Lego Mona Lisa

Look what I got for my birthday!  Hubby gave me this: it's a picture of the Mona Lisa - made out of Lego!!!

Oprah Fever

I was pretty ambivalent about the whole Oprah visiting Australia.  I thought it would be cool for publicity for Australia, but with the whole QANTAS F-ups lately and the dollar being so sky high that nothing could really boost it for Australia.

But it's hard not to get caught up the excitement of it all.  Oprah had her show filmed on the steps of the Sydney Opera House and there were things on the news, like Hugh Jackman flying in on a flying fox and then getting stuck and injuring himself, and how Oprah generously gave 250k to a couple with cancer so they could have the year off to enjoy themselves, she gave everybody who attended her show a necklace with pearl or diamond, and a whole bevy of stars were on stage.

Nurse C, one of the girls at work actually went!  She was telling me about it, and she said that she was 7 rows from the front and that she was quite close to all the american guests that Oprah brought with her.  She saw Bon Jovi, Bono, Hugh Jackman, Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban.  She saw the whole thing with Hugh Jackman and she said he had a tiny little cut on his face, and his kids were crying, and his wife Deborah-Lee was there saying "I told him not to do that! I said he shouldn't do that!" and they had to cut filming twice - once so that he could get patched up, and a paramedic hugged him and apparently Hugh said he'd never been hugged by a paramedic before, and at that time St Johns Ambulance and a whole bunch of other first aid people came on... she said it was overkill!  And then they had to stop filming again so Hugh could sit with his kids and stop them from crying to let them know he was alright.

I asked her what was the best thing about the event, and she said the atmosphere, seeing Bono and she couldn't think of a third thing.  She was just excited about it all, said it was such a beautiful day and that everyone was super excited to be there.

Nobody was allowed to take photos and security walked around quite frequently to make sure people didn't film or take pictures.

I got credit on my electricity bill!

Wow this is the first time I got a decent credit on my electricity bill!  There is $260 credit on my bill so hopefully enough money to last through the summer with no extra payments on it!  I think that's rather cool.  I wonder if I'll be able to get enough in the summer and autumn months to be able to have a cost free electricity.

Julian at 14 months, Erika at 2 and 3/4

Erika has lately started sleeping with the blanket around her.  It's cute, now she likes to have a pillow and her blanket and she does it all on her own.  Another great thing is that she has stopped weeing at night!  I started giving her milk at night, sometimes even quite late and she's still not weeing.  So she has gone almost a week now with no nappy at night.  What a clever girl!

Julian has been quite cheeky, for the last month he has been pulling out one of the drawers on the coffee table and using that to step up onto the coffee table.  He likes standing and dancing on  my glass table.  The other day he also did a clapping hands motion, which could be the signal for toilet poopoo-weewee so I took him to the toilet and he urinated in the potty.  Hubby was so impressed, but I don't think he was really understanding or communicating.  Though he does understand when I tell him not to touch the Christmas tree, though he can't help himself, he keeps wanting to pull the decorations and balls off the tree.

Happy Birthday to me!

I officially am closer to 40 than I am 30 today.

I normally love my birthday.  Birthdays to me are a special day that belongs to just me (well technically it's not just ME because there are millions of people out there who have the same birthday), and I often feel like it's my prerogative, my right, to do anything I want to make myself happy for that one day.  My family has always celebrated birthdays and I intend to do the same for my children.

I was thinking back early this morning (at midnight when it was officially my birthday), about previous birthdays.  I had a friend who used to message me on the dot at midnight when it was my birthday, and then message me the whole day with random happy birthdays and it always made me smile, and feel special and remembered!  Silly but cute.  This year I looked at my phone at midnight and there were no messages and though it was silly, tears welled up in my eyes as I felt forgotten, and unremembered.  I didn't feel special anymore!  Such a self centred silly thing really.  Even now thinking about it I have tears in my eyes again.

I'm determined not to let it ruin my day.  I already have a long day ahead of me.  One bonus I have to admit is that my morning list was cancelled so I can have a bit of relaxing time with no kids and no work (though I ended up doing work by doing some difficult registrar discussions).  I should have gone shopping instead.  I do after all have a free boost drink to pick up as a special treat for my birthday.

So, happy birthday to me.