In the news!!

saw this in the news and it really made me laugh!!!

That's Americans for you!!

We are here...

and have been for the past 2 weeks and I know I have been bad and not updated at all about our trip.

We arrived to the worst dust storms in Sydney in 70yrs.....check out the photos...

We have spent time in Tamworth with my folks, it was so cold there that I had to go and buy Jumpers and slippers. We then moved on to Toowoomba to my sisters house, where I have been for the past week. We have been busy doing wedding stuff, programs..printing and re printing, and wedding favors.

Today we made it down to Brisbane and are staying with our good friend the Beckers, they have 4 girls. So with 6 girls and Markie the house is busy but they are all getting along really well. Here is a picture of the girls after a swim this afternoon, they had to have a bath because it was so cold...

Less than 48hrs....

AAAARRRRRRHHHHHHH !!!!!!!!!!!! I am have a small freak out because that is how long till we start long long long long journey home. And I still have so much to do in that time.

Here is our Journey itinerary ..

• 7.55am (Monday Morning) Train from Inverness to Edinburgh
• 11.30 arrive in Edinburgh....have to kill about 4 hour in Edinburgh
• 4pm check in at the Edinburgh Airport
• 5pm go threw security and say farewell to Mike who will now head back to Inverness... It's now just me and the kids!!!
• 6.15pm take off for London heathrow
• 7.40pm arrive in London.... now change for T5 to T4 and head to gate for Sydney flight
• 9.40pm wave good bye to the UK
• 5.15am Wednesday land on Aussie soil in Sydney -8.15pm UK time Tues-
• - now this is going to be my major concern, I know have to collect my luggage and double count the kid to make sure i have them all and not any extras. Clear customs with 2 suitcases, 4 carry on, 1 buggy, 3 kids.... and any sanity left. Change to the Domestic terminal and check for our flight to Brisbane.
• 7.15am Do our last leg of this mammoth journey fighting for Sydney to Brisbane
• 8.35am Bust with excitement as we arrive HOME to all our great friends and family... hugs all round

Anyone is welcome at the Airport, we will head to Macca toombal for Coffee after arriving for a quick catch up.

Other wise we are really looking forward to coming home...... see you then!!!!

Macho Princess

What more do I need to say!!! Just wait the girls will have him dressed in dresses and with make up on before we know it!

Coming Home....

We are all on the count down for our trip down under...4 sleeps!!!! I think I'm crazy flying with 3 kids on my own but that the way it goes. Tickets are booked and there is no changing it!! We arrive in Brissy next Wednesday (23rd) .. wow this time next week we will be there!!! We are really looking forward to catching up with friends and family. If anyone wants to catch feel free to drop me an email (or Comment) and we can organize it.

SEE YOU ALL VERY VERY SOON!!!!

Ears

Lexy has been asking for ages to have her ears pierced, in our family we have all had our ears done when we were 10... but at 9yr 5mth we gave in and let her get then done so she could were ear rings at Courts wedding in October. My little girls is growing up, there are days that just can't believe i'm a mother to a almost 10yr. I'm so proud of her showing great responsibly in looking after her ears, cleaning them and turning them.

doesn't she look grown up?

Got to love hats!!!!

7mths...

Well today my boy was 7mths old... were does the time go?? I'm loving seeing his personality develop. He is a mummy's boy threw and threw, and despite being born in Scotland he has the Aussie in him and loves being outside, if he is upset all i have to do is walk out the front door and he is happy. He is bringing more and more joy to our house everyday.....I even think that girls would now admit that they love him!!

Don't you just love that face?!?!

What he is up to this month...

• Sitting up without any assistance
• is starting to push up on his knees
• has 7 teeth
• loves pulling hair
• is eating 3 big meals a day
• Has an intolerance to milk...so no yogurt, milk proteins,
• loves chewing on apple
• can move around quickly with rolling and wiggling
• loves chattering with his sisters
• is very strong and steady on his feet
• loving his jolly jumper

Just lovable!!

Markis Play date!

We had friends come over in the holidays with and little boy C. He is 3 mths older than Markie, we have got together before but never have the boys interacted so much. He was great to see, C. kept trying to bite Markus or pulling his hair (not that there is much). Markus loved it, I can't wait to see how they interact next time.

Mummy and her boy!

Alyssa's first day of P1.....

Alyssa started school today, a few snap shoots of the day. She had a good time, all she could talk about when she got home was how one of her friends got in trouble for talking. No school tomorrow, but all her class will be there on Thursday (and I got lots done without the girls in the house).

Mummy and Alyssa

Daddy and Alyssa

Alyssa and Alexis.. Lexy's first day of P5

Alyssa and all her friends waiting in line ready to go in.. her teacher too!

Still the poser!!

Neighbours

No not the TV show!!!
We have been spending a bit of time with the Neighbours over the Holidays, the kids get on really well. Alyssa plays with the little boy A. and Alexis plays with the bigger girl E. We went to the indoor play ground with the kids last week, and then on Saturday we went and saw E. play in the pipe band down the High St.

Lexy on the Climbing wall>

Markus did not like the ball pit!!!!

Alyssa had a blast, she had sweat dripping off her when we left.
It's great having a teenager around she loves Markie and great at supervising the others!!

My little Bruiser

My boy is now sporting his first bruise. Our neighbour was playing with Markie playing with the YoYo over his head (he was loving it too!!) when it slipped from her finger hitting Markie just under the eye..... poor E was upset. Markie cried lots too but everyone is fine now..... and I'm sure there will be may more and much worse to come.

One of those days!!

Today is one of those days where I wished I could resign from Motherhood. The kids are demanding, Markus only wants to be held and screams if I put him down, Lexy want every fact or joke ever known about space to take to the mission today night and wants now!! I'm trying to tell her it's over kill, just the best. Alyssa, well for once she is just off playing.

I just feel that every where i look there is mess, dirty dishes here and there, pencils all over the floor, clothes to be folded, ironing to be done, the floors have to be done because Markus has started to put things in his mouth so it has to stay clean, I'd really like an adult conversation right now and not a demanding kid. You know to top it off the dishwasher broke last week and i don't think the landlords will fix it this time, the dishwasher has broke the last 2 times mike has gone away. I want more than 5 hours sleep at night. I feel wrecked. When you don't get enough sleep everything is so hard... right now I want to be with my hubby on the other side of the world.

Surely the day can only get better...

btw... I do really love my kids....some days life is just tough

Happy half birthday

Well our Marky boy (as he has become known in our house) is now 6mths old. (actually it was Friday, I'm a few days behind). Each and every day has become a blessing having this little man in our house. He is a mummy's boy and cries when I leave the room, loves having cuddles with mummy...but will settle for Daddy if needed. Here is what Marky is up to now....

• Can now hold his own bottle, but is quite happy for someone else to do it.
• Now has 4 teeth but has cut 2 more in the last couple of days.
• Is rolling around lots.
• Can move forward by pushing up on his knees.
• Is have 3 meals and 4 bottles
• Favourite foods are Carrots, apples, and baby rice cakes
• Can't stomach bananas, give him a real pain in the tummy.
• Loves to a have a chat.
• Laughs when you tickle his tummy and his feet
• would rather stand or lay...doesn't really like to sit (i think it hurts his already sensitive tummy)
• Loves being outside,
• going for walks in the buggy.
• Is looking a lot like his daddy as a baby.
• Is sitting up all on his own, toppling every now and then
  

you can compare his growth here, and here.

And here is another interview

How to speak Australian with Mike Bird

Flying with the Bird

Mike is in the states at the moment, meeting with Zondervan and they are doing a mini documentary about 'flying with the bird' heres the Link... really funny have a look

hi ho hi ho it's off to Edinburgh I go....

Today, I'm heading south, all by myself. My darling hubby has let me out to play for a few days. I'm looking forward to lots of R & R, coffee and girls chat with my mate Penny. We are staying on the Royal Mile for those who now the now the area. Look out Edinburgh here we come. See you when I get back.. :)

Big Spend day.....£££££££or$$$$$$$

Well today I booked my tickets to come to Australia, very very exciting stuff!!!! Even better was the I booked all 5 ticket for under £3000...don't convert it you Aussies it sounds better in pounds. Well it is 10 weeks and 1 day till I back in the land of sunshine, Tim tams, and cherry ripes. I'm really looking forward to my trip home, I now have to work out how to catch up with everyone, and it is going to be really busy with all the final wedding prep. It's so hard because mum and dad are in Tamworth and we really want to spend a lot of our time with them, but then there is all our Brissy friends we want to see too. I think we will need to do an open day somewhere so everyone can come and see us...I'll think on it. It would be good to have our place to stay but I think I'll be commuting from Toowoomba where my sis will have a place. Anyway I'm so very excited.

The only down side will be coming home in November to short, dark, cold, wet days!! :(

Oh and I booked 2 days away in Edinburgh for ME tonight too, staying here for some much needed R & R. I have friend coming to stay one night, I'm looking forward to eating my food while it is hot and walking around for 2 days without baby sick on me. AARRRHHH the simple things in life!!

Blessings!!

Well this week i discovered that my UK visa don't expire in November as we thought it's expiry date is September AAARRRHHH. Then after much Internet surfing found that it was going to cost me £820 pound to become a resident....AAARRRHHH times 2. After a minor heart attack over were on earth were we going to get the money for that and pay for ticket to Australia in September, I surfed some more and on closer examination of my visa and the wording, which says "Indefinite leave to enter" realised that I don't have to renew just transfer my visa to my new passport or travel with 2 passport... All the website talk about "indefinite leave to remain" visas, but it has to do with where you were when you received your visa, me I was not in the UK there for my visa says Enter..not remain. Anyway we are counting our blessing and truly relieved that this is the case. But now have to get on and get a new passport before November.

Really it's a good thing that I checked my visa because I thought that it expired in November so I would have got to the Airport in September with an expired passport.....now that would not have been a good thing!!!!

Tantrum time!!

Mike is off again today, this time to Cambridge...for the Tyndale conference.. And I have got my nicker in s twist about it. I was trying to remember the last time i got to go away, I think it was last Easter for Lexy's birthday we went to Glasgow for a girls night. I've lost count of all the place he has been in the last 12mth....London, Edinburgh, San Diego, Brisbane, Cambridge, Sheffield (twice), these are just off the top of my head I know there are more... and he is off to Chicago at the end of this month and then New Orleans in November..And Australia in between...oh and then there is Belgian in Sept too... Imagine me throwing myself on the floor kicking and screaming....

Do you get the picture, i just feel that I never get to go anywhere, Mike is always telling me that he would rather be home but that doesn't really help. I just want to go somewhere too.

But this week I have to work on my attitude about this because it is going to be a long and hard week if I don't. I really don't like feeling like this but being left at home all the time is hard work. Maybe that is what I'm resentful about, that i am left to do all the hard work of parenting and running the house.

Anyway forgive me please, And keep me in check this week. Remind me there could be worse places in the world to be!!!

IN 12 Weeks

I'll be home in Australia. My sister is getting married in October so I'm coming Home a little earlier to spend some time with the family. I'll be booking my flights this week...YAY.... and I plan to fly the around the 21st September. I'm so excited, I'm looking forward to lots of cuppas and chats with all my great friends New and Old.

Holidays

School is out for the Summer on Thursdays and I'm dreading it, I think it is more the fact that a Mike is going to be away for nearly half of the holidays and we aren't going anywhere for a break. I need some ideas to keep me going for 7 weeks...3 of those on my own. Please Please help from going insane...

A new record..

I have been blogging since 2006 and today I have posted more this month than I have in any year 2006 -36 posts , 2007 - 20 posts and 2008 - 40 posts. I say well done to me. Thanks Simione for the blog off.....even if I am loseing I'm blogging way more than ever!!

Markus at 5mths

As I promised Here are some pictures of Markie boy at 5mths

What can you do with 2 empty coke bottles???

We went to the Highland Festival last weekend, they had Luis Palau speaking, great family activities and band playing. We had a great time with some of Mike's students, these are the pictures of Alyssa playing along to the bands. It was so loud that you could feel it in your chest, and she found a great way to pass the time and entertain us to...Just wish I had the video camera.

Got to love that face...

Why ??

am I blogging at 4 am, I'm heading off to bed to see if I can get a few more hour sleep in before Markus is up. The Sun is already up but I'm going back to bed!!!

The News!!

Well I have been quiet over the past couple off weeks. There are two reason,

One being that I'm indexing a book for Mike which is sapping every spare (and not so spare) moment that I have, it takes about an hr to do about 8 pages.

The second being that I have been getting over the disappointment of Mike being turned down for the job in Australia. And I didn't want to post really bad and emotional posts and not very nice things about some people.

2 weeks ago we had the dreaded phone call that left our world shattered, reason that I won't post but at this stage we are not coming home .. to Zion, the promised land as Mike calls it...

At first I was very depressed.. I think I cried for 3days. I have been very angry and frustrated with how things happened. I have really questioned God as to WHY we have to go threw such an awful thing. Why when all the door seem to be opening that we get so close and then it all went pear shaped. I am still angry, but I am praying to be able to overcome it. We are continuing to pray about where God wants us. We feel so very blessed by all our great friends here who have sad that they are sorry we aren't going but I thrill that we are staying. We feel really loved and cared for. So today I will be playing catchup on post and see how many more I can do for the blog off end today.

New Book

A copy of one of Mike's new books arrived this week, it is so exciting seeing the fruit of all the hour he puts in behind that lap top. So go check out , 'Are you the one Who is to come' , you can read a little more about it on Mike's blog

Well done honey

5 Months

Markus was 5 months old this past Wednesday. This little man has brought much joy and blessing into our home. The past 5mth have been hard, with more sleepless night than I care to count (including tonight 1.11am and I'm on the net), nights and day of worry as to what to do, many tears on my side not knowing what he needs and wants. But the smile and coos and chatter make it all worth it.

What is he up to now....... well

• Can roll from tummy to back
• and back to tummy
• Is pushing forward with his feet
• almost sitting up
• has 2 teeth
• loves to chatter
• with stop crying if you take him outside
• loves talking to his sisters in the car
• is on 2 meals a day, lunch and dinner
• so far have tried, apple, pear, rice cereal, and carrot
• is now full bottle fed.. :(
• has a pretty good routine.....most of the time
• would rather talk to someone then play with a toy
• Cries when mummy comes into the room, whats with that??
• is almost out of size 3-6 clothes (size'00' for the Aussies)
• His favourite thing is his feet, don't you know they are so much fun.
• if finally enjoying bath time

I'll post a picture in the morning of Markus at 5mths.

One of those days

I had one of those days today... I managed to loose/misplace both my debit and credit cards. I dropped my debit card coming out of Tesco and some kind stranger handed it in. And my credit card well it was in Markus' car seat, why ?? who knows. But I'm glad to have found them both before I had a trolley full of groceries and without having to cancel the cards. Having dropped my card at Tesco in Inverness, I had rare chance to head into town in the evening, and because Tesco is open 24hr there was no time limit, it was really nice to just look around instead of doing a race and grab. But the best bit by far was driving home at 10.45pm seeing the sun setting behind the mountains, the sky was streaked with pink and orange, so calming and peaceful. What a great opportunity to stop and marvel at the wonder of God's beautiful creation.

Just watched...

Australia, I really liked it !!!

Vote against Same Sex marriage in Australia

Friends please go to this site and vote against, we as a Christian body need to have our voice heard.

Catch up...Sports Days

We had Lexy's school sports last Monday and Alyssa's on the Wednesday. I think that things like this are to see just how competitive the parents are, because the kids have a blast sitting with their friends talking and playing to their hearts content.
On Monday the weather was good (if 14c and windy is good) so they could have if outside. Lys, Markus and I went down to watch. Lexy did really well , she took a 2 1st and a 2nds. And not to forget all the participation stickers.
On Wednesday it was a rotten day it was really windy and wet, so they crammed us all in the hall for the nursery sport, this was for the 3 and 4 yr old so not so many people. Mike was able to get the morning off work and join us. Alyssa had a blast and she tells me that she won EVERY race because she got a sticker for every race, she took a a 1st, 2 2nds and a 3rd. Mike talk me into doing the parents race this year. We had to go about 20 meters with bean bag on our heads and holding an egg and spoon. I raced well if i say so myself, taking 2nd. Yay to me. Mike did the dads race and took 1st, but I have been told that he cheated by holding the egg. I couldn't see so I don't know, but that could be right!
Here are a fews Picture of the days, I have video too if I can ever work out how to put it on you tube!!

Go Lexy... forgot to take my camera to school so was only able to get the after shots


Well done!

Markus Slept threw and good part of Alyssa's sports

Lyss and her friend A doing the buddy race...apparently the 3 leg race is too dangerous to do now!

The Monkey race, I love this Picture, Alyssa is the one just over the finish line with the black leggings on, love the legs mid air!

Run baby, run

Look at us!!!

Wow so grown up!!

lightest day of 2009....

...... today we had 18hr 4min of daylight, now you don't get that in Australia. It's 10.45pm now and it's still twilight outside.

first food!!

With a baby in the house there doesn't seem to go a week without a first and this weeks choice is FOOD!!!!

Waiting for a new experience!!! YYYAAAYYY!!!
In his bumbo...isn't he cute.

"What this stuff mum??"

"Do you really want me to put that in my month mum?"