Sulawesi great, next up Gautemala

It's been a crazy busy week here work-wise but Will has finally been able to write a little about his Sulawesi experience over on the home-page of our company website here. Also check out the Updates From HQ in the Campos News section for more details and photos....for some reason I'm having trouble linking directly to it.

I'm so excited that the kids and I will be tagging along on our next direct trade coffee trip....to Central America this time! Picking season is December through to late February and we've yet to knuckle down and book flights etc. but it has to happen within that timeframe. Guatemala is a definite (we've already met the lovely family who will be hosting us there - a crazy and wonderful couple with a baby girl who treated us to a night of Guatemalan food, music and dancing right here in Sydney last year) and possibly El Salvador and /or Costa Rica too.

Totally unrelated to coffee, here are a few snapshots from our week.

On the beam. Little D began a junior gymnastics class with some other wee homeschooled children last week. He LOVES it!

Doing the dishes. This is the favourite job of the month. So much so it's kinda driving me crazy. Deep breaths, plenty of towels to mop up the splashes and letting go of the notion that doing the dishes should only take a few minutes is helping me to get through it!

I don't know what Little H is playing here. But the headband was necessary, as was the little red sticker on his hand which he kept 'pressing' so that it went beep! And choo choo!

Side by side but lost in their own separate tasks in the Craft Corner. Which continues to receive a crazy amount of attention from Little D. Below is something I found on his craft table this afternoon. Obviously the mountain of craft materials at, under and beside his table wasn't enough today and he went looking in the fruit bowl for inspiration.

Happy weekend to you all!

Rainbows and umbrellas

On his way home from Sulawesi Will had a stopover in Bali. Nothing says Balinese like a tie dyed sarong! He got Little D and Little H one each to play with as they please. And after a couple of days of being stuck inside due to rain here's how they're being used at the moment. Colourful fabric and pegs - everything you need for a fantastic cubby. Oh and one can not forget the sleeping bag, a cubby simply isn't a cubby without a 'bed'. Little D's favourite thing about the cubby? He can stand up in it! Our normal attempts at cubby building usually result in something less grand and require crawling into and sitting only.

We ventured out for a rainy walk this morning. Just because. Any excuse to put on gumboots and use umbrellas goes down well with these boys. Little D is looking out for his brother here, telling him to Stop! Driveway ahead! Little H is wearing his cape or as he calls it his 'tooo-tha-res-queeeeeew" (to the rescue).

So I finished something finally...

Introducing Roberto Robot. My first softie. I first came across him here. Which lead me to his creators blog, which lead me to this post here. I deviated a little from the pattern, both intentionally (those square button eyes) and by accident (the un-boxed lower body - you can see how it should have looked here).

I used fabric entirely from my stash including that super duper metallic stuff and the fluorescent orange velvet which mum gave me recently. At first I thought the result a little scary and left him unfinished for a few days by the sewing machine while thinking about what to do. Should I take out all the stuffing, turn it inside out again and box the corners of the body to get rid of those hip wings? Should I get ready for some serious unpicking and re-do his whole face without those freaky big square button eyes?

What I hadn't counted on was Little D coming across him before I was done thinking...and Little D LOVED what he saw. The kids rarely venture up the spiral staircase to my sewing area but on Wednesday D asked for some orange fabric for something he was working on at his craft table and I didn't think to run ahead and hide my robot-in-progress until it was too late.

So apparently my concern that I had created a nightmare-inducing freaky toy was unwarranted and he is not so scary after all! Last night I finished up by hand-stitching the opening and left him on D's bed to discover in the morning. That was his idea. Mum, he said at bedtime, make sure you finish my robot and put him on my bed so I see him when I wake up.

Today his robot, as yet unnamed (but not Roberto thanks mum!), was the centre of all D's play. And he even obliged me with a cheesy photo session as you can see...

Biennale

Car free Wednesday. What to do?

Take a train then a ferry to Sydney's

Biennale Festival on Cockatoo Island.

Both boys gob-smacked by this installation. How did those cars get up there and who put all those wires and lights inside mum? Here's a link to a better photo. It's even cooler in real life.

We clambered over the roofs of this amazing sculpture of a shanty town. Imagining people below our feet sleeping and cooking and as evidenced by the aerials and satellite dishes, watching TV. I tried to explain to Little D that there are places in the world that look exactly like this. I'm not sure he really understood.

(Yep, he jumped in that puddle. It wasn't the last).

One of the reasons for our visit was a friend recently telling us about this life size replica of the Hubble Telescope on display. I can't think why she thought D would be interested.

Don't feel like tackling the steep gradients of the island? No problem - you can take this tunnel. It takes you literally from one side of the island to the other. I think I was more excited by this than the kids. A tunnel? Why, we must go in and see where it takes us!

And we just couldn't possibly be in Sydney Harbour without the opportunity for playing among the roots of a Moreton Bay fig tree would we? Little D, when reflecting on our day this evening said he'd like to go again and again and again. (I'd say we'll go to Cockatoo Island again sometime...)

Space mission

Little H was drawing today and I noticed how well he is doing with his pincer grip. Not bad huh? He was scribbling what he called rockets and saying "chhhh-choo, lift off!" and then he accidently drew a circle-ish shape and got very excited because it looked like a "boon" (balloon) and he went on to draw a bunch of them. Just this week he has started saying his brothers name properly and it's clear as day instead of his past version which sounded something like "Der der".

In the darkness of the early winter morning yesterday after a quiet 10 or 15 minutes at his craft table Little D brought this to show me - a Lighthouse that he created using a torch inside the toilet rolls. Blue paper for the base represents the ocean, the brown scrunches are rocks. It's all lit up in this photo but it's rather difficult to photograph well- you'll just have to trust me that in a dark room with the torch shining through the yellow paper it really looks quite cool.

While his imagination took him ocean side for a little yesterday, space is still this kids preferred place to 'reside' in. The whole house was apparently a spaceship. He wore his astronaut suit to bed last night because his space mission needed to continue while he slept - there are big distances to cover in space and it can take days to get somewhere. Here he is explaining that when inside the spaceship, due to the lack of gravity, the ceilings and walls and floors are always changing and becoming each other. The suit stayed on today when we went to Little H's music class. He is currently watching his Spaceflight DVD which we got at the PHM last year. It is seriously the most dry documentary I've ever seen, all original (grainy) footage of various space missions without any of the bells and whistles of your modern day doco - he loves it none the less. This morning his first comment was "Well, how far have we travelled overnight? I think we're nearing Saturn."

Daddy-less for a week

A quiet weekend here. A little bike ride in the beautiful sunshine.

We dropped by the warehouse yesterday and I snapped this shot of the team making me a coffee. I'm sure I've shared very similar photo(s) before but it really is such an integral part of the fabric of our lives that you'll just have to accept the repetition! The kids never tire of the warehouse and the exciting things that lie within. Little D mimics his dad. "Double ristretto or piccolo latte? Or do you want both Mum?" he says in his serious getting down to business voice. His beverage of choice is a luke-warm weak hot chocolate which he drinks with a straw. Little H remains unimpressed by baby cino's and we've not introduced him to the delights of a hot chocolate yet so he usually munches an apple from the staff fruit bowl while the rest of us get our daily fix. They finish up elbowing each other in their efforts to load the little dishwasher beneath the counter! (We don't have one at home so it has that novelty factor still)!

We dropped Will off at the airport this afternoon for his trip to Sulawesi. It looks set to be quite the adventure. He'll no doubt write about it in the Campos News section on our website once he is back and I'll post a link to it then.

While Will is away these next 7 days I'm hoping to pick up a few projects that have been gathering dust recently. What else is a girl to do when the kids are tucked up in bed and her husband is away during these long winter evenings? My sewing machine has been very neglected of late and I'm itching for it! The most difficult thing is deciding what to tackle first? Perhaps this little robot for my robot mad son.

Barber visit

Here's Little D dancing his way to the barber's on Monday. He had his fourth EVER haircut. That's right, he is 4 years and 8 months and in his whole little life has only had his hair cut four times. This kid's hair is sloooow growing and as such his mummy is a little precious about it. His locks however were starting to look a little too mullet-like for my liking and I requested the barber to do the bare minimum to take just a little of length/bulk off the back to lessen the mullet look. Of course, easier said than done and....AHHHH! His hair is now a lot shorter. See for yourself. It looks sweet enough of course but I'll be happy to see some length growing back in the coming months.

Little H had a quick turn in the barbers chair too but you can hardly tell. Poor barber was too scared to take much off as I obviously came across as one of those crazy mothers not yet ready for my baby's locks to be tampered with! He did however tidy up the back, which I'd hacked at several months ago when his hair was taking on more of a mullet style than I could handle. (I obviously have some deep seated fears regarding mullets). So now the back is even and those wispy wings that stick over each ear (see below) are here to stay for a little longer!

Today we honoured our car free Wednesday. Which we failed to do last week due to driving to Bathurst. But I think we made up for it today. Little D walked the furthest he has ever walked in his life. Well, possibly not, but he certainly walked a long way and with good cheer the whole time. We took the bus to our destination and wandered from Campos and a couple of shops on to the library. We'd planned to catch the bus home but decided to walk, and then kept on walking all the way PAST our house and onto the warehouse to visit daddy before finally returning home. We were out and about for 2 and a half hours, walking most of that time. I did a quick calculation on a map just now and we walked a couple of hundred meters short of 4 kilometres! Now that's nothing for this grown up but it's quiet the achievement for Little D and he was so proud of himself. Little H enjoyed the journey from the luxury of the stroller.

We're home

So we're back from our little trip to Bathurst. As with any trip away from home with little people, we had our share of, shall we say, difficult situations, including a few simultaneous meltdowns (yay for me!) due to late nights, poor sleep and too much excitement. In the end we returned home a little earlier than planned due to cranky children, cranky mummy and well just general crankiness all round. Not to worry, each trip gets a little easier as the boys get older and mum and dad and my childhood home aren't going anywhere! The boys really enjoyed the time they got to spend with their cousin (even though her older brother was missed). Here are some highlights.

Nanny and Pa's fish pond is always the first thing the kids want to check out. The old garden bed which they lined with plastic, filled with water and threw in a few gold fish thinking the birds would probably eat them is still going strong and the fish have been happily breeding for at least 10 years now. Ice often forms on the surface yet still they survive. Who knew gold fish would thrive so well outdoors in Bathurst? The kids like trying to count them.

Little D wanted to find the source of the chorus of croaking down by the dam but the frogs are good at hiding and alas we heard many but saw none.

Little H surprised me with his timidness regarding the vast open space of the paddocks. This is the look he had on his face basically the whole time we were outdoors! Little D was yelling and running back and forth and saying to his little brother "Come on H, lets find the sheep, lets look for frogs. You can run with me, do you see the dam?" and so on. But H was obviously overwhelmed by the very non-urban environment he found himself in and wanted to be carried or to hold my hand. I realised that he simply hasn't spent the time at mum and dad's that Little D has (when there was just one babe in my life and the 3.5 hour drive and parenting without Will - who usually has to stay behind for work -was much more achievable).

Although outside his comfort zone he did eventually get lost (in a good kind of way) in the long grass. His hair matches the colour of the dry grass don't you think?

It wasn't actually very cold and (sadly) there was no need to kit out H in the old ski suit hanging in the laundry cupboard which I'd been imagining him in. Nor Little D in an old parka. Oh well, next time huh!

Little D enjoyed following the sheep around, calling out to H to join him. He was disappointed to find the chooks were no longer around after a fox made a meal of them a few months back but was very matter of fact about it. "Foxes eat hens, don't you know mum."

D feeding the neighbours horses. Notice Little H keeping a safe distance. He was pretty terrified of what he called dogs. I imagine a dog the size of a horse would be pretty scary! I reassured him they were friendly (and not oversized canines) and he was happy to be in my arms while I stroked their noses but not in the least bit interested in touching them or feeding them himself.

The kids first experience of a bonfire was definitely the highlight of our stay and Pa even made them their very own little fire in an old kitchen sink for marshmallow toasting. Although the little one wasn't too keen on eating them he enjoyed the toasting part. His big brother could hardly believe his luck and ate at least half the packet! (His mother may have consumed most of the other half. Yum)!

Little H kept backing away saying "too sunny" and shielding his face with his hands. Little D was extremely interested in how the fire "makes the stuff it is burning disappear". I think that all of our attempts to explain it completely failed to satisfy the poor child. I mean, it's pretty tricky to explain isn't it? He loved it every time Pa or Uncle Matt added something big to the fire sending millions of sparks off into the night.

Little D (AKA apprentice chef) didn't miss out on his need to create in the kitchen just because he was away from daddy (AKA resident chef). He helped Nanny make lemon meringue pies for an afternoon tea party we had with some Bathurstian mates.

It's lovely to come home after a few days away. The latest Ottobre magazine arrived while we were away and I'm going to hop into bed now and drool over all the children's clothes that I'll probably never find time to sew!