Thanksgiving

This year for Thanksgiving we didn't make any plans. Seeing that it is NOT a public holiday out here (or even celebrated) and that I am usually the host...which wasn't going to happen this year post jaw surgery, we didn't even bother.

THEN- a couple days before Thanksgiving, we received a text from a friend (Tash Bains) inviting us over to celebrate. He father is Canadian and they were going to have a harvest celebration (aka Thanksgiving), and since we were American we were invited. I didn't even bring anything to contribute to the table, we just showed up and ate food! It was great and most of the food was soft (mashed potatoes, stuffing, pie, sweet potatoes, cranberry sauce etc...) so I could eat most of it :-)

The house we went to was outside of town near the farms. Tash had a horse that would stand by the front door with its head in the entry way- the kids loved it! All in all, I am grateful for friends during the holidays!

Family Pictures!

We get our family pictures taken every couple of years. We were due for an update and I found someone to take some snap shots of the family!  

Love this one Olivia & Mary

Family Shot (Olivia 10, Thomas 5, Mary 8)

Stan and I....we are supposed to be serious :)

Olivia in action

Mary adores her daddy-

Daddy and the girls

Daddy and the kids

Thomas and I

The kids and I

and a few black and white group shots-

Enjoy!

Olivia's first billboard!

So you may not know this, but Olivia was picked up by an agency called Triple Talent earlier this year. After she got so far in the Annie Auditions for Broadway (second to last kid cut), we had a lot of people approach us about getting Olivia on their books. We originally declined and let her sit for a year, and then decided to go with an agency called Triple Talent, after realising if you are not with an agency you don't get many opportunities to audition for work. After getting some head shots and attending a few auditions, we learned that Olivia loves the spotlight and she LOVES 'chat-to-cameras'. Basically when you audition for anything you just talk to a camera about whatever they tell you too-

On her second audition ever she landed a part as a kid eating chicken in a Coles commercial (Coles is a grocery store in Australia). It was fun, you get fed on set, do a lot of waiting around, finally film, and get paid pretty good (I think she got $750.00 for that commercial and she was only allowed to work for 4 hours- so we got to go home early)!  We set up a bank account in her name and all her money goes into this account which she can cash out once she is 18.

Anyway, as fate would have it, Olivia's photo shoot for Cottees cordial got rained out and postponed just a few days after my jaw surgery. I organised a ride for her (minors always have to be supervised by an adult) and since I was in and out of hibernation, I completely forgot about the photo shoot until I drove Stan to the train station and did a double take! I was absolutely flabbergasted to see a billboard of my daughter! Usually when you do modeling you have no idea what they will use the pictures for or IF they will use the pictures, so we were lucky to see it! 

 

I then looked on their Face book page and there were lots more pictures https://www.facebook.com/CotteesAustralia

We later found out this was a national campaign and that these billboards were by every train station in Australia. The best part about the modeling is that we usually get to keep the clothes later! I think Olivia has come away with over 1K worth of clothes in the last 6 months. I can't complain since she and Mary as the same size. Olivia is also very good at sharing and let's Mary have a pick of what clothes she wants to keep.

Halloween!

This year for Halloween Stan was up in Kuala Lumpar (Malaysia) for a quick business trip. He was sad  to miss it, as he was only gone for three days, but those three days overlapped with Halloween. This meant, that I needed to take the kids trick-or-treating 16 days post operation.

I am not going to lie, I had a lot of people doing double takes (I am sure they were thinking, 'is that a mask or her face?) Then someone finally did ask...and I was like "Nope...It's not a mask.... (then the long awkward silence) with me trying to flex my smiling muscles with my mouth wired shut...not pretty :-)

In the name of going the extra mile, I also arranged to come into my kids classrooms  (to Olivia's horror) to do a 1 hour presentation on Halloween. I was quite proud of myself. I researched how Halloween is celebrated throughout the world. I learned that France and Australia are the only two countries in the world that fail to celebrate Halloween. I showed the class what a Jack-o-lantern looks like and told them the history behind it. I brought in apples in a bucket and had them try bobbing for apples. We also tried donuts on a string and then the classic ghosts made with lollipops and tissue (then you draw the face on them). Everyone thought I was a genius which I got quite a kick out of.

Since I was talking funny I just had to tell the class in the beginning that I had just had an operation and while my mouth was wired shut I had just had it loosened so I could talk a little bit. I had one little girl walk up to me and tell me that her class had just learned about "not staring at people" I was like "that is nice...." and then she walked off :-)

This year we probably got about 20 pieces of candy after trick-or-treating for an hour or two. It was cold weather so people were not up to the trek. We did have a lot of trick-or-treaters at our house. We live on a pretty busy main road and this year we decorated very well so everyone was pulling over to ring our door bell. Olivia loved it and would wait by the door to hand out candy. We also passed out announcements to our neighbors explaining Halloween and telling them when to expect trick-or-treaters. I don't think people bothered reading the announcement because while we were handing them out people started handing my kids candy. I was like 'tell them Halloween is not TODAY' but my kids kept getting candy (even without a costume).

Either way- Happy Halloween!

Jaw Surgery

So I haven't blogged for a while! Sorry!! Just after my last post I underwent jaw surgery. It sucked (no pun intended :-)

Long story short, I love love love teeth and when I look at anyone for the first time I usually have something good to say about their teeth. Sometimes I even read about teeth online when I have free time. So I love all things about teeth and so you would think that I would take care of mine RIGHT?

No- I didn't wear my retainer post 2 years of braces as a teenager, I am a bad brusher, don't even ask me about flossing. But I LOVE my teeth because I just NEVER get cavities and what's not to love about that?

Anyway, I went to the Whitsundays (Great barrier reef) for my 10- year anniversary afterwards while looking at the pictures I saw a picture of me smiling my heart out and realised my gummy smile has gotten pretty bad. Yes, click on the picture and zoom in - that is a row of gums!

 So I promptly interviewed about 6 orthodontists... thinking maybe a retainer at night or invisalign. After the first 5 told me 2 years of braces + jaw surgery I decided all orthodontists in Australia are charlatans and then sat on the decision for a while. I read blogs, looked online, and then interviewed one last orthodontist (the most expensive I might add), who took all these pictures of my face and profile and then sat me down and did a 10 minute power point presentation where he showed me where my jaw was wrong and how they would fix it and how I would look and then sent me home with a CD so I could review his procedure at home.

He spent and extra 20 minutes giving me a full diagnosis while the other orthodontists met me for the first time, took a quick look and rattled off the same solution...This orthodontist is also a little OCD and gets impatient with his staff when they do not work efficient. He is an extreme perfectionist and so I decided this is EXACTLY the person I want to work with.

I did my first consultation in October, then in November I had to get ready for the braces. Impressions, x-rays, replacing a cap that I had on my front tooth. (I knocked out my front tooth as a 9 year old and the cap was still holding strong 20 years later- but since we were putting braces on we decided to replace it so it would be strong).

Stan was not happy about the braces option so I paid double and got them on the inside of my teeth (this is called Lingual braces) They are more expensive because they are a massive pain for the orthodontist. Everything is done backwards and there is also less surface to stick the braces to from the inside, so it can get quite tricky.  All in all I LOVED lingual braces, as my smile started to look better and better and people couldn't put their finger on what was different (note: picture off the Internet).

Anyway, the plan was to have braces on for 1 year then do the jaw surgery and then keep the braces on for 6 more months. We moved the jaw surgery up to mid-October for some reason and in hindsight this was good as it gave me more time to recover. 

The surgery was good- I was asleep and can't remember anything. My surgeon was the best in Melbourne and even the hospital staff who would bring me water all commented how lucky I was to have him. My recovery was awful, but compared to just about everyone else who has done it, it was awesome. I didn't have any complications, I got feeling back in my face, my swelling went down quickly, I weaned of medicine very quickly and so I really shouldn't complain, but seriously I shutter at the thought of anyone ever doing jaw surgery in the future. 

I lost a lot of weight (got down to 105 lbs), and I wasn't going in with much (115lbs). I was so hungry and tired that I spent almost 6 weeks straight sleeping- it was like hibernating. I wanted to eat, but it took so much effort and time to suck 1 cup of soup that I just didn't have the energy.  I was cold a lot too- which was odd because we were going into the summer. 

The scariest part of the whole surgery was when my kids came home from school with gastro. I was worried if I caught it and needed to vomit I would drowned in my vomit because my mouth was wired shut. As fate would have it I did catch it, but because I was eating so little to begin with I only dry-heaved. 

Anyway, it is now 6 months post surgery and I have two months left of braces. I get them off in June. I don't look much different- some people look really different after jaw surgery- I look the same, but my teeth look better! 

Mary's Baptism Photo-shoot!

So every year I try to take a quick photo-shoot of my kids. Here are Mary's 8 year old photo's and some info about Mary this year. 

 Mary is in year 2 (grade 2) at Coatsville Primary School. Her teacher is Miss Hemming 

 Mary's best friend is Natalie. Mary is very social and will have a 'bad day' if she doesn't get some one-on-one time with a friend or parent. With that said, she prefers one or two people over a whole group of people.

 Mary is very detailed and cares a lot about her appearance. She would rather go to school hungry (no breakfast) than compromise her hair. She loves jewelry and nails and all things glam. She loves skirts and dresses, but lately prefers to wear basketball shorts, and a t-shirt with some flip-flops + jewelry. Mary will ALWAYS wear her hair in a pony tail (I had to talk her into wearing it down for these pictures) 

 Mary LOVES babies and will spend hours of one-on-one time with them. She recently told me, she wanted to be a baby doctor, I told her that was called a paediatrician! 

  Mary got Stan's brain. She can out spell Olivia, and picks up math rather easily. Her favourite books to read are 'fairy books' she reads about fairy almost every night...which is good since she keeps loosing teeth. She gets regular visits by the tooth fairy. 

 Mary plays on an under 9 girls basketball team. She is going on over a year in basketball now and is quite good a defence. Her height is an added bonus!

 Mary also does swimming lessons and little nippers (surf life-saving) during the summer. She also started piano lessons this year.

 Mary can be very gentle and kind, but she also likes to be the second mom and if anyone in the house gets a lecture, she usually chimes in her two cents.

 Mary doesn't like sandwiches...of any kind. She usually gets raisin toast in her lunch or a bread roll.

 This year Mary has developed a tolerance for boys. She used to cry if there was one in her swimming class, this year she is the only girl and she is handling it well. To top it off there is one boy named 'Hayden' that might have a crush on her. She might have a crush on him....

 Mary has two hobbies at home that she LOVES. The first is Cooking. Mary is very meticulous when it comes to following a recipe and measuring out ingredients. She has a gift too- her food sometimes turns out better than mine!

 Her second hobby is painting. She got an easel from Stan earlier this year, and will spend hours, drawing out pictures, and then painting over them. She really enjoys paying attention to detail and has quite a bit of patience with both cooking and painting and school. 

 I think Mary is gorgeous! I love her dark curly hair, it is so thick and grows out so well. She is very tall and muscular. She got a good mix of genes. 

 Mary has a delicate balance. She loves her sleep and food. I taught her about Maslows hierarchy of needs and she likes to remind me which areas in her life needs attention. "mom my social needs are not being met, so I need to have a play date."

 Mary's nickname is Mary-Bear, but her middle name is Adelle. She loves both. 

 Mary got her ears pierced for her 8th birthday. She is wearing pink diamond studs.

 Mary can be quite shy at first and usually likes to hang back and assess before jumping into a situation.

 Mary's body temperature is about 10 degrees warmer than me and Olivia's. She is constantly hot and I find her sweating at night. She tends to sleep in 'not much' compared to Olivia who can go to sleep in a layered sweatsuit.

Mary is the teachers pet every year. She LOVES her teachers and loves school. I think out of all my kids, she is the most well-rounded and has a bright future ahead! LOVE you Mary Bear!

School Holidays, Footy Grand Final, & the Royal Melbourne Show....

It is spring break here in Melbourne!  We have two weeks off of school until we head into our last term of the school year. On the last day of school each of the kids had to dress up in the colours of their favourite footy team (Australian Football League). AFL is really only a game played in Australia and in Australia only Melbourne is really into it. It is a mix between rugby and American football.

Saying Melbourne is "into it" is an understatement. The majority of people LOVE footy season. The games are on TV all the time, the stadiums are almost always packed and people can be quite "feral" (as the Aussies would put it) when it comes to team spirit.

Olivia decided to barrack for Carlingford (because her BFF and boy-crush, go for them (and on the last day of school you get put into teams with other kids who barrack for the same team).

 Mary cheered for the Swans (who I have a deep respect for). Long story short: footy was so big in Melbourne (a while ago) that a certain footy team (Collingwood) decided they  no longer wanted to share their sports training facilities with the Australian Olympic team. Collingwood said they needed the extra practice. It went to court and the footy team won. The Olympians had nowhere to train, so the Sydney swans gave the Olympians their training facilities and moved up to Sydney.

Thomas barracks for Hawthorne (which was the team that won the grand final this year). Stan and I are undecided. Most families barrack together and you cannot change your mind from year to year...otherwise you are called a "turncoat." In Australia you barrack vs. root for a team. Rooting is a very crass word which means "sex" in Australia, so to root for a team would be even more of a shock vs. rooting a person.

Once school was out we have had lots of time to play and hang out with friends. This Saturday we went to the royal Melbourne show, which is basically a big carnival. The kids had a blast.

 

 can't believe Olivia and Mary went on this one-

 Thomas and I did this one together-

 and the bubble balls (my kids favourite)-