Do you know how much I love you?

It is easy to forget or become complacent with your husband when you have the needs of three young children to care for. He gets pushed to the side because the little people are more needy of your love and affection. The other side of the coin is that he is so busy working hard to provide for his young family that often he is exhausted and preoccupied. I think this is how so many marriages break down. And it happens without you realising it as you are all so busy doing what "has" to be done. Have you even taken time out from all of those things that have to be done to think about how much and what you love about your life partner? Nathan and I had a really nice reminder yesterday. And despite our busy lives I know that we are growing together. I have faith that our love for each other will sustain us through these emotionally tough years of putting our heart and souls into our children. And I know that when we are done with that there will be so much left over to sustain each other for the rest of our lives.
Your children are yours for such a short time. Then they become their own people and what i pray is that we have shown them enough about love and life that they will want to be involved in our life. But the reality is that they will leave and what are you left with but you life partner. And this is why you should attempt to put the mundane life experiences aside and remind yourself how much you love your other half and what you love about them and what you look forward to loving in the future. The biggest goal in raising children should be that you and your husband will be able to say that was a job very well done darling now lets spend the next 50 years doing what we want together. As we will bloody well deserve it.
The thought of Nathan being an old man, with a bald head, round belly and no fashion sense is going to be my reward in life! Not many people would see that as i reward but i cant wait!
Nath do you know how much I love you? I know you do!

Cesspool of illness!

That is what our house is currently and the reason why it has been so long since i last posted. And it's not just the kids. I have tonsillitis too. The boys apparently have viral tonsillitis and i have bacterial tonsillitis. And what that amounts too is an awful lot of snot and cranky children and an even CRANKIER mummy. And with a workaholic Daddy who refused to take time off to look after us it means that this illness is dragging on longer that i have ever been sick. And to be fair to Nathan he has been away for a while while we were sick and he couldn't really come home to look after us.
So I will attempt to briefly catch you all up with that latest shenanigans in the Rickard house hold!
Last Wednesday Matthew has his first school excursion. To the ............DENTIST!!!!!! What the? They call that fun these days! Guess who did NOT put up her hasn't to chaperon. Me! But Matthew said it was great. He got to catch a bus! So we then got to talking about dentists and what the dentist talked about and it turns out that you have to brush your teeth for...... an hour! Twice a day! When i queried the length of time Ryan decided 15 minutes might just be enough time! Thank goodness Matthew hasn't insisted on doing it for an hour. And the other thing t come out of the dentist trip was a huge discussion about future career options. Matthew is quite insistent that he wants to be a builder when he grows up. Apparently it the the allure of all those tools and diggers. So i thought i was being clever when discussing all the dentists tool and saying "Matthew dentist use tools too maybe you would like to be a dentist when you grow up instead!" But he wasn't impressed a dentist doesn't drive a backhoe mummy!
Well that is enough for now. I'm headed back to my death bed!

VERY hungry

Today Ryan informed me that his legs were hungry! And you know what.... this made perfect sense to me! We often talk to the boys about how they have to eat until they are full to their eyebrows (otherwise they "save" room for their nightly milo). So I can understand that when your legs are hungry you are REALLY hungry!
Additionally today. Ryan had some really profound thoughts. Dogs don't talk Mummy! However teddy bears do. Think about that!

Big things and small things

I really am very lucky. I think I have the best husband in the world because not only does he spoil me with big things like a new dyson vacuum cleaner (or back room cleaner as the boys call it. Yes it is a worry!) But last night he put the hot water bottle on my side of the bed so when I got in bed after "brothers and sisters" I got into a warm bed! Isn't he thoughtful!

Is this the way it is always going to be?

I'm exhausted! It's Thursday night. Nath is away. I've just come home from a pre school p & c meeting. Tuesday night had us at the kindy information night. Last night was grocery shopping (which i had to do before nath left or we would have had nothing left to eat and have you ever tried to drag three growing boys through a grocery shop? Not pretty!) My life is soo busy currently.
It wasn't so long ago that i had three boys at home all day with me. It didn't matter if we didn't get out of our pajamas all day.We only had plans for colouring in, play dough and afternoon naps.

Today my day started at 4.45 when i pushed nath out of bed so he could catch his plane on time. At 5.30 Ben was climbing into bed with me and i spent the next half an hour trying to coax him back to sleep, silently, before he woke his brothers. No luck Matthew heard him at 6. Matthew woke Ryan at 6.15 by getting into bed with him. Ben crawled out of my bed at 6.30. I crawled out of my bed at 6.45. 7 - 8 was repairing the damage that had been done in the 15 minutes it took me to talk myself into getting out of my warm bed for my cold house. 8 til 8.15 i gave Matthew exactly 5 minutes to have breakfast or i would throw it out as i wasn't having them mess around for over half an hour again today! While i yelled at them for 5 minutes to eat i dressed Ben. I took Matthew and Ryan's breakfast off them about 10 minutes later and gave them 10 minutes to get dressed. If they weren't dressed by the time I got out of the shower they would go to school naked! Well guess who went to playschool this morning naked! (Well i let him think that while i put the others in the car!) So i then run back inside to dress him whilst lecturing him about getting dressed quickly or he WILL go to school naked. Finally we arrive at pre school dead on nine. Just as i say "let go boys we have to take Ryan to playschool!" Ben tips out the hardest puzzle known to man and i spend the next 10 minutes trying to put it back together. Finally finished we rush out to drop Ryan at playschool. After having a mini meeting with the teacher about things that need to be done at the community house (of which i am on the committee) I convince Ben its time to go. We have just enough time to go back to the house to pick up the bikkies for Ben's morning tea that i had left behind. Then it's off to pick up cousin Karen who is visiting from WA. By the time i finally arrive (5 minutes late, i drove to the wrong end of the street!) It's time to hurry back to pick up Ryan from Playschool. We arrive just in time to wave goodbye to Kenny Koala (the police puppet!) We shove Ryan in the car and pick up lunch on the way home (aeroplane bread rolls otherwise known as plain knot rolls! Who's daddy is an aeronautical engineer?!) We sit down at home for 2 seconds to eat them then all back in the car to pick up Matthew. I had a chat with Matthew's teacher as she is a little concerned about him. Then we all pile in the car to go home. Now comes the relaxing part of our day as we have 2 hours to sit down and chat to Karen. Then it's all back in the car to take Karen back to where she is staying. On the way back we drive through macca's for dinner. Get home finish dinner, quick bath, read bedtime stories as the babysitter arrives run out the door to take the minutes for the committee meeting. Rush home to find the boys still awake. Put them to bed. Sit down and have a chat to Cleon (babysitter). Quickly writing this before I type the minutes then i promise i will fall into bed. Housework is overrated isn't it? I will have to fit it into my similarly paced day tomorrow!

Parking Garage

Tonight we had a drama! I needed to do the grocery shopping but i wanted to watch Ugly Betty as well. No problem, just tape it right? Wrong! You can't get a blank tape in the machine if there is a pile up of matchbox cars already parked in there!!!!!! Thank God I married an engineer as it only took him a few minutes to have the machine apart and all vehicles returned to their correct parking spaces!

Culture

Is what i got a lot of this weekend. Not only did i get to see some fabulous pyrotechnics. I also got to go to the Turner to Monet: Impressionist Landscapes Exhibition at the National Art Gallery. A friend of mine was saying how much she wanted to go and I told her how I had been trying to bribe Nathan into going with me. So we thought we would let Nath off the hook and go together. So we did! And our 3 hours of childless, mature, cultured fun was glorious! Margie is an artist and interior designer herself so I really enjoyed her perspective. However, we were concerned that poor Kerry Stokes' walls are bereft of all of his Monet's currently! (He had 4 on loan to the exhibition!)

Anyway my favourite on show (if I had to pick one as there were many!) was a Vincent Van Gogh called Tree trunks in the grass. And Nathan only has to work 5 jobs for the next 90 years until he has enough money to buy it for me!

Here is a postcard picture of Tree Trunk in the grass (sooooo doesn't do it justice as you lose all the texture on the canvas but you get the idea!)

Queens Birthday Weekend

The June public holiday weekend in Canberra is the annual firework weekend. Last year we arrived home from Brisbane, just in time for the children to be petrified all weekend long. They HATED fireworks and loud noises too, as a result. We had been dreading this weekend all year. However I managed to turn things around! If you can't beat them, join them. So we coaxed the kids outside and the grandparents too, as they were afraid of the cold while the children were afraid of the noise! And Nathan proceeded to have a ball playing pyrotechnician. Some were fairly tame and did little more than fizzle and others were a blast! We had the most fun with the ladybugs. They spun around before launching into the air. The first one was great, the second fell off the brick and headed towards us (we were a far distance away at the bottom of the hill). Poor Poppy tried to gather all the children behind him and i hid behind Nanna but we were saved as it took a 90 degree turn and headed directly towards Nath! He bolted and it missed him by about 1 metre! So after that we stuck to the sparklers!

Here are some pictures i took some with the firework function on my camera and others with the night time function.

I thought i had more time!

Before Ryan would start stealing Matthew's girlfriends but no! Matthew's favourite girlfriend LOVES to tickle Ryan and Ben. Today after Preschool were getting into the car whilst waving goodbye to her when Matthew asked me "Mummy, why does {insert girlfriends name in here} tickle Ryan and Ben and not me?" There is the loud sound of me thinking really fast!
Then my answer "Well Matthew, that's because said girlfriend thinks Ryan and Ben are babies and you tickle babies, not big boys!"
Matthew response: "Oh! Ok!"
Ryan's response: "I want to be a baby!"

Rain

Thank God for the rain! It has been so long since we have had any. I bought raincoats for the boys, in preparation for the rain, months ago! The boys have been nagging me to wear them. Well today was their day!

Wrong feet?

Apparently Ryan doesn't have his shoes on the wrong feet, his legs are on the wrong way!

And now the pictures....

Nathan Craig Rickard BE, ME