Crafty Nesting

Darren tends to observe my obsessive cleaning spurts, cooking adventures, and kids projects as "nesting." True or not, we certainly all benefit from this stage of pregnancy. You'll probably recognize many of these ideas, but we've thoroughly enjoyed getting artsy and crafty, especially over the break. (And it doesn't hurt that they have these great art/writing competitions around Australia that offer $500 prizes and game consoles and such...)

 Fingerprint, Q-tip and bottle art...

Contact paper with tissue art (can be made shapeable as "sculptures" by hangers/wire as seen here.)

 Good old sharpie and tin foil art (their fave.)

Summer can eventually be found drifting back to her color sorting, (and has become a gracious playdate host of late.)

 They also discovered this awesome aboriginal hosted funky dance show - HILarious to see them try to catch on.

 And we've enjoyed a few field trips... this particular one out in the boonies where we toured Canberra's Deep Space Communication Complex.

 It's truly hard to capture the size of this dish. It's one of three largest in the world. You can fit a whole football stadium in it with ease and it moves with hairwidth precision to see out deeper in space than any place on earth.

Next year is a big anniversary year with some fun celebrations and even an opportunity to watch a new rover landing live on Mars.

Followed up by an impromptu FWD adventure. They got nervous when mom checked the manual... (nervous enough to GET OUT OF THE CAR before I drove down this hill - steeper than it looks since they couldn't even walk down and had to slide down on their bottoms) but I sufficiently won their trust in the end as we drove through rivers and bounced up and down hills.

Probably not my smartest move prego with 4 kids and far from cell service, but we did have fun.

An Ode to D

Darren's been back at it and I must say, his skills are improving. Don't you think??

Would that we all could discover hidden talent at 37. (Sure beats a mid-life crisis...)

His other new hobby (read, obsession) is geneology and family history research. Once he realized he could put his superstar tech skills to work solving all sorts of family tree mysteries, I basically haven't seen him since (we're talking staying up til 3am night after night after night...)

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We love days when Dad is home.

Kids coerced him onto FreeFall at Questacon then eagerly showed him the new exhibits. They just adore that guy joining in the fun.

Top it off with the National Museum, McD's and relaxing in the sun and you've got a recipe for memories.

Nothing thrills them more than him getting silly or wrestling them to the ground or giving them special treatment when they're sick. But I'd have to say their new favorite thing about Dad is when he paints them a picture or writes them a silly song, (and better yet, records it with them.) He's a creative one, that D-Man.

Happy BDay Buzzy! You just keep getting cooler and cooler with every passing year.

xoxo

Apple-ville

My new favorite morning activity with Sum Sums. She sees the signs and yells "Apple! Apple!!" so I call it Apple Lane. Being right in Costco's neighborhood doesn't hurt...

 There are 3-4 growers along the lane and the orchards are just beautiful. I love tasting all the exotic apples (and other fruits) I've never heard of.

Plenty of crafty garden places there as well - that giraffe is made of shells and stones.

These nets over the dwarf trees prevent birds from stealing the bounty.

 Wish I had a picture of their faces when I came home with one of these to make "apple slinkies" like they sell at school. (You know the apples are good when they're eating the peels like candy.)