Preschool Concert
Thursday, 19 December 2013
Amazingly it is almost the end of the PreSchool year (kinder to our Victorian readers) before starting Kindergarten (Prep) next year. Where did the year go? Last night was the PreSchool end of year celebration. It was really a concert but the girls teacher didn't like to call it a concert coz the thought of organising up to 80 preschoolers to sing freaked her out! We had a lovely picnic with all the other families while our children buzzed around like excited bees before being rounded up for the concert. The kids did a great job singing with not any stage fright that I could see. Abby loved singing and doing the moves while Zo concentrated hard to get it all just right. Belinda, as she had predicted, cried in the audience. Below is a little snap with the kids in mid move - Zoe is to the left sitting down in purple and Abs is sitting down in the middle making rolly-polly hand moves. Very proud. :) 
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PeeWees Presentation
Wednesday, 4 December 2013
Another day another camera-phone-blog-entry. This was from the last day of Pee Wees soccer when the girls were presented with trophies. All I can say is they were very very proud. Here the Zoe, Emma, Abby and Cate (a preschool buddy who joined PeeWees a bit late). 
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Noosa SLSC
Sunday, 1 December 2013
One of the best nights during our week in Noosa was eating dinner on the balcony of the Noosa SLSC. Actually I think it was just called 'the Surf Club'. Great fish and chips, icy cold beer, girls enjoying themselves and fantastic view as we watched the nippers train and the sunset. Perfect weather. Walked home along the shores edge to our apartment in Little Cove. I feel happy inside just remembering it. 
Oh I also went back to the club later in the week after the girls were in bed to catch a magnificent last quarter of the Dogs overhauling the Crows. The table of Crows supporters next to me didnt seem to mind too much. :)
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Freedom Drive
Sunday, 1 December 2013
OK so its been a while. Again. But better late than never I've got a plan for a bit of blogging again. I'm going to go back through the photos on my phone and use them for a few short entries to summarise what happened and get a bit more filling into the blog for 2013. 
So to start with the selfie above was obviously me. We went to Noosa again this year and rather than haul the girls on two long drives we went with a plan of Jase driving the car up to Brissy and picking the girls up from a very exciting plane flight. The photo above was after the first nights camping at Hawks Nest where I'd had a cracker meal at the local pub. The photo below is from a focus of mine on the drive - using the Beanhunter app to find quality coffee on the Pacific Highway. Below is one of our favorite cafes, Harvest Cafe in Newybar near Byron and next to it was a cracker coffee I had in Coffs Harbour. The 3 days driving without the girls went very quickly and was a really nice bit of me-time. There - I've done a blog update. Yipee! 
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Hip-story
Wednesday, 28 August 2013
Yesterday was the day for Zoe's now annual trip to see Dr Little, or as he is now known Professor Little, at Westmead Childrens Hospital in Sydney. Unlike previous visits this was not an up and back in a day - we have been on holidays in Noosa (hopefully more entries to follow) for a week and a half so this was on the way home. The Orthopaedic Clinic seems to have got more popular over the last 5 years and so the wait was longer but in the end worth the wait. Professor Little came into our little examination room and announced "Well today Zoe's hip is normal!!!" What a relief! All the effort of 2 and 4 weekly visits to Westmead came flooding back, poor little 9 month old Zo in the pavlik harness and then the brace and especially the nights and days of the first few weeks in the harness. But in the end worth it. Prof Little advised we come back in 2 years and again 3 years after that for a check up but as he said "I won't even bother telling you about the things we will check for because they won't happen with Zoe". As he said, with Zoe's history just need to check at different developmental stages. As we were about to leave Belinda remembered that Zoe wanted to show Dr. Little how she hopped (last appointment he had said hopping would help) and proudly hop away Zoe did - as Prof Little turned to leave he smiled, laughed and said "Now thats why her hip's better!"
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PeeWees Soccer
Thursday, 4 July 2013
This term, which is nearly over, was our families first foray into Saturday morning sport. We'd found out that Tom & Liam, and best of all good buddy Emma, we're trying out Peewees Soccer at the mighty BelSouth Juniors so we thought we'd give it a go. It involves getting put into small groups with other Under 5's and doing drills with the parents. At the first day there were about 100 kids so the parents need to help out. We follow the instructions at each station of the circuit and do each drill for 5 mins or so. The second half is a series of little 4 on 4 or so games which bring all sport has to offer - tears, pain, glory, goals and test the limits to the extreme. I'd have to say its been fun. Although I didn't anticipate as a parent how much I'd get caught up on every move or difficulty of each of my girls - from being so proud of them when they execute a skill to the level of frustration when there is a perceived lack of effort (controlling my frustration should not be so hard when your 2 daughters and their buddy decide to sit down and pick grass mid match!). Anyhoo some photos below of the 3 pee wee amigos ( Zoe, Abby and Emma). 
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Holding up a mirror
Wednesday, 26 June 2013
Sometimes the girls say stuff and I find myself thinking "hmmmm they definitely got that from me". And then other times Belinda and I are doing pick-up from the YMCA child care and there it is in a laminated poster on the wall (NB: Shane is the team leader in the PreSchool room at the Y): 
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Cheeky Monkies
Sunday, 16 June 2013
Ah Tuesdays. Still Daddy-day-care (although technically it was Friday's for a while...) and now including some sport, usually friends or cousins, household chores or a trip to Coles and generally family life. On this Tuesday I was trying to catch a moment on the phone with the excellent electrician Dave whose done work for us before. I managed to catch him and retreated to the study for the ensuing 10 minute convo. Consequently I didn't hear any of the raucous laughter coming from Belinda and my bedroom but when I did I found a set of twins, I suspect led by Abby, who had deposited most of my wardrobe on the floor and were now wearing the clothes below "dressed as Daddy". Very cute. Note length of pants. They are my work pants of course. 
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Memories
Monday, 8 April 2013
Abby and Zoe turned 5 on Friday! 5 just
seems so, well, OLD! The girls both had a great day, taking cupcakes to
preschool that had been made and carefully decorated the day before; followed
by a lovely dinner with Grandma and Grandpa (aka Mum and Dad), Jo, Shep and
cousins Roy and Lewie. We had a party at Weston Park on Saturday, which was
really fun and included a train ride, freddo frog hunt and cake. And no rain,
happily!
The girls’ 5th birthday felt
like such a milestone to me too – that somehow I made it. I didn’t run away to
join the circus after all, I didn’t end up selling anyone on ebay, and in fact
have survived 5 years of parenting twins and have two wonderful, lovely, caring
girls (totally unbiased opinion, of course!).
The other exciting thing from the weekend
was that Abby and Zoe learnt to ride their (new) bikes without training wheels!
They’d been a bit of nervous practicing in the driveway, and we went over to
Aranda Primary which has a covered basketball court with that nice soft
athletics track type stuff on the ground, and all of a sudden after a little
bit of help to get going, Zoe and Abby both were just riding round doing laps!
It was fantastic! I have to say that as I was riding the girls to childcare
today in the bike trailer, which is starting to get pretty hard going on any
low-moderate slope, I was thinking/hoping it might not be too long before we
can all ride over to the Y! Belinda Heres a photo from our Easter trip to Daylesford when we had a birthday dinner for the girls with Nanny & Pa: 
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February 15 - 10th Anniversary!
Monday, 18 February 2013
And so another year comes to pass and another Anniversary photo! This year was Belinda and my 10th anniversary. We had a lovely evening out thanks to baby sitter Al going to our favourite Indian Restaurant and following it up with a movie at the Dendy Premium. It only seems yesterday we had such a lovely wedding day with friends and family but it was in fact 10 years ago. So of course to go with the anniversary we trekked out to the Botanic Gardens and the very lawn where we were married for our traditional photo. This year for the first time before we could take the self-timered photo we had to sit through many sittings as the girls took photos with the camera - most of which turned out quite nicely (other than the pained, 'get-on-with-it' expressions of Belinda and my faces!). We then did 4-5 self-timered shots with Belinda and Zoe racing back into camera before the click of the photo and below is the 2013 edition - not perfect but what is? Feel free to go to the 'February 15' item on the left hand side of this page to see an updated version showing all 11 photos from our 10 years of February 15s. 
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Pre School Day 2
Friday, 8 February 2013
At drop off for Pre-School today: Abby: OK Daddy, you can go now. Zoe - give Daddy a kiss and he can go. Action sequence: Daddy goes to kiss Zoe but too late she's run off to play with something..... They grow up so fast! ;) Anyway here's the Day 2 of Preschool photo that Zoe wanted taken. 
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Pre School!!!!!!
Thursday, 7 February 2013
Today was Zoe and Abby's first day at Pre-School. Yep Pre-School. Both girls were very excited and looking forward to it immensely. For the only time in the lifetime of the McCraes we got there early and in fact if the girls had had their way we would've been at Pre School by 8am. Zoe was a little tentative when we (Mum & Dad left) but Koalas and the Y had taught us she would be fine once we left. Abby seemed so grown up and wanted us to leave a lot earlier than we did. They are in the 'Joeys' group and their teacher is Kelly. Even better their buddy Felix from Koalas and a friend from the Y, Cate, are in the same class. Oh and in case you are wondering what we did with the Pre-School time.... 
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Emma turns 5
Sunday, 3 February 2013
One of Abby & Zoe's besties, Emma, turned 5 this week and had a party. It was a dress up and after more analysis and consideration than you can imagine over several weeks, the girls both decided to go as Fairies. Abby had been considering her Super Girl outfit but Zoe was always set on her Fairy outfit so she could wear her red party shoes. 
It was of course a fun party with cake, lollies, a fair bit of running round and of course a game. The only drawback was Daddy (Jase) forgetting the meal Mummy (Belinda) had especially made to help Emma's Mummy & Daddy get through the recent arrival of Emma's younger brother. Dough! All the talk amongst the parents at the party though showed the day to be a bit of a marker. The last day before lots of A&Z's friends start school (a.k.a Big School or The Red School (all the kids at Aranda PS wear red)). A&Z are a smidgeon younger than Emma and the others (Max & Ella especially) but it does mean this week they start Pre-School! 2.5 days a week up at Aranda Pre-School (8 minute walk tested on the weekend but I spose could be longer under school traffic conditions? ;)). There is a reasonable amount of excitement with a dash of trepidation. Us adults are just excited. :)
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Merry Christmas!
Tuesday, 25 December 2012
Merry Christmas Dear (persistent and patient) Reader! From Left to Right below: Playing with pressys Chrstmas morning, The sign on the front door A&Z left for Santa ('Santa please shut the door gently because it makes a big bang') and on far right some of the 'offcuts' from our Christmas photos. 
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Pop Up Tour 2012
Sunday, 18 November 2012
 Today Zoe and I (jase) went to the Justine Clarke gig in town. For the uninitiated Justine is a Play School presenter who has gone solo with her own album, music clips, book and numerous other 'merch'. She's big in the under 6 demographic. Abby wasn't keen to go when we got the tickets a few weeks ago saying "the people are too big" which is her way of saying "last time when we went to Angelina Ballerina at Canberra Theatre I got pretty scared from the loud noise and lots of people and if you think I'm doing that again you're dumber than you look."
So Zoe and I set off today catching the bus in to the big smoke to catch Justine Live, The Pop Up Tour. It was pretty fun with Zoe excited but also a bit nervous. It was indeed pretty loud and that was without the 100 Under 6's below the front of the stage or in the "mushroom pit" as Justine called it. Justine ran through her album, read a story, couldnt find the book-eating monster while all the kids knew where he was and generally had the audience in the palm of her hand. For Zoe it was very exciting in a sit-very-still-on-Dads-lap-and-watch kinda way and the happiness on the way home was palpable. Also a bit of strut that she'd done it. As per in my 20s at a U2 concert I was a sucker for the merch getting a couple of t-shirts (for the girls - they didn't seem to have my size...) and we got home to yummy chocolate cake that Abby had made, with help from Belinda, while we'd been at the gig. Whats more after Zoe's description of the excitement Abby had a quiet word to me later on that she might come along next time... Waiting for Justine to come on: 
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