretty energetic little boy already, so cannot imagine what he's going to be like once he can breathe properly! (a clue was after he was under GA to have a broken arm set, and on oxygen. After he got through the god awful horribleness of the effects of GA, The Husband and both commented on how energetic he was, like he'd had THE BEST sleep ever. He obviously had!).

But in the meantime...I'm bracing myself for the few days that follow the surgery.  We've an enforced few days - A Holiday, The Husband calls it! -in the city post-operatively, but in that there are strings attached - no shopping centres or places where there are lots of germy people obviously! (I shall be taking advantage of Woolies Home Delivery I think!)

Kid's Panadol and Nurofen are on my shopping list. The Zoku iceblock maker is on the packing list.

I'm taking my laptop, and hoping to catch up on lots of blogging and photo editing - hopefully I will find that space of mind that has been seriously lacking of late.

Dr approves of fresh sea air as well (but no swimming) so I forsee some leisurely beach sitting in the afternoons or early evenings.

Mental note to self: pack picnic blanket.

In the meantime, please feel free to share any tips and hints of your experiences with tonsil and adenoid removal! I'm all ears.

I'll catch up with you after the storm ;-)

Blog in Print

I spent quite some time researching and seeking out ways to EASILY have my blog converted to print for posterity. So many stories contained within these electronic walls, even if they are somewhat sporadic of late.

I first started off with Blurb, which offered the most control in the way of formatting the layout. However – 1. this was NOT user friendly, and 2. it slurped up the WHOLE blog in its entirety in one hit, not allowing for any filters to be applied beforehand. One then had to remove the posts that you didn’t want to include (this takes a while if you have been blogging for years).

Next I went to Blog2Print. Hear the angels chorus. It allows limited formatting options for layout BUT filters the dates you put in, if like me you only wanted to print a one year at a time.

Let me point out that blog photos are generally reduced in resolution for web viewing, so not optimum for printing. There is a way around this – if you want gloriously large images you can one by one replace the images you have used with the full sized ones from your computer. Did I do this? NO.

I have now printed FOUR years of blog books and the family adores them….

I did blog in 08/09 I think but the posts sporadic and not worthy of collating.

One can choose the colour of the cover and a pattern. Can also choose a photo to put on the front AND the back. I picked my favourite of the kids for each year and the annual Christmas shot for the the back.

The front page inside the cover also allows for a short dedication or few words (not pictured) for a little bit of literary prose to sum up the year.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The layout seems to vary from book to book and sometimes the pics are slightly out of order from the text…but I’m not overly worried. As you can see the images aren’t big, they are as big as they can be given their resolution.

I have printed the comments usually (you can ask it to NOT include them) as some of the best bits are there.

As you can see I still ended up with pretty hearty looking books, which was another reason why I decided I wasn’t overly fussed about making the layout all pretty. I think each year has cost around $100-145 to print, which as I have hardly printed a photo in the past four years, pretty cheap. If I never ever print or scrapbook again, these stories are saved.

And…they take up so little space on the shelf opposed to the regular old (albeit much loved) scrapbook album. These really have cemented in me that I will be doing digital and printed albums from now on, even just the regular yearly gathering of photos (a great many of which don’t ever make it to the public blog by their very nature!) which I have spoken about before.

We love our blog books,the kids and husband often get them out and peruse, and I often go searching for something I know I have included to check on date etc.

Do let me know if you have any experiences in transferring your blog to print, and if you have used any different company.

Age shall not weary them

Nor the years condemn

At the going down of the sun

And in the morning

We will remember them.

Lest we forget.

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Those are amongst the most moving words ever written I think. As usual our little community commemorated Anzac Day with the school children running the service. Short and sweet but full of meaning. We were honoured to have a Major (Military Medal) of veteran  of 35 years Army Service not long moved to the area, give a short address alongside the kids.

 

And it wouldn’t be a gathering in Australia with smoko and cup of tea to follow.

Lest we forget.

Easter Holiday mini adventure

thThe Easter Holidays weren’t terribly exciting, with work to be done and all parties relishing in the lack of school and no lunches to be made (mum in particular enjoying that one). But when the cattle work was finally done and the weaners finally delivered to Yaraka, we made time for a day off.

We thought, that, with some of the storms about, that the Secret Special Fishin’ Hole might have a decent amount of water. So armed with smoko and lunch delicacies, and fishing lines (I always pack food as my faith in fisher persons is not high) and accompanied by friends, we set off.

The kids were excited to be heading in the wild yonder.

We did find water, far less than we had hoped for. Obviously rains upstream was short and sweet and it was no longer running, other than the tiniest of trickles through the sand. Casualty of the drought that does continue.

Lines were thrown in with great enthusiasm.

But the water was murky looking and whilst we could see the little tiny fish swimming around the edges, there was no big fish sighted no any nibbles received.

Rachel and I decided that fishing was not for us, and retired for smoko. Could have been far worser ways to be spending the day. We wore off the excesses of smoko with a stroll down river exploring….

Kids may have tried to catch little tiny fish with their hands in the rockpools, but those fish were too fast for them

The biggest fishing expedition of the day happened when we discovered that Pete’s shoe,knocked off a rock by one of the kids (or a bird) had to be found….fortunately shoes float, and aided by a northerly breeze was found nestled into the bank some 200 metres downstream .

The lack of fish did not deter us; we found some shade and greeness, the kids explored and we may have lazed away a few good hours talking and eating and righting the wrongs of the world…

(The Husband was wishing the chair had one of those foot rest thingys so he could have a quiet 40 winks)

Despite the lack of fish,the day was still declared a success by the kids and they weren’t the only ones who was a wee bit weary from doing very little that evening.

Nothing like a bit of fresh air and zero electronic entertainment for the day!