Month: June 2012

Film of the Week

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OK it would seem most mums-who-blog have themes in the week, Silent Sunday is a popular one for those who take photos (a theme I may plagiarise when I get my camera) and there are various cooking and creative ones.  Well I thought I would try and review a film I watch once a week and I have an idea forming for one around children and food but we’ll just have to see about that. We watched a DVD last night, The Descendants, starring George Clooney. As expected Clooney did not disappoint with an excellent performance as the conservative, kind and yet annoyingly unaware husband and father to three feisty, self absorbed women (one being his wife, two being his daughters).   So we enter at a point where you get glimpses of how he used to be unattached to his family, but now in a place where he is the pivotal character in everyone’s life and he can’t escape becoming an active participant.  You get the impression people have enjoyed living their lives without …

Muffin to go

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In cafes over here, when you order a muffin, they ask if you want it warmed with butter – weird.  But that’s not the muffin this blog is about. One of the problems with two winters in a row (there are too many to mention on one blog) is that you miss that time in 12 months where you are motivated and enabled to lose the jabber that appears over the cold, dark months. This coupled with the fact that we have lived in temporary homes for that whole time (meaning we are without all of our belongings, my exercise “stuff” being part of the packed up things) I have really struggled to keep off the winter padding – the hips don’t lie. Now we are two weeks away from moving into our new house (please God let it be so), 48 hours from the nights getting shorter and 22 days from me turning 36, which rather depressingly means I’m closer to 40 than 30 in this decade. Ergo THE MUFFIN (TOP) MUST GO! I …

Pooh Sticks

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Pooh Sticks

It was a pretty rainy day yesterday but we ventured out anyways (dragging along the Barnetts, so sorry!) – jury is out on whether it was worth it, Minnie was as grumpy as the clouds.

However we did have a successful five minutes of pooh sticks, Minnie and I watched them float while Jackson posed for pictures.

Time with one

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You don’t often get time with just one of your babies when you have two close in age.  How you do it with twins I have no idea! Most of the time I just have to sneak some time with one of them when the other is sleeping.  My eldest gets the rough side of this because when her little brother is sleeping Mummy generally has to get the dinner cooked or various other domestic duties.  Now that Minnie is going to nursery two afternoons a week I have some time with Jackson which we are both loving.  It makes me more aware that just-us-girls time is even more important to find. Last Sunday we went out for a coffee and a fluffy (hot milk with a marshmallow) and had a great time using up all her stickers in her new magazine.  It was so lovely having an hour where I had nothing to do but talk with my daughter. This week Jackson has been waking up later in the morning so I get to …

Jackson is 1

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A year ago today I met the second Cowles man I have fallen in love with.  We celebrated his first birthday in quite a low key fashion, learning from the traumas of an overwhelmed one year old daughter 18 months ago.  This is the diary of Jackson’s first birthday. I got up at my usual time this morning and shouted until my mum came for me, as I usually do.  In she came and wished me a happy birthday.  We then went downstairs and I checked out my presents. Before I/Minnie could open my presents I had my breakfast. The first present was a keyboard (thank you Gran and Grandpa).  I played on that while Minnie unwrapped all of the rest. After that I put on my new jacket (thank you Uncle Gordon and Aunty Rhiannon) and looked through my cards. We went out to the toy library to get even more toys (these weren’t all for me, the pink pram is Minnie’s), then it was home for lunch with mum. After lunch I had …

Budgets

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I am so over them. Gareth and I have had to work hard over the last ten years of marriage (that’s right, coming up to a decade of The Cowlzies) to find harmony when it comes to spending money.  We come with very different ideas so the work is meeting in the middle or closer to one of our ends, but we meet and that’s worth working at. Most of the time we just have to make decisions about one purchase and it’s not for a huge amount of money, so agreement is found argument free-ish.  However, since coming to New Zealand it’s all about the big stuff; renting a house, buying a house, buying a car and now, how to spend the set amount of money we have left after the purchase of the house to make it liveable.  The list looks like this: washing machine tumble dryer (so necessary in the land of no central heating) fridge/freezer two sofas spare double bed for visitors a proper bed for Big Girl Minnie a gate …

Snowman in June

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Minnie and I had a delightful 10 minutes (seriously couldn’t do any longer with no wellies and no gloves) making a snowman – her first ever. The snow is perfect, really sticky.  So sticky in fact that once we had got in, cleaned up and got into dry clothes I realised my wedding ring must be somewhere in the snowman! Don’t worry any of you who know I wear my great Grandma’s engagement ring, that is currently being valued at a jewelers for our new contents insurance, phew.  However this means until the snow melts and I can get out there to dissect the snowman I have nothing on my ring finger – very disconcerting! We’re trapped in the house for the afternoon now – have no idea how I’m going to keep us all sane until dinner time – please Jackson have a REALLY long lunchtime nap…

God save our gracious queen

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So I have never been that into the Royal family, in fact a few years ago I would have argued about getting rid of them (probably more to wind up my Grandad than actual conviction).  In more recent years I have conceded that they make a lot of money for us, so they are worth keeping purely on a financial basis.  How nice for them, they are financially viable! Then in the last 12 months I have fallen in love with Wills and Harry and their lovely ladies (Harry having many more than Wills) and have felt really quite positive about our Royal future. Now, having lived in a Commonwealth country for just over two months, I am positively brimming with pride for our Windsor contingency. Twice over the Bank Holiday weekend (yes that’s right they have a Bank Holiday for the Queens’ birthday – every year!!) I have commented on how much more enthusiastic Kiwis are about our Queen than we Brits, “We don’t have a bank holiday every year for her birthday and …