According to my spam I am a depressed, nay, suicidal, infertile lover of naked celebrities.

Who’d have guessed?

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 Sorry guys.

Sorry to leave you all hanging.

The audition;

went well.

They had fun, enjoyed themselves, found the actual dance not too hard at all. They had a limited amount of time to learn a dance and then perform it. They went to a workshop where they were assessed on dance, singing and drama. It was a morning of heaven for the pair.

Now we have to wait.

They said in about two weeks we will get a letter telling us whether or not the girls made it.

The girls are trying not to get their hopes up and I am trying not to build any.

Just keep your fingers crossed, okay?

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Spam is a salty tinned meat that is good for a miriad of things.

Apparently, good for eating as well.

I read an article that said Spam sales were through the roof and supermarkets could not keep tins on the shelves. Spam was moving that fast.

Apparently Spam is really popular in these tight times.

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One pre teen girl to the other, after a particularly blonde moment: “You’re so dumb you stole a free sample.”

Other pre teen in response to insult: “Well, you’re so dumb it took you three hours to watch 60 Minutes.”

When Lily excuses herself to go to the bathroom at dinnertime and she can barely get the words out for all of the casserole she has crammed down the side of her mouth, I know exactly what she is going to do.

You do too.

She is going to spew that ‘hours over a hot stove’ meal right into the big white telephone.

“Helloooooo”.

I’m not an idiot.

I know the plan because

I used to do it too.

Now, Mum, I know you are reading this and I don’t want any comments from you,

M’kay?

I hear your distress at my failing to eat what you put in front of me.

I do.

Karma has bitten me on the bum seven fold, if you get what I mean.

For me, it was broad beans.

Ugh.

What is the deal with those things?

They taste like wood or something else that I can’t quite put my finger on because I don’t eat it on a regular basis…

Oh yeah, poo.

They taste like poo.

(Sorry to any BB lovers, or for that matter anyone, who might have a love for anything faecal).

They just don’t do anything for me.

So, the broad beans were flushed, often along with brussel sprouts.

This story is not about that though.

This is the tale of the ham steaks.

A story I told my kids in true mummy/child confidentiality, only to have it relayed straight back to the one person I never wanted to find out.

My mother.

It goes like this;

Tuesday night was bowling night and we were fed early. It was my mother’s one night to go out and get away from my father have some time out.

Every week we would have the same thing.

Ham steaks, pineapple, cheese and salad (or vegies in winter).

Tuesday night was Ham Steak Night.

Mum would serve us up and go for a shower, trusting us to eat our meals in doing so. You can imagine that after a while we got a bit sick of it (being kids and all and not stopping for one moment to think about anything other than ourselves).

During this period of our lives, we had acquired a red kelpie dog, who we had named Toffee. That dog was not meant for suburban life at all. In fact I’m not sure where she belonged because she was a tree climbing, fence jumping, runaway tear - arse of a dog, who was cunning in avoiding capture when she escaped the yard. She thought she was some kind of bird, I’m sure.

Always flying the coop.

She was, of course a working dog and would try to round us up, any chance she got, like sheep into a holding fence, ready for the dip. She could leap especially high and this was a great source of amusement to three children with a less than stellar childhood.

The dog was alwaysat our feet around dinner time and was a die hard carnivore, often stealing meat from preparatory areas before the cooking had begun.

So when we discovered that ham steaks made especially good frisbees, Toffee was there to play fetch.

Except she didn’t fetch…

and the ham steaks didn’t come back.

We would fling the round slabs of meat high into the air, often obtaining some mad spinning pizza action mid throw. Toffee would leap, her svelte, red body almost folding in two as she twisted and turned to snare the much desired lump of ham. She would seemingly inhale the steak just before the next was hurled.

Of course dinner was dutifully finished, not a trace of ham to be found and we were toted as angels for having eaten quickly and quietly…

and she never found out

until the traitors gave it away.

I’m thinking a little payback is in order… ham steaks, anyone?

Do you?

She wanders out to the kitchen, a look of urgency on her face.

“You take me” she directs,

“you take me to the hospital”.

“Why?” I ask.

She rushes down the hallway and I follow. She has picked up her Dorothy the Dinosaur handbag and  starts to pack it.

A plastic mobile phone, a pair of undies (important when you are still in nappies), a drink bottle and “Catty”.

It’s always serious when the Dorothy bag comes out.

So I ask her again, where we are going and she cups my face in her little hands, looks earnestly into my eyes and tells me…

“Take to hospital, Mummy”.

I am starting to worry. Perhaps she knows something that I haven’t picked up on, maybe she is sick.

“Why are we going to the hospital, bubba?” I ask.

” Because *M’s* there, I luff* him. I live with him, he make me feel so betterbetter”.

My sigh is huge.

She is not sick.

Well, she is,

just a bit.

Love sick.

*M*  - paediatrician

*luff is an Ivy - ism for love.

It’s cold.

It’s a stay inside kind of season.

Traditionally we do the kinds of things that keep us warm and dry.

Movies.

Bowling.

Cooking.

Craft.

Today we wanted to do something, get out of the house.

Anyone who has been reading for a year, might remember when we attempted the movies last year. It ended in a whole lot of pain when a snotty teen told me that by bringing the babies, I had ruined the movie for everyone. The result was me using a word I am unaccustomed to using.

It started with F and rhymed with truck.

I was so ashamed that I had uttered that word in front of the kids but emotional accusations called for emotion felt words and that is what popped out.

The comeuppance  of the experience was that we don’t do the movies anymore as a family. The big kids hang out for their grandparents to take them or a chance to go with friends comes up.

Movies with toddlers is way worse than taking two babies, as would be bowling, ice skating, or anything that allows older kid participation but not the younger set.

 I break into a sweat at the thought of it.

Can you imagine?

Big kids on the ice, two toddlers running around everywhere, or strapped into their stroller, to prevent the running around but screeching at the top of their lungs because their idea of a good time does not involve belts and prams in any way shape or form.

It just doesn’t work.

For me.

Stress levels too high. Head likely to explode.

Besides that, it is totallyuncool for pre teens to be seen with their mother.

Totally

and I am not prepared to let them go on their own yet.

Ok, it might be different for others and I pass no judgement on that but for me (with my various issues) it’s not right.

Today, I tried to work out what we could all do together and I’m here to tell you, it was hard.

The big kids are too big for play centres. Not that I would be able to take the I - girl there without picking up something nasty requiring a week in hospital, anyway but have you seen my girls lately? They are like willow trees.

The thought of them trying to weave their way through the climbing equipment makes me cringe with thoughts of the fire department having to be called with the jaws of life to extract the gangly pre teen, arms and legs knotted up, like the pit of my stomach.

Even though the toddlers would think a play centre was the ants pants, the pre teens would sneer and sloth down into the bottom of the cafe chairs and claim absolute boredom, or worse still, ask for a coffee because they’re all “growned (groaned) up”, you know. Lily would be torn between being a ‘cool’ pre teen and playing like a ten year old should and Mal, well, he would just be Mal.

Only a few of you out there have been privy to Mal’s obscene dancing skills but I’m sure, if it were a play centre we chose to spend the day, with Hi - 5 or Wiggles music booming through the stereo system, anyone who entered it’s realm, would have their eyes burnt with the sight of his moves.

Cute as I find them.

Other patronage might disagree.

So play centres are out.

Movies, ice skating, bowling out. At least until I have the wonderhusband to even out the numbers - toddlers 2: parents 2 sounds more manageable to me.

I love the idea of parks and beaches in the Summer but in the Winter time, there is just not enough sunshine for me, or anyone else for that matter. That idea was vetoed by everyone, including Mum, who was on the other end of the phone when these discussions were taking place.

So home bound we remain.

We have decided on a DVD afternoon (after the babies have had their  ’sleep off their 5am start’ nap), with popcorn, snacks and I can feel a choc top making session coming on too.

That will have to do.

The chasm between the pre teens and the toddlers has never seemed so vast as it has today.

*sigh*

I know.

As boring for me as it is for you, dear readers.

Yesterday was spent in a turmoil driven cleaning frenzy of snot, slobber and vomit.

The cherubs have what I think is a tonsil related illness, with the added bonus of a cold and all the big kids have some lurgy, that involves coughing.

Lots of coughing.

When toddlers cough, they vomit.

Alot.

The boy was the worst for wear yesterday but came good in the early evening and chatted on into the night and into the early hours about Big Red Cars and boats.

He slept it off, his immune system kicked in and this morning, my boy is tired but back to his normal self.

Today, the girl has performed her high temp party trick and thrown off a febrile convulsion in  spectacular Ivy style.

While she is sleeping off the post ictal phase, I  have dressed the boy and put him in the high chair for breakfast.

I ask him; “toast or Weet bix?”

His reply?

“Eggs. Cook me some eggs” (woman and while you’re at it, get my slippers and my pipe).

Ah yes, definitely feeling better.

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In my desperation last night I begged David for a holiday.

I explained if we could not afford for all of us to escape, that was fine.

He could stay with the coughing hoards (he being one of the mass) and I would go to some tropical island on my own.

The family fell about laughing.

They thought I was joking.

In the Winter sunshine the voices of the children’s choir lifted into the blue sky.

So blue and clear that I felt I could whisper my thoughts upwards and they would evaporate into organza swirls of white, consumed by the vastness of the day.

I am tired today and I can’t seem to pick myself up off the ground.

Fragile.

Is it possible to have the three day blues, even though there is no baby?

I think something similar happens when I retreat to my own world after the sterility of the hospital. The first few days are busy recreating normality but the third day, I always crash and burn.

Of course, scientifically, biologically, it is a known fact, that ‘fight or flight’ response. That sudden elevation in cortisol and adrenalin that pumps through the body in times of stress.

It helps us to cope.

It helps us to get through the trauma, helps us to stay upright.

If there is that high then, realistically, there must be a low.

Right?

A time when the hormones shift back to normal levels, leaving you flat, almost down.

That’s me.

The girl is not 100%  and I am watching her along.

I know the pneumonia can take up to two weeks to resolve and so I keep vigil.

Our day though has been the stuff of dreams.

Relaxed, easy hours together.

The kids playing in the green fields, happy, carefree.

You can’t ask for more than that.

Linus:(black dog, of equal or less intelligence) ”Ah, ya wasteoid, ya tweeker, you’ve been dropping gluten free biscuits again, haven’t ya?”

Nelson: “No! It’s not what you think! I tripped and fell into the box!”

Don’t worry animal lovers, no dogs were harmed in the making of this post and he was, in fact, rescued by his owners, even though he ate the whole box of GF bikkies, which he stole from the baby bag.

Me.

Hairdresser phobic me.

What is it with all those mirrors, anyway?

Why are there so many of the damn things?

While we are on the subject, why do hairdressers ask what type of cut we want? I never went to haircutting school. I don’t know anything about layers or razoring or anything much more than ‘a number two on the sides with a number four on top, ‘cos it’s Winter’.

That is like me asking the hairdresser which optimal position she has decided on for the birth of her first child and had she considered tearing or episiotomy with that.

When it comes to hair I am uneducated.

All I know is that the short cut got tired, I grew it out, to a point where it just looked like someone had popped a mop on my noggin’ and called it a ‘do’.

That and in less than twenty four hours, I am going to be the mother of two twelve year olds and I think that calls for something a bit more grown - uppish than the mess that was my hair.

What do you think?

So, I got it cut, with a side fringe (I’ve never had a side fringe, heck, I’ve never had a fringe, period) and layers.

It’s not in my face.

It looks like someone has actually done something with it, no longer the caveman, lost cause look.

(Now if I could just do something with my bushman eyebrows).

So, here is a picture.

It’s not a  great photo because I didn’t want to look like a total git and ask one of the kids to snap off a few for the blog but you can see, it has shape, right, and I look like I could have 12 year olds, yes?

No, don’t look at the dark circles.

Anyway, those are marks of babies and toddlers and maybe teenagers who don’t come home until after midnight. If I had just 12 year olds, my panda eyes would not be so bad.

I’m sure of it.

Don’t look at the stupid grin.

I felt stupid, okay.

I just want your opinion… is it an okay haircut?

Much like I was in my younger years. Oh yes, my friends, I was not always The Old Woman Who Lived In The Shoe, I used to love all things thespian, as my mother will proudly tell anyone who will listen. I sang and danced and I was into drama, the whole shebang. Yes, even musicals.

Anyhoo, the almost twelve year olds have followed in my footsteps.

They dance.

Maddy sings.

Immy is into drama.

They are auditioning for The Performing Arts High School later in the year.

They were successful in gaining a  place in the Gifted and Talented camp, this coming August.

They are the quintessential drama queens. (Do I sound like my mother much? Oy, now there is a good subject for a blog post…).

This week is Starstruck week. Starstruck is a huge stage show that is performed by the schools, encompassing three areas. This is their second year and also their last. If they don’t get through auditions for the performing arts school, their local highschool does not allow them to participate again until they are in year 9.

The girls have been rehearsing for the last two months and tonight is the first performance.

It is a big week for the girls, exhausting, exciting, thrilling. Today is their ‘pyjama day’ where they will be allowed to sloth around in ugg -  booty -  goodness before the show.

Lily and I are going to tonight’s performance… as they say in show business, break a leg, girls. Break a leg!