A New School

It's been a rollercoaster week and a half.

I feel I should report in about our first (half) week back at school especially given that there have been some changes here at Clan EasternMax.

First, after a rollercoaster week and a half, Padawan Learner started at a new school. We were offered a place at this school on Monday 19th, accepted it on Tuesday the 20th and then spent the rest of the week organising uniforms, booklists, visiting the school, meeting the teacher and then breaking the news to PL's friends.

So, why a new school? Until this year PL has gone to our local public school. A fabulous school that Blossom still attends. However, I'm a firm believer in recognising the individual needs of each child and I am not afraid to differentiate between them if I judge it to be in their best interest. While our local school has been an amazing place for Blossom it hasn't been the same experience for PL.

Our local school has increased by 200 students in the last five years and is bursting at the seams. Blossom thrives in this environment, PL does not. In addition PL needs considerable Occupational Therapy intervention which has been difficult to integrate into his normal day. The new school is smaller, has on site OT and has great pastoral care.

I'm fortunate to have a choice.

While PL misses his old friends (as you would expect with a change of school) he has a sparkle in his eyes that I haven't seen for about TWO YEARS. He is motivated and he now even has his own blog where he is recording his thoughts about his new environment (sorry, it's a private authors-only blog).

Meanwhile all is good at Blossom's school. She loves her new teacher who she says is a "medium-level happy-dancey" type. She is with her friends and she has met some new girls who arrived at the school this year. Smiles all 'round. The only thing she's cross about his that PL gets four more weeks holiday than she does! (it's the Pay.More.Get.Less system of the private schools).

So that's been my week. Two schools. Two drop-offs. Two Pickups. I must be completely out of my mind.

O Hai, I haz Auzi LOLHymn for Straya Day

Palm Beach, Sydney January 2009

Happy Australia Day!

This is the day we celebrate sand in our bathers, vegemite on toast and the correct pronunciation of Australia - STRAYA.

In the celebration of the young, hip nation that we are I present you with something I wrote for fun some time back in another blog - our national anthem in LOLcat (what's this? nb: it's different from sms/texting shorthand).

Auzi Hym

All Auzi cmon hav fun

Coz we yung an we can has wot we want

We can has gud home and can has dollarz if wrk hard

Auzi home does has watr all round

Auzi home does has much gud stuff

We iz lucky

Invisible Histry guru wud sai

Go Auzi Go Auzi

Cmon sing loud

Go Auzi Go Auzi

Under cool starz

We can do hrd wrk and thnk gud thingz

An mak r home

Well known all over

Fur visible guys want come from other landz

We can has sharing wiv u

So be brav an come, an sing

Go Auzi Go Auzi

Cmon sing

Go Auzi Go Auzi

For a translation click here *

Kthxbye!

PS. I've translated the 1st and 3rd verses as are traditionally sung

Pool's empty but nobody cares

I truly believe I am slowly melting here in Sydney at the moment. Summer has finally hit and the humidity has arrived.

My resolve to shun (ie. not install) air-conditioning is tested on days like this. Luckily we are 10 mins walk from a free local pool.

This is what our local harbour pool looks like on a normal January day. It's a magnet for the locals and has great views.

This is what it looked like today.

Once a week this pool, which is fed by filtered harbour water, is cleaned and re-filled. It's the cleanest day of the week to swim here.

The kids love playing in the water as the pool slowly re-fills. Today we took down the surf mats and the kids skidded from the shallow to the deep end.

Bliss.

What shall I knit?

A lovely friend gave me these two gorgeous skeins of Noro Gisha yarn in colour 108 as a New Year gift.

The question is, what am I going to knit with it? I'm hoping you clever crafty knitting people out there might be able to make a suggestion.

Cycling in Parramatta

Parramatta Regional Park is National Heritage Listed and contains Australia's oldest surviving Government house. The park, formerly known as Governor's Domain, was laid out in the late 1700s not long after European settlement.

The park has a 3.5km bike track and was the location of this weekend's family bike ride.

We rode past Old Government House (built 1799) but declined the $18 family fee to look through. The kids weren't interested.

We rode past the site of Parramatta's first ever European building.

And we walked our bikes over the Parramatta River.

I took heed of Fairlie's excellent information about the colour accent feature of my camera and gave it a go. The idea is you choose one colour and the rest of the picture will be in B&W. I chose to highlight red. I see that it not only picked up the bright red shades but also the ochre ones as well.