Woolley Family

Yesterday I cried all the way home from Fairfield to Windaroo. My home was well away from the floods. I hadn’t lost anything except my naïve assumptions about the damage a flood can do. But I couldn’t hold back the emotion. As the flood waters receded, we knew that we had to do something to help those affected by the Brisbane floods. Thousands of homes had been inundated by flood waters and they were saying on TV and on the internet that an army of volunteers was needed. I arranged for my Mum to come and watch the kids for the day, packed the car with brooms, shovels, mops, buckets, water and other cleaning supplies, and set off to try to “do some good”. My brother in law and his wife had friends on a street in Fairfield whose house had been submerged up to just under their roof, so they sent me the address and I headed for Fairfield. I was nervous as I didn’t know what to expect. As I drove under the overpass at Mt Gravatt I saw a huge line of volunteers over the bridg...

We decided that something we had to address with the kids was the fact that Reid was sleeping on Megan's floor on a mattress every night, which meant that neither of them were getting enough sleep. So I took the mattress out of her room one day and hid it in my cupboard, and told Reid he could sleep in his room or the spare room, just not Megan's room. When it came down to it, the only way to get Reid to sleep in a separate room was to lay down in bed with him until he fell asleep. For a few weeks now that's what we've been doing. Overall it is working. Reid is sleeping in a different room, and Megan is getting more sleep. This plan has it's disadvantages though. For one, most nights it's pretty even odds who is going to fall asleep first - him or me. A few nights I have woken up at 9:30pm to find him finally asleep next to me. How I fall asleep I don't know because Reid going to sleep is like a dog going to sleep - how they get up and down and turn a...

For Family Home Evening this week we watched the movie Journey to the Center of the Earth in 3D. The kids thought it was great fun and especially liked that we all sat down together wearing 3D glasses. There were a few scary bits and Reid did quite a few "jumps", especially during the prehistoric fish parts. They were pretty nasty looking though. Reid spent most of the movie exclaiming that someone threw water at him, or birds were flying out of the TV. I don't think he's seen anything in 3-D before. In all it was a clean family movie and a fun way to spend a Monday evening.

I have just been tagged by Konnie. The rules: 1. Go to the section of your computer where you store all of your photos. 2. Select the 6th folder. 3. Select the 6th photo from that folder. 4. Post and explain about that picture. 5. Tag 6 other people. Here is my photo: This was in 1999 in April. Forgive me for my memory but I THINK we were all down in Sydney to see Narelle's brother Reeve get married. I must have put those photos elsewhere because they are not in this folder. The people you can barely see are Narelle, Lauren, Jordan, Me and Dallas. We had a great time looking around Sydney together and to this day I still remember Alana eating her icecream. Aren't they cute?! Here's one to embarrass Jordan: Dallas had a great time playing with the kids back at the rooms: Not sure what's going on here! Narelle's uncle Nev is the one on the right. He needed a lift back to Brisbane, so he drove back with Dallas and I. I remember he made for some entertaining conversatio...

Some of our adventures in February.... For one Family Home Evening we went for a walk about the streets of the complex. It is gated and we feel very safe. Dallas takes the kids out for walks on the golf course to collect stray balls. I don't think he'll need to buy golf balls again for a while! One night when they got back Dallas made fruit smoothies for everyone. I lost track of what went into them and the kids had great fun throwing fruit in. Megan, Dallas and Reid Make Smoothies One of our favourite pastimes at the new house is riding bikes. The streets are flat and we are in a cul-de-sac, so they can ride just around the bottom of our street. Megan has had her training wheels removed, which she was not very impressed with at first but is doing a great job now, considering she has hardly ridden at all before now. Reid had one of those little Fisher Price toddler bikes and after watching his little legs pedalling so fast just to keep up, we got him a new "big boy" b...

This Sunday is two years since my brother Levi died of a brain tumor. I thought by now, after two years, I would have some measure of understanding of what happened to him or at least be at peace with it, but both elude me. I think I have progressed at least. For a long time all I wanted was for him to visit me somehow and tell me that he is OK. I guess I know he is OK now and I don't obsess about wanting to see him again anymore. I no longer cry every day and for the most part life is back to normal. But there are still times when it hurts so much that I can't hardly breathe. I have tried to figure out what it is that I am feeling, and sometimes I think it is anger. I watched the life being sucked out of my baby brother. I watched him wither away until his body just couldn't take it anymore. I drove his children to watch him be lowered into his grave and listened to Kya ask why Daddy had to go live in heaven, and I had no answer for her. I try to remember him as he was but...

Well we woke up this morning and Megan has a lisp :) She came running up to me completely upset because her OTHER front tooth had fallen out and she couldn't find it. She hasn't lost a tooth in ages and now she's lost 2 in one week. We eventually found it in her bed, so the tooth fairy can visit tonight. She has announced that she knows that I am the tooth fairy but doesn't seem to think that should preclude the tooth fairy actually visiting. I am trying hard not to giggle when she says words that contain "s". Luckily she thinks it's kind of amusing too! You can see the packing box in the background. The big day is one week from tomorrow.