A hodge podge post about recent life

We took Marvin for a final afternoon wander last week before his surgery.  Nothing serious, just some growths that needed removing.  But boy, he looks awful now!  Two big patches of shaved fur and four chunky lines of stitches adorn him.  The lump behind one ear required quite a large incision and it looks a bit like his whole ear was cut off then sewn back on.  I wont provide a photo but lets just say even our lovely vet Sarah said he's got a nice Frankenstein look about him!

The boys decided to stomp on Will's shadow for the walk home.  Will kept them leaping about by ducking and jumping from side to side on the footpath.  I'm sure passerby's thought he was some kind of crazy man, bouncing about behind two little kids who to the unseeing eye looked to just be walking normally along in front!

I recently purchased some wool online, not realising it would arrive in skeins.  Bah.  No fancy equipment here, its a slow process of hand-balling the yarn.  Is that even a term?  Ah well, I'll leave the technical yarn language to the likes of Ravalry and Soulemama shall I?

On Friday morning Dexter and Hugo were deeply engrossed in a space adventure at home so when it came time to head off to our friends place they incorporated the whole adventure into their imaginary game.  Check out the awesome 'outer wear' Dex has on over his normal orange NASA suit.  $1 from a Bathurst op shop -  a score I came across last week while visiting mum and dad.  One dollar!  It is too totally awesome is it not?  Dexter almost peed himself with joy upon seeing it.  

We tried our hand at a wee geocaching* adventure on the weekend after being inspired by these guys.  We attempted two different treasure hunts and both were cache-less.  One was vandalised and the other had been unfortunately 'archived', a small detail we didn't notice on the hunt description until we arrived at said location.  We failed our first ever geocaching adventure!  It really didn't matter at all though, we still thoroughly enjoyed our bush trekking and plan to have another go at hunting down a cache at the next available opportunity.

*Geowhat?  Here's how wikipedia explains it :  Geocaching is an outdoor sporting activity in which the participants use a Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver or mobile device^[2] and other navigational techniques to hide and seek containers, called "geocaches" or "caches", anywhere in the world.

On Monday we spent the day picnicking with Cass and co. in the old cemetery at St Stephens church in Newtown. It is so gorgeous in there.  Truly an oasis from the hustle and bustle and energy of nearby King Street.  We whiled away the day on a big rug with books in reach and I even worked on my crocheted blanket for a time.  Cass and I took turns to wander up to King Street - alone - to grab takeaway sushi rolls and salad and hot chips for lunch.  The children switched back and forth between playing altogether and splitting into the two older and the 2 younger children doing their separate things.  Dexter spent quite a lot of time alone up a tree, as he does, while Harriet tried unsuccessfully to argue her case for why she should get to take home a small broken piece of a headstone.  Hugo was in a more manic mood and gave his bossy voice a workout during his version of a hybrid game of soccer/hide and seek....which Ted took totally in his stride with a grin plastered to his face the whole time.

Hugo has been telling Will and I over and over how he made Teddy laugh by saying in his silly voice 'I'm a total rock star'!  And he indeed did, I captured the moment right here.  These two together are delightful aren't they? 

Cass attempted to capture the four children together in one photo.  Yeah sure. At least one of them would run away at the last moment each and every single time she was about to snap them!  I'm not sure she actually got one.  Keep an eye on her blog because when she gets around to posting her photos from this afternoon they are sure to be gorgeous.  My photos do no justice what so ever to the real gorgeousness of this place.