Day 50 - and I'm up to date!!

I remember to take the photo each day..I just don't always have a chance to post here. I'm still a few weeks behind in my layouts, but find that as long as I print the photos I can catch up pretty easily. I'll have to print LOTS this weekend :)
Today's photo is part of a little story...

On my way to work this morning a Huntsman Spider ran across my bonnet - totally freaking me out! I mean really, why do they always run over the car when I'M driving?? At least it's outside right? Right!
I tried to get it off the car by turning on the windscreen washer and wipers, to no avail. The hairy little (?) spider ran along the passenger side of the door, not totally freaking Miss M and Courtney! All was good whilst I had sight of the spider in my side mirrors. We watched him run along the window and into the handle recess of the passenger door....and then he disappeared!!!!!!!!! Aaargh! Chaos reigned! The spider ran into the space between the passenger and rear passenger door, right near where M was seated....
...it didn't come inside, but it may as well have! M couldn't sit still. She had to be forced to sit and put her seat on, even climbing through to the front seat to "get away from it". When she realised the space between the two doors was actually closer to the front, she moved to the back again. . but I still had to convince her to put her seatbelt on and SITDOWN, because being dead would be worse than a spider bite. LOL - she didn't agree!!
When we got to school we got out to have a look, but couldn't see the spider. There was no way we were going to open the passenger side doors so both girls had to climb out my side.
The passenger doors stayed shut until around 6pm, when we went to Cricket and my team mate, DI, offered to remove the spider for us. When we got to the car Di looked into the crack between the doors and could see the spider still there, 10 hours after it climbed into the crack! She opened the front door first and tried to remove the spider with a stick. The spider ran into the rear passenger door space - exactly what I was afraid of!! Thankfully she removed it and it ran under the car, over to the driver's side rear tyre. We took the handbreak off and pushed the car to try to run over the spider, but the car wouldn't roll far enough. I grabbed T's SpeedStick and nudged the spider out from under the tyre, with the plan that one of us would tread on it as it escaped. NOPE. It ran under my mum's car!!! Last time we saw it it was laying under the edge of her driver side rear tyre.
We didn't tell mum it was there, hoping it would be gone by the time she went home, as we didn't want to worry her about something that might not be an issue. I might tell her tomorrow....I'm just glad it's not on our car anymore!!!

Day 49 - 18th February

Wednesday's are big days at the moment. M has swimming at school and then we all head down to the tennis courts at 7pm for M's hit with her coach Craig. B and T spend a lot of the time playing tennis too, and sometimes playing with Turner...
Turner isn't really allowed in the car because he leaves too much hair and he won't sit still, so the hair goes all over the car...BUT, when Dad isn't home we sometimes sneak him down to tennis with us :)
Wednesday's are great because there's very few people at the courts and Turner can run around all he likes. We shut the front gate and he walks around and sniffs things, chases the kids, has some cuddles and if he's really lucky, gets to play with a ball.
It's really hard to take a photo of Turner because he always seems to move just as you click...

Day 48

On Sunday, M attended her friend's little sister's party and took along her newly acquired "ripstick". Somehow or other the board got water in it and was difficult for M to turn safely. She lost balance and fell backwards, steadying herself with her right hand and causing herself some pain in the process. After a couple of days listening to her complain about the sore arm we whisked her off to Emergency for an X-ray. We got to the hospital early and were seen fairly promptly. On examination the doctor informed us there was no break and no need for an xray, even though I asked for one "just to be sure" because she plays so much tennis (at least 5 times per week). The school was just around the corner, and by the time we arrived at reception, to sign M into school there was a message for us from the hospital. We hopped back into the car and returned to emergency to pick up a form requesting an xray for one RW (right wrist). Again, we wer attended to pretty quickly and we were back at school and work, with the "no break" verdict, a couple of bandages, some panadol and instructions to "rest", by 10.30am.
M rested for one day (the day Before the x-ray) and attended her tennis lesson as per usual on the day we visited the hospital. Her arm is still sore, and still strapped, but she's not taking pain medication and is icing after use. She's not wanting to miss her tennis and whilst she can cope she's going to give it all she's got. She's one tough cookie!

Day 47 - Out with the Old

My purse has been on the way out for sometime. I purchased the black one in Darwin last year when I was there, because the zip on the brown one kept splitting. I like the layout of my brown purse (which doubles as a bag) and so was delighted to find another with the same layout! The black one doesn't have bag clips and it will take me some time to get used to looking for a black purse in a black bag...
I managed to prolong the life of my brown purse for quite some time and believed it would continue to work ok, as long as I didn't stuff it full of register receipts... It finally bit the dust on the 16th of February 2009. Thankfully I had the black one on standby and was able to clear out my old purse and swap my bits and pieces to my new purse right away.

Day 46 - Pyjama Day

We had plans to go for a drive, and to spend the day as a family out of the house. . . Somewhere during the week M made plans to visit Courtney, right in the middle of the day - throwing our plans somewhat off course, not that she would have minded us going without her!
As it turned out it was a very relaxing day. I stayed in my PJ's for the entire day and no one else seemed to have much energy either...although T was very keen to go for a drive..
Maybe when the weather cools and the flies aren't so bad, we'll go for that drive.
Overall, it was a lovely day at home with the family :)

Day 45 - 14th February

Valentine's day. The day I came back from Darwin.
The day I got the most beautiful sentiments in a card from my darling A. He said the words I needed to hear :) It was the best present I could have received on a day that we don't usually celebrate!

However, being away from home I spent the morning walking down Smith Street mall in Darwin and found a little shop full of chocolate, tucked away in a little side street. I bought a lot of Fudge for A and and little heart shaped box with a heart shaped chocolate for each of the kids :)
The kids went all out for Valentine's too; making me cards and a heart shaped cake, filled with Nutella.

After the airport we went straight to the Club to celebrate the birth of A's workmate's (Murph) baby. We had a nice afternoon, chatting, "sharing a few quiet ones" and dabbling in Keno (We won $2! lol) before deciding to stay for tea, the perfect end to an almost perfect day :)

Day 44 - February 13th

Black Friday. Friday the 13th, unlucky for some..but we had a great day!
M's school had a casual day and "Meet the teacher BBQ", which I couldn't attend as I was out of town. M couldn't go to the BBQ either as she was busily cooking a fundraiser BBQ and playing tennis. The Tennis centre organised a Friday the 13th night fundraiser for M's squad to assist with their "Girls Only" tennis tour which is in planning for sometime in the future - they raised $160 and plan to do more soon.
B and T got right into the spirit of things, dressing up and inviting their friends...and eventually winning the dressup prizes!
Our Interstated PD was also based around the Friday 13th theme with decorations including, cobwebs, black cats, skulls, pieces of skeletons, couldrons, worms, glow in the dark frisbies and bats and a little dressing up. We had a fun day and Peter and I managed to finish most of our planning. He's offered to learn to Blog so that we can set up a blog for the team to use to communicate with each other. Apparently he'd like to learn, so I'll let him, seeing as how (obviously) I already know how to do it...

Friendship Award

I received this lovely little Friendship Award from my friend Sherry :)
What a great surprise it was too!!
Here's what the award says:

“These blogs are exceedingly charming. These kind bloggers aim to find and be friends. They are not interested in self-aggrandizement. Our hope is that when the ribbons of these prizes are cut, even more friendships are propagated. Please give more attention to these writers. Deliver this award to eight bloggers who must choose eight more and include this cleverly-written text into the body of their award.”

Now my job (pleasure) is to pass it to 8 more people deserving of the award :) I can't really give it back to Sherry...But I certainly would..she's very deserving...


1. Mary ...seriously hoping she'll come out and start blogging again..
2. Lita ...hoping she can afford to get the net back on again soon..
3. Michelle ...a wonderful new-ish Mum..
4. Leanne ...very giving person, who's had a lot of heartache this past year..
5. Susan ... for inspiring us to complete our challenges..
6. Rhonda ... Su! Demonstrator with a HUGE heart...
7. Cori ...I first "met" Cori through Sister Swaps...love her down to earth Blog...
8. Meg ..Somone I've wanted to get to know better since I found SS ... Her honesty and strength is truly inspiring.

Day 43

I planned to finish work around 2.45pm today so that I could pick up the kids and get some fuel before collecting A on the way to the Airport. We made good time, even though I did get out a few minutes late. I rearranged my schedule, got fuel, picked up M and then went to get B and T from the bus stop, where they were waiting patiently all by themselves!
At the airport we checked in then sat down to a big bowl of chips and gravy, before boarding.
I sat with Budgie on the plane, with Mandy and Bil behind us, and we chatted most of the way, which passed the time nicely. I unnecessarily ate the dinner (stew, rice, roll and chocolate) on the plane and then ate again when we got to Darwin!! This is a photo of my lovely Laksa Soup from the Noodle House...absolutely fantastic!
We spent the night at a new Hotel, the Mantra Panadanas and I shared with Rowan from Gove.
This was also 12 on 12 for February so I had an interesting look at the day through the lens of my camera..making for some different photos for this month's 12 on 12....I'll post my layout when I get it done :)