Yippee!

Today I had a meeting with the lovely Daniel from our local counsel. He is the coordinator of the Disability Services and in turn organises the respite care. Now I must say Zachary is not a high need demanding child at the moment (well not more than any other 2 year old!) but he some special needs that do take up a lot of time as many readers of this blog would totally understand. So I have started Zach (and Anna of course) in daycare one day a week to take some pressure off. I can go and do the exciting things like grocery shopping in complete peace (and buy way to much stuff because I have time to just browse the isles - eek!). DADHC kindly contacted the counsel to inquire about respite and that was what today was all about. They will pay for his time in daycare - more than just one day if I feel the need - you can probably understand how happy I was to hear this! Daycare is sooooo not cheap and even after the Centrelink rebate it is still costing me a pretty penny to send the three there. Without going into detail lets just say it has three figures. I was able to get a day of Preschool for Mitchell on the same day so I'm like totally kid free! Anyway it was an awful amount of paper work but its done now.

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Mitchell has gone with (D)ExP until Sunday. I miss him already and he has only been gone for a few hours! I still have another 4 days until he is home again. I must say that I do really appreciate the break as Mitchell has been very testing lately. I can totally understand, he has been through a lot recently and it must be hard for a 5 year old to understand. First in comes these two little babies into his life. They needs turn out to be much more than we expected. Just when he feels that things may have settled down his Mummy and Daddy stop living with each other. I'm kinda glad my parents split up before I was old enough to know any different. My poor little guy, it really breaks my heart!

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Not much else going on here at the moment. Getting ready for the trip on Friday. Just normal things.....For now I'll leave you with these.....

Its been so long!

Sorry I haven't posted in a while. As you may have guessed it is a bit busy around here at the moment. I spend most of time at the moment running around filling in forms, see different people and of course spending some lovely stress-free time with my children.....

It is getting a bit.....tense here sometimes. I guess that's what you get when you put a daughter that hasn't lived at home since she was 16 and now has 4 (delightfully energy filled) children of her own back in the same house with her (ever patient) Mum that is totally not used to having said children in her life 24/7! We try and give Mum/Nanny her own space but at times it does get really chaotic here!

We do our bit around her and of course pass on money to help out with the bills (that I'm sure are going to be 10 times the last ones!). The kids are going a bit nuts as there is no yard here for them to just run outside but thankfully there is a park just across the road with plenty of room for running and bike riding and such. We do spend a bit of time there.

Now I guess I will give you a little run down on all the kids.....what's happening now and what's the plan for the future.....

Ashlee:

Currently on school holidays and will (sadly) start at a new school in the new term. Hopefully meet up with some more wonderful friends that she can move onto high school with.

She is enjoying some time here at Nan's but will have to come back down to earth very soon I think!

Ashlee also competed at the Athletics Carnival in Cooma recently.......out of 5 events she got 2 firsts, 2 seconds and a third! She also got third overall senior girls! {Round of Applause!} We are waiting to see if she made it to the next level now.

Mitchell:

Mitchell.....well, he's not up to much. He is taking the split in his stride but I know it is hard on him. He spent some time down with his Dad recently and although it was a nice break I missed him terribly! Even by day 2 I was yearning for my little man.....he's home now and making me smile everyday.

Mitchell loves to spend his time over at the park riding his bike and playing with the twins. They all got new balls recently and that has been a great pass time.

I am currently looking into schools for him. Can you believe he starts 'big school' next year!

Zachary:

Our sweet little Zachary......Zach is going great. As you may have guessed from previous pictures, Zachary got his walker! And its gold! He loves it and is really going well with it. Almost running around with it and kicking balls too! Unfortunately he sometimes has to fight Anna for it. I am trying to get her to understand that his walker is not a toy and he needs it to get around.

In other news, our quotes for Zach's AFO's have finally come through and we are now on the way to getting the funding - finally! We are seeing the Spastic Centre in Canberra while we are here which includes attending the orthotics clinic on the 22nd. Great, means we don't have to drive to Sydney for that! One less thing to worry about. Zach sees Dr L again in August.

Another thing the kids have all been loving is colouring in and play dough. We have discovered that Zach is left handed. This may just be or because he is affected in his right arm.

Anna:

Lastly, our little clean freak. I tell you I've NEVER seen a 2 year old like her! She loves to clean, help out and pack up. Don't get me wrong I'm not complaining! It's great! Anna is a very helpful, bright and beautiful little girl. Zach's body guard too......don't look at him wrong or Anna will let you know about it.

Something new she has been doing is climbing into Zachary's cot usually when they go down for their afternoon sleep. It's cute, yes, but then they just don't sleep!

Anna can now dress herself (somewhat), put on her own shoes (usually on the right feet) but hates having anything in her hair - sadly.

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Alright, this post has taken me the better part of the night to get finished so I'm going to leave it there and (hopefully) see you all again soon!

Take Care!

Its done

Just a short post to let you all know that I've done it.....

Things came to a head, I had to get out, so I packed up my life and my children and we are now camping at Mum's until we sort things out....

We are all ok, very tired but ok....

Oh what a day!

Today we had 'the' court appearance. (D)ExP - and I can assure you that the D doesn't stand for darling! - is trying to get an AVO on me, yes that's right - ME! The judge basically laughed at him but 'has to go through due course and hear the matter out'. So we are back again in August. A REAL waste of time on every bodies behalf.

Right now I have so much support around me, it really feels great. Even having my bloggy friends leave words of support feels great. Finally I have reached out and asked for help with the local agencies and we are getting somewhere. There are also quite a few people, locals, that have come out of the woodwork with offers of help. Considering this is (D)ExP's home town, that says a lot!

I will admit I am scared. Not scared of our soon to be new life, that I am really looking to, but scared of how things will pan out with all this mess. What fight do I have ahead of me?! Is a fight even going to be needed?! Who knows. (D)ExP is so unpredictable.

Tomorrow I have absolutely no plans, and that feels great. I am looking forward to spending the day tidying up and just going nowhere. Just spending the day with the kids.

Tonight - well I'm going to get these children dinner, a bath and tuck them in bed safe and sound for tomorrow is another day. I am going to do the dishes and fold the washing that I did get hung out. I also need to start sorting things out and begin thinking about packing things up! A daunting task.

So thank you to everyone for their support. Back to life now....

Welcome to our new blog

I felt it was time for a change.

I am no longer able to find time to craft.

Although I am definitely NOT saying I never will! I would love to find the time again and hopefully in the future I will but at this point in time it is just not an option.

With Zach's cerebral palsy and a few issues we are having with Anna's eyes I feel a blog that could be better put to use as more of our day to day journal of where we have been and where we are going.

Life at the moment is just so hectic.

For example; on Monday we travelled 2 hours to Bega, Tuesday we travelled 1.5 hours to Cooma, today I had a meeting at the preschool that took 4 hours and tomorrow I need to be in Bombala. I REALLY hoping that Friday I-CAN-STAY-HOME!!

My house is feeling unloved and really if I don't get to it, it will be unclean too! Ahhhhh!

Being totally open and honest, this is where we stand today:

Washing has piled up and today I nearly had a nervous break down. I'm telling you I really felt like that! By the time I got the three little ones into bed I just wanted to curl up in a corner and cry - I didn't actually do it but I'm sure it would have been VERY beneficial!

Tonight my children had sandwiches for dinner and went to bed without a bath - again Ahhhh!

I did not do the dishes tonight and don't plan to - they won't go anywhere and will still be there in the morning.

I have a load of washing that I put on to wash before I went out this morning that is still in the machine and will not get hung out until the morning - its so cold out there!!

Lastly tonight, I am soon to be - well really I am already! - a single mummy to 4. Over the next few days I will be moving. Out on my own, mixed emotions but it is definitely the best move for the children and myself.

So that's it in short for now. I hope my old readers will join me over here but would happily welcome anyone new!

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P.S Please bear with me as I style my blog too! ; ) I am also organising an update post and also a bit of history thrown in there too.