Amanda’s Musings

Our house has not been in a daily routine for the last four weeks. I didn’t want to say anything on here until we were all back to normal and you’ll see why. For the last week and a half the three of us have been in Sydney, we got back last night to a boiling hot Perth (42 here yesterday). For the three weeks prior to that Michael was away in Peru and Keziah and I were home alone.

Those three weeks were very very long weeks. I tried to book myself up for things as much as I could and in the weeks leading up to his departure I was overwhelmed with thoughts of how am I going to handle just me and Kezi alone for that long. I thought I just wouldn’t handle doing everything for Kezi as Michael always does the mornings for me by getting her up and giving her breakfast. Being pregnant meant that I was probably more emotional but also more weary.

In the end, the hardest part of each day wasn’t the work, in fact I coped fine with that. I went to bed around 9pm each night and had naps when she had hers in the day so I was ok with doing everything. What really got to me was lonliness. I had no one coming home at night and chatting to me and no one to say goodnight to. That was the hardest part.

I was counting down the days until Keziah and I would fly to Sydney to meet up with him and it was a great reunion. For the whole three weeks Kezi told me ‘Daddy’s on plane’ so when we went on one she was surprised he wasn’t there. He was at the airport though and she ran and gave him a big hug.

Our time in Sydney was for our annual SIM State Ministry Director’s get together. It was a great time to catch up with our team and spend quality time sharing. The second half of our time in Sydney was spent at a private house for our meetings and Kezi had a wonderful backyard to play in. She tends to throw herself around a fair bit and has the bruises on her legs to prove it! She fell down the three outside steps head first twice but each time got up and just said ‘oh dear’. She’s tough.

All three of us (actually four) are home again now and back into our routine. Apart from the fact that it was raining with a big thunderstorm in Sydney and we had to fly to a very hot Perth, I’m glad to be home. I wish we could have brought the rain with us!

Here are some shots from our time away, you can see some of Michael’s Peru trip photos on his Flickr page here. Oh and he went to Peru with SIM to vist the work there. He got to visit Camp La Joya which I posted about a few weeks ago and to visit Machu Pichu!

Its very very good to be home altogether.

The last two are Kezi in her own hat from Peru and then Michael’s hat from Peru. The last shot is a favourite!

I’ve got more to say about our time in Sydney but I thought this would be a quick update summary.

It seems that Kezi has reached the stage where she likes carrying around dollies. She has one or two actual dolls that are not anything too fancy like Baby Borns for example but that doesn’t matter at all. Its quite funny to watch as she enters true toddlerhood and offers dolly her drink or food or puts her to bed. I bought a little doll jumper from the cheap shop today and she loved that! I think I’ll have to get clever with my sewing or knitting and start making them because dolls clothes are a complete rip off!

For her first birthday my Dad gave her a very special present. He fixed up a little wooden cot that my Grandad had made for my Mum when she was a little girl. I played with it too for years and eventually it fell apart with age. He did a fabulous job and its been waiting for Keziah to be old enough to appreciate it (she’s almost 2 and 5 months now). Its so well fixed up that she will be able to pass it down to her daughter if she has one which is really great I think.

Kez in her dolls cot!

Today I found her a little packet of baby born size nappies for dolls and she absolutely loved putting them on all her dolls till the packet ran out. Even poor ol’ Big Bird and Ernie have nappies on them. She has a little pusher (stroller) that my Mum bought her but apart from that her toys aren’t that doll related.

Poor ol’ Big Bird and Ernie although they look like someone just told a good joke!

Anyway, its so much fun having a little girl (I’m sure boys are great fun too) and for someone as boisterous and sociable as her, its so great to see her being all sweet and motherly to her dollies. It can only get better. : )

My creative urge has not yet returned but recently I took some photos of work that I did over the last couple of months. This first one you may have seen before as I had it for sale in my shops for a while. I sold it with the request to make a matching baby’s bracelet:

With Valentine’s Day coming up I made a little heart shaped set to enter a Challenge for the PCAGOE (polymer clay artists guild of Etsy). It wasn’t much but it was all the creativity I could muster!

Then recently I came up with a new way of using the rough edged parts of the clay when its put through the pasta machine. I quite like the results and when I get the energy to put these in my shops I will!

I have had a go at my gocco but decided to wait till I’m not pregnant to use it as I had to use turpentine to clean up the screen. I quite like how they turned out and have since then been working back into the prints with watercolour. I’ll take a photo soon when I’ve finished one.

Ok, so that’s my creative update. Bye for now!