General Catch Up

Well, I am so behind with the blogging that I thought I would cram lots of otherwise unrelated updates into one post and hope no-one notices that they are being short-changed...

First up - Phoebe is walking. Actually, she started walking when Nick was in the UK in March, and has honed her skills in the last two months to the extent that she now climbs stairs (and gets back down), pushes her dolly pram around, climbs the climbing frame at the park, and generally runs around causing mayhem and mischief.



She is also still to be found emptying kitchen cupboards on a regular basis - we can't attach locks in a rented property, and she worked out how to remove the elastic bands... - and recently we found her IN the kitchen drawer. Funnily enough I have a very similar picture of her big sister a couple of years ago!




Phoebe has never liked having her nappy changed, and now she just gets up and runs away... and she's really quick! I have added a flower to this picture for the sake of modesty, but you get the idea - she thought it was a great game!

She now starts tugging at her clothes as soon as the bath tap is turned on, brings you a bowl when she is hungry, her shoes when she wants to go out, and points to her eyes, ears, toes, tummy and nose on command....



She is turning into a very funny little girl indeed - usually to be found accessorised to the hilt with beads, bangles and hats. Was packing up some winter stuff the other day when I found hats and gloves - she wasn't sure about them at all - never had a pair of gloves on since she was about two months old...

For anyone who has been living in Outer Mongolia and hasn't heard, Nick has a consultant's job in Fife starting in August. These are very exciting times for us!! He went back to the UK for two and a half weeks in March - with Ella in tow as we got a free flight for her - and arrived 36 hours before the biggest interview of his life. Obviously, he got the job and we over the moon that the biggest hurdle of his career was cleared at the first attempt.


So we are coming home - and are really looking forward to having a short time back in Dunbar before relocating to Fife. Of course, that is very much dependent on selling our house in Sunny Dunny - the property market is not exactly in great shape right now! Our house is on the market, and generating plenty of interest, so we are cautiously optimistic. Nick could commute to Fife in the short term, but it would add about three hours to his day AND he would need to stay up there if on call, so not conducive to family life really...

So not only are we moving back close to where we met and married, but NHS Fife is also forging stronger links with the Bute Medical School in St Andrews and Nick is hoping to be able to be involved in undergraduate teaching there.

After achieving all he set out to in the first couple of days of the trip, Nick spent the rest of the time being sent across the country to look at houses (none of which we can afford!) and putting all our furniture back in the house. This will make a huge difference when we return home with four grumpy children after thirty hours of travel...


So while Nick was away, I amused myself with the children as follows:

Scienceworks in Melbourne - a bit like the kids' museums we visited in Boston and Sydney - full of hands on things for the children to do. There were three main areas - one about our human bodies and their capabilities, so they got to do things like run against Cathy Freeman (they lost!), climb, jump, test their grip strength, measure their reaction times, shoot netballs, paddle a canoe, compete in a wheelchair sprint... and make a skeleton pedal a bike!

Upstairs was a kind of city exploration centre with a construction zone - see pics above, recycling centre and a restaurant totally stocked with plastic food and all the children loved serving their mummy at the tables outside. I think Will is serving a whole chicken here...


There was also a whole floor dedicated to what goes on inside a house and how the items we use today were developed - so you could walk through a giant vacuum cleaner, see what goes on inside a tumble dryer, look inside a mattress (not recommended), see how a transparent toilet flushes, learn how food goes mouldy, see how an LP plays (or in James and Will's case, learn what an LP is...)and generally open drawers and cupboards and curtains.


There was even a section on what's down the back of the couch... James and Will were pretty interested in what was there, but Phoebe had free-range baby syndrome and just kept going back to the funny mirrors...




March also saw Crazy Hair Day at school - and having been informed by the boys that they wanted green and blue hair, I obliged accordingly. Was slightly worried that Will's hair might be permanently stained, but it washed out ok....











We have had (oh joy) nits (James, again) worms (Will, 1st time) and nits (Ella 1st time). I feel like some kind of plague house. Yes, I know that nits like clean hair, and worms don't really care who they inhabit, but I do feel somehow unclean. And don't even get me started on Swine Flu - at the moment I'm praying that the slow trickle of cases in Australia doesn't get any worse and we can fly home to Scotland unimpeded, though at the rate Victoria is closing schools and confirming cases, I'm getting a little twitchy!


Will has been student of the week for making friends in his class -ie not playing with his brother and his brother's friends all the time - though to be honest, I don't mind him playing with James and James is remarkably keen to play with Will - we're leaving in two weeks - it really doesn't matter if he doesn't make any new friends!!

Finally, the weather has started to turn cold recently and everywhere is looking green again - which is great cos I was sick of the dustbowl, but weird, as it seems wrong to have the green times in winter... This is eastern Beach with the outdoor pool just visible on the left. We are again freezing inside our little cardboard house and looking forward to coming back to a country with radiators..


Still get the occasional hot day though - here are the boys at Eastern Beach on a recent warm spell. I love the picture of them squatting by the rocks - they are watching a couple launch a fishing boat down the boat ramp.

In the other pic they are posing next to one of the Geelong bollards which line the shore in town - Old Mother Hubbard, in honour of Granny Jenny who was born a Hubbard...

Melbourne Grand Prix 2009

We didn't think we could let our year go past without attending the Melbourne Grand Prix. As a one-time serious Formula One fan, I was always desperate to go to one and the experience did not disappoint.

And it was CHEAP to go - unlike the European Grands Prix, it cost about £90 to admit all of us for race day. We were almost sabotaged in our attemps to enter by a Melbourne train driver who dropped us (and about 30 others) at a station which was closed for the day as he had (wait for it) gone straight past the Gate 2 stop he was meant to stop at. Now, most of the stations are out of service on Grand Prix day, so he had a pretty straightforward gig - city centre, Gate 1, Gate 2.... and repeat in reverse.... but still he managed to cock it up, so we had to walk a bit (after actually having to climb out of the closed, gated, locked station...) but once we got there we loved the venue and the buzz.

There was so much going on - all kinds of classic cars on display, food and drink tents, lots of boozing and schmoozing. There was also plenty of flesh on display - Nick said he had to take a picture of this girl as she was wearing a chequered flag. Do I , as they say, look like I came up the Clyde on a banana boat?



We parked ourselves on the corner at turn three and tried to find a big enough space for all of us and Graham, Leanne and the boys - no mean feat as the banking was already heaving and the race was still FIVE hours away!




Fortunately, there was plenty of pre-race entertainment - three other types of car race - each louder than the one before. We had earphones for everyone - Phoebe tolerated hers for about 30 seconds, so I resorted to putting a hairband round her head.

We had army helicopters flying right overhead, followed by an aerial display team who were awesome. on about their third pass, one peeled of the back and did a twisty, corkscrew move. 'That one is just showing off' said James. Nick and I nearly choked on our beer - Umm, James, showing off is kind of de rigueur for a stunt pilot...



There was also the new Qantas Airbus A380 - otherwise known as the 'really big plane' and a military jet which moved so fast I didn't get any pictures - but the noise reminded me of Dunbar...





And at last it was time for the racing - I can't describe how loud a field of Formula One cars is, or how fast they move, but it was great to witness. It was the first race of the season, and the first race for Brawn Racing who subsequently took the first and second spots. I've been a big fan of Ross Brawn since his days at Benetton and Ferarri and I think he was directly responsible for much of their success through being a better strategist than anyone else in Formula one - even when he didn't have the best cars.


The green and white car in these pictures - the one with no sponsorship - is Jensen Button streets ahead of the field...

I have to be honest and say that the view of an F1 race is far better on the TV, but you don't go for the view! It was a gorgeous, hot day, a great atmosphere and the setting in Albert Park is stunning. The kids did remarkably well - considering how confined by the crowds we were, and the usual Shortt tactic of 'just keep feeding them' worked as well as ever. And they seemed not remotely bothered by the noise - in fact, Phoebe slept through about an hour of it.

Gran Anne visits

Yes, yes, I know I'm writing this in a kitchen in East Lothian, and my blogging tardiness has reached epic proportions, but just suspend your disbelief for a while and pretend we're still in Geelong!!

So, in April my mum (finally) came to visit.

I think she was hoping that if she waited long enough, maybe we would have left and she could do a nice Australian tour without the added complication of family visits in the middle, but we're not so easy to get rid of!! (Just kidding ma!)

Anyway, I was very proud of her as, prior to meeting up with us in Torquay, she had ventured solo from the UK to Singapore, spent a few days there, flew to Perth, spent a few days there, flew to Adelaide and then driven all the way along the Great Ocean Road. Way to go Gran Anne!! And after seeing us, she moved on to Melbourne and Sydney, and then back to the UK with a LOT of luggage.

So, in spite of my advice that Winter was upon us, and the weather could be pretty chilly, the first couple of days were scorching - this is us at lunch and then messing about in the huge playpark in Torquay.

We went off the next day to get the ferry from Queenscliff to Sorrento - which as you will note from the website, crosses Port Philip Bay 24 times a day, on the hour,every hour... Remember that bit - it's important.

Ella is holding a sick bag in the picture due to her intermittent tendency to pebble-dash the inside of cars with her stomach contents. She has also been known to turn it into a multi-sensory production by following such and event with a chirpy chorus of 'What's that coming over the hill - is it vomit? Is it vomit?'

We had a lovely walk around Sorrento (lovely town, lovely shops, lovely lunch) and then headed off around to Frankston (which is on the opposite side of Port Phillip Bay to Geelong - see map) to go and see the Sand Sculpting Dinosaurs exhibition.

I have never seen anything like it - the scale, complexity and the attention to detail. The weather wasn't so great - wet and windy - and I think at one point we were the only people in there - but the kids had a riot doing sand pictures, ably assisted by Gran Anne.

Once we had drunk our foam-free cappucinos (the foam blew away - seriously) and picked all the bits of coloured sand out of various orifices, we headed back to the car to drive around and get the ferry. In no particular rush, I might add, since Nick had done the checking, and assured us the ferry ran 24 hours a day. Now, the more observant (female) among you may have noticed that the website does in fact say 24 crossings, not 24 hours, but we'll get to that bit in a minute...

So we left Frankston about 5.15, thinking we might get the 6pm ferry, but more than likely the 7pm - probably with a healthy dinner courtesy of the Golden Arches in between. And although I drove the Kia of Khaos like a demon, even managing a little wheel-screech on the roundabouts, we pulled into the ferry terminal just as the ferry was pulling out. Steve McQueen would have gone for it, but sanity prevailed and, after all, there'd be another one along in a hour. Chugging optimistically into the dark, deserted, unlit, empty, desolate, abandoned ferry terminal. Umm, Nick - could you go and check that timetable over there?

And that's when The Scottish Factor reared its ugly head again - mysteriously absent for months, and now resurrected by the arrival of my mother. There was, in fact, no 7 o'clock ferry. The next one was 6am the following morning. AND to add insult to injury, until two days previously, there had been a 7 o'clock ferry, but we were now on the Winter time table as the clocks had just gone back...

So, after a few moments of banging head on steering wheel, we turned around, headed BACK along the road to Frankston for only the third time that day, and then drove the loooooooooong way home around the bay. Ho-hum.

Under direction of mother, went off to Anglesea Golf Course to do some kangaroo spotting (don't be fooled by suggestions that Australia is overrun with kangaroos living in the wild and bouncing freely, Skippy-like through the bush - they do in fact all live an easy life on green, lush, watered golf courses where they get food, free veterinary attention and all the rounds of golf they can manage). If your eyesight's good, you might actually be able to spot one in this picture!!

In a fit of lunacy, decided to spend the next day in Melbourne showing Gran Anne the sights - or, in our case, the inside of a lot of shops! Mother managed to buy stuff in Laura Ashley (that well known Australian shop) whilst Lovely Hubby took all four children to the museum. Anyway, the rest of the day was uneventful, until we got on the 7 o'clock train home... and the Scottish Factor kicked in again. 6.55pm, cue conductor's announcement - 'Ladies and Gentlemen, we are sorry to advise that, due to a fatality on the line at Laverton, this train has now been cancelled and we will be arranging buses to take you to your destination' Aaaaarrrrrrgh!!! Won't bore you with the details of the painful trip home, but suffice to say we got home at 10.30 and told my mum we were never having another family trip involving her ever.

And finally, this is what she was responsible for when I went to the gym one night... Note the boys are wearing my shoes, as well as all their sister's jewellery. This woman is not to be trusted in charge of children...

Deck Tales

There's no real tale to this blog post - but it just struck me the other day how much goes on out on our deck. It's completely enclosed and not at all overlooked, and feels a bit like another room of the house.

And you can see how comfortable my children feel out there - I think the naked bike riding came about because the boys have new bikes (Will for his birthday, and James because his £50 bike from Costco four years ago had reached the end of its natural life) and wanted to ride them whilst simultaneously being told to get ready to get in the bath.... I'm not sure, but I think Nick was in Scotland, so normal parenting rules didn't apply - I was so harried they could have got away with anything. Actually, I've just noticed that Will is, in fact, riding his old bike, and James is riding Will's new bike, so maybe new bikes had nothing to do with it and they just felt like getting naked!

The next classic is Laundry Basket Racing - the rules are (1) take one laundry basket, (2) insert sister of your choosing, (3) draw finishing line with chalk on the deck, (4) decide on number of laps, (5) hoon around the deck, drift on the corners and try to complete the race without dumping your sister out of the basket. Ella and Phoebe LOVE this game - I'm still waiting for the first big smash, after which we may need a permanent black flagging...

And finally, Phoebe, hat-fetishist extraordinaire - desperate to put a hat on her head, but still slightly lacking in the skills to do so! Though it's admirable that she could balance it there at all. Actually, it's also impressive that this is even a hat - in the last few days, she has attempted to put a sock, a pencil case and a pair of pyjama pants on her head. Future career as a milliner, perhaps?

Pako Festa

Pako Festa is an annual festival to celebrate all the nationalities which come together in Geelong and is held - funnily enough on 'Pako', or Pakington Street, just down the road from our house....


Will and Ella were walking in the parade this year as they were part of the Geelong Gymnastics Centre group, and James, Phoebe and I watched from a street corner. The day had started off chilly, but in true Geelong style, by the time the parade had begun, it was scorching.




There were hundreds of different groups walking and the parade was so colourful and vibrant - even the pipe bands were up to scratch!! My favourites were the Chinese performers who had drummers, dragon dancers, ladies with fans, beautifully embroidered outfits...



















There was a big representation from Eastern Europe - Serbia, Croatia, Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Slovenia, Bosnia, Lithuania - and we made a bizarre discovery - Lithuanian traditional dancing is almost indistinguishable from Scottish country dancing. As we were watching them on one of the stages after the parade, Nick and I both turned to each other and said 'That's a Dashing White Sergeant!' The main difference (in Geelong) being that some of the Lithuanian dancers were under 60. Some of them were even under 20. The same cannot be said of the Geelong Scottish Country Dancing Group. Let's just say I don't think it will be in existence for much longer...

We had fantastic German food for lunch, sushi rolls for dinner, chocolate strawberries for snack... and a really enjoyable day in the sun.

Swimming Lessons

One thing which has been really fantastic in Geelong is the quality of swimming tuition - there is a swim centre dedicated only to teaching (ie you can't just go there for a splash about) and we have lessons for all the kids on a Saturday morning.


The thing that we have noticed is that before they teach children to swim, they teach them not to drown - how to hold onto the edge of a pool and 'monkey walk' along to the steps, how to turn as soon as you go under water - ie turn back to face what you fell from, how it feels in the water wearing clothes or a life jacket, how to float on your back... all simple things, but you can see that it could be the difference between a child panicking and drowning, or possibly just climbing out a bit wet.


Phoebe goes in the pool with Nick and happily jumps in from the side, goes underwater and pops back up facing the right way, holds on to the side of the pool and climbs out and swims to daddy through a foam 'tunnel'. Humpty Dumpty and Ring a Ring a Roses are also part of her repertoire, and she likes to court danger by trying to swim away from Nick, which is only temporarily successful...


Ella is a true water baby and has made incredible progress this year - she can swim short distances by herself and is learning the beginnings of proper strokes. She can retrieve toys from under water and loves to put her goggles on and look under water at other people - especially if they make funny faces at her!

The slide in the picture here only comes out for the last class of each term, so it's a bit of a treat.

Will has also suddenly got the hang of the swimming thing and now seems to genuinely enjoy his time in the water - as with most new things for Will, it took a while for him to get his confidence up. Will can actually swim well and does a beautiful breaststroke (pizza arms!), but doesn't have the confidence to do it for very long! He has been learning back and front kicking with a board to get ready to move onto backstroke and crawl, and has recently started adding the arm movements.


A big milestone for Will has been getting him confident under the water, but with the aid of a few sinking pool toys, he now dives to retrieve them beautifully. Both boys love it when we throw the toys to the furthest ends of the pool and send them off in search of a particular colour.




We have noticed that Will needs to keep going to the pool regularly to keep his skills and confidence up, as opposed to Ella and James who just throw themselves straight back into it after an absence, so I am looking forward to lots of visits to the Dunbar pool once we get back.

James has been our real star - progressing from non-swimmer to fully-fledged crawl and backstroke swimmer - this is a picture of him doing crawl, proper breathing and all, which is better than his mother can do... He can't do 'pizza arms' as well as Will yet, but I guess everyone has a natural stroke they feel more comfortabe with, and James' is crawl. He is absolutely at home in, on or under the water, and, when not actually swimming, is usually to be found doing underwater handstands or somersaults. Or trying to dive, but our efforts to eliminate the comedy belly flop have been less than successful!

We will really miss Geelong Aquatic Centre - both for the quality of teaching and also for the fact that we have all four children accommodated in simultaneous lessons. I don't think we'll be able to manage that in Scotland.

Will starts school

Though it seems about two minutes since I was waving James off to school for the first time, suddenly it was time for Will to start - and I must confess to feeling less emotional about it than I did the first time round.

I think Will has been so ready for school for such a long time now - every day he sees his brother go off to school, and then return home (mostly unscathed) with tales of what he has learned and who he has played with (OK, I admit, I have to drag most of that information out of him, but I can pretend it's freely given and that I live in sitcom-world). Will is familiar with the playgrounds, the buildings, most of James' friends... so I wasn't surprised when he headed into his classroom quite happily on day 1.


I'm not going to pretend that he hasn't had a couple of momentary wobbles in the first few weeks - like the time he said he had a headache in the morning, so I said that if he went to school and still really had a headache, his teacher would call me.... so eventually at midday the call came from the school 'Will is complaining of a headache' - when I picked him up he was grinning from ear to ear, and insisted on eating his lunch as soon as he got in the car cos he was starving. 'Will' I said, 'is there actually anything wrong with you?' 'No' he said 'I mean yes...'

His teacher did apologise for calling, but said he had been adamant all day that his head hurt and his mummy had said that if his head was still sore, the school would call his mum. He has been assured that this should not be repeated, for the sake of his health...

Apart from that he has been mostly fine. We have established that three kisses (no more, no less, and none on the lips) is the right amount before he stands in his line to go into school, that he can't scooter to school with his exceptionally large bag on his back as he falls over, and that (lo and behold) his teacher agress that we need to work on his 'inside voice'!

James has been really pleased to have Will at school too - and Will has spent most of his break time playing with James and his friends - so much so that his teachers have had to encourage him to play with his own classmates sometimes. But he is making friends slowly in his own class and I hear him making plans in the morning about who he is playing with at lunchtime and who he is playing with at little break. I hope he settles in as well when we go home to Scotland!!