My Child is a Genius

Tony has set up a profile on my iMac for Josie and showed her how to log in.

She now knows to:

Click on my name in the top right hand corner, then select her name in the drop down menu.
Then it comes up with a window asking for a password and she knows how to enter her password (josie).
Then she has her little dock of games and applications at the bottom and she knows how to click on them to load the programs and away she goes.

Four and a half years old.

Genius I tell ya.

Four and a Half, Going on 40

In the car this morning..

Josie: I can be lots of things. I can be a girl fireman, and a fairy, and a butterfly and a pony..
Mari: Yes honey, you can be anything you want to be..
[A few minutes to ponder]
Josie: Mummy, I just can't help the silly moments..

;-)

On.. In.. Doesn't Matter!

Ok I haven't been posting any conversations with my dad cause my mum told me off for embarrassing him in front of the entire world (cause thats who reads my blog, didn't you know??). So I stopped. But this I couldn't resist.

He had been given a second hand laptop at work and wanted us to have a look at it.

Mari: well bring it tonight and we will have a look over the weekend
George: so don't be late today
Mari: I will be there before you
Mari: and if not you can just leave it
George: ok see you
George: it is on my car
George: so it is mine already
Mari: well take it off your car before you leave because it will fall off when you move the car
George: no it is on the car box
Mari: your car has a box ?
George: yes on the boot
Mari: well you need to take it off the boot because when you move the car the box will slide off the boot.
George: it is inside of box
George: and box is fixed to the car
Mari: on the boot ?
Mari: you fixed a box to the top of your boot?
Mari: how do you open the boot ?
George: it is inside of my boot
Mari: ahhh right
Mari: so IN your car.. not ON your car then ?
George: at least
George: for my it is the same
Mari: its at least in your car?
George: on.....in.....
Mari: and at most under it ?
George: you want competision in russian
Mari: no thanks.. I dont live there
George: i will laught too
George: you was born....
George: and you first languch was russian
George: so you probably just forgot russian
Mari: probably

My mum will probably have strong words for me.. but after three days of taking care of a house full of sick people, it was a good laugh ;-)

Harika & Sven's Baby Guessing Game

I have set up a Guessing Pool for Harri & Sven!

Please have a guess!

A Sick Household

Bah.. this is fun.. NOT..

Josie has the flu.. Tony has the flu.. Granny has the flu.. everyone has the bloody flu!!!!!

Josie has had temps up to 39.5. Tony hasn't had temps but he has thrown up all over the floor.

Gloria is sick in bed with temps AND throwing up.

I'm fine ;-) I had a flu shot. I'm ALL good.. so far.. lol..

I managed to be at work for a whole hour before having to come home and take care of both sick people.

Tomorrow Josie will be going to Baba's, Tony will be home and I, hopefully, will be going to work.

Mini Update

I know I haven't blogged for a while..

Just been very slack is all ;-)

I have updated Flickr with a LOT of new photos.. http://www.flickr.com/photos/josiephotos/.. check them out ;-)

Everything is fine with everyone.. although Josie is kinda sick at the moment with a cold..

Its 1130pm and I need to get to bed now.. enjoy the photos..

Fall of The Great Thinker

See.. even the intellectual have their moments..

Mat: tried to get some cool photos of the moon two nights ago
Mat: was very full and yellow over the water
Mat: couldn't stop the camera shake .. even on a tripod
Mat: just pressing the button moved the camera
Tony: set the timer
Mat: bought a remote shutter release on Ebay for $6
Mat: ok you know what .. you go to hell
Mat: you go to hell and you die
Tony: ROFL

And More From Josie..

She was just full of conversation today..
_____________

From Becka..

We are all watching The Bold and The Beautiful and Josie starts talking:

Josie [in a nagging voice]: Becka... Becka...

Becka: Shhhh Jose we are watching..

Josie runs into the other room and returns a few minutes later.

Josie: Becka you were silly. I thought about it. I went and sat in the naughty spot and I thought about it, you were just being silly, ok?
_____________

Then on the way home.. out of no where..

Josie: Mummy, Bambi was little.. and then he growed big..
Mari: Yes honey, Bambi was a dear..
Josie: But I am already a dear!

and later still in the car..

Josie: Mummy, do I have any bruddas?
Mari: No honey..
Josie: Do I have any stisters?
Mari: No honey.. you have cousins..
Josie: Yeh like Matty.. he's my little baby boy.. he sits on my lap and he's so heavy that I can't even pick him up, he's a big baby but I am bigger.. I am this big [shows me how big she is.. which is about the size of a cat]..
Mari: Yes ok honey..
[A little time passes..]
Josie: What were we talking about??

LOL..

Lions and Elephants and Josie.. Oh My!

Josie is at Baba's today with Becka..

They were watching Play School on TV and they were showing elephants..

Becka: Have you ever seen real elephants?

Josie: No because they will eat me!

Becka: No, they live in cages.

Josie: Well i don't want to go to the zoo.

Becka: But they can't eat you because they will be in cages!!

Josie: Yeh but what about the Lions?

Becka: No everyone lives in cages so you just go and watch them.

Josie: Well I just don't like lions.

Becka: Well what about if on a nice day we go to the zoo and see everything except the lions?

Josie: Yeh... But no lions.

[Pondering...]

Josie: I have an idea, what about if we dress up like elephants and go to the zoo like that? I'm going to ask my mum to buy me an elephant suit because I want to be an Elephant!

LOL.. I'm off to the shops..

A New Babysitter

For years now our niece Becka has been bugging us to let her babysit Josie. We have always been reluctant because we were not confident in Josie listening and following the orders of anyone else. We were worried that Becka wouldn't be able handle an out of control and willful Josephine.

Over the last couple of months we have noticed a new maturity in both Josie and in Becka. One shows more promise in listening and following orders, and the other shows more maturity in thought and deed. So we decided to give it a go.

So last night, Tony and I went to see Fantastic Four (which was fabulous!) and left Becka in charge of Josie at home.

All worked out very well. Becka made sure that Josie had dinner (finished all her veges too!) and had her in bed and asleep by 8pm. She did a great job and Tony and I were very impressed. Well done Becka!

Its nice to think we now have another option at babysitting, and this one Josie will enjoy the best.

So the night before last Becka came over in the evening (to wash my dishes cause I am a lazy woman who let her dishes pile up to a state where I couldn't bare to look at them and had to go to rent-a-niece to get them done) and Tony took her home after that. The next morning Josie wakes up, comes straight to me, wakes me up and says:

Josie: Mummy! Why is Becka not asleep on the couch!?

I had to explain to her that that was happening the following morning.

So the next morning Josie joined Becka on the couch.. see below..

Mari & Josie == Everything

I related a set of events that happened today that renewed my appreciation for my wife and child on the message board of a podcast I listen to regularly (The Deadpan podcast).
Not going to re-write it here, you guys can deal with second hand content. So without further ado:

"Hey guys,

Sorry i haven’t contributed to the community in quite a while Jack (and after you gave me such a high by mentioning me in a list of new community members and all) but I have been listening to the podcast (Deadpan is indeed the way) and lurking in the boards every now and then.

Anyway, I wanted to share an experience I had today that involved the deadpan in finale.

I had a dream/nightmare last night (ie it started off ok and then went bad):
My wife and daughter and our 3 cats moved into a new house in a great neighbourhood.
My wife left the house to go to work leaving me and the Spudlette (my daughters nickname which is short for her super hero name “Spudlette The Crazy Chicken”….erm….mine is “The Bowel”…don’t ask. My wifes is “The Glare”…anyhoo!) to start getting the house into some kind of order.

Well after a few bits which aren’t Germain to the nightmare part the time period sort of changed such that even though time had gone forward I no longer had ever had a daughter and my wife had left me. And I was still in the living room of the house (with just the cats now) having to start the unpacking.

Just as I finished the unpacking and was doing something at one of the windows I saw my wife's car pull up and she got out in a wedding dress. Somehow I knew she was coming back from her honeymoon. She and her new husband who was an old friend of mine. They were going to live in the new house. My mother was helping her out of the car (because of the dress being so cumbersome) and into the house.

They all entered the house and while my mother and my wifes new husband and (perhaps) his mother were all sorting stuff out my wife (Mari - ironically…you should have seen what a clown I looked like when I asked her father for his permission to “marry…er…Mari”) came into the lounge room and started to talk to me like nothing was wrong, like we must have had a perfectly amicable split. That wasn't how I felt. I felt destroyed.

I left the room, pushing past her and heading for the kitchen. She followed me and I realised I was going to try to win her back. With her standing in a wedding dress and having just returned from her honeymoon. Tough but I needed her. I couldn’t live without her. And I remembered my baby, like she was a future that had been changed because I had stuffed up and lost my wife.

Just as I was starting to talk to her the husband, my friend, walked into the kitchen and knowing our history he was suspicious and well to cut a short story shorter we started to fight.
A sword fight.
With hard cardboard tubing.
Awesome fight. Very kung fu.

In the middle of the fight I woke up in my bed. I looked over my shoulder and my wife was not there. And my heart just about exploded until I rolled further and bumped up against something. Turning over fully I found it to be my little girl snuggled up in the covers up against me. And my heart did burst. I drew her into my arms and held her against me for a long time. During which I heard sounds of Mari in the other room getting ready for work. Everything was ok.

The dream didn't really linger in my mind very long after I too got up and started (very hurriedly) getting ready to take my daughter to school and then myself to work (we were running very late now) but when I got into work I remembered the dream and started to related it to Mari over IM. By the time I was finished I was feeling very emotional again and sad. The feelings were still very fresh. Just as I finished recounting the tale I hit the end of Deadpan 59 (which I have listened to before but I like the Tee Morris interview enough to keep listening when my playlist clocked over back to the beginning) where you (Jack of course) played the song which I don't know the name of (To Make You Feel My Love seems possible) and I just about lost it completely. Being an emotion junky and a bit of a masochist I don't know if this was the worst time or the best time for that song to kick in but it had a pretty spectacular effect to say the least.

Mari suggested chocolate to cheer me up but I opted instead for the solitude of the bathroom for a little breakdown. I’m ok now though.

Thank you Jack, for playing that song as frequently as you do. Though it may have been painful it enhanced an experience I was having and made the lessons learned all the more powerful.

Deadpan for life.

Myrddin"

We Have Harry !

Woohoo!

Harry Potter Gold Class! First Saturday, 1pm! Back centre seats!

WOOHOO!

Weirded out by Josie

I often feel like I'm going slightly mad in the moments between when Josie suddenly starts talking out of nowhere and when I figure out what she's talking about.

This morning we were sitting in traffic on our way to school and I'm thinking about stuff going on at work when I hear, in the background of my thoughts, floating out of the back seat as if on the wind:

Josie: The chicken is holding the cats label...
Daddy: *distractedly* is he?
And then as my sub-conscious begins to start rapping smartly on my conscious for attention and the words "DOES NOT COMPUTE" start to light up in my head I become confused and swivel around in my seat in the hope that if I can see and therefore focus on the child she will start to make sense and the feeling of holding onto sanity by my fingernails will fade...
Daddy: Huh, hang on what? The cats hat?!
Josie: NOOOooo, its LABEL!
Daddy: Wha?!
But before I have time to ask some questions to try and make sense of this conversation she quickly hits back with...
Josie: *in her special thinking voice* I think it's a duck.
Daddy: *completely out to sea at this point* Wha? Duck? What?
Josie: It's not a biiiird! *VERY earnestly*
Daddy: *nothing. But in my head I'm screaming*
Josie: It's a chicken *her mind is made up by the tone in her voice*
Daddy: *I go to my special place...again...in my head* Dribble
Having decided what it is (whatever IT is) Josie now has enough bandwidth to notice Daddy is drooling into his beard and in exasperation points past my shoulder and says...
Josie: The bird!!! Hanging there!
I turn and see the bird and cat fluffy toys which harbor the deoderisers for my car and suddenly I feel myself washed ashore once more on the land on sanity.
Daddy: Oooooooh -thank christ for that-
I turn the bird around to get a look at it and proclaim...
Daddy: It's a toucan sweety
Having now had a good look at it and clearly disgusted by Daddy's paltry mental abilities Josie deadpan-stares me and matter-of-factly states...
Josie: It's a parrot.

Adendum
After we started moving again and a small pause in conversation I tried to reclaim some of my lost status with my daughter by suggesting...
Daddy: Is it a Pirate Parrot?!
To which Josie replied simply...
Josie: No.
In a tone which clearly stated "You are neither funny nor particularly bright. Now, I have intelligent conversations to pursue with my imaginary dollies ... shush."
I shut up for the rest of the trip.

First Ever Layout

I got the scrapbooking bug last night. Decided to try some digital scrapbooking. Here is my very first attempt! A bit simplistic but there you go ;-)

Who Is Family?

As we were pulling into Granny's driveway over the weekend we had the following conversation.

Josie: You are my family..
Mari: Yes honey, we are, good girl!
Josie: Me and Daddy and Mummy are all family.. and Granny and Baba..
Mari: Yep, and Grandpa and Dyeda and Uncle Mat and Auntie Wendy and Becka and Vika are all our family..
Josie: yeh and Auntie Harri..
[Dramatic pause while I wipe a tear..]
Mari: yes honey..
Josie: And Matty.. and Jayden..
Tony: Who is Jayden's mummy?
Josie [thinking]: Uhh I dunno..
Tony: Anna!
Josie [slaps forehead]: Yeh! Anna!

lol..

Tales from the back seat (get your mind out of the gutter)

Heard floating out of the back seat while driving Josie to school this morning:

"Dear Rachel,
Sharing is clareing...and Hairy A'Clarey is afraid of Slinky A'Linky...He's a Bad Cat!...I'm goina wrap up this [feather] for Rachel..."

Some Photo Compilations

I've been busy..

A Breakthrough!

For the first time in years and years, Josie went to bed by herself!

Since she was a baby, we have always stayed in the room with Josie as she was falling asleep. A VERY bad habit to fall into, I know, but there you go, we fell. A few periods of time through her younger years we have had succeful results from control crying, and she would go to sleep herself but then she would get sick or something, and would revert to needing one of us in there.

So tonight, she was at Rachel's house, and was being naughty. Wouldnt get dressed to go, wouldnt clean up, and I have had a very long day so I lost my temper and went off at her. Her punishment would be no story and no daddy for bed.

She was on her best behaviour for the rest of the night, expecting us to relent if she was good. We didn't, and she was qite upset going to bed, but Tony took her in, changed her and got her ready for bed, then explained that he would leave the door open and we were right outside.

He came out and we very quietly watched TV.

We didn't hear a peep out of her, and she just drifted off to sleep!

WOOHOO!!!!

Now I have no illusions.. this was a punishment, so I have to be very careful how I encourage this, but hopefully this is just the beginning!

Yay Josie!

From the Mouth Of A Babe

Driving back to Vika's from school..

Josie: are we there yet?
Vika: soon
Josie: vika, you are slow
Vika: well i cant go too fast i have to wait for the other cars, cant jump over them
Josie: no you dont have super powers, my dad can, he can do anything, he is super...ahm, special.
Josie: vika go faster
Vika: i cant go too fast or we can have an accident
[a few seconds of thinking....]
Josie: did you know that granny had an accident
Vika: no, what happened
Josie: granny smashed when i took seat belt off, she smashed into a
man with brother and sister and i took seatbelt off because i wanted to
so i did and when i did granny had an accident
Vika: you took seat belt off while granny was still driving?
Josie: yes and she smashed into man and brother and sister.

She is a bit confused..

Josie has gotten in trouble twice in the last week or so, most recently yesterday, for taking her seatbelt off while Granny is still driving the car. She got a stern talking to last night.

On a completely separate occasion, Granny had a small prang while Josie was in the back (with her seatbelt on).

Understandably, Vika was quite concerned when she questioned me about this.. ;-)

Josie, Road Rage And The Jean-Stock

Yesterday evening, having picked up Josie from Granny's, we were driving home. I came to some lights and edged forward to turn right but there was traffic so I didn't have enough room before the light turned red again. Seeing as I was out too far I started back up a bit, the car behind me was quite a way back so there was no problem, however seeing me back up, the silly woman started beeping at me. I groaned.

Mari (looking back): Yeh yeh, I SEE you!

So I back up and wait for the green light. Lights change and I go, having turned the corner, we passed a bus and a truck, who after an altercation of some kind started beeping at eachother. Josie has learnt well what to do in this situation.

Josie (from the back): Yeh yeh, we SEE you!

LOL.

Then...

Driving to school this morning, Josie was reading from her Read-Along Jack and the Beanstalk book. When you open the book and turn the pages, it reads to you. But alas, it has stopped working, so Josie has to do the reading herself, but seeing as she can't read yet, she makes it up as she goes along. Here is a snippet..

Josie: Jack gave some coloured beans to his mummy but his mummy didn't like them so she threw them.. out the window.. but Jack went up the jean-stock and saw the giant and he got scared and came back down.

Pretty succinct, no?