January's Journal

Jason, Jacob & Bella at The Thomas Expo

Well who can believe that January has been and gone and 2011 is truly underway?  So here is a brief outline of what the Taylors got up to in the first month of the year.

The year got off to a very quiet start for us all this year.  With the lack of babysitting volunteers available on New Year’s Eve, it can be difficult for parents with young kids to celebrate (or be bothered to celebrate) New Year.  Jason usually always heads out somewhere but for some reason this year he decided to stay home.  We were supposed to have a few people come round for a mini party but with a few hours to go we decided that we just couldn’t face it this year and were too exhausted to bother, so we were very unkind friends and pulled the pin but like the true friends they are they appreciated our reasons.  Jason and I ended up tucked in bed and asleep by 9pm.

So we were a little boring but it was nice to wake up on New Year’s Day to a Non-hungover Jason.  New Years Day was pretty quiet and relaxed too.  We visited Jason’s dad (Rob) and then had Jason’s mum (Lib) around for a roast dinner.  That turned out rather amusing when we got her to read Jacob’s Scottish story book to him, it was so funny but we were all laughing with her and not at her.

A few days later and it was time for Jason to return to work but we did have a great festive holiday and it’s always nice to have Jason home in the day.

Happy Birthday Jacob

On the 9^th we celebrated Jacob’s Birthday which I won’t go into too much detail about here as I already have a whole Blog post dedicated to it.  We paid a visit to Southbank in the rain and had a picnic, who could foretell that this would be our last visit to Southbank for a while as a few days later the area would be underwater along with a rather large percentage of Queensland.

It’s impossible to recap the month without mentioning the floods although I won’t harp on about it, as we have all seen the news reports and know the devastation that it caused.  I am thankful on a personal note that nobody we are related to or know was directly affected by the floods although clearly there is a knock on impact for all of us.  Below I have cut and pasted a few facts from Wikipedia regarding the Economic impact of the floods on Queenslanders.

·    Queensland Treasurer Andrew Fraser said it was not possible to put a figure on the damage; "other than to say the damage bill is going to start with a b and not an m".

·    The floods will cost the Australian economy at least A$10 billion.

·    The price of food across Australia will go up.  The floods will cost supermarket chains 10's of millions of dollars.

·    The persistent wet conditions also caused health problems for livestock. There was severe damage to roadways in forestry plantations across wide areas of the south of the state.

·    Prime Minister Julia Gillard announced that her government would impose a flood levy to fund reconstruction works.

On a positive note the floods  brought some amazing community spirit to our lives with more than 55,000 volunteers registered to help clean up the streets of Brisbane.

Jacob & The Fat Controller

So what else did January bring for the Taylors?

There was Australia Day which was just a fantastic family day for us.  We started bright and early and were out the house by 7am.  We headed to Manly’s Bandstand Park for a morning of free entertainment.  Sausage sizzle and pancakes for breakfast.  Face painting and rides for the kids.  Live music for the kids to dance along to.  Pony rides, which were Jacob’s favorite part of the day.  Snow cones for the whole family and a colouring in competition for Jacob to enter, which he didn’t win but had a very good attempt at.

After a few hours here we headed to Lib’s to say hello and then to the hospital to see Rob, who was a little tickled to see the kids with their Australia Day tattoo’s and dress up.  Then it was home to cool off on the deck with the kids water spray on their cubby house and a few much needed beers and bourbons for Jason and me.  It was truly a fabulous day.

We ended the month with a visit to Ipswich to see the Thomas the Tank Engine Workshops at the Railway Museum.  The kids really enjoyed the afternoon, especially the play pit were there was a mountain of Thomas toys to play with.

So that was pretty much everything the Taylors did in January that is worth mentioning.  Apart from Jason, who FINALLY managed to get a few 20/20 cricket matches in this Summer.  Below is a brief individual note on each of the kids.

Australia Day Jacob

Jacob

Well as you know Jacob turned 4 this month and said “Goodbye” to his senior kindy class and “Hello” to Preschool.  This has excited him so much and he has been asking to go to kindy EVERY DAY since. 

He was a very brave boy when he went to get the final 2 vaccinations he needs until he starts High School.  I thought there may be a few tears but Jason informed me that he couldn’t stop talking to the nurse for long enough to cry.  He was too busy telling her about preschool and the new kids in his class.

Jacob’s favorite pastime at the moment is playing his Lego in particular his Police Lego.

He weighs 19.4k and stands 104cm tall.

Australia Day Bella

Bella

This month saw Bella learn how to climb on to our dining table. Seriously that girl is a handful and NEVER gives us a minute but she is adorable with it.

FINALLY we saw another tooth this month it has been a LONG time since the last one and she now has 7 with only 13 more to go.

Her favorite pastime at the moment is eating.

She weighs 10.5k and stands 72.5cm tall.