Grandma's Hand and Mine

God has given us two hands, one to receive with and the other to give with!

(Happy Halloween) My apologies...many blog updates to come!

We (I) have been soo busy these past few days!!

My mom just arrived home after 35 hours of travel and we are so blessed she arrived safely! I still haven't talked to her to see how her trip went, but from the tiny email she sent out to let us know she made it sounded like she has quite a story to tell! Bumped up to Business Class and on an international flight... we're talking big time stuff!! Can't wait to hear all about it.

I wanted to cram in as many fun things as possible at the last minute with mom and the girls and while we did alot while battling terrible colds I have got so far behind on blogging. So even though my mom is gone, the next few days will have plenty of "Grandma Betsy" in them and ending with taking her to the airport. (that'll be a sad one! just giving out the warning!!!)

Also it's officially Oct 31 here in Australia so I'd like to wish everyone a Happy Halloween!! Emmy was Snow White and Lilah was a Ballerina. It was too hot for me to dress up as I had planned. Next year I can plan to have a cooler outfit and it'll work out! I'll post a formal halloween post with pictures!

Back To The Good U.S. of A.

We had to get up at 3:34 am to get ready for the airport. I had everything packed the night before and loaded up the car so all I had to do was make breakfast, get dressed, and scoop sleeping babies out of bed and stick them in the car. I made mom and Kim a huge omelet with mushrooms and bell peppers. I wanted her to have a full belly of food other than McDonald's or Burger King. Once we got to the airport Miss Emmy wanted to run around and not do anything she was told. Check out the temper tantrum below....

As we waited for her flight to board we got to watch the sun come up and it was very pretty and peaceful way to say our goodbyes. The loading ramp was broken so all the passengers got to walk out to large staircases to board the plane. It was neat to watch her walk out in the pretty sunshine walk up and wave goodbye before stepping onto the plane. Just like it is in the movies!

I was very glad that Kim had taken the day off from work and that we had a full day planned, because I needed the support and distractions because I knew I'd be very sad. I was also worried about Emmy being sad. Mom says the look on her face as she was walking away towards the plane was a very concerned and worried look. I was so afraid when we got home that Emmy would be looking for her or knocking on the guestroom door thinking she'd be in her room, but she's so smart. She totally understood that Grandma had left. I took her into the guestroom the next morning just so she could get a good look around and take it all in and in her jabbering I heard her say "grandma" by her tone I imagine she was telling me how this had been grandma's room and now she went bye bye.

Once mom got home and we got to make our first skype call Emmy was so happy to see her, or as my mom calls herself "Just the head on the screen!" lol I would love to know what Emmy really thinks. Does she think that my mom came out of the computer to play with her? On another note.....I love this last picture :) The ease of a hungry baby in a sling. No bottles, no warming, no pram...easy peasey!

Monkey Nut Cafe

Mom's last Wednesday here we took her to the Monkey Nut Cafe & Kies Family Wines. UUmmmm what a yummy lunch and some great wines! It was such a beautiful day and I was so happy that we were having some great weather for some of mom's last few days here. Of course here are the fun pictures :) Thanks for a fun afternoon Jan & Kingsley!!

While I Was Out....

Looking cute for grandma..

Please can we play doctor AGAIN!

Posing in our weedy backyard!

Grandma is a babywearing pro now too!

Rain Rain Go Away... So Glad You Listened!

Despite being ill we have been outside in the backyard trying to enjoy some of the sunny weather. It's so nice to finally be getting a little bit of a summer glow. I also managed to plant 4 parlor palms and 3 clematis type vining plants outside the girls bedroom window. I hope they'll survive the summer heat and grow quickly. It'll be so nice to look out their window and see beautiful greenery and flowers rather than a nasty metal fence and bare lattice!uumm eating a homemade fruit pop

a lazy day

making some shade

St. Hallet With Grandma

We took Grandma Betsy to St. Hallet Wines nearly 2 weeks ago. We had planned on taking her to winery's every Wednesday, but so far it's not worked out that well with mom first being sick and then me and the kids. Hopefully next week (mom's last week here) we'll have beautiful weather and all feel better! Here's some fun photo's from our first winery visit! Click on the photo's to see them bigger. I'm not sure if this will work in the email forward, so you may have to go to the real blog post to click on them to see the detail. http://sariasenith.blogspot.com/

This one you have to see big... the detail is so beautiful with the vineyards in the back!

oOOoo look at the wines.... uumm!

Grandma and Emmy talking to Stevie the Parrot

Playing Doctor...

Wobbie not Grandma haha

Emmy lovingly looking at the Buzz Light Year Grandma got her.

It is unbelievable how attached Emmy has already become to my mom. Every morning she goes running down the hall to her with arms up when she hears mom come out of her room. She will call out to her by saying "wobbie" which we totally don't know why. We have both heard her say "grandma" clear as day and she says "mommy" very clear.... so why she calls my mom wobbie is strange although now that I'm thinking about it she does hear me call her mom so maybe that has confused her a bit... but I of course I always call her "grandma" when talking to Emmy. We've offered her other names to use.... "nanna, mam maw, me maw" haha but she won't say them, but she will sign "grandma" lots. Who knows!

Going for a walk. This is around the corner from our house. You can click on it to make it bigger to see the detail. It's mom with Emmy.

Almost every day mom rocks her to sleep for her nap and then again at night. Emmy absolutely loves it and grabs her blanket and climbs up on her lap and snuggles in. They play games and one of Emmy's favorites is to play doctor with mom. Mom has her stethoscope and Emmy has a toy one and they listen to each others heart. It's cute because Emmy knows that hers is a toy and she gives it to mom so she can have the one that works, lol!!

I'm already dreading having to go to the airport and say goodbye. It's going to be so hard on everyone but extra hard for Emmy because she doesn't understand the distance. Ugh, it just makes me sick to think about it.

Finger Painting


Finger Painting Wobbie

Melbourne Trip Last Day

This is how it looked all the way home.

Our last day was spent waking up semi early and finishing up the packing we had started the night before and trying to make sense of our mess. We went back to the same cafe we had breakfast at the day before because it was so yummy and then we hit the road. I had no idea how the drive home would go since we were leaving late morning rather than in the middle of the night. Emmy did so good. She watched her TV lots and played with her toys, but Lilah didn't find anything fun about the trip. She hated being in her car seat and screamed tons. We made 5-6 stops for the girls to get out and let out some energy. I would lay down a thick small blanket where we'd stop so I could change their diapers. We were all so ready to get home and it felt like it was taking forever. We left Melbourne around 10 am and got home at 8 pm. Yuck!! Mom and Kim unpacked the car while I gave the girls a bath, put on pj's and put them to bed. We all slept so good in our own beds and it was so nice to be home. There's no place like home :)

One of our many stops to play.


My view of mom :)


Emmy's view of Daddy!

Melbourne Trip Day 3

Aquarium day! I was so super excited to take the girls to the Melbourne Aquarium. I hoped that Emmy would be amazed and greatly amused with the fish. At times she was, but she was equally disgruntle and not agreeable about anything. Aside from her throwing her fit in a restaurant one time this has to be one of her biggest melt downs. There was full on screaming and body throwing on the floor.

Normally I would have been mortified but we had a long day planned so there was no point in worrying about it because the worse might have been yet to come, lol! Good for us it got better as the day went on. Grandma bought her some popcorn (one of her favorite junk foods) and she sat in the rented stroller and ate that happily while looking at the fish.

Of course the nice picture I get of Kim and he's not in front of some cool fish :(

She would sign fish when she saw the penguins swimming and we'd tell her no it's a bird that swims and then she's sign bird. Really I think she thought we were wrong.

This fish cracks me up! Click on the picture to make it larger. He totally reminds me of a stuck up frenchmen hahahhahahhaha

This is pretty much how Lilah and I looked the entire trip!


From one fish to another :)

Smile Grandma

After the aquarium we hopped the free trolley car and road down towards China Town for some shopping. I found a few Korean gems for their next birthdays and am very happy about that! We spent several hours walking all around and then realized we were not to far away from the car so we just decided to finish walking the rest of the way. The girls were such angels and didn't make a peep the entire time we were shopping and sight seeing. I think now that Emmy would have been able to enjoy the aquarium much more had she been slinged but I thought the freedom to run around would be have fun for her, but I guess not. It's been a long while since my feet hurt like that and the hot tub was sounding sooo good! We dropped by a super yummy Italian restaurant for dinner then back to the hotel for some relaxing and soaking!being silly on the trolley

Melbourne Trip Day 2

Shopping at the Queen Victoria Market

Both snug and snoozing away!

buurrr it was cold out!

Friday we went to the Queen Victoria Market and had such a great time. It was freezing cold, but we dressed warm and snuggled both the kids to us so everyone was warm and happy. There is nothing better than wearing your babies in my opinion :) we just love it!! The girls slept most of the time and we didn't really hear a peep out of them. I found so many cute and fun things. I finished up some christmas shopping too... what a bonus! Here's a little bit about the market:

The Queen Victoria Market, said to be the southern hemisphere’s largest open-air market offering a variety of fresh farm produce and, on Sundays, a wider range of merchant items which turn the market into a modern Arabian Nights bazaar.

The Queen Victoria Market is an historic Melbourne landmark and a Melbourne institution dating back to more than 120 years ago. To learn more about it go to this website.

Next we went to the US Consultant (the whole reason for this trip) to get the girls American Citizenship worked out and to obtain US Passports for each of them. Kim did a super good job booking our hotel close to it and it ended up being just across the street. I was expecting a beautiful building with flags flying high, but what we got was more of a "men in black" type of building... very sleek, modern, and professional looking. We went in and to the back where we had to get buzzed in to reach security. They wouldn't let mom go beyond security because she wasn't on "the list" so we sent her back to the hotel. They took everything off of us...diapers, wipes, snacks, toys. The only thing we could take with us was the kids and one bottle of milk for Emmy. Once we got upstairs they had a second security area and they told us that they would have to hold the milk and if we needed it then we'd need to go out to that location to give it to her. Geezz!!! Now we could go into the waiting room that was divided into two areas. One for US Passport holders and one for none US Passport holders. We were number 503 but the room was empty so we had to be the next ones haha. We waited about 5 mins then over a loud speak it said "Number 503 Please step into room 6" The room was a tiny 4x4 foot room where you stood up to what looked like a bank teller window with just the tiniest slit to pass through paperwork. She asked us questions and took our paperwork and added some of her own. Next she took our paper work to a person she called "the officer" we went back to the waiting room and after another 5-10 minutes we were called back in to swear to everything on the paper work was correct and honest. In 2-3 weeks we'll get the girl's passports. How exciting!

We celebrated by taking the girls down to the hot tub. Lilah absolutely loved it and kicked like a little frog the whole time. She is such a water baby :)

Later that night Kim and I went out to eat while my mom watched the girls at the hotel. Emmy was happy and Lilah had just passed out after have a really big feed so I was confident she'd stay asleep while we were gone. Kim found a great mexican restaurant called Taco Bills. This place was amazing and I recommend anyone visiting Melbourne to drop in and have a bite.... so yummy!! Anyways... once we got back about 2 hours later the girls were both peacefully sleeping and I asked how it went. About 20 minutes after we left Lilah woke up and screamed her head off the whole time. Mom said she was waiting for someone to come beating on the hotel door about the screaming baby. Poor mom! She said she bounced, danced, sang, and bathed her and she hated all of it. She eventually passed out from exhaustion. I felt so bad for the both of them and would have never left if I had thought this would have happened. Despite mom's tough time we had a great date.

Emmy showing off her new Russian Doll set.

Melbourne Trip Day 1

I spent last Wednesday packing up the car and getting everything all ready for our trip. We set our alarms for 2:30 am and had the kids and cooler loaded and on the road by 3 am. I sat squished in the backseat with the kids while Mom and Kim navigated the trip. The girls and I slept over half way before we had a stop for food and a stretch.

When Emmy wasn't sleeping she was enjoying her DVD player her dad got her. Lilah only watched hers for tiny bits at a time, but I'm sure it will be very useful in the future!

Emmy watching her Baby Einstein Signs DVD it's built into the headrest

After we hit downtown Melbourne Emmy stuck her hand down into Lilah's car seat on her side and said "eewwww" I had a look at her fingers then quickly looked down that side and Lilah had done one massive blow out. Out the diaper, through the clothes and all over the car seat. We had to do an emergency stop and strip both baby and car seat. I'm so lucky that I had two car seat covers on it that I had made a while back so it was easy to put back a clean baby in a clean seat!

Operation Clean Baby!!

Emmy running off some steam with daddy

It didn't take much longer and we were at our hotel. We unpacked and got organized then took off for the hot tub! Emmy loved the hot water and it felt so good to get into because the air outside was so cold! Once we got back to the room we warmed up some left over pizza. We called room service to come pick it up and I think they thought we were pretty weird haha but Paul (the service man/bartender/ice bringer) took it down for us. Mom thought Paul was pretty cute :)Mom and Lilah happy to be at the hotel finally!

ahhh this feels good!

Here's what our trip looked like and it took us around 9 hours to get there.

To Be Continued...