So Close

Max

Had the big 20'ish week scan today (one day short of 23w).  Every thing is perfect, where it should be.  He is measuring a week ahead. Child is clearly advanced.  She (the u/s whizz) kindly did some free 4D shots. I love free.  Look how gorgeous my boy is!

 
PS am feeling like shite.  Got a nasty gastro bug. V v unpleasant.  Off to bed.

Random updates from the land of the Analtyns

Hello campers.  Here comes one of those boring blog posts where I start off telling you all that I don’t have much to say at the moment, and then I ramble on for ages.

I don’t have enough material for an actual deep and meaningful blog post, so here goes a few random updates from the land of the Analtyns

Hmm, let’s start with….. Rose!  Let’s start with Rose.  Rose is very well.  I think out of everyone, she is MOST excited about the new baby. Rose loves newborns and I can see I am going to have to pry Max out of her arms to get a turn.  Unfortunately the driving lessons are not going that well.  I think the novelty has worn off slightly, although she is still very keen.  What would be fantastic is if I could find someone who would give her a lesson every day. She needs to practice every day and I just do not have the time to take her.  Plus of course, when the kids are with us, I can hardly take them in the car with us. 

Then, how about my long suffering husband Marko.  Marko is fine.  The end.

Actually, he is has been decidedly unannoying lately. I am having fond thoughts about him and even sent him a note the other day telling him what a winner husband and father he is being.  We even sat next to each other on the couch on the weekend.  For five minutes, before I got all uncomfortable and had to move.  A friend said that was the most loving she had ever seen us.  Such passionate romantics, Marko and I.

The kids.  The kids are fine.  Adam has been a bit of a pain in the ass lately, a real cry baby.  He cries at least 5 times a day.  Three times for when he hurts himself and the other two when he cries that he is no longer my friend and is running away from home.  Kate is her usual self.  This is not a new thing, but not sure if have told you this before? We are not allowed to call her pretty or beautiful.  Nice, or clever is fine.  But not pretty. She gets very cross if we call her that .  I AM NOT PRETTY!!!  That child is odd. We bought new school bags for school. Adam chose one with Lightening McQueen on it (obviously).  I picked out a nice (not pretty) Hello Kitty one but she refused, and chose a navy blue one with a spider on it.  Whatever. 

Max – Max is hopefully fine.  Last week was a big of a big week for me. 21 weeks was the terrible week for me when I found out Luke (Ben’s twin) had died in utero and was when I was admitted to hospital for bed rest in an attempt to save Ben. So I have been a little anxious, but at least that horrible milestone has passed.  I am going for my big organ scan (22w) tomorrow and feeling a little anxious about that. But besides these little moments, I am doing fine.  Huge, but fine.

Mom – mom is finally feeling a bit better as the chemo side effects from round 2 wear off. Still weak, but each day gets better.

Shelly – That dog drives us NUTS!!  She is a one-dog garden-destroying machine.  I thought I was prepared for the destructive puppy stage, the stage that last 18 months but what I didn’t realize is that Retrievers are like NORMAL dogs, they are like puppies on acid. 

The house.  Sigh, the house.  Selling a house is a HUGE pain in the ass. Firstly you have to deal with estate agents, which is an experience in itself. And secondly, you have people traipsing in and out your house all the time. Not fun.  We have until the end of Feb in which to sell our house, but to be honest, if it doesn’t sell, we will be fine.  We love where we say, and the new house is SOOOOOOOO expensive.  If we do get it, bonus. If not, we happily stay where we are.

Best news – we (Marko and I) are getting new beds.  My dream has (almost*) come true!  We are each getting our own ¾ bed, and our own double duvet. We will push the beds together so that Marko is happy, but I will have my own duvet and my own clearly demarcated section of the marital bed. I am overjoyed.

And now I have to go as I have just received an email that has annoyed the shit of out me. Completely ruined the moment.  I better go deal with it before my head explodes.  Bye.

* my dream would be my own bed AND own room, but hell is more likely to freeze over before Marko agrees to that.  Maybe even in a few years time, when I’ve worn him down enough to give in.

Doing what we can

My mom had her second round of chemo last week.  It went a little rougher than the first round.  Thank goodness many of you warned us, so we were prepared. (BTW, my mother and father both read my blog now and have been blown away by your messages of support for them)

The actual chemo was tough, my mom got an allergic reaction half way through (severe back pain apparently worse than labour, which my mom has done four times with no drugs – ouch!), so they had to stop one of the meds, then reinstate it slowly.  Which means it took the whole day to get through the chemo.

Then, as it did last time, the side effects kicked in with a vengeance two days later.  This time my mom had such bad joint and limb pain, she couldn’t lift her head to drink soup through a straw.

And that’s the hard part.

We are a VERY close family, sometimes too close.  I know that the closeness can seem overwhelming, especially to the poor buggers who marry into this family, but the good part of this is if any of us is need, we rally around immediately.  

I am fortunate in that I live closest to my parents. I am the eldest, but the biggest baby in the family, by far.  I tell people I live close to my parents in case they need me.  The truth is, I need them. 

So, I live close by. I can help where ever I can. Shop (not cook, couldn't subject the poor old folks to that), tidy up, sit with my mom while she has her chemo etc.  My poor siblings, sister Nina who lives in Seoul and brother Paul who lives in London, have been ready to jump on that plane from the minute my mom got the diagnosis, but there is only so much any of us can do. 

Sister Mel lives close enough, but even she can only do so much. My dad has been absolutely amazing.  Honestly, that man is my hero.  He looks after her like gold.  I keep phoning and saying “can I help? Can I fold laundry? Wash dishes? Shop for you?” and he keeps telling me “don’t worry, we’ve got it under control”.

But even him, even all of us, can only help so far. There are some things she has to go through alone, one of which is the chemo side effects. That is the part I find hardest to bear.  To see her in pain and not be able to make it (physically) better for her. We all struggle with that. My mom is the strong one in the family, the rock.  To see her suffer is damn hard.  But she is a trooper and very strong. She has already turned the corner, and is feeling better each day. And the amazing thing is, I went to visit her on Saturday, in the midst of her worst time and there she was, greeting me at the door with lipstick on.  My mother believes lipstick cures all ills.  She might be bald, she might be suffering, but she has lipstick on and looks great.  Go mom!

As I said, it is hardest for Nina and Paul who are so far away, and who can’t be physically here for my mom, but they do what they can from afar, to show their love and support.  And I know each little word, each little gesture means the world to my mom.

I am so blessed to have such an amazing family, I love you all!

 

My brother Paul from London, with a message to my mom. He shaved his head in support.

That was a bloody expensive flea!

So, at 10:00am Friday the 23^rd January 2009, I dispatched the dogs off to the doggie parlour to be dipped and deflead. The flea people arrived at 10:30, as promised. Well, actually they promised to arrive at 10am, but what’s 30 minutes between friends.  They arrived and I left.  And even though they said it was safe for us to return after two hours, I decided to keep the kids and myself away from the house for a few hours.  The only problem was that I had a meeting at 2:30.  I called Marko and asked whether he could come home early to pick up the kids from the coffee shop where my meeting would be taking place.

I then had two hours to kill while the fleas were being killed, so I asked the kids where they would like to go. “Old Macdonald” they said (meaning McDonalds)  I hate that place.  With a passion. I don’t eat burgers and chips and that stuff, so I inevitably end up settling for something that distantly resembles a healthy meal which always tastes like shit.  And the kids don’t even eat burgers either!  My kids are such crap eaters, they don’t even eat junk food. How depressing is that.  But alas, the lure of the happy meal toy and the play area are strong.  So off we went to eat our crappy meals and climb in the tubes.  60 bucks*, two burgers wrapped in a serviette for the dogs, and two cheap plastic toys later, we went to the coffee shop to order two milkshakes and wait for Marko. Who was running late!  The kids were getting increasingly bored and loud and I was getting increasingly anxious that my meeting would arrive before Marko did.  Very professional to have two clambering four year olds covered in strawberry milkshake.

* Apologies, I should have mentioned that I meant R60, not $60! R10 = $1, so it cost me $6!

Side note:  On the walls of the coffee shop, they have these huge photos / wall paper thingies.  The one picture was of a horse drawn cart and a chap who looked like Charlie Chaplin. Adam says in his very loud voice, across the very quiet coffee shop, “OH LOOK MOM, THERE’S JESUS!”  Perfect.  My kids think Charlie Chaplin is Jesus.  Maybe they should be spending more time with their happy clapping Aunt, Sister Mel.  Hey, at least they have heard about Jesus before (must be from watching TV).

Eventually Marko arrives at 2:29pm and takes the kids off to the play place.  I quickly ask the waitress to clear the strawberry milkshakes, compose myself and mentally shift 475 gears to get ready for meeting.  Meeting arrives, all goes well.

Until I get this text message on my phone from Marko:

“Kate just made a poo in her pants. All over her bum and panties. No wipes, scrubbing with toilet paper. All over my hands. Now have her shitty panties in my pocket smelling like shit. I have been floeking* you. Just my luck. Hurry up”.

* Vloeking means ‘cursing’

I nearly peed in my pants.  HAHAHA!!!  Hilarious!  I can just picture Marko in his smart work clothes, cursing me as he wipes up messy poop. I told him afterwards to throw the damn panties away, but he said I am just wasting money, as usual. So I told him that he could clean them then. He threw the panties away.

Anyway, I went to go rescue him and we all went home.  The carpet people came the next day to steam clean the carpets.  Poor Rose has worked like a demon, washing and cleaning every last thing in the house, even though I told her it would be fine. She was paranoid about the flea poison. 

Between the wasted Happy Meals and the cheap plastic toys, the wasted strawberry milkshakes (even though I actually did finish them off myself – oink), the VERY VERY expensive play place (R26 for two appletizers, are they on drugs!!!), the discarded panties, the doggie parlour, the extermination, the carpet steam clean and the effect on Marko’s nerves, it has been a bloody expensive exercise.  And yes, our lesson has been learnt, we will NEVER EVER not deflea our animals again for such a long time.  (in our defence, in the 10 years we’ve been together and had pets, this is the first time this has ever happened).

But in a small way, it was almost worth it just to picture Marko with the poo emergency, because I can just imagine how he must have been cursing me. Because as you know, stuff that like is obviously all my fault. 

Oh, and just to top it all?  There are still some fleas hopping about.  I want to scream.  The exterminators are coming back on Monday.  

I HATE THESE FARKING FLEAS!!!  Just hurry up and die already.  Asshole fleas.

Too busy freaking out to update blog

I wanted to do a deep and meaningful blog post today, but I am too busy freaking the fuck out!

A few days ago I de-flead Shelly for the second time as the first round didn't seem to have had any effect. (It is very hot here at the mo') Then, a day or so ago, I noticed quite a few flea bites on Kate. Didn't think too much of it as the kids are always lying on top of Shelly.  Then last night, at about 9:00 pm, I noticed two fleas on my foot.  I told Marko who started looking on the floor and all of a sudden we noticed about 475 million of the little fuckers hopping about.  OMG!!! I have a flea investation in my house.  Suddenly Marko and I start itching and scratching all over.  We imagine fleas crawling all over us.

Desperate times call for desperate measures.  I phoned the emergency number for the carpet cleaning place, apologizing profusely for phoning at 9:30 at night, but explaining that this was an emergency as WE HAVE FLEAS! IN OUR HOUSE!

The kind woman said she would send the hit squad over at 10:00 am SHARP with their anti-flea counter-insurgents and attack the problem with the strongest weaponary they have.  Thank bloody goodness, or else we would have had to move house immediately.  I am off the vet as we speak to get mega dose flea shit for the pets.

I am completely grossed out.  WE HAVE FLEAS! IN OUR HOUSE!  I will understand if you never want to visit me again.  Now excuse me while I go scratch my itchy bits.

Common questions asked about travelling to South Africa

These questions about South Africa were posted on a South African Tourism Website and were answered by the website owner. (not sure if this is really true, got it off another blog, I thought it was flipping hilarious)

Q: Does it ever get rainy in South Africa ? I have never seen it rain on TV, so how do the plants grow? ( UK )
A: We import all plants fully grown and then just sit around watching them die.

Q: Will I be able to see elephants in the street? ( USA )
A: Depends how much you've been drinking.

Q: I want to walk from Durban to Cape Town - can I follow the railroad tracks? (Sweden)  A: Sure, it's only two thousand kilometres. Take lots of water...

Q: Is it safe to run around in the bushes in South Africa ? ( Sweden )
A: So it's true what they say about Swedes.

Q: Are there any ATMs (cash machines) in South Africa ? Can you send me a List of them in JHB, Cape Town , Knysna and Jeffrey's Bay? ( UK )
A: What did your last slave die of?

Q: Can you give me some information about Koala Bear racing in South Africa ? ( USA )
A: Aus-tra-lia is that big island in the middle of the pacific. A-Fri-ca is the big triangle shaped continent south of Europe which does not.... Oh forget it. Sure, the Koala Bear racing is every Tuesday night in Hillbrow. Come naked.

Q: Which direction is north in South Africa ? ( USA )
A: Face south and then turn 90 degrees. Contact us when you get here and we'll send the rest of the directions.

Q: Can I bring cutlery into South Africa ? ( UK )
A: Why? Just use your fingers like we do.

Q: Do you have perfume in South Africa ? ( France )
A: No, WE don't stink.

Q: Can you tell me the regions in South Africa where the female population is smaller than the male population? ( Italy )
A: Yes, gay nightclubs.

Q: Do you celebrate Christmas in South Africa ? ( France )
A: Only at Christmas.

Q: Are there killer bees in South Africa ? ( Germany )
A: Not yet, but for you, we'll import them.

Q: Are there supermarkets in Cape Town and is milk available all year round? ( Germany )
A: No, we are a peaceful civilisation of vegetarian hunter- gatherers.. Milk Is illegal.

Q: Please send a list of all doctors in South Africa who can dispense rattlesnake serum. ( USA )
A: Rattlesnakes live in A-meri-ca, which is where YOU come from. All South African snakes are perfectly harmless, can be safely handled and make good pets.

Q: I was in South Africa in 1969, and I want to contact the girl I dated while I was staying in Hillbrow. Can you help? ( USA )
A: Yes, and you will still have to pay her by the hour.

And just to remind you, what a typical (i.e. mine) looks like in South Africa

(Designed by my brilliant friend, the American Asshole)

Those special parenting moments that make it all worthwhile

Adam this morning:  “Hey mom, come look at my poo, it looks like a dog with one eye"

(A bit like the Rorschach inkblot test, but only with poo, Adam seems to derive great joy in finding shapes and patterns in his poop.  Which is fine, if that is what floats his boat, but I really wish I didn’t have to join in to look for the one eyed dog too)

Kate in Woolworths this afternoon (really loudly as Kate only has one volume setting ‘VERY LOUD’)  “Mom, there are tiny little bubbles coming out my bum”

Some things are not meant to be shared with all and sundry my darling daughter, and tiny little bubbles coming out your bum is one of them. 

(I must be honest, the bubbles out the bum thing did have me panicked a little and I asked with a sense of urgency whether she needed to go to the loo that very minute, but she assured me they were only tiny little bubbles and not poop. Right. Good.)

The joys of parenting. 

Momvise*

*Momvise is like assvise, but for moms. .

 

My kids are going through a stage (please let it be a stage!) where they seem to be dreaming a lot, and calling out in their sleep.  Not night terrors as such, at least I don’t think so. They don’t scream in fear, or are inconsolable, but they call out at night, sometimes sitting up when they do it.  Things like “No Adam, that is my XYZ”, or “Katie, STOP IT!”  At least once a night, sometimes twice.

 

When they call out, I immediately jump up and go to them.  I put my arm around them and say ‘sshhh, go back to sleep’ and I even ask them if they are having a bad dream. They will answer me, and then go back to sleep. 

 

This might not seem like a big deal (and isn’t to my husband who sleeps through the entire thing), but it is seriously disturbing my sleep! The kids know nothing about it in the morning when they wake up.  I suppose I should try not to jump up straight away, but I am scared the one will wake the other. Although the other one usually sleeps through the noise and even if they do wake up, they go back to sleep.  Actually, not sure what I am scared of. I guess I am scared of them being scared and I want to console them when I hear them call out.  BUT I NEED MY SLEEP!!! Sleep is in very short supply and in high demand here. And in four months time (FOUR MONTHS – EEEKK!!), I will be getting even less of it!

 

I don’t know. This has been going on for about 2-3 months now. Is this a stage?  What should I do?  Any assvise for me?

Masende update

Remember Masende?  Harrison’s son who you so kindly helped out with his university admission fees?  Well, he passed his first year of his engineering degree!  His parents are SO proud of him.  Both of them are very low earning unskilled workers who grew up during apartheid where there was very limited access to decent basic education for black people, and obtaining a university education was just about impossible for many, so this is a very big achievement for them, as it would be for any parent actually.  Thank you to all of you who made this possible xxxxx

Women and Home Shoot

Some pics from a W&H shoot last year (Nov edition).  Unphotoshopped and self-done make up.  V impressed with myself.  For a make-up novice, I did quite well.  This was before I got knocked up, hence the wine.  Oh, how I miss the wine. 

See, I've left my hair with its natural curl since you all told me you preferred it slightly curly than blow-dried straight. Which is rather handy as it saves me the time and money of getting a blow job beforehand.  Do you like the boobs? They have settled in quite nicely, am rather pleased with them. 



The sweet young woman on the left is the super clever, massively talented Maritza, my partner on the awesome South African Infertility support site - Fertilicare. It has become the biggest online support portal for infertility in South Africa.