Simple Saturday

This is what we did today.  Well for some of it!  Levi had a soccer game in the morning and again the teams played well.  At one point I was cheering for Levi as he got a goal, when I realised that Levi was in fact sitting on the sideline!  Of course that started a teasing from the assembled parents that rivaled the competition on the field.  They all teased that they would ask Levi to raise his hand just prior to doing anything.  Of course about a minute later Levi raised his hand to call for the ball.  The laughter was loud and long!  It is great that we play kids from his own school, so we know the kids and the parents.  We spent most of the day doing fun things and some non fun things like homework.  On a beautiful, sunny, warm day it was just perfect!

BMX Boy

We found another track nearby.  Actually we didn't but some friends did and we followed them to it!  Levi is getting really good and is starting to get airtime.  OK that is stretching the truth a little.  He is incredibly excited when his front wheel lifts off even slightly and calls it "air time".  Here are some photos of the day!

Customer Service

It has been beautiful at night at the moment, because the nights have been clear and the moon beautifully full.  I love the moon.  I love that it gets to travel all over the world in a day and that it is the same moon that watches over my friends and family in Oregon as the one that watches us here!

Jo brought home a toy the other day for Levi.  It was a lighted stick that you shot into the sky and in the dark it was just fabulous to watch.  He had a great time out there shooting it into the sky and then running after it.  They continued until the mosquitoes drove us all indoors.  As you can see, Levi has decided that his hair needs to be short again.  Really short because he doesn't do anything by halves.  He wanted me to cut it, which I did and then he ran his hands through his hair and said that is wasn't short enough because it wasn't 'spiky' enough!  I continued to buzz it until it was in fact, spiky enough!  He loves the spiky feel and I will have to admit that I love the feel as well!

Today I had some interesting interactions with the customer service.  My iPhone has been failing.  It turns itself off without a loss of charge and sometimes needs to be charging to do anything.  If I had to use it while it was charging, it would give you a mild electric shock for the pleasure.  Today I took it to Chermside because it is the only place on the Northside that has an Apple store.  They were great once I actually got through the waiting involved endlessly at Apple.  In fact, after they were able to replicate the charging silliness, they just replaced the phone.  

Now I have to go back to Chermside anyway.  I bought Levi a new bike!  There is more to this story and Levi has been really patient.  His old bike had a few minor problems.  The first is that the brakes are broken, broken so they freeze onto the wheel about once every 5 minutes or so.  The pedal is also broken and in the process of breaking, ripped out the thread.  The only way to replace the pedal without thread is to tighten the new pedal on as far as it will go and try to jam it in there at a funny angle.  It doesn't work very well.  The pedal falls off about every 10 minutes.  Levi didn't really complain but he would have to bring the bike in for repairs every seven and a half minutes or so!  So after being tight for about two months, I finally bought him a Transformers bike.

We took it home and then he and I put it together.  Only to find that the front bike tube was ripped and he couldn't use it anyway.  I had come home early because there was a big storm on the way and I had only computer work anyway, so I could do it at home.

Riding and Jumping

We had a whole flock of these grazing beside us!

 Today we went bike riding!  There is a BMX track in Caboolture that is just fantastic!  If you go early enough there are no big kids there and really for much of this morning our boys had the track pretty much to themselves.  This track is quite long but has lots of jumps and turns.  Levi, who only this time last year, I was despairing would ever learn to ride a bike, loved it.  He has started to jump hos bike and loves to slide out on turns.  He still isn't as confident as some of the other kids but he is doing well.  Frankly he is happy and that is all I really care about.

I love his helmet hair!  He went round and round the track until he was bright red and exhausted.  The other two boys weren't any better.  But there is not much that a rest and a Coke Slushie won't cure! 

There is a skate park at the same place.  Levi actually rode around and jumped out today!  This was the first time that I have seen him do anything that daring.  It is fun to watch him gradually pushing the limits.  Admittedly, it isn't how I did it.  I pushed limits for sure but there wasn't anything gradual about it!  Where Levi pushes his limits with a gentle hand, I tended to push my limits with a hammer!  I love watching him 'do it differently' even though I have to gag myself or sit on my hands at times to stop from trying to shove him forwards.

We start Term 4 in a couple of days and I am looking forward to it, more because Levi's bedtime drops back to 7pm from 8pm and I get more time at night.  I am selfish to want that so badly but I do treasure the time at night.  Time for me and the things that I want to do.  Admittedly most of the time it involves cleaning and vacuuming, but still at least I have fewer demands at night!  In Term 4, Levi starts swimming as a part of his PE program.  I love that the school starts to take over some of those tasks as well.  They start to make sure that everybody can swim.  

I called Cheryl this morning and Nate is doing well.  No rash.  No problems.  Just a tired little boy recovering from a bad day!

Long Week

 It has been a long week.  It will be a longer month but at least we are on the way to getting through it.  This month is busy.  Not just busy but impossibly busy.  It looks like this:

Week 1 - Outreach to Townsville all week

Week 2 - Outreach to Mt Isa and regular work

Week 3 - Ekka week both Levi and I are off, Monday day off, Wednesday, Levi off as well

Week 4 - Outreach to Cairns all week and then the thing Levi has been waiting for; holiday in Cairns!

So I am back on the computer after a week to write on the blog.  Last night I was too busy with other things and my attendance here is going to be sporadic in the next month I am sure!  Levi is finally well enough to actually get out there and play.  There is still a residue of that illness, however.  This morning we went to swimming training and then met some friends at the BMX track.  A little way into that he started to fade and wanted to go home.  He spent the next two hours quietly plying with Legos and watching TV.  It isn't time that he normally would have needed, but it is less than this time last week!  So getting there, but slowly!

Last night in the shower Levi decided that he didn't want a fringe anymore and he cut it off.  I asked him why he didn't just tell me so I could help him.  He said that I always threw his hair away and he wanted to keep it.  So he cut it almost to the skin in huge chunks and also cut it at the back.  In the places that he cut the hair, I think he was lucky not to have cut himself it was so short.  So I did what every parent in my situation would do:

I took a photo of it!

And then I laughed and got out the number 3 buzzer and gave him a buzz cut.  Levi loved it and it is so fuzzy and soft, I can't resist running my hands through it.  That is the softest fuzz that I have ever felt.  Levi said that he wants a haircut every day so his hair doesn't have a chance to grow.  I said that I thought it would be a long time before it was long enough to cut, so we could probably cut it every two weeks and still maintain it.

 The mancub was very excited but I wish we could have got there a more legitimate way.  Still it will stop him getting nits in his hair from school and it will save on shampoo and generally make it easier to wash.  And I can run my hands through his hair!  He is such a snugly thing too!



Climbing

 Yes, face paint has become a real thing in the last few days, first the knight and now stripes.  What can I say?  It's holidays!

Levi and I met up with some friends and went to the bike paths and playground today.  There are some jumps that the kids can ride over and some that are bigger still that they are not quite up to riding over.  Levi has progressed his riding now and is significantly more confident with the whole thing.  He is doing the small jumps without difficulty and doesn't cry when he falls off anymore!  Then Levi decided to climb the trees.  At least he did it in a helmet. 

I have times when I despair that the next generation will have any respect at all.  Well, except for my child of course, because he is perfect!  There was another couple of families there and it blew me away how those kids played.  They stood in the middle of the jumps so no one could use them.  When they were finished using their bikes or scooters they just left them in the middle of the pathway!  One of the boys about 10 or 11, threw a cup at a kid jumping a bike.  Had he hit him, the bike and the rider would have taken a huge tumble.  That we did react to and the thrower looked contrite and stopped.  My question though is where is his family?  Why did a stranger have to discipline her son doing an incredibly dangerous activity.  It is not like she wasn't standing there partially watching.  I am hoping that we were just witnesses to bad parenting, but there are times that I do despair about the state of the children!

Catching up

This weekend has caught up with me.  I am getting sick.  Levi is too.  I think after burning the candle at both ends for three days that is just what happens.  I think I am even going to take tomorrow off and snuggle into bed and watch movies.  Levi is sleeping in the next room, coughing.  I am also coughing.  I hope that we get over it really fast.  I am already sick of being sick!

On a better note, Levi has become suddenly proficient on his bike.  Suddenly he wants to ride his bike all the time.  We were going out to dinner tonight and as we were waiting to get picked up, he took the bike, round and round the house 10 times.  Suddenly he has got it.  Suddenly he is a big boy.  I am excited to see the next phase of his life, but I will have to say, I am already missing the little boy!