Madhouse Mumblings (aka Shaft St S#!%)

School holidays, maybe that's why I have more time to post - or Dayna guilting us all into updating more regularly LOL

It's been an eventful week. Monday involved more tidying attempts in the living room before visiting Julie-Anne and Mitchell. Julie-Anne had gone outside Sunday night to find a wild duckling following her cat. The kids had a great time playing with it while I helped Julie-Anne with some decluttering. I left her with 2 full bins, luckily it was bin night. Tuesday we had lunch with Nanna, Mum, Clive, Damien, Oscar, Carolynn and Jarrad at the Stadium (Schweppes Centre) just down the road. We came back here for coffees and to show off the tv unit. Wednesday was another day in the girls' room, I got rid of a lot of the stuff under the beds. In this case "got rid of" means either "stored in my room" or "moved to another part of the house". Having said that, I filled a couple of bags for the op shop and put them in the boot of the car as I went. Then I had to take it all out to go to the supermarket because we ran out of pet food and milk, so we did the week's shopping. Then the bags went back into boot...

Thursday I went and looked at the bunks/loft with storage style beds. They are awesome! The people selling them had a trailer and I chatted to the woman while her hubby and Jared packed up the beds. He followed us home and helped us put it all into the entrance (which I'd also tidied up by storing stuff in the laundry, did I mention we have too much stuff) We were home by lunch time so I took the girls' old beds apart and started cleaning walls before we visited mum. Mum made a comment about painting while the room is mostly empty like we did when we moved Jared in to the room that had been Carolynn's. It sounded like a lot of work... but she was right, I hate the colour of every room in this house. It's dirty white. Every wall in every room is the same, except Jared's room obviously, it's now a nice pale apricot. And now the girls' room is pink. I took the paint from mum's that was labelled "Brew" (Peach Blossom, laundry and bathroom had been crossed out). I added some pink I'd had mixed up to paint the dolls house (still not done) and went to work. I did ask Ian first, but I told him I was going to use the same colour as Jared's room... it's far more pink. So I did the cornice with more pink. If Ian isn't happy I'll paint over it when (if?) we move out.

Trinity slept on the floor in the living room and Daria slept in with me Thursday night. I started the second coat on Friday morning before taking the girls to the Botanical Gardens to meet Julie-Anne, Mitchell and some of Mitchell's friends for lunch. We took salad, cheezels, biscuits and sipahh straws (milk flavouring). Between the other mums we had chicken and salad rolls and the mums got coffee. It threatened to rain but over all it was a fantastic day. Until we went to leave around 3pm. Julie-Anne's car wouldn't start. I stayed with her while she waited for the RACV. The guy said it was probably her starter motor, he couldn't jump start the car, and he offered her a tow. It would be free to their East Bendigo shop where they'd put together a quote, or between $88-95 to tow to a place she chose. She rang her dad for advice and he said he'd hire a trailer and get the car home so they can work out what to do. Trinity sat in the car playing with my phone while Daria and Mitchell rode Mitchell's scooter up and down the path. We got home at 6pm after a drive to pick up a borrowed tent and drop the 5 bags of stuff at the op shop on the way home. Thankfully during my busy run-around morning I'd thrown apricot chicken into the crock pot so I did a bit of rice in the microwave and tea was done. I did the second coat on the walls after tea, it's not a great job but it's a vast improvement on how they looked before.

Saturday saw me finish the cornice before breakfast, then we had to start thinking about packing the car to head to Ballarat. Pat and Bree have an amazing new house/property and threw a house-warming party. Sophia and Marius had 3 friends each staying. The plan was to camp out, they have a big paddock behind them and in the middle of that was a bonfire. We set up a tent in the back yard, it's huge too. In the end the girls (Sophia and friends) stayed in their tent and we slept in ours - everyone else ended up inside, including Carolynn and Jarrad. Marius and his friends didn't like the wind. It was a very cold and windy night but the girls still thought it was fun - if scary. Sophia and her friends are around 14-15, and our Jared was the only teenage boy - he certainly seemed to enjoy the attention from 2 of Sophia's friends LOL

Sunday we headed to Tamara's. She was pretty stoked, and had lasagne, chicken, salad, garlic bread and a huge amount of fruit. We had lunch and tried to work out what's wrong with their laptop before heading home a bit after 2pm. We got home and moved the parts of the girls' bed in to their room and put it all together, with some help from Carolynn and Jarrad. We ordered pizza for tea and watched last week's episode of Dr Who, then it was bedtime. For me as well, I was asleep by 9.30pm.

The girls are asking what we're doing today - more cleaning up!

Will try to update next week!

A Hop Across the Pond - New York

I've had an interesting week - caught up with a friend on Monday; spent Tuesday at a team meeting in London and got a free make-over on the way to the train station (Kat & I decided to do some window shopping and turns out it was a fashion week event and shops were all doing special things - like giving out gin or offering make-overs); Thursday we were at a careers event in Neath Port Talbot; Wednesday and Friday I spent in the office but there's still a lot to do.  I have a LOT of events coming up in October, so I'm going to have to try really hard to write my updates. And even harder to update the Six Month Challenge site - because I actually have to DO something before I can update that one. :-)

In the meantime, here's the next little bit of our trip...

New York

We arrived late on Wednesday night. It had taken ages to get across the border - a bus load of people all having to go through immigration and have papers checked! Luckily we'd booked a late-ish flight, so it didn't matter that we were half-an-hour late arriving at the airport.

We stayed in New Jersey, just across the river from Manhattan so it was really easy to get in and out of the city (and check out the view from the bus stop below!). We spent very little time in the apartment - there's just so much to see and do in New York.

We had three full days in New York City, and we walked a LOT. We bought the City Pass and tried to do everything that was in the booklet...

• We went up to the top of the Empire State Building - twice (once in the morning and then again at night - I forgot to collect my tripod both times.. oops). 

• We walked through Harlem and along the length of Central Park (the park itself is about 4km!), stopping for lunch on the rooftop of the Metropolitan Museum of Art (about half-way along the park). We made sure we checked out the art whilst we were there - it's an incredible collection. 

• We saw the longest running show on Broadway (Phantom of the Opera, for those who didn't know) - we were in the second row, so it was almost like we were IN the show. :-) 

• We took a cruise that went past the Statue of Liberty (but there were so many people on the boat that you couldn't move from your little plastic seat). 

• We shopped in Macy's and window-shopped in Tiffany's (but didn't have breakfast in the jewellery shop), visited Grand Central Station and spent some time in Times Square.

• And on our last day in New York we managed to fit in the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), the American Museum of Natural History AND the Guggenheim Museum. 

Looking at it all like this, there's no wonder we were really tired by the time we got to Montreal.

But you'll have to wait till the next instalment to find out what we did back in Canada. :-)

Gordon St Gossip

Hey all, a quick one from us too :)

Ossie's enjoying school. He doesn't like that Lil gets to stay home while he has to go, but when he's there he has fun, and has been building up his confidence - he's finally playing with friends who aren't Daria ;) He got a cold on Day 1 of the school holidays, of course, but he's getting past it now so hopefully he can enjoy the second week a little more. They're off to the Melbourne Zoo with School next term.

Lil's been going to playgroup and the Library for Toddler Time and generally singing, dancing and enjoying herself. She can't decide whether she's "only little" or "a big girl now".. it depends on whether she wants to do something (like play on the iPad) or we want her to do something (like pack up her toys) - that said she does like helping with the cooking and even gives washing dishes a go.

I've been pretty focussed on Iaido. Numbers have dropped a bit in class (down to 8 or so, so still acceptable) but it's possible the people who have left will come on Saturdays when I start that class - a few have said Tuesday is a bit tricky for them. This weekend is the camp. It's been a learning experience organising it to be honest - I was hoping I would just have to organise the accommodation and bookings, but it's turned out I've had to work out a lot more (food, payments etc). It's the issue with having a "committee" I think - more than 3 or so people and everyone thinks someone else will step up and do the work. Once we're past that I'll think about how to handle trying out a kid's class on the Saturday as well.

Chez has been volunteering a lot at Ossie's school, working in the canteen. I for one enjoy the odd spare dim sim or dino nugget she brings home ;) She's also been going to Pilates on Fridays, which means her legs are sore just in time for the weekend. And of course the full time job of "looking after Lily" which may also include participating in the aforementioned singing and dancing ;)

Oh and it turns out the government have been massively underpaying our Family Tax Benefit so we got a big boost at the EOFY. We're going to buy a car! At some point in the future ;)

GORDON ST GANGSTERS OUT YO!

Who's the slackest of them all?

Ok, so the last time I posted an update was December 2013... really?

So Daria's in Prep and Trinity is in grade 3. I've been working but now it's school holidays again so I'm off until the kids go back to school and then we've got about a month or so until the contract will be up. I've had to join a job network but they paid for me to do my First Aid certificate. I basically go in once a month for a 10 minute "nothing's changed, see you next month" until my job finishes. Then she's aware that I'm unlikely to work through the summer holidays so once January ends I hope to find something. It's all because now I'm a single parent and my youngest has turned 6, they've made it all much harder on single parents with Centrelink and Job Networks and agreements. I get a whole one day's notice that I have to go into Centrelink. Once Daria turns 8 I'll be put onto Newstart Allowance so I'm hoping by then I'll have something permanent. The stupid thing is that all they've done is made things harder on the people that want to do the right thing - the ones that they should be looking at is the single parents having baby after baby while on the pension. It's just so frustrating.

Anyway...

You'll have seen on Facebook that my team at work (the HIPPY Lippies) are trying to raise awareness (and of course money) for women's mental health. I've been having a bit of fun with the different colours, but from the start I knew green, yellow and orange were going to be awful. I guess that's why they have 6 shades of pink - I only bought 2. The link to my donation page is here -

Liptember

I've also been using mum's old crock pot a lot since borrowing it. It's great! I've got fudge in it at the moment, takes about 2 hours to cook but since I usually ruin it if I try the 'fast' way this is much better. When I'm working I try to organise myself enough in the morning to throw stuff in the pot, then give it a stir when we get home. It's much easier than trying to sort out tea at the end of the day, I wish I'd borrowed it sooner. But of course storage is part of the problem, I needed some bench space, and even now the crock pot hasn't really got a 'home'.

On decluttering - I've bought a new (secondhand) tv unit which prompted a big rearrange of the living room. Next step will be the girls room, as I'm planning to get them some bunks with storage that I found on Gumtree. I'm at the point where I'm over the constant mess so the girls have been warned, I will ask them to pick their things up, anything left on the floor goes in the bin. I'm also filling op shop bags... see how long it takes to get this house under control LOL

That's about it I think. I'll try to update on Sundays but I may need reminding :)

-The Roberts-French Madhouse.

A Hop Across the Pond - Niagara Falls

Lovely to talk to Mum and Lisa today (and Jared - briefly). We all agreed to update the Bandwagon more frequently - and this goes for everyone. :-) Even if it's just a sentence to talk about the week. Okay?!

A Hop Across the Pond

We've done a heap of stuff since July - the most exciting thing was our recent holiday to North America. We spent two weeks and visited four cities: Niagara Falls, New York, Montreal and Toronto.

Niagara Falls

We stayed on the Canadian side, along with all of the other tourists! The Falls are amazing - every single minute there's enough water going over the Falls to fill one million bathtubs.

In order to make the most of our two days, we bought an Adventure Pass. The night we arrived we collected our passes (they didn't have enough 'adult' ones, so ours had "ADULT" scrawled in black marker pen over the "child" label on the front), donned a blue plastic poncho and headed to Niagara's Fury. We learnt a little about Niagara's history and got very wet (one of those "4D" movies). We spent some of the evening watching a fab sound and light show that was in the park opposite the Falls. The lights were projected onto water jets and looked amazing.

The next day we walked along the Whirlpool Rapids, went on the Hornblower - the boat that goes to the bottom of the Horseshoe Falls (we got a red plastic poncho), and did the Journey Behind the Falls - that is, we wandered through some tunnels and looked the water rushing past a couple of openings (and we got yellow plastic ponchoes). We also had a good look around Niagara Falls, including all of the (slightly tacky) 'man-made attractions', like Ripley's Belive it or Not, or dinosaur mini-golf. We didn't go into any of the attractions - it was fun enough to walk along the street and people-watch.

Our second night we spent in the Hilton hotel with views of the Falls (the first of our three 'fancy' things booked on our trip). It was great - we even got to watch the fireworks from our room! And they were below us!!

All in all, Niagara Falls was very touristy but a fascinating natural beauty. Just remember to have patience and that everyone else is there to see the same things as you. ;-)

I'll post this now and update on the other cities very soon.
The (very very abridged) photo album for the trip is here.

Just a Sec..

Hey everyone,
I've probably told you about my one second per day video project. Well, here's the first full year!
Enjoy!

*hugz*
-d-

Weekend adventures

Back in June, Toby sent me this link: http://www.thisiscolossal.com/2014/06/bounce-below-trampolines-wales/

Giant trampolines in an old slate mine! How much fun does that sound?

So we found a free weekend (not an easy thing lately) and booked tickets. Since the venue also has a zipline (flying fox) course, we booked that in too. We have had such a fun weekend!!

I caught the train to Baglan to meet Bruce after work - we both finished a little early so we could get on the way before peak hour. It was a three hour drive to Dolgellau (doll-geth-lie) and our 16th century B&B. We stayed in room 6, which may have once been a stable... but we didn't see any babies in mangers or wise men on our journey. 😁

In my opinion, the Lechwedd Slate Cavern is one of the most fun places in Wales! On arrival we swapped our print-at-home tickets for coloured wristbands and got into bright red jumpsuits (hehe..  jumpsuits..  for jumping!) and collected our helmets. We were loaded into a tiny mine train and were shuttled into the old mine. After a short safety briefing,  we popped on our special booties and headed on to the trampolines.

It was SO MUCH FUN ! In fact, I think I'll say that again for emphasis -  it was SO MUCH FUN!

It's only a little like being on a regular trampoline - there were about 50 of us on there at any time,  so the "floor" is never where you expect it to be and, as a result, you spend a lot of time falling over. It's hilarious. Even when you get some good jumping going on, it just takes someone going past to either take away your bounce (awww) or bounce you double (woohoo!). This happens even when you're sitting on the mats taking a break from the jumping. SO. MUCH. FUN! And actually really tiring too! :-)

Trying to move around the mats takes a lot of effort (see bouncing comment above) and to move between the levels is even more of an adventure! There are 'tubes' (snakes) to descend - made out of the same netting as the mats, you jump in the top and 'slide' down to the next level. You need to cover your face when you jump into the hole so you don't end up with friction burn on your nose. :-)  To get back up a level, they have 'tunnels' (ladders) - more like rock climbing than a ladder really.. similar to the tube but with ropes or something to hold on to (and to give a bit of help with your footing). It takes quite a bit of muscle power to climb the tunnels! They also have a giant spiral net that is a little easier to get back to the middle from the bottom level.

You get an hour on the trampolines and this is exactly the right amount of time - just enough for some bouncing, some sitting, some snakes, some ladders and some lying on the mat recovering (looking through from the top or bottom level is really cool - you can see everyone on the other levels, as well as the slate cave around you!). After our alloted hour, we were packed back on the little train, taken out of the mine and returned the jumpsuits.

Unfortunately we didn't know that you could take your phone (and suffer the consequences if you drop it), so we don't have any photos of Bounce Below. We didn't make the same mistake with the zip lining!

After lunch it was time to don another red jumpsuit. This one was slightly more waterproof (only slightly) and was covered by a strange harness. The harness had a wooden 'seat' in it, so it felt really weird walking (I felt like a duck.. quack quack) and trying to sit down (sitting on a seat on a seat.. weird!!). Safety gear in place, we piled onto the bus to be taken to the first zipline. Unfortunately, the weather had taken a turn for the worse so we couldn't see any of the spectacular views that they had seen for the previous five weeks straight! Bah! Actually, we could have been at the Three Sisters! ;-) 

I think we missed out on some of the thrill because everything was grey, but it was still good fun. There were three zip lines - mountain, moor and another thing starting with m..  the first one (mountain) was apparently the longest one - but it was so grey! It was like flying through a cloud - I think I caught sight of the ground only once. The second one was faster and probably my favourite - it was low enough to see a little of the scenery (or maybe the weather had cleared a little) and it was fast! Woohoo! The third and last one was alright but it was raining again and that took away some of the enjoyment.

There was a lot of waiting around during the zip line session - the whole thing took about two hours but I reckon we were on the lines for less than a few minutes! The cool thing about it was that there were four parallel lines, so B & I joined two others and could have races (not that you really had any control over how fast you went).

By the end of the day we were both cold, wet and fairly knackered, but it was definitely a fun day (and one that we might repeat in better weather). It was a really lovely weekend (especially since I'll be working half of the weekends in July as well as the first weekend in August).

It seems I've gone on a bit.. oops.. so what have the rest of you lot been up to?

Iaido update

Thursday I got the good news that Hokushin Shinoh Ryu Iaido members were exempt from the Victorian sword laws. This is a massive win for Hokushin - until now each of our members had to organise their own Chief Commissioner's Approval ($170 per year) or join a collectors club (which may not cover martial arts), but now by paying their annual membership to us they're legally covered.

It's a massive weight off my shoulders, making it possible for people travelling from interstate (for the camp) to bring swords with them, plus simplifying the whole process for our Victorian students. It's also a big motivation for our students to keep paying their membership since if they stop their swords become illegal ;)

Looking at the to-do list from my previous Iaido post I've also printed and distributed the membership cards, got the order from Japan (and ordered some new cheap swords from the US), and the mid-year seminar is in two weeks.  Once we get through that I'll turn my attention to getting the camp sorted out. Oh and I've taught in Melbourne twice now, and will look to doing it again after the seminar.

New home, new car.. new new new

Time to get back to regular updates! And that goes for everyone. ;-)

Can you believe we've been back for three weeks? I can't! We (I) still haven't finished unpacking boxes yet.. but I've had a meeting in London, been to a conference (& dinner), run experiments in Swansea, attended a chemistry festival in Cardiff, and spent a day talking about Spectroscopy in a Suitcase. And that's just work!

Our big news is that we've bought a new car! I can't remember if we told you - B's car was playing up before we came home and it was going to cost a lot of money to fix it. We ended up deciding to replace it instead and last week we went and looked at a possibility or two. We ended up deciding on this one - a little blue Corsa. I haven't driven it yet so I'll let Bruce comment on it. ;-)

Next week is the Urdd Eisteddfod - a Welsh festival for young people. I'll be spending most of the week in North Wales running chemistry experiments (with a day midweek for exams back in Cardiff - I'm one of the examiners! I'll update next week!). Unfortunately I lose this weekend (which is a long weekend!) but it should be fun (and I'll take the time back some time...).

What has everyone else been up to?

Traveling

Made it to China. No Wi-Fi in the hotel tho.. O well. At least we get to sleep in a real bed!

Neither of us felt like dinner by the time we got to the hotel - local time 8.45pm, body thought it was 10.45pm! So we spent our Chinese currency on a can of coke and cucumber flavoured crisps. Yes, cucumber! I think these are the oddest flavour crisps I've ever had!

Anyway, we get breakfast as part of the stop-over.. I'm looking forward to finding out what kinds of foods the Chinese eat first thing in the morning. :-)

*hugz*
-b&d-

Too many drafts

I've just found three beginnings of posts in my email.. I start a post and then something comes up and I don't remember to come back later and finish it. Oops.

In an hour..ish, we head for the local station. We've booked the coach to Heathrow from Cardiff and need to get in to town by 12.30pm. Unfortunately, Sunday timetabling means we'll be hanging around in the centre for an hour. Given it was that or the need to run with our cases to the coach stop, I'm happy to wait.

Although our flight is a very reasonable 27 hours (or thereabouts), once we add on getting to the airport, or travel time is approaching 48hrs! In fact, if we add the car journey at the other end (thanks Mum & Clive), it'll be over two days! Don't expect us to be too buoyant on arrival. ;-)

Looking forward to seeing everyone! Still doesn't seem real.. I've been super busy at work lately and haven't had time to think about it! Dial up the sunshine for us please - we'll be there soon!!

*big hugz*
-b&d-

Go Dan Grading

A big week this week for Iaido.

On Tuesday the Win News cameraman came and took some footage of the dojo, plus interviewing me and my students. He'd seen me do the demo for Chinese New Year, and started training a few weeks earlier. He'd had the idea of putting together a little story about the club, and was able to find a "newsworthy" angle to go with.

Wednesday it was on the news. I don't know if it will bring new students or not, but it was kind of cool anyway. You've probably already seen it but here it is.

Thursday I headed out to a karate class to teach one of the Sensei there. He's keen to learn but very busy (and unavailable on Tuesday when I have my usual class) so we'll need to work out some way I can teach him, maybe once a month.

Then Saturday I caught a lift to Melbourne with one of the students to take part in Shihan's seminar/grading. I passed my Go Dan (fifth Dan) grade, which was good! We'd had a bit of training but then everyone just stood around watching, so I had to be careful - Shihan might not have minded a little mistake but I didn't want the students doubting me ;) I'd prepared for 20 waza (fighting forms) and Shihan picked about 7 out of that list for me to do. If I'd known which 7 I could have really worked those, but no luck - I had to be ready to do any.

That should be my last grading for 2 years, plus the next one also requires those same 20, so I'm okay for now.

Shihan also wanted me to take a more active role in teaching the Melbourne guys, and especially to try to get their teacher up to a higher standard, so I'm going to try to make the trip down every 4 - 6 weeks to teach. There's a fair bit to improve but hopefully I can get it all working a bit better before Shihan returns.

House Hunting

Today we started our hunt to find a new place to live.

It turns out our 'walk-in bar' is actually bigger than most people's master bedroom...   :-(

Hmmm ....  maybe we have too much alcohol.....I guess we can fix that though!!  :-)

Our makeover is complete

I thought I'd write a quick post here (before it gets too late) to tell y'all about our little makeover^[1] which was completed today.

Jess and co. from Temple & Webster arrived at 9am this morning and immediately started unloading a van with various things -- I dawdled as long as I could, but eventually had to head off to work (dammit!), with a promise to return circa 3:30 for the wrap-up and photo shoot. Luckily (?), I'm so busy with work at the moment that the intervening hours just flew by, so before I knew it I was taking my leave and heading back home...

... to find all sorts of shiny interior design-y goodness had magically transformed our habitat into a cosy little home. We had new furniture and furnishings, plants and greenery galore, a dining table, lamps and haberdashery^[2]. I wandered through the space in awe, finding new marvels at every turn and only half-listening as Jess explained each item or another. A rug made from saris? Hand-stencilled cushion covers? Tiny poison bottles-cum-vases? A fiddle-leaf fern in our house?? All very cool, very "us" (I think) but somehow more than we would have been able to put together ourselves (price notwithstanding).

Last weekend we cleared all the outside furniture and pressure-cleaned the deck, then put down a layer of decking oil; Monday and Tuesday night Dee finished off with another layer. We had to keep the kids off it as long as we could, but when Jules finally slipped through he just loved running around the empty balcony.

When he got home today to find the new stuff, he walked around saying "Oooh!" and "Cool!" a lot -- unimaginably cute. I'm very happy with the result, and so was Jules: "I like it," he declared. Let's face it, I'm probably only still up now (at 11pm) because I want to spend time here, and can't afford to work from home tomorrow (like Dee is). But yeah, photos^[3]!

[1] As a reminder, I entered a "25 words or less" competition from The Livingroom (TV show) and won an $18,000 lounge room makeover. As you've seen from the photos, in a small little cottage like ours that actually stretched to include our bedroom and the outside balcony area.

[2] Honestly, I didn't even know that was a thing (although I'm not using the term correctly -- think "knick knacks" rather than buttons and beads).

[3] I've asked for copies of the professional photos, which should include some of the "making of" behind-the-scenes. In the meantime, these iPhone and Android photos will have to do.

Meet Max

We've got a new member of the family - Max, or as the kids call him "Little Maxie". We adopted him from the RSPCA on Saturday, although we didn't pick him up until Monday because he needed to be desexed. We were lucky - another person had put in an application for him about 5 minutes before us, but they didn't have approval from their landlord so they missed out.

He's a really affectionate little guy. About 11 weeks old, so he has bursts of typical boy insanity racing around the house jumping on things but most of the time he's happy to just relax or, as he did this morning, sleep in my lap while I work ;) Lily seems to swing between being afraid of him when he's a bit frisky and being his best friend the rest of the time. Ossie was so excited to pick him up from the Vet and loves him, although like with all animals he's a little wary.

Still, I think he's the right kind of cat for our family - quiet and friendly. Now if we can just sort out his sleeping so he's not scratching at our door all night that'll be perfect ;)