Winner!

Thanks to random.org, the winner of the rug giveaway from buysterrugs is the 3rd of the 15 Aussie comments at the blog post.

(click on the image if you want to enlarge it)

Congratulations Renata from Sunnyside Farm - and thank you to everyone who entered.

Nelson's Illustrated Guide to Religions

I was very pleased to have the chance to review this very informative guide to religions. Did you know that Buddhists believe there is no God or supreme creator while Hindus believe there is one supreme God who manifests in various forms and can dwell in images? And Muslims believe that there is no God but Allah and although their prophet Muhammad was sinless, he is not divine.

These are very superficial comparisons but there is so much more depth in this book. It is well set out and easy to read. The individual sections are comprehensive and give an excellent overview of the religious covered, and are a good place to begin an in depth study of any religion, faith or cult.

Interesting and informative, I would recommend Nelson's Illustrated Guide to Religions to anyone who wants to find out something particular about a certain religion, is considering the study of religion in general or those who, like me, are just interested in discovering the foundations of the different faiths in our world.

Reviewed for Thomas Nelson.

Welcoming the Warmth Giveaway!!!

After a bit of a false start early in September, Spring has finally arrived bringing with it some very welcome warmth. Kitcat was certainly excited to go to the pool at last! She has been asking me for weeks "When will it be summer so we can go swimming?"

The flowers in my garden are blooming, from the elegant lily buds ......

..... to the showy Carpobrotus rossii (pig face), sweet Alice and the seaside daisies.

The neighbour's rose bushes are full of blushing blossoms.

And the hills are turning lavender as the Patterson's curse begins to flower.I think it looks like someone has rolled out a pretty purple rug over the hillside.

Speaking of rugs, the friendly people at buysterrugs are giving away one of their delightful items to a lucky Aussie reader.

To enter, all you have to do is -
1) Visit buysterrugs and see for yourself their lovely floor coverings, and find out how easy it is to navigate around the site.
2) leave a comment on this post.

I will announce a random winner on 10th November 2009. The winner may select a rug up to the value of $80 (including postage).

For extra entries you can -

1) Write a blog post about this giveaway linking back here. Leave an extra comment here with a link to your post.

2) Twitter about this giveaway. Leave an extra comment telling me you've tweeted twittered whatever the correct term is.

3) Become a follower of this blog. Leave an extra comment telling me you've become a follower, or are an existing follower.

{The winner must be prepared to email me their contact details which I will forward to buysterrugs, who will then arrange for you to claim your rug. Australian entries only.}

It's Gone

This was Dragon at the height of his chicken pox outbreak. He had his own special 'throne' (part of the sofa covered with an old sheet) which was the only place he was allowed to sit, because the calamine lotion had to be applied everywhere.

Despite having his right wrist fixed in one position, Dragon still managed to train, catch and battle Pokemon on his Gameboy. Unfortunately, playing Gameboy was one of the few activities Dragon was allowed to do while his arm was in the cast. He eagerly awaited the day it would be removed.

The day finally arrived. (Yesterday)

We were pleased that, unlike all our other appointments at the hospital, we were called in almost on time! No waiting for hours and hours, which was very nice. The nurse gave Dragon a quick explanation about what she would do, demonstrated the circular saw, made him don earmuffs to block out the noise and then set straight to work.

Dragon said it tickled. I have no doubt it did, but I think most of his glee stemmed from the knowledge that he would very soon be rid of that cast!

And doesn't he look pleased to have that cast somewhere else besides on his arm?

The nurse was impressed with the range of movement he displayed immediately after she removed the cast. The doctor was similarly impressed, so much so that he decided Dragon would not need any further x-rays to determine that the breaks were completely healed. It was rather obvious to him that Dragon's wrist and elbow were working just as they should.

The doctor gave some strict instructions about how long Dragon should wait until he started playing any sports. He encouraged him to do as much swimming (breaststroke only) as he wanted but other sports like judo, soccer, basketball etc would have to wait for about three weeks until the full range of movement was restored to his joints. Dragon asked the doctor "What do you mean?" And the doctor answered, "When you can comfortably stretch your elbow out straight, then bend it fully to touch your shoulder. And when you can twist your wrist around completely so your palm faces the ceiling and then faces the ground - then you will have the full range of movement back. It will take about 3 weeks."

This was Dragon about 5 minutes after we arrived home, "Look mum, I have the full range of movement back in my arm. Can I go ride my bike now?"Needless to say HB and I are having a tough time trying to convince Dragon that he really does need to take it easy for 3 weeks.

And what did he do with his old cast?

He hung it off the mini basketball hoop in his bedroom - like some sort of trophy.

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Psssst! Anyone want a new rug? I have a giveaway coming up next week so keep an eye out.

Book Week Parade

Halloween is trying hard to 'catch on' here in Australia (I guess I should say that retailers are working hard to force Halloween on Australians) but so far I don't think it is going so well. In the last ten years I think I have had 4 or 5 knocks at our door, and 3 of those times the children weren't even dressed up!

So I guess in Australia our "dress up" day is the parade which is held in most schools to celebrate Book Week. Children dress up as a character from a book. When I was at school this meant that in the months leading up to Book Week we would borrow a book from the school library, actually read it, and then attempt to dress as someone from the book. We then had to stop at the rostrum and tell the assembly who we were dressed as before parading around the hall or the playground (location depended on the weather, of course.) Naturally we had our far share of Cinderella and Superman, but a lot of the children did actually read a book and find a new character to dress as.

One year I found a book about a little girl who had the same name as me, and she pushed all her pets around in her dolly pram. So I got my dolly pram, filled it with stuffed toy animals, dressed like the girl from the book and proceeded to parade around the school playground. I remember Darth Vader and Spiderman laughed at my curly hairdo and made fun of my pram, while several Cinderella turned their nose up at my ordinary outfit, but at least I was original.

These days many of the characters from the Book Week parade are movie stars. We had lots of Hannah Montanna, Lizzy McGuire, Harry Potter and Transformers. I insisted that Ducky and Mousie dress as someone from a book they had read. Since they love reading the Barbie series of Little Golden Books, they both chose to dress as Barbie.

Mousie was Veterinary Barbie ... ... stylish yet practical in her boots, long pants and trendy jacket.

Ducky was Fashion Model Barbie ... ... all dressed in Barbie pink. She chose her outfit herself and dictated to instructed me how she wanted her hair done.

Teddy and Kitcat were only observers but they insisted on dressing up too, even though they only swelled the ranks of the many Disney Princesses who were already in attendance.

Princess Snow White and Princess Sleeping Beauty.

Kitcat's Daffodil

Kitcat and I met up with a friend at Floriade on September 30th. Kitcat sat on this bench by the lake ........... and watched the black swans and cygnets groom themselves.
Then we wandered along through the flower beds until Kitcat spied the big ferris wheel.
"That's where I want to go!"She stopped to sniff a few flowers as we wound our way through the crowds towards the ferris wheel..

But when we arrived at the ticket booth we discovered that it would cost $14.00 for a ride! I'm all for having the occasional treat, but that was just a ridiculous amount of money for 6 or 7 revolutions on the ferris wheel. Poor Kitcat was so upset. While I was attempting to console her and explain that I just didn't have the money (or the inclination) to pay for the ride, one of the official gardeners came slowly toward us, stopping to pick out dead flowers from the displays as she made her way down the path. As she drew near she 'accidentally' picked this beautiful daffodil and said to Kitcat, "Oops! I didn't mean to pull the good flower. Would you look after it for me?"

So Kitcat was happy again, thanks to a simple yet thoughtful act by a stranger.

(And then I had to explain to every other official gardener who saw us that I wasn't really allowing my daughter destroy the flower gardens.)

Click here for more Floriade photos at Pics 'n' Poems.

Things Kids Say

Mousie has recently decided to make up her own jokes. Here are some examples -

What shape has 300 sides?
The milk.

Why does a car drive on the roof?
Because it is a ghost.

How come the jacket tried to hang on the ceiling?
It wanted to be a light.

HB and I think the funniest things about Mousie's jokes is the way that, after she asks the question, you can watch her eyes search the immediate area to find the answer.

Mousie's jokes reminded me that Possum, at a similar age, used to tell us jokes too. Her jokes went something like this ...

"Mum ... hey mum! {giggle} What if {giggle giggle giggle} .... what if the jug {giggle giggle} .... what if the jug {giggle} was on the {giggle giggle} WALL {giggle giggle giggle} and the picture {giggle giggle} ... and the picture {giggle} was on {giggle giggle} ..... was on the TABLE???!!! {hysterical laughter}

HB and I used to agree that the only funny thing about Possum's "jokes" was the fact that she thought they were so funny.

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Teddy wandered into my room while I was applying deodorant body spray.

"You have to put that on to stop you from being smelly, don't you mum."

{sniff sniff}

"You'd better put all of it on Mummy."

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Then later she was being silly saying "What's your name Mum?"

"It's Mum." I said. "You know that. You just said it!"

"No it's not."

"Well, what's my name then?"

"It's Una the Frog."

??? Croak!

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Kitcat was looking at HB's shiny service medals which are locked away in the display cabinet. I figured I would soon be questioned about them, but when she did open her mouth what she said was, "Mummy, can I eat those big chocolate coins please?"

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Ducky desperately wanted to adopt the ducklings from my previous post. She pleaded with HB to let her take them home. We explained to her that little ducklings need to be with other ducks.

"You wouldn't be able to teach the ducklings how to find food, swim, or how to fly," we reasoned.

"But I could teach them how to do ballet!" was her illogical reply.

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I found these great silhouette portraits and made one of the Half-dozen.

My Family from WiddlyTinks.com