Council Approval

YAYYYYYY!!!!!!! We got a call from Perry Homes (our builders) this afternoon saying that they have received the final approval from the local council to start constructing our house!!! SOOOOOOOOO excited!!!!! Now we just need the bank to sign the authority to commence and then the file gets sent off to the site manager who will order all the materials, book all the labourers and get things started. That will take no more than 3 weeks but possibly a lot less than that which would be GREAT!!! I am just so happy!!

On another note, my knitting is coming along nicely!! Here is 1 of the finished leg warmers...



I have started working on the 2nd one so that should be done in the next few days. Then it is onto a jumper for Mia!!

Here is another pic of Mia - the love of my life.



And here is Mia having a blast with a roll of toilet paper...kids will be kids!!

I've Got the Knitting Bug!!

I was taught how to knit way back in about 2003 by David's mum who can knit ANYTHING!! When I first learned it wasn't very pretty...the tension was all terrible and it was just darn right horrible! But with practise I have got the tension right, can read a pattern and can do lots of things!! I have been having fun over the last few weeks getting started on some projects and I look forward to doing lots more! Here are some of my projects...













I have also been knitting a sweater for my dad for a few years now...I know I know...talk about procrastination!!! I will get it done one day!!

My current project is a pair of leg warmers for Mia. They are turning out great so far!!

Adobe Lightroom

I am SO in love with my new photo editing software! It is called Adobe Lightroom and it is just amazing! There is so much you can do with it!! Of course I wouldn't use it for most photos - just the really special ones. I am just so excited I can't stop playing with it!!! Here are some of my masterpieces...lol...

My New Lifestyle Plan

Ok, so I have said this before but I have officially turned over a new leaf of health, fitness and happiness. I have just joined back up to Curves which I am SO happy about. I used to be a member of Curves when I was pregnant and then I hurt my back and ankle badly when I feel at work and then had back problems after Mia was born resulting in surgery so I left Curves. Now that my back is healed and I am able to I have joined back up. I had my first work out this morning and it felt GREAT! My plan is to do that 5 mornings a week (3 mornings for resistance training and 2 for cardio days) and also take a daily walk on my treadmill and with Mia.

I am also re-vamping my eating. My menu this week includes:

Breakfast: vanilla low fat yoghurt, 1 cup of blueberries, 1/4 cup of muesli and some nuts
Lunch: sundried tomato wrap filled with ham, lettuce, cucumber, snow peas, mushrooms and a dollop of sour cream
Dinner: various

I am going to have the same thing for breakfast and lunch all week and then change that every week to get some variety.

I am so excited about getting back into shape and losing the weight I want to lose. My goal is to lose 25kg (about 50lbs) by next March. Mia and I are taking a trip to Hawaii next March to have a holiday with my parents so that is my goal - wish me luck!!

I got some great pics of Mia's 8 teeth today!! I just love her toothy grin!!

Colour Selection Excitement!!

It has been a pretty exciting week! We finally got to go and do our official colour selection with the builder. I thought it would be really daunting but because we did a lot of our homework before it wasn't as bad as I thought! It would have been CRAZY had we not looked at samples and picked most of the bits before hand!

We made the decision to change what we initially decided on for our kitchen cupboards. We are now doing a style called Natural Oak. It worked better with the red splashback. Here is a photo...



Everything else stayed the same. The cupboard handles that we picked are basically like the picture below - ours aren't as wide as that but you get the idea!



Here is a picture of the carpet and colour that we chose...the colour is called Cumberland.



My new vacuum arrived yesterday and boy does it have some serious suction power!!! I miss my motorised head of my other vacuum but I think this one picks up everything better!

The Love of My Life

I don't have much to report today...

1. I still haven't made my perogies yet. That is my plan this week but I just couldn't be bothered on the weekend.

2. Mia and I are basically over our colds now which is a nice change. We are really looking forward to going to swimming lessons this afternoon!

3. I can't express how much I love my little muffin Mia!! She is just the most precious thing EVER!!

Perogies

Today I am having a MAJOR craving for...perogies!! And before you think it...no I am not pregnant. I just LOVE perogies and you can't buy them here in Australia!! It is such a disgrace! Everytime I want them I have to make them from scratch and I have to say they are pretty labour intensive!! I think that will be my task this weekend...massive batch of perogies just waiting to be made and frozen to save for days like today.

On another note, our house plans have FINALLY been sent off to council for approval. Hopefully that will only take a couple of weeks and then the builders can finally start building! The build time with Perry Homes is 13 weeks so fingers crossed there will be no delays. At least I know we will be in our new house for Christmas (it better be well before that though!!). We go for our final colour selection appointment next Wednesday so that is exciting!

Mia is growing in leaps and bounds. She had her 11 month weigh and measure the other day and is now 9.28kg (20lbs 7oz) and is 73.5cm in length. She is still doing her caterpillar crawling and seems content with that. She gets up on all fours all the time but hasn't started "normal" crawling as yet. She gets to where she wants to go and can sit up from her crawling position so that keeps her happy. She is loving swinging on her swing as you can see! It is only 24 days until she turns the big 1. Eeeek!!!! I am finalising plans for her birthday party. It is pretty low key, being held at a park and I am making the cake (well cupcakes!) myself. Should be interesting!!

Mia and I are still trying to get over our cold that we both have. It has hung around for a while now!









Other exciting news is that thanks to my parents we have bought a new vacuum cleaner!!! Woohoo!!!! It is VERY colourful...purple and yellow actually!! Here is a picture of it...

What a Day!

What an absolutely shocking day!! I woke up this morning with an extremely sore throat, stuffy nose and generally feeling terrible. My day just continued to get worse as Mia decided that today would be the day that she would refuse to sleep. She spent most of the day whinging and rubbing her eyes but no matter what I tried she would not sleep for any length of time. Not the day to do this to mumma Mia!!! I needed to sleep myself! It is now after 8pm and I still feel terrible so it will be an early night to bed for me! I still love my Mia though...even though some days she drives me crazy!!

Found more fungus in the backyard today. I am going to have to do some research to see what I can spray along the retaining wall to get rid of it once and for all.

I am having a pretty quiet week this week. My friend Cass is coming over on Thursday and then on Saturday we are going to Kailin's first birthday party (which will be SO fun!!) but other than that the week is quiet. Probably a good thing since I am not feeling well!!

A friend of mine recently gave birth to her son Patrick at 23 weeks. He only weighed about 510g so we are all praying hard that he makes it through. He has a tough battle ahead of him.

Hopefully tomorrow will be better...

My little girl is 11 months old!!!!!

I think I am still in a state of shock...on Friday Mia turned 11 months old. The time has absolutely flown by!! In less than a month she will be a toddler - OMG!!! It is so amazing to look back at the scrapbook that I am sssslllllooooooooooowwwwllllllyyyyyy getting done for her and see her development across the months. She still isn't properly "crawling" but she is happy doing what she is doing. She gets up onto all fours and gets from her stomach to a sitting position so that keeps her happy. It is also incredible to watch how she interacts with the same toys she has had since the beginning. To start she would just touch them and look at them but now she is figuring out how to "use" them and it is so exciting to see! She is quite the chatterbox and is just the most gorgeous girl in the world!!!





On another note, we woke up this morning and looked out the back window and noticed a TOTALLY weird fungus growing near the retaining wall...absolutely disgusting and vile!!!



Our loan has finally all been sorted through the bank. A slight hiccup occurred that we thought would derail the whole process but luckily we got through it and our house plans will be sent off to council either late next week or first thing the week after. We think we have picked the wall colour for the inside of the house...called Grand Piano from the Dulux range. It seems to work the best with the tiles and cupboards that we picked.

Other than all of this my life has been pretty ordinary...but I kind of like it that way!