Time for another post!

It's been a while, so I'm going to update you all. :) Photos will have to come at a later date, as Alastair is out and I don't know how to do it. :P

Just after my last post (our anniversary), I made the best chicken noodle soup. Had to put that in there. It was awesome. :)

We've been busy with finishing off the loan... and applying for another. :P Alastair's car has been on its way out for a while, so we decided that we would take out another loan, with a view to working hard at it and paying it off in about a two-year time frame.

And that meant looking around at cars... researching... test driving... thinking... etc... and we decided to buy a Tarago. :) It came home with us last Wednesday night. It's a 2008 model and only has 90-something-thousand kms on the clock, which means that if we look after it, it should give us many years of safe travel. A lot of people have been laughing at us for buying such a big car when we don't even have one child yet, but we're standing firm. :) It's a pleasure to drive, and we are very happy with it.

On Friday I was 19 weeks. We had another scan - saw our baby for the second time, and heard its beautiful little heart beating for the first time! Yay! :) It was so lovely to see it, but it was being a little uncooperative and wouldn't let the lady look at its whole spine or its heart - amongst other things! We weren't planning to find out the sex, and she said that she couldn't have told us even if we'd wanted to! We tried going for a walk to see if that would get the little noggin moving, but half an hour later it was still lying on its tummy being obnoxious. :P This baby may be more like its daddy than we realise already! :)

After the ultrasound, we hopped in our new car and drove down to see the Axelbys, near Canberra. It was great to see them again, and even though it was only a 24 hour visit, we managed to cram in lots of chats, laughs, cups of tea, dancing, games, chips, cuddles and more in. :) They are such a beautiful family, and Alastair loves them as much as I do, so that makes our visits very easy. :) What made it extra special was that I felt the baby move for the first time that night in bed. Twice. :)

So we were sensible and left the Axelbys in the late afternoon to get home and do some washing and get into bed early (given that we'd been up til 1am the night before!)... but I got a call from Meaghan to say that Mr. and Mrs. Carey and Tain, as well as the Hornseys, were staying at their place, and to ask if we wanted to join the party. Of course we did want to very much, and called in just for an hour to catch up with them all. I laughed until I cried, which I haven't done for a while... it was good. :)

We didn't get home too late... 10pm it was. And then the clocks went back for the end of daylight saving, so it was actually 9pm. :)

Up early the next morning to go up to Sydney for Alastair's Nan's 80th birthday lunch. We picked Joel and Katherine up from the airport... drove to Jonathan's at Erskineville... caught the train with him, Esme and Nan to Circular Quay... hopped on a water taxi to Balmoral... then walked around to Bathers Pavillion - a VERY posh restaurant on the beach. Beautiful, but not really our scene. Since the menu was practically all in French, I played the "I'm pregnant and need plain food" card, and managed to get steak and vegies. :) There's got to be something wrong when you have to google on your iPhone the words of a dish on the menu, hasn't there? :P It was a very pleasant afternoon, then we went back the way we'd come... and came home. I fell asleep in the car, I was just so exhausted - and was in bed before 8pm!

Yesterday was my last day of teaching for Term 1 - yay! And given that there are two long-weekends in Term 2, I only have 8 more Mondays of teaching to go! Wow, that puts it into perspective...

Today I had to get up early to go back to the ultrasound place before work at the pharmacy, in the hopes that baby was going to be more cooperative... but it wasn't. Grr. I think it might be a boy, the way it's behaving! So she said I could come back tomorrow, but I can't keep doing that, not with work and everything. Decided to give up and go back at 24 weeks. :P I hope that the midwife at my antenatal visit tomorrow doesn't mind. :)

So Alastair is at trivia tonight, with his Dad. He still has tea with his Dad on Tuesdays and then they both go to trivia. I'm glad they have that time together. I just get some soup out of the freezer for dinner and do some pottering around. Speaking of which, I need to take up my new black maternity pants as they are too long and drag on the ground. So I should do that.... but I'm so tired!

Alright, that's it until next time! And I'll try to find some photos! :)

Life goes on

Our rush trip to Victoria happened on the weekend. Alastair and I both finished work at 3pm on Friday, and we were on the road by 4pm. Almost seven hours later we let ourselves in at Nan's house in Benalla, and we fell into bed exhausted. On Saturday we went up to Wangaratta (a half hour trip) to see Grandad, and he didn't look too good at all. Back to Nan's for lunch, and in the afternoon, Alastair and his mum went back up to the hospital. He was a bit more himself, and they had a good visit. I kept Nan company at home... we looked at knitting patterns and I experimented with a couple, and then played a computer game! She's a cool Nan. :) We all went out for dinner, and then Alastair's mum went to see a few of her old friends. Alastair, Nan and I shared our specialty dessert (chopped up mint slice biscuits with mini m&m's on ice-cream) and had a good long chat. First thing the next morning we were up and off on our trip home, via the hospital again. We came home via Beechworth - which was beautiful, but added to our trip considerably, given that there was a Celtic Festival on, and the beautiful little shops were all open and beckoning us...

So that was a big weekend, and we were back into work and everything the next day. Alastair's Uncle Jonathan had bought himself and Esme, and Alastair and I tickets to the Amy Gillet Foundation Dinner ($250/head!) which was on the Monday night... in Sydney at The Menzies. Wow. Sooooo not our scene! Fancy food, fancy people... an interesting experience, but that is all really.

Another post-midnight bedtime, and there have been two days of dragging ourselves to work since. :)

Today we had news that Grandad has been moved to Melbourne for a procedure on his lungs... but his oxygen saturation levels were really low, and he was practically comatose, so they haven't done it yet. The doctors have summoned Nan and his children to Melbourne for a family conference, which doesn't sound too good.

That's all really...