Happy Birthday Amelia!!

My precious little girl is 2 today!!!! She is the funniest little girl. Almost everyday Mark and I look at each other and say "The other two weren't like this were they?". Anyone who has had the pleasure of spending time with her knows what I am talking about. And to think that we almost lost her is unimaginable.

I just want to share with you what we went through in the first 12 months of her life. Some of you know the whole story. Some know bit and pieces so here is the whole story.

Amelia Nicole arrived 2 weeks early exactly! After a day at hockey in a town about an hour away I went to bed to be woken in the middle of the night by my waters braking as I rolled over. This is exactly how I went into labour with Molly so I knew I had plenty of time for the 2.5hr drive to Perth. Once we had packed bags, stripped the bed, and woken the kids we headed off and she was born later that day.When we called the kids to say they had a little sister, Lochie was not too impressed. He told me he was meant to have a brother. But as soon as he saw her in hospital he was in love. Since that say he has called her sweetheart.

I had trouble feeding her from the very beginning. She was a great baby and slept through from 3 weeks. I thought I had hit the jackpot! I took her to my GP for her 6 week check up. She noticed that she was under weight. So we went over the the child health clinic to get her weighed. She was under weight. I was supposed to get a urine sample done but didn't. Don't really know why I didn't. Between the GP & the clinic nurse we put in place a plan that I would give her an extra feed before bed and wake her in the mornings for an extra feed. Also get her weighed weekly. I did tell them that she was very 'chucky' but they didn't think that was the problem. I also got mastitis at this time and as we were having so much trouble with getting her to put on weight it was decided to put her on the bottle. I tried expressing but there is only so much you can do when you have 2 other kids to look after as well as a baby.

She put on weight slowly for a few weeks then when she was 10 weeks old she had lost weight. The night before that appointment I told Mark I was worried because she couldn't hold eye contact and she wasn't smiling. Whilst I was at clinic I fed her and she proceeded as was normal for her to chuck 90% of the bottle back up. We called the Dr's and my GP wasn't on that day so we had an appointment with another Dr at 5pm that day. The Dr I saw that day told me to put a bottle in her bed and she would feed herself through the night! I couldn't believe it. On this day my best friend gave birth to a beautiful healthy baby boy. He weighed more then Amelia did and she was 10 weeks old! This helped set of a huge light bulb in my head.

After a sleepless night I called the clinic nurse the next day and asked her is she would call and speak to my GP. As I knew that what I had been told the night before was not right. 5 minutes later  my GP called to tell me Amelia and I were going to be in hospital for the weekend. I had to get in there as soon as I could and be prepared for the fact that we may end up in Perth.  So after calling Mark and my mum we headed into the hospital. After getting in major trouble for not getting the urine sample as a urine infection can be a cause of weight loss in babies. We did that and came up with a feeding plan. We had to feed her 60mls every 2 hours and keep her upright for half an hour afterwards. At night it was every 3 hours. We had to set alarms as she wouldn't wake or cry if she was hungry.

Over the weekend she put on weight and we found out she didn't have a urine infection. It was silent reflux. I was of the thought that you don't wake a sleeping baby and that babies will cry if they are hungry. Apparently not! Before we left the hospital the Dr told us that when she came in on Friday she only had enough energy to keep her heart beating and her lungs going. Had we left it a few more days she would have died. This was very hard to hear and even harder to process. I still can't believe it.

The next 3 months were spent doing the 2 hourly feeds and have twice weekly weigh ins and weekly Dr appointments. She slowly started putting on weight. We tried several different formulas and in the end Soy Milk worked the best. We went to Perth for an ultra sound just to make sure that there was nothing wrong with her stomach. Then after 3 months we could stretch out her feeds and drop it back to weekly weigh ins and monthly Dr appointments.

Now you wouldn't believe that she spent that much time trying to put on weight. She is a very healthy 2yr old with a very healthy appetite!! She never stops eating!! I always spend a bit of time on her birthday reflecting on what we went through in those first 12 months of her life. It was really hard on the whole family as I was tired and stressed. Mark was the same and poor Lochie and Molly had to fit in around this new little member of our family.

We still have not decided if we have finished our family. I think both of us are a little scared of the same thing happening again. Although this time we would be more prepared and know what to look for. For now we have a great healthy happy family who keep me on my toes and make me smile whilst sending me grey at the same time.

Onto my weekly weigh in results as I can't do a post on Wednesday without my weigh in results.
I found 600 grams this week. I am not surprised as last weeks loss was helped along by gastro and I spent Monday and Tuesday 'grazing' all day. But back on track and seeding should all over with today so I will have more time to exercise! YAY!!
Weekly Loss +600grams
Totals Loss 15.6kg
Round 2  1.5Kg
4.4kg till bottle of Moet!

Found my motivation but lost my will power

I have finally found my motivation to get my house in order! Has only taken 5 months. Although some would say it has taken me 32 years. I have never been an overly tidy person. My house is clean don't get me wrong but always a mess. I can't even blame it on the kids as it was like it before they came along.

I am not too sure what has sparked this little burst of house organising motivation but I am just going with it. Last weekend I got our bedroom sorted as it had become a dumping ground for everything! Washing would get folded but then put on the bed and then onto the floor before bed. So now everything is put away and I even went through my draws and got rid of all my clothes that are to big.

It has stayed like it for over a week now which is great. Amazing how much nicer it is to go to bed with a room that is organised. It is also so much easier to keep tidy now that everything is put away and I have less clothes in my cupboard. I also have been making my bed everyday. This is huge for me! It is something I have never done as my theory was always no one ever sees it so what's the point. But I think it helps to keep it tidy if the bed is made for some reason.

The next room I have tackled is Amelia's bedroom. It is one of those rooms that I never spend any time in except for changing nappies and putting her to bed. I also desperately needed to go through her draws and get rid of the clothes that are too small. I also moved her room around a bit so that there is a bit more room and she can finally have some of her toys in her room. I also finally put some pictures up on her wall. I need to get a few more hooks so I can finish decorating but for now it is a huge improvement.

So whilst I have been having a great time getting the house in order I seem to have lost my willpower when it comes to food!!!! I have been making cupcakes and slices for hockey in the last few weeks. As well as making piklets and things for the kids after school. On Saturday I made a huge Apple Crumble for sweets after hockey. Apple Crumble is my ALL time favourite. We brought home 3/4 of the crumble. Not a good thing when you are watching what you eat!! I have also eaten the odd cupcake and licked the odd bowl.

I know that you can't deprive yourself of all these things as it makes the craving worse. But when you have roast pork including lots of crackling and gravy, followed by apple crumble it really doesn't help in the whole weight loss plan. I think I just got a bit excited by last weeks weigh in and now it's time to get back into watching what I eat.

Fingers crossed seeding will be finished today which will mean I will be able to exercise more regularly as hubby will be home at a reasonable hour! I have really missed going for runs. Not something I ever thought I would say!!

We are off to playgroup this morning to have cupcakes for Amelia's birthday. She is 2 tomorrow so she is having her cake with friend today. Hope you all have a great day and I will be back tomorrow with my weigh in results and a post dedicated to the birthday girl.

WARNING this post is about spew and pooh.

So if you read my post on Saturday you would have some idea of why I haven't posted since then. The dreaded gastro bug that had been working it's way through our small community finally hit our house on Saturday and has worked it's way through the almost the whole family. Hubby is the only one who has remained untouched. I put it down to the fact that he isn't home much at the moment.

I managed to last until Tuesday night and after all 3 kids had come down with it before I finally caught it. Although I should say it caught me because I definitely wasn't chasing it. It's funny how different kids cope with these things. Molly who is 5 was great she made it to the bathroom each time and whilst she cried every time she was really good at the follow up, washing hands, blowing nose, wiping her face, drink of water etc.

Amelia ,almost 2, well she was a pretty typical toddler. First off she freaked out at the feel of needing to be sick. Then she couldn't tell me when she was going to be sick. And finally I couldn't get her to understand that she couldn't eat anything or have her bottle of milk as that would just make her feel even worse. She was also very good at covering her mum in spew whilst she remained perfectly untouched!!! Which is how I ended up going through 5 changes of clothes on a day when we had 14ml of rain so getting washing dry was impossible.

Then it was Lochie's turn. Luckily enough we left football training early as he said he didn't feel well. We had been home all of 10 minutes when he was in the shower and it started. I am so glad we left football early it is much easier to clean a bath then a car! I don't know if it's a boy and girl thing or what but he was the complete opposite to Molly. I don't think he made it to the bathroom once!

After feeling queazie for days and cleaning up everyone elses 'accidents' it finally got me. It was only a matter of time really. The joys of being a mum. Another joy of being a mum is being sick and all you want to do is sleep but you have a toddler and a sick 6yr old to look after. All I kept thinking was if Mark had this he would be in bed whilst I looked after him and everyone else. I must admit it made me a bit jealous.

I do have to say that through all this Mark was really great. He came home for an hour on Monday morning to get Lochie & Molly ready for school as with a toddler being sick everywhere I just couldn't function very well. And yesterday when I was sick he came home and got Molly ready. He also came home early last night and did the dinner, bath and bed routine for me.

We are all finally healthy again and now I am spending the day catching up on washing & housework. Although my bathroom is the cleanest room in the house and has been disinfected more times this week then it would normally be in a year. Also getting ready for another home game of hockey this weekend which means I may actually do some baking today.

With a little help from the gastro fairy troll I had a good weigh in this week. I lost 1.2kg and I am determined not to put it back on now that I can eat again. This loss put me into the 80's! (just) So here are the stats so far.

Weekly Weight Loss 1.2kg
Round 2 Loss 2.1kg
Total Loss 16.8kg
1.2kg till half way
3.2kg till bottle of Moet

Not quite what I had planned for the weekend.

When you have kids you can make plans but they don't always work out. Never more true then this weekend. It started last weekend when a gastro bug started spreading through our small school. Each day it seemed another family had been struck. We had no hockey this weekend so I had made plans to go and visit my nephew for his 10th birthday as well as visit my old town and watch my old hockey team play their first game of the season. I was also hosting Book Club on Friday night so I was sure it would hit us Friday after I had cleaned the house and was all organised and ready.

All was well and we had a great night Friday night. I love having people over not only does it MAKE me clean the house but it's also nice when you can just crawl into bed afterwards and don't have to drive home. Only problem was I wasn't watching what I drank and drank to much. AGAIN! I really need to remember that as my physical fitness has improved my drinking fitness has taken a hit and I need to slow down!

I was woken at about 2am by Molly not feeling well and it was all down hill from there. She had me up on and off for the rest of the night then perked up a bit first thing in the morning. I thought we may have been ok. But driving for 2hrs with a kid who has been sick during the night was not something I was too keen on. Never mind spreading it around the state. Within 10 minutes of me making phone calls and sending txt messages to tell everyone we weren't going anywhere she was back in the bathroom.

My day was spent washing and disinfecting everything she touched. Giving lessons in hand washing AGAIN. Then all she wanted to do was sit on my knee. Which was fine with me but not so fine with the almost 2yr old who thinks her mum's knee is just for her. She did have a sleep for an hour or so in which time I managed to clean the kitchen and start making pumpkin soup. Only problem was when I got to the point of putting it together and blending it she woke up worse! And trying to cook whilst cleaning up a gastro riddled 5yr old doesn't really work. So it was back to cuddles on the couch.

We ended up with all of us in the lounge room watching a movie. As much as I really wanted to go visiting it was really nice to have a day at home and veg out with the kids. I could have done without the spewing and poohing. But the day ended well.

Today hubby is home which makes it the first time in almost 3 weeks that we are all home together. The only plan is Lochie has football at lunch time. In the interest of the health of everyone it will be a father son trip to footy today. I am planning a run at some point today. My other plan is to clean our bedroom up! It has been a dumping ground of late. It is right down the other end of our house so it is that place where things get put when there isn't enough time to put them away properly. And where washing doesn't always get put away. The folded piles get put on the bed then at bed time then just get moved to the floor. It's also always the last room in the house to get cleaned up as I never spend any time in their during the day (unless it's to dump things) and every night when I go to bed I tell myself I will tidy it tomorrow.

So I better get off here finish my cuppa and get started! Before the next member of the household is struck down with the dreaded gastro bug.  Happy Sunday everyone. I may even get really motivated and post before & after pics of my bedroom. Although maybe just the after as the before might be a touch to much to share.

20 weeks in and I can actually run!!!

Things have been a bit hectic here this week. Although no more then usual really. Can you believe it has been 20 weeks since I started this whole change?? I can't! I am amazed that nearly half a year has gone. I am on track having lost on average 700grams a week. Hopefully by doing it slowly and focusing on fitness as well as weight loss I am making lasting changes.

I had a mini exercise break through on Tuesday afternoon. If you remember a few months ago I said how I struggle to run a lap of the oval. I could run a km on the road but as soon as I got on that oval I couldn't do more then a lap. Well last week I ran 2 laps in a row which I was stoked about. Then on Tuesday half way through my second lap I thought I will just keep going. Well I managed 3 laps and only stopped because I had to do a wee. (always happens when I start running) Our oval is about 600 metres around the edge so that's 1.8kms!!! I was very excited although the excitement was lost on the kids.

I had a great weigh in day yesterday. Lost removed 700grams. I have said before that I am addicted to my scales. And it works for me.
Here is how my week goes........
Wednesday  - weigh in normally great
Thursday - more weight gone
Friday - little bit more gone
Saturday - about the same as Friday
Sunday - weigh a bit more the Saturday
Monday - weigh a bit more then Sunday
Tuesday - dropped weekend weight.

So I sometimes feel like I spend Monday & Tuesday catching up from the weekend. I don't do anything drastic on these days I just get back on track. You still have to live and that's what weekends are for. I really am one of those people who needs the daily weigh in as otherwise I would be having lots of little extras thinking it's ok because I lost weight on the Wednesday. I need it to keep me in check. And hey, it has worked for the last 20 weeks so why change it now.

Something else I want to touch on is forums. I find them really hard work! It's feels like everyone knows everyone and they have a little club going. It's also hard to work out which forum best suits you. I delved into the 12wbt forums a few times. I found some great advice and everyone was really friendly. I posted my blog links in the blog forum. I also found it very time consuming. I am sure once you work out what you are doing this isn't the case.

Does anyone have any advice? I would love to get a bit more involved but I am struggling with it all at the moment.

So here are the stats
Total loss 15.3kg
Weekly Loss 700grams
Rd 2 12WBT loss 700grams
Size 18 pants starting to get loose and have lost 2 cups sizes from my boobies. (happy with this but don't want to lose any more from there)
4.7kg till next bottle of Moet!

A little bit of everything.

This is going to be one of those blog posts that starts in one place and ends up in a completely different place. Mainly because I have lots of little things going on so I will share a bit of everything. And that is just how my brain works at the moment.

I am hosting bookclub at my house on Friday night. Which means I will be spending the week getting my house in order. It's actually not too bad at the moment. There are some things that can't be done until Friday afternoon as they just won't stay clean. I am excited to have the girls over. It is nice to interact with different people and talk about something other then kids & hockey. Today's job is to get the washing done, folded and put away. With the rain last week and being out all weekend the mountain had doubled. So with some lovely sunshine today I am hoping to get most of it done.

After hockey on Saturday I realised I really need to get back on top of my fitness. I had a sore hamstring muscle for a week or so and with the start of seeding I had become quite slack.  So that is the plan for this week. I went into the school for mothers day morning tea this morning and planned to go to the oval afterwards and do some running and sprints. I thought (hoped) that Amelia would just play in the playground while I ran around. Oh how wrong I was by the time I had done one lap of the oval she was in the middle of the oval screaming. So onto plan 2 I put her in her pram and we went for a walk. So a 40 minute walk was better then nothing. It's times like this I wish I had invested in a jogging pram. I am hoping to do a work out DVD this afternoon when the kids are home to distract her.

Tomorrow Lochie has Auskick training in the afternoon and I have about an hour up my sleeve after school so I am going to try running at the oval again but this time with the big kids there to play with Amelia. Then Wednesday I am going into the school to do hockey coaching in the morning so will try to do some running after that. It will probably end as it did today but I am hoping not.

I had a full-on weekend with a home game of hockey and then out all day for mothers day yesterday. When we have a home game of hockey we run a full canteen and then bar with dinner afterwards. It is all run by volunteers on a roster. We have an amazing club with great people who are willing to help out whenever needed. The only problem is that I am a completely control freak and I sweat the small stuff. I let myself get frazzled easily and I need to learn to chill out. We had a small problem this week with a gastro bug taking out some of our kids and thus their mum's weren't able to work their shifts. It was great as others were willing and able to fill in and make the day run smoothly. And Lochie won the mothers day raffle which included a lovely bunch of flowers, some lovely choccies & a bottle of MUMM!

We had a great night afterwards with some drinks. I haven't been drinking much this year especially not beer. But I made up for it on Saturday night. It was great to have drinks with the girls after a busy day but not so great when I woke up at 2am with a dry throat and I couldn't get back to sleep until 4am. It wouldn't have been so bad if I didn't have to take the kids to a family picnic an hour and a half away on Sunday!

So there you go, that is enough of my dribble for today. I said it could end up anywhere. On another note I have started round 2 of 12WBT today. I love the recipes and the weekly mind set videos. I am hoping to really learn a lot this round and then maybe go it on my own.

Have a great week everyone!

Round 2 fitness test results & my new goals for this round.

Righto so this time last week I had put on 2kg. I was feeling ok about it as I had been away for 5 days visiting wineries, breweries and attending an AWESOME wedding. I also had a very sore hamstring which made exercise almost impossible. This week I am stoked to report that I lost those 2kgs and then some. I lost a whopping 3kg!!! Well not lost as I never want to find it again.

I have now lost 14.7kg. When I have spoken to people and they ask how much I have lost I say almost 15kg. Hopefully next week I will be able to say just over 15kg.

I was lucky yesterday afternoon as hubby came home early afternoon. They couldn't do any more seeding until it rained so he was home for the day. It took me about 5 minutes to realise that this meant I could get out of the house and go for a run. So I finished folding the washing, got changed and was out the door. I went into town as I wanted to run around the oval and I had to get a few thing anyway.

We have cut our hockey trainings back from 1hr twice a week to 1.5hrs once a week. I really miss that extra training as now I have to make the time for myself. I am looking forward to tomorrow night as I always work harder when there are others to push me rather then me doing it on my own. This is another thing I never thought I would hear myself saying. It really is a year of firsts.

If you remember a few months ago I mentioned that I couldn't run more then one lap around the oval without stopping. And there was no way that I could run 2 laps in a row even though I could run further if I was just running on the road. Well yesterday I ran 2 laps in a row without stopping! Yay me. It was 1.2km.

I also did my fitness test for Round 2 of 12WBT yesterday.Round 2 starts Monday. I have to say that the results weren't great. Last round I only did the 1km time trial part of the fitness test. This time I did all of them. So here is how it went.

1km time trial  5min 50sec
20 push ups in 1 minute. (on my knees)
60sec plank on knees
25sec Wall Sit
-16 cm Sit & Reach

Some of these results are no surprise to me as I have NEVER had good results with the sit & reach test. I am not flexible and have bad balance. Definitely something I need to work on. However my 1km run time has improved by over 2 minutes.

I have been reassessing my goals and trying to make some very specific goals for the next 3 months. So here they are.

Current weight 91.9kg
By the end of this round (12weeks) I want to be at 80kg (or of course under).
I have broken it down to mini goals. First goal is to get to under 90kg by end of May.
Next is to hit my 20kg Milestone 86.6kg.....................by 19th June. We have country week hockey that weekend and would love to take my bottle of Moet down there and share it with the girls.
Then the under 80kg by the end of July.

I also have some fitness goals.
I want to be able to run 4 laps of the oval with out stopping.
Run 1km in under 5 minutes.
Run 5km with out stopping.
I haven't put any time on these goals. I will see how I go I want to be able to do these by the end of round 2.

Wish me luck!

Seeding & Hockey have started!

It has been an interesting few days in our house. We finally had a few days of the school holidays at home with no plans. It was so nice to not have to go anywhere and to get on top of the washing! The kids were great 90% of the time. The older 2 kids played well together (it helps that Molly got some of her own GIRL leggo for her birthday) for 80% of the day. Then when Lochie wanted some chill out time Molly would play dolls & weddings.

We also started seeding. Well hubby started seeding which means I become a single mum for about a month. It all depends on the rain. We are really lucky that he has a very understanding boss as most years the guys will work 6 days a week and have Sundays off. This year they have decided to have Saturdays off. Well for next week anyway. The reason this is so important is that both myself and the boss's wife play hockey on Saturdays. And this Saturday we have a home game which means we need our husbands to look after the kids whilst we work in the kitchen, on the gate & play hockey. So whilst he has LONG days on the tractor I will have LONG days doing all the parenting on my own.

We had our first day of hockey. It started early leaving the house at 8:30am and getting home about 7pm. A long day for kids & Mum. Lochie & Molly both had Hook in2 Hockey. It is Lochie's 2nd year but Molly's first. When they were getting dressed Molly was all set and asked if she looked Beautiful. Lochie told her you have to look serious when you play hockey not beautiful. I don't think she was too happy with this reply. So after a quick stop at the sports shop to buy their sticks (nothing like being organised) they were all set and very excited. They both had a great time and Molly did beautiful dribbling so she tells me.

Looking both serious & beautiful.

We had a few hours between their hockey and my hockey so we went and did the food shopping before coming back to watch some other games. Luckily Mark came in to watch them while we played. Amelia was very excited as she hadn't seen him for 2 days. It definately made my life easier to have him there as I didn't have to worry about other people looking after them. We drew our game 2 all. It was a great game and great to see all our hard work from pre season paying off.

We went to the pub for a drink before we headed home. Lochie was in heaven as there were bigger boys there playing pool. Molly was in heaven as there was a Juke Box. And poor Amelia I think just needed to go home to bed. It was great to sit down with the girls, have a drink & a bit of a debrief. When Amelia was sitting on a stool pushing me away saying 'Bye Love you" I knew it was time to go home.

The end result was 3 very tired kids who slept most of the 45 minute drive home. And a hubby who got home just after I had done all the transfers.

Today I have had a very sick little baby. It included a trip to the hospital as she was having trouble breathing and I thought it may be a chest infection. But luckily it hadn't gone into her chest. So just a paranoid mother and a miserable little girl for the afternoon. Which threw all my plans of baking and running out the window. Plus we had visitors who had come up from Perth and were going to come out for a visit. Always the way when you actually have plans the kids quickly change that. Here's hoping she gets a good nights sleep tonight and is better in the morning.

I have been spending the day thinking about my goals for the next round of 12WBT. I am trying to be more specific and more realistic. I will think about it a little more, get out the diary and look at dates and get back to you on that. I did have another little victory today. I wore a belt for the first time in 3 years. And because I had to not for fashion. I wore these size 18 shorts yesterday and had to keep pulling them up so today out came the belt. WOOHOO! Size 16 here I come.

Wearing a belt for the first time in 3yrs!