A birthday, boys, boots and a baby

It was Meeks' birthday yesterday, but the day didn't start well with Mitchy having a high temperature so having to stay home. However aside from the temperature he was okay. Mum came over to babysit the boys and Holly and Meeks and I went to have a special lunch at Pilu at Freshwater. When we turned up they were actually filming a segment from Masterchef. We found out it was one of the reward lunches. So if you watch Masterchef very carefully during the Pilu reward lunch when they arrive at the restaurant, Meeks and I are in the background ... maybe :) Anyway, the food was fantastic. We were so happy to have a beautiful meal.

After we got home Lucas, Sam and I made Meeks birthday cake. Later when it was cooked and cooled Lucas and Sam decorated it (you can see Sam did some sampling!)

After dinner we Meeks blew out the candles and we all enjoyed the cake including Mitch who was feeling a bit better

and even Holly got some

Today I went and did some shopping and bought Mitch some soccer boots and pads and some extra socks and shorts for training. Now in my day, soccer boots were black and occasionally had a few stripes on them. These days soccer boots can be all sorts of colours and as much as I would have liked to find him some black ones, I had to get him some white ones because those were the only ones they had in his size. They also happened to be the cheapest ones there, but that was just an added bonus. Anyway, here they are:

Very smart looking and just in time for training this afternoon and his first game on Saturday.

That's about all the news, I start my new job next week which I'm kind of looking forward to and kind of not after being on holidays for the last two weeks.

Here is another photo of Holly, just because she's cute :)

Mitch's Soccer Gala Day

Mitch had a pre-season gala day for his soccer team yesterday afternoon. He was very, very excited about it and couldn't wait to get his soccer jersey. He had three 20 minute games over the course of about 2 hours and was thoroughly pooped by the end of it, but loved every minute of it. He did extremely well and scored a few goals which were celebrated in style. It's fair to say he has a little tendency to boasting about it, but we'll try to get on top of that before it causes any trouble. Anyway, here are some shots from the day.

Holly at 6 months

And as promised a few photos of beautiful Holly at 6 months

and one of Holly and Sam

A day of milestones

Well today marks a few milestones so I thought I should blog about them briefly.

Firstly, it is Holly's 6 month birthday. We can't believe she has been in our lives for 6 whole months. She is such a smiley delight and we love her so much. Unfortunately she has a nasty cold and snot is flowing freely and her eyes are all red and ... well, she just doesn't look her best, so we will wait a few days and take some photos of her then.

Secondly Mitchy has his first loose tooth! One of his front bottom teeth is loose and he is very excited. Phrases like "I can't believe this is happening to me!" and "This is the best thing ever" were coming out of his mouth when he realised it, which may seem over the top, but they have also been applied to Meeks laminating one of his drawings or having tacos for dinner, so perhaps his threshold for over what constitutes the best things in his life is a little low.

Thirdly, we have started potty training Lucas and Sam. Meeks has made a little chart for both of them and every time they are successful they get a little star to put on their chart. Today was their first day and it went surprisingly well. Lucas is by far the more frequent urinator seeming to need to wee every 30 minutes or so, with a number of accidents (including one big number two) and a similar number of successes. He was so proud of himself every time he did a wee in the toilet. His little face lit up it was a delight to be able to see. He ended the day with 7 stars and then woke up about 2 hours after he'd gone to sleep wanting to do another wee in the toilet. Not sure if he'll make it through the night, but a very good first up effort. Sam is a slightly different case, he had no accidents, but then only did a wee twice in the toilet, despite being put on the toilet a number of times throughout the day. Hopefully he relaxes a bit tomorrow and gets into the flow of things.

Fourthly, today I had my first day of unemployment since January 2000. I was informed a few weeks ago by IBM that I was being made redundant as of March 31st. I have been very fortunate in securing a new job starting in the first week in April, so decided to take redundancy a couple of weeks early so as to get a bit of a break between jobs. The redundancy payout from IBM is generous, so I would have been okay without a job for a while, but it is indeed a answered prayer to have this new job so the period of stress was minimal for us all. The new job is in a small company and a world away from financial services so is very much a new start for me and I am very much looking forward to the challenge. I have quite a bit of reading to get through in these two weeks to get me a bit up to speed when I start in the beginning of April.

Fifthly, not really a milestone, but we're all in various stages of being sick with a nasty cold. Mitch and Lucas had it early last week, I had it bad over the weekend, but am coming out of it now, Sam has been off colour for a few days, Holly is pretty sick now and has been for a few days and Meeks just started getting it badly today. Again, fortunately I'm at home so I can help out, but if Meeks has it as bad as I did over the weekend, then she's in for a pretty unpleasant few days. Pray that we all get better!

Anyway, that's all the news for now!

Beautiful Holly

Just a very quick post of a bunch of pictures of beautiful Holly at 5 and a half months. She is rolling from back to front and very occasionally from front to back and she cut her first teeth this week. She is such a joy and blessing to us :)