Tonight while running the bath Grace decided she needed to give me quite a few demonstrations of how she does a poo on the potty.
Without the sound effects the pics don't really do it justice, but you can get the general idea!
Just imagine lots of grunting and it will be just like you were there!
Down to the 'tunnel park' for dinner tonight... Well, dinner doesn't quite seen the right word for hungry jacks burgers but still....
On the way we had to go to the plaza and of course Grace had to have a ride in the car carousel thingy.... With her turtle obviously.
At work today this arrived in the mail for me.
I knew exactly what it was, but admittedly had never actually seen one to realise how huge they are.
It's a satellite tag that gets attached to a Tuna to transmit data about its location, speed, water temperature and a multitude of other information.
It does float, but still, I pity the poor fish that have to swim around with this hanging off their fins.
A birthday party for us all today as Kahu turned two today.
Grace had fun playing with all the kids and Kahu's toys, the cake tasted every bit as good as it looked, and the rain held out just long enough.
Followed by lunch at the Coffee Club, it was another good day.
In fact, the toughest part of the day was trying to build a cardboard castle for Grace with no instructions. Not even a picture of how it should look!
Canberra show today! I've been looking forward to it for a while now, and i wasn't disappointed.
It may be a little bit Country for me, but still a good day out.
Grace as usual loved the animals, and this year's photo of her holding a duckling is a much happier look than last year!
We also got a Pet Shop show bag that Grace was very happy with. Face painting went down well, and i was pretty impressed with the huge parliament house and capital hill made from fresh fruit.
Seems like it was self serve night at Bunnings tonight.
I actually couldn't find anyone to open the roller door for me so I did it myself and drove in. Which did get some staff attention at least.
But by the time I got the timber I needed, there was once again no-one to be found so I had to write down the codes etc myself to then be told off by the register guy that it should have been written on proper Bunnings paper.... Aaarrrrgghhhh.
I did eventually get everything I needed paid for and finally found someone to let me back out.
Dinner at the club tonight, trying to get back to our Thursday night tradition, albeit by ourselves since the Merrys didn't make it.
Snitty was delicious as always... I think actually even better since its been a while since we last had one.
After snitty we went down to the riverside where Grace loved playing in the sand and was pretty impressed with all the ducks and birds.
We had a swing in the big swing there too, though looking at the photos, I'm not sure who had more fun!
Grace is loving walking around the block with Baxter at moment so, to save it being so late, tonight we went before dinner.
But right before leaving she decided she must bring her stethoscope with her.
Made it quite a slow walk when Grace had to keep stopping to check her vitals.
Thankfully, they were 'sounding good' every time she checked.
Not that she always quite managed to check in the right place!
Tonight after work I played with Grace and her play dough for a while. I thought my version of a dolphin was pretty good...
Then since she no longer used her high chair, because (in her words) she's a big girl now, we shortened the legs so Grace would have a chair to use at her play table... Where she proceeded to take the role of Queen of the house far too seriously - by reclining and barking orders for toys, drink and snacks...
So clearly these are not my photos today, but they both really impressed me.
The first is an amazing photo taken by an astronaut currently living in the International Space Station. Though from there, every photo is amazing.
And tonight for the second time in a month, but the last time for a lot of years, Jupiter was eclipsed by the Moon. I didn't get a photo, but I was impressed to see how clear and bright it was last night. So this photo amazed me to see how clear it was. You can even deeper two little dots on the lower right which are two of Jupiter's own moons. Just awesome.
So it may be coming up to twelve months since I first started the project, but today I finally got Graces Teddy Zoo done so that it now actually holds teddies.
And despite our reservations on how many will fit, it turns out that all of the teddies we wanted in there fitted just perfectly.
As you can see, it looks awesome.
Perfection really does take time. I just need to convince Leah of that now! Though maybe she already knows. It does explain why she married me, considering I'm 10 years older... That's 10 years more perfection in the making.
This morning Grace decided she MUST fit into the new storage boxes Leah bought. But she really didn't fit.
It was amazing how long she tried to get in and get them zipped shut though.
And then tonight we went to the Circus and got to hold a baby lion cub. Well we got shoved into a seat, thrown a lion to hold tight, told to smile, and then dragged back off the seats quicker than you could say "Look Grace, it's a baby lion, give it a pat".
Hence the reason in the photo we all look like stunned lion holders. And poor Grace didn't even get to touch it.
But she did get to have a pony ride at intermission which she was pretty excited about.
Gadget day today.
We ordered a dual screen setup for the car a while back that connects to an iDevice to display the video /photos on two 7" screens, and it arrived today.
Grace was so impressed with it she sat in the back of the car in the garage and watched Toy Story.
And tonight I was impressed to buy a digital tape measure at Bunnings that, among other things, will automatically calculate distance between points by simply rolling it along. It will also evenly divide the distance and beep each time you need to mark a spot.
Very handy for even spaced picture hanging is what I am thinking. I can hardly wait to use it tomorrow. I'm sure Leah can find at least a few projects for it!
Tried to take a photo of Baxter this afternoon but because I was laying on the couch and inherently lazy, I didn't want to get up so just held my phone left handed and nearly dropped it on every shot.
As you can see, this certainly leads to a very distinctive style of photography.
I call it the 'blur' effect.
Grace has a favourite pet shop in Canberra.
She tells us is because they have turtles there.... But I think it's really because every time we go there she climbs in the Dog houses and checks them all out for comfort.
And of course, today Lula had to check them with her.
Playing on the trampoline this afternoon and everything was going well until Grace saw me getting my phone out for a blog photo.
By the time I got the Camera opened, this was all I got!
A trip to Kmart and the bargain of the year so far - Lula the Dog. She is a FurrReal puppy that wakes up and goes to sleep as you pat her back. And she was less than 1/4 of her normal price. Yay.
No idea where the name came from, Grace just decided that her name was Lula.
After we bought her we had to take her to the seaside to feed the birds, have a swing, see some 'seaweed' and then she was so tired we had to give her a bottle in the car.
Grace really does love Lula.
Grace really loves Baxter. She loves to play with him. She loves to cuddle him. She loves to sit with him. She loves to torment him. And most of all, she loves to walk him.
So today she was so excited to be on her Nans bed with Baxter she actually asked us to take their photo.
And this afternoon between thunderstorms we met Nathan and Maddie and Tucker for a play.... Where Grace proudly told me that Maddie was her best friend and Tucker was Baxter's best friend too.
Today consisted mainly of playing with Grace. Which means playing with her Pet Shops A LOT.
Today they had a lot of picnic time but there was barely enough room on the picnic blanket for them all, she has so many.
The Top Gear Festival comes to Sydney next month. I wasn't terribly interested in going until I heard that the would be a race between Casey Stoner on a MotoGP bike and Mark Webber in his F1. So then I got excited about it.
But after reviewing the full weekend program it appears that there really isn't that much else that appeals to me.
So maybe that's still a no go...
Grace had a really late day nap today, so after tea to try and wear her out a little, we took her and Baxter for a walk up to the oval.
Baxter was very impressed with the Frisbee that we took, and Grace was very impressed with walking Baxter.
She must be tired now, it was hot, and she walked all the way, though I'm not sure who was walking who really.
Some days I am amazed at how many talents I actually have.
Not only can I sing (averagely), play guitar (awesomely), play piano (kind of), cook (a bit), make stuff (sometimes), fix stuff (most of the time), rebuild a rotary engine (if I ever needed to), ride a bike (like most of us), write computer software (pretty well), write and publish short stories (excellently), write and publish a color book of poetry (brilliantly), Manage data and compliance with a worldwide tuna fishery (single handedly saving a species)....the list goes on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on.....anyway, you get the point...
Hmmmm, now I've lost mine.
Oh yeah, in addition to all of the above stuff, it seems I can also be a good dog groomer.
Well I can brush a dog. With a brush.
Its been a while since I went to Questacon and I have to say, despite all the photos and descriptions I have been given over the past few months since it became a semi regular hangout for Leah and Grace, I was still pretty surprised how much it has changed.
But its better now than last time I was there and it was funny having Grace show me things that she liked to play with.
A bit of a strange food day today.
For breakfast I had some turkish pide with cucumber dip.
For morning tea I had some turkish pide with cucumber dip.
For lunch I had some turkish pide with cucumber dip.
For afternoon tea I had some turkish pide with cucumber dip.
And for dinner I had pancakes with cream (I did have more turkish pide with cucumber dip, but just couldn't bring myself to eat it).
Yes that is a bowl with a 6-8cm thick stack of blueberry pancakes and an entire tub of cream.
Since Leah took Grace to the Dinosaur Museum last week, Grace has been begging to go back. So today I took her back to have a look.
I was personally a little underwhelmed by it, since nearly all of the moving displays were not working today. Despite Grace assuring me they were working on Thursday.
But we did a fossil hunt, found a fossil that we weren't allowed to keep, and got a sharks tooth instead.
Grace loved using the magnifying glass to look at all the fossils though!
Then tonight after a few failed dinner attempts for various reasons, we finally ended up at the playground in Yarralumla, with enough Turkish food to feed all of Turkey for a week. Thankfully I heard that Turkey had food already (plus it wasn't dinner time there), so we got to try and eat it all ourselves. 4 Australians can make pretty light work of the Turkish weekly rations I discovered.
Hopefully after a decent play with Maddie, it will be enough for Grace to sleep 42-6-7, and not just 42 like she told us.
When we got our Nintendo Wii 5 years ago, one of the coolest things to do in it (I thought) was create a Mii character in my likeness.
Today we plugged in the Wii for the first time in months (or years) and I was still amazed at how much I think my Mii looks like me. Apart from it having SOME hair...
We also found the "thumbs up" photo of me on the Wii. Taken in 2008 it showcases the second most amazing feature back then - the ability to email photos directly to the Wii.
The photo was taken in my office at CCAMLR in Hobart. And the thumbs up was to show how cool it was to email our Wii.
Quick lesson: when you are trying to pack down the contents of your wheelie bin on garbage night, do step it down with your foot of necessary. But do NOT, I repeat, NOT stand completely in the bin when it is balanced on uneven ground, surrounded by pebbles and a stone retaining wall.
Even as I was lifting my second leg into the bin, before I felt it start to tip, something told me this was not a good idea. And when it did start to tip, that same something told me this isn't going to end well.
And now, 4 days later, it hasn't. The top photo is my left leg mmediately after the fall, and the bottom one was taken this morning...
As a very wise man used to say to me "that's a trap for young players". Just a shame I'm not so young anymore to use that excuse...
This is actually a photo I took last year when I was building the scooter we bought Grace for Christmas, but I only just remembered that I never got around to blogging it.
Now remember, this scooter is called "My First Scooter", so to me, there is a definite implication that it's for small children.
Not to mention that it is covered in Disney Princesses, which I would have thought not so popular with the adults.
Finally, with a 20kg weight limit, I am convinced it is a scooter small children.
Which leads me to the question of....why is there a warning about not riding while intoxicated?
Sorry Grace, but it looks like we will have to stop putting the Kahlua in your milk. Well at least, if you want to ride your scooter.
