Lusting after this and that...

this bloody brilliant branded bling

that for when i'm feeling cross

this inspiring re-invention

this for everyday encouragement

that for hiding my secrets (or secret junk)

this, this or maybe that... or maybe one of these for the walls of our future home (unless my ultimate of green dreams comes true with this pppretty ppplease!

this for kristian if he's good (hmmmmmmm)

definitely that for andrew

this to keep us warm during winter

that for me to drool over

this or this or this or this for counting dirty, dirty cash

this for my right brain

and on of these because it's so freakin cool

pulling it together

Time has been three dimensional this week. The days have been long, wide, high and encompassing a whole range of emotions.

Hugo's been sick with a cold. He's very rarely sick but has a pretty strong immune system so I'm sure he'll be back in working order in no time!

And on the au-pair front, I've thankfully struck an agreement with Andrew and he's coming here two days a week to look after Hugo so I can get some work done. It's soooooooooo good. Hugo absolutely adores having his uncle around and literally ignores me when he's around. I can't wipe his nose, but Andrew can. Drinks that I give him are a bore, but the ones Andrew provide are "a-licious"... and there are other benefits like this and this and this. The arrangement is terrific and I'd love to make it an ongoing thing, if only Andrew didn't want to travel next year!!

Thank God for great family though!!!

Bring on the rejection complex!

Well people, the great au-pair chose another family. Can you believe it?!

My hopes were absolutely dashed when the lovely woman from the au-pair agency called tonight to relay the news. She knows how hard it has been for us this time and I admit I almost cried.

The girl apparently really liked us and our home, but we were up against a gorgeous set of twin boys and she went for them instead as she wanted more of a challenge.

So, our third time has not been so lucky. We found Jen and Susi after interviewing only two other girls. This time, we have already interviewed six. One actually accepted the job and worked with us for three days before deciding that she didn't want to be an au-pair anymore (she was 25 and understandably a little too old for it).

Part of me is wondering whether all the stress and lack of luck could be sign that I should investigate another option - perhaps a couple of days in pre-school for Hugo instead?

I must admit that I like having the house to ourselves and it's actually tidier now than it's ever been! This arrangement would be perfect if I could only find a way to get a few free hours during the day for work.

So I'm going to call a few pre-schools that I've researched tomorrow and will take it from there. It might not be a bad idea, especially if I'm going to be working more from the office, I guess we'll see...

Patty & Selma Eat Your Heart Out

I've been into Macgyver cooking lately (yes, what a great term!).

It's basically what our mothers did nearly every night for dinner - they took ingredients from the fridge and pantry and threw them together to concoct a great or 'interesting' meal, using a good dash of trial and error (is that even allowed these days?).

It feels insanely liberating to cook without a recipe. Almost rebellious. The process is creative and inspiring and makes me think about flavours, the matching of flavours, all those new possibilities and the herbs that sit in our pantry waiting to be more frequently used (bay leaves, corriander seeds, etc).

In this experimental frenzy we've had grilled peri peri chicken with delicious salt & pepper sweet potato chips; quinoa & polenta with garlic tomato lentils and roasted herbed vegetables; and a yummy garlic, parmesan, white wine and lemon risotto with grilled chicken breast. And it's only been three days!

Anyone have any other homemade suggestions?

In other headlines.... we met with another au-pair today and I reeeeally like her. I hope she likes us too. I will suffer from immense issues of rejection if not! Unfortunately the two we met before her didn't work out. I did a little bit of snooping and know that this new au-pair has met with two other families, one of which she doesn't like, so we have a 50% chance... I should find out tomorrow :)

Also read this article, which presented a great point about last week's abandoned baby drama that I blogged about earlier in the week.

And hello... I'm soooo onto the global village vibe of things - came across the term 'word of blog' today and it reminded me of this blog entry....

SO, what's new with you?

Picture Perfect

I remember when getting family photos done was a rare and special occassion that took place every few years. Outfits were perfectly co-ordinated (sailor suits were fierce in those days), haircuts fresh, and ears even cleaned.

It's been a while since we've had any nice family photos taken so for Mothers Day this year, I organised for my dreadfully talented friend, Rebecca, to take some casual and candid shots of us all. Outfits were not discussed, haircuts were a sensitive issue and let's hope our ears are always clean now.

We held the shoot at our house over a couple of hours last Sunday and the relaxed environment produced some really amazing shots. I'm meeting with Bec tomorrow to go through all the pics, but here's a snapshot of the 500+ shots taken. Kristian wasn't really in the mood for pictures so we have around 10 uncomfortable shots of him and none of the three of us (Kristian, me and Hugo), so we plan to re-schedule with Bec to take some more... just for fun!

And as a side note, if any of you Sydney-folk are looking for a brilliant photographer, then you MUST visit Rebecca's website and book her in. She is so very talented. Everyone felt really happy and relaxed during the shoot and I credit that totally to her approach. Here's some of the results.... (and don't worry Mom, we'll be sending a disc of the best images to your Canadian shores this week!)

secret song-list

don't we all have them?? those corny and shameful songs you only listen to in the privacy of your room or with head phones on. and i'm not talking about those retro songs that actually are cool - we're talking major pop artists who the 'common folk' listen to. who knows why we associate superiority and class with such a subjective and emotive thing. the more popular a song is, the more uncool it seems to be to like it.

i think i actually lost a friendship when an uber-cool "rock star" friend of mine caught me off-guard, not listening to the presets or van-she and instead indulging in sugar snap, crackle...

but anyway, it's past midnight. hugo and kristian and asleep in our bedroom. kristian and i have argued over putting a "secret" pull-up nappy on hugo while he sleeps (me no, him yes) and i'm now staying up late for work, getting organised during this sweet silence and breaking it to listen to some of those scandalous sounds to keep me motivated.

and what exactly are those songs??

mariah carey, unplugged album: soooo good for dancing around the house and singing to, while waving your right arm up and down

whitney houston, i have nothing: do we really need an explanation for this one? it's a song karoke dreams are made of.

ne-yo, sexy love: this reminds me of being a teenager, holding unreciprocated crushes and daydreaming of being in love

ben e king, supernatural thing: dad loved this artist and we'd play his tape all the time at home. it was my first choice for housework, which (angelina as my witness) i spent most of my teenage years doing. it also reminds me of my dad's motorbike dance, which i'll happily demonstrate to any fool who asks... preferably to this song

janet jackson, that's the way love goes: am i detecting a teen-theme here? this was my favourite song when i was a teen. i choreographed my first routine to this tune and can still remember most of it. it reminds me of staying up late, dancing for hours in our family lounge room and the simple joy i got from doing it

luther vandross, don't you remember: i love this classic, poignant love song, it reminds me of the music my parents listened to when i was a child and is an absolutely perfect lonesome, singalong song

flamingos, only have eyes for you: to me, this is such an old-school romantic song. it reminds me of nights with billowing humidity, crickets, light summer dresses, the smell of aftershave and sweat...

ok, so anyone else want to fess up??

The Rise of the Stepford Mum

The media has been dominated with the story of baby Catherine lately, the beautiful baby girl who was abandoned by her mother in a Melbourne hospital on Mothers Day. Coverage about the possible where-abouts and disposition of her mother has sparked widespread debate - and so has the media's angles, in particular the Daily Telegraph's front page headline which proclaimed 'how could she?'

I was having a much needed glass of red last week with two girlfriends (also fellow mothers) and after seeing further front-page coverage, we began sharing our post-birth experiences.

We spoke about the rollercoaster of emotions and the crazy hormones, the torchurous sleep deprivation, the sudden responsibility, the immediate lack of 'self', difficulties with breast-feeding and the absolute shock. Then there were the bad days, the times when you sat at home feeling despondant and alone, crying and feeling as though you had lost all of that strength you once thought that you had.

It was liberating to have this conversation as I can freely say that they are rare. I've written about this in my journals over the past couple of years and remember a story that belongs to a good friend of mine. She claims no one spoke about depression or the bad days in her mother's group. She used to broach the subject and was met with silence and nothing in return.

I remember I went to a mothers group once with Hugo when he was very young. The mothers all had strict routines, personal trainers, everyone was happy and content and managed their homes, careers and children with perfectly groomed hair, their manicured fingers still clean. I felt so random, unorganised and out of place.

I only went to one meeting as grasping a little bit of chaos helped me cope. I needed space and air to adjust. Time became three-dimension. Some days were wide and tall and round, others were blinking and staccatto. I wanted to lie in bed with him, sometimes for whole days, I needed to nap together, to smell his baby neck and feel the folds of his legs, I needed to stare to see what our child actually looks like, learn what his different cries meant and quite simply bond without the notion of an obligatory timetable.

If anything, I feel for the mother who left baby Catherine, I don't think any empathetic human being would want to judge her. We can only imagine what she's going through and at least she showed the care to leave her baby at a hospital and not in a random and isolated area.

I don't think there are any simple answers or solutions to this. Life is messy and unpredictable and expectations of perfection, routine and happiness are utterly unrealistic for mothers and quite frankly, don't help the truly 'character stretching' experiencing that parenting is.

Does anyone else think it's ridiculous for the game, 'rock, paper, scissors' to be called a sport??

wordspy eat your heart out

anyone monitoring my internet habits (google anyone?), would know that every now and then i get insanely addicted to certain websites that include wordspy.

so in tribute to the site and the bevvy of new terms being born every day, here are some that i'd like to suggest....

remote playlisting/short mus-ention span: when you're so hungry to hear all the songs in your playlist that you can't last to the end of any tune and skip to the next song mid-way and so on...

cyber-stalking: surfing the blogs or myspace profiles of those you know in order to catch up with their latest, instead of actually meeting or talking with them

myspace slut: perhaps a little harsh, it's those with an insatiable need to garner a great number of "friends" on these sites to validate their worth or popularity

shamography: it's those uber cool pics you see on myspace profiles, the ones that have been "casually taken" and posted online to make one look cool. photoshop is necessary and so is a dash of vanity

ipod dependancy: those who can't be seen alone in public with an ipod, whether it's to exercise, roam the shops or wait for a friend - i challenge you to find someone who just sits in public now!

au-pairs. don't come easy. to me.

As many of you know, our second au-pair, Susi left us on Monday to selfishly trek around the country - how could she!!??!

Our family experiences an interesting transition whenever it's time for an au-pair to leave. It's almost like losing a member of the family. There's sadness as we miss having Susi around; adjustment to the lack of help (I stayed up until 2am two nights this week to manage my workload with making meals, laundry and housework as Hugo engrosses most of my time), but there's also a new sense of family, which we are really enjoying.

I love spending all of this extra time with our little Hugo. He's much happier and absolutely adores spending days with Andrew and Mum as they've been helping us. Kristian definitely feels more at home and we've re-gain a sense of our little family unit, just the three of us.

Nevertheless, it's not practical for me try and effectively manage everything on my own, so we're in search of another au-pair. It's such a bad time of the year as there aren't many people coming out for winter. We're in competition with at least three other families for every au-pair that arrives and because each person not only works for you, but also lives with you and looks after the most precious thing in the world, we can't just go with anyone.

We've seen one au-pair in the past two weeks and find out tomorrow whether she also likes us (as we thought she would be good) .... So wish us luck!

It looks like I was onto something two months ago as wordspy has featured the new terms eco-anxiety and eco-sexual this month.... interesting stuff!

Let's Get Physical

After a few years of serious inaction, Kristian and I have become quite the active couple lately. Kristian plays squash three times a week and I've been enjoying intensive two hour dance classes at the Sydney Dance Company for the past two months.

It's interesting to see how things have changed since I last enjoyed these classes. It's been around five years. I used to dance with friends and then started with a small Japanese crew before becoming distracted with other pursuits - in particular, Kristian and my career.

The only studio I still remembered was the Sydney Dance Company so I started attending Sunday afternoon hip hop classes and then ventured into mid-week territory, incorporating funk too.

The atmosphere of a dance studio is truly something electric. I'm almost always nervous in anticipation... the smell of the studios, the creativity, the discipline, and the way dancers totally submit and release to the shameless blasting of music that shakes that area in your centre (where rumour says your soul sits). Mine certainly doesn't after a good class. The aftershocks can leave me giddy for days afterwards. It felt right to be back.

I know that mainstream hip hop and pop charts often intertwine (for instance, Justin Timberlake can be found here on the hip hop, pop and dance charts), but I've been recently shocked to discover how this has translated into the dance arena.

My first experience was during a funk class. Mid-week on a Wednesday night, the studio was nearly overflowing with funky young professionals in fitted, coordinated outfits with perfectly styled hair, girls with make-up on, designer bottles of water littering the black corners. Warm- ups were a challenging combination of sit ups, push ups, dance stretches and strengthening exercises, all in anticipation of the routine ahead. And despite men making up around a third of the class, we learnt choreography to the Pussy Cat Dolls song, "Beep". I was surprised that a teacher would stand the risk of alienating such a large percentage of her audience with an admittedly 'girly' routine, but thought it had been a while and was time to get with the times.

I also thought it would be my last funk class. As catchy as they are, the Dolls aren't for me.

Conflicting work and family adventures meant it was couple of weeks before I returned to a class and I couldn't contain my disappointment when after another gruelling 3o minute warm up, the 'hip hop' teacher warned the class that the routine was to the Pussy Cat Dolls song, "Buttons". WTF??

I tried to stay open-minded when he told us to 'release the sexual tension within', I tried to get into character when the choreography meant that the girls had to act like literal sexed-up cats with the boys gawking at the back of the room (but only did it once as it truly felt too demeaning), thanked the Lord I have short hair when the instructor asked for the girls to take their hair out as he thought it was sexier for the routine (none of the girls did it though), but my anger and frustration won when the WHOLE routine resembled something I learnt at Alicia's hen's night.

Don't get me wrong, I'm absolutely fine with learning that style of dancing if that's what I've paid for and I understand that the sexualisation of women in hip hop film clips may justify this sexed-up style being taught, but am still pissed off.

The teacher spent a lot of time talking about himself (even asking the class about his hair before discussing his recent drunken cut) and was blind to the fact that his class was clearly uncomfortable, which made the room feel awkward, which made the teacher talk even more. There were a lot of young girls, six boys who learnt about two bars of eight and stood at the back of the room for the majority of the class and when we were asked to team up with the opposite sex, no one was willing, even after a lengthy pep-talk. It just didn't work.

I left the class right on the time it ended, despite moves still being taught, apologising to my partner (yes, I felt sorry for the dejected guys at the back and helped to team three of them up). We both agreed this wasn't hip hop and shook hands. On my way out, I heard another guy from the class complaining to a friend about how shitty it was.

I drove home full of rage, particularly at the sexualisation of girls and women. I was angry that young women were being taught to 'sex it up' in a local dance class by a self-engrossed and immature boy. I understand that some think the Pussy Cat Dolls encourage empowerment in young girls, but I don't agree when their lyrics talk of stealing your sista's boyfriend and their style encourages young women to look like cloned strippers who use sex and stimpy outfits to gain power - why not use your intellect, sense of humour, character and personal style? This is not girl power, even if it does sell records.

Anyway, my livid state fuelled me to search for an alternative, so if anyone is looking for an authentic, humble and grassroots hip hop class to attend in Sydney, I'd recommend you skip the Sydney Dance Company (unless you go to Sunday afternoons hip hop, which isn't soooo bad) and go to Dancekool. Their classes are central, cheap and everyone there is friendly and unpretenious when they almost have every right to be because their moves absolutely kick ass.

Eurovision Gold

Can someone tell me why the Ukraine didn't win!!???

Better late than never??

Crikey, it's been months since an update! So what's new??

We are well. Hugo is BIG, Kristian and I are trying not to be. Susi is leaving us tomorrow. Sob. Boo.

Here are some highlights and favourite photos from the last few months...

Hugo and I went to the Hi-5 concert with Sam and Louis:





















Hugo playing with his handsome little friend Nathan:











Hugo playing before his second birthday party:











Hugo likes to line his trucks and trains up the same way:














Kristian and Hugo at the zoo (I love this picture):
























Hugo sleeping in the car:














Cute after a nap:














Painting:






























Post-painting close-ups:









































Escaping the heat during summer....















Parkin' fun:
































































Bath time:





















































Randomness:





























Views from our apartment, local park, etc...