Interviewer: So perhaps you could tell us your greatest weakness…
Applicant: Well I guess my greatest weakness is that I can get caught up in a job and feel compelled to finish it up – to the point where I will lose track of time.
I started making a dress for my baby girl last night and found I just couldn’t stop!
At 1.15 I thought I should call it a night.
At 3am said baby girl woke me up with a headache.
I am soooooooooooooo tired.
Hey but the dress is coming together!
My baby is thirteen and she is gorgeous.
Today we went on the tunnel tour under Fremantle Prison, the largest convict built establishment in Australia.
I think my girl was impressed that the jail was still in use when “I was alive”.
In fact they closed the prison in 1991 and then had to wait a year before they could open the old jail to the public… it was made of limestone… they used toilet buckets… limestone is very porous and holds the smell apparently… they had to air the place out.
Anyway the tunnels were made in the 1880s to harness the water in the underground aquifer, by 1910 the water was getting saline from a rising water table and by then of course the Mundaring Weir was supplying the water to the metro area.
And they were forgotton about.
Until an oil leak in the tunnel system caused oil to spray out of the prison reticulation in 1989.
The tunnels are well cool.
It’s what is known as an Extreme Heritage Experience.
There are harnesses and headlamps involved.
Anyway we had fun, learned a bit, and loved spending the morning together… although I think my gorgeous girl would have also enjoyed hanging out at home playing with her tablet.
I love you gorgeous girl!
This is my daughter being some Cosplay character that no doubt she will scream at me for not remembering!
She dressed up to go to some anime/manga convention in January.
Isn’t she cute.
I’m not sure I agree with the whole dress up like a naughty schoolgirl thing that generally seems to happen at these conventions but at least in this case she her skirt falls below her knees.
It covers more than her actual school uniform in fact!
So the question is – how long will the phase last?
I love dressing up myself so maybe for a long time.
In other news she is now babysitting… and getting paid!
She loves it, especially the money, the boys she looks after love her.
And at least if she is going to be on her laptop all night we don’t have to watch and think boy are we bad parents because – she’s working!
Win win.
A little bit of Christmas silliness to wish you all a very happy season:
Scary huh?
Only three belts away from a karate black belt.
Dippity refused to let us watch her grading.
Apparently we would have put her off.
I think she was more worried about us embarrassing her.
Well we did threaten to cheer on the sidelines…
It is our job after all, as parents, to embarrass our children whenever possible.
So we went down the pub and had a beer and talked about her instead.
We’re very proud.
Just don’t let her know that.
Dippity and I went down to UWA today to go to an upmarket in the Undercroft.
We had to walk down the main drag to the Guild to get some money out and of course it was a chance for me to remember 25 years ago, my first day at university.
Ahhhh they were good days…
We walked past the Oak Lawn and watched some medieval knights and ladies doing their hey nonny nonny thang.
We laughed at the AW building.
Awful isn’t it.
*Dippity face plants in reaction to terrible mum joke*
We wandered through that tropical garden in front of the Reid Library.
I love that garden.
It’s so lush.
So we’re wandering through it and the trees just tower over you and Dipp finds this flower.
Surrounded by all that sandstone architecture, by the beautiful gardens she finds a single flower to photograph.
Well… I’m a fan of that macro button as well.
This violet reminds me of something I recently heard – I think it was someone talking about the GFC – one of those people putting together those mortgage packages for big banks to buy – the things that caused this recession.
He said “you know those people who can’t see the wood for the trees… well we couldn’t even see the trees. All we could see was bark…”
Bark watchers.
I love that phrase.
This week’s theme is balloons and when I think of balloons I always think of my dad’s 60th birthday.
We held it at my place and blew up about 200 helium filled balloons with long ribbon tails to cover the ceiling.
Then we all waited with the lights off in the lounge room for him to arrive.
It was a new house, with no curtains and we had windows letting in the moonlight.
We didn’t surprise him.
He could see the silhouettes of the guests through the windows not hidden by the wall.
The next morning, the balloons had started to fall from the ceiling and floated at every height.
The kids (aged about 4 and 16 months) were elated.
They captured them in enormous balloon bundles, crocodiles and ran through the house. [see video]
You could hardly see them for balloons.
Check out some of the other entries for some more balloon magic.
What I love about the school curriculum these days – no matter it be private or public – is the onus on public service.
I don’t remember it being part of my education.
There are heaps of fundraisers of course but the kids are also required to complete a certain number of hours of community service.
Hugamuga for example teaches computer skills to elderly people. Dippity has sat on the gate of a community fair collecting money.
The thing with community work is when you do it you realise that you feel SO good which is why I shouldn’t have been surprised when Dippity came to me with a handmade sponsorship sheet and a promise not to speak for 24 hours.
Win-win I thought.
She came up with it herself and convinced some mates to join her. She got permission from her teachers and went for it.
They raised about $140.
We had a very quiet night.
Community service… it’s a good thing.
UPDATE: For those of you who are interested here is the Education Department Policy.
As part of the Community Service Program students must complete a minimum of 20 hours of service in the community. Students complete their community service between Years 10 and 12.
From 2009, completion of 20 hours of service will be one of the requirements for achieving the WACE for Year 12 students.
Schools provide students with a variety of ways in which they can complete their 20 hours of service through the Community Service Program.
A couple of years ago I wrote about the bogans at the Perth Royal Show. I was quite scathing. Now, it’s not that the show has suddenly become a bogan-free zone – quite the contraire – it’s just that – for the first time in about ten years I went to the show and I actually enjoyed it.
Far from the jaded worn out parent from a couple of years ago, dragged from one show bag stall to the next overpriced ride, this year I left the elder at home to play Spore (thanks to his Aunty he is now SUPER popular) and simply dropped the young one off to volunteer at Animal Aid Abroad…
Where she stayed happily content all morning.
This left Groover and me free to wander the showgrounds at our whim and act like young teenagers in love – without the heavy petting in public.
It took me back to my younger more impressionable years and my Grease-like fantasies of what teenagers did at Royal Shows… or at least end of year carnivals…
Okay so he didn’t hit a mallet and win me an oversized stuffed dog twice my size (this year’s choice prize) but then, I’m not actually a teenager and so didn’t miss it, nor miss finding the wretched thing space in my over-cluttered house.
Back to this year’s Royal Show… does anyone else find it distasteful that they sold the naming rights? It just doesn’t sound right to have the [insert advertiser name here] Perth Royal Show… did they ask the Queen first? Wrong wrong wrong.
And would you go on a rollercoaster propped up on stacked wooden blocks?
No. Neither would I. And after I noticed these height adjusters – which did not seem to be in any way secured to either the rattling rollercoaster above or the ground below – I paid careful attention to every other ride’s supports. Here’s a closer look…
Groover and I did go on one ride though, which seemed to be made for teenagers, or at least smaller people than us. It was the best ride I’ve been on at a local show. And so it should have been at $10 each. Highway robbery.
Didn’t seem to be putting off the masses of people in sideshow alley though.
Anyway after our free time we picked up Dippity, had some lunch (a lovely wood-fired pizza), Groover left and Dippity and I did a bit of wandering before doing another volunteering stint at another exhibit.
We finished the day exhausted and I learned a few lessons.
Okay then Dippity – what do you want to achieve with your life? What do you want to do?
Oh I don’t know…
C’mon you must have something you want to do…
Well…
Yes?
I’d like to take over the world with my army of flying evil ninja monkeys!
???
Where did this child come from?
