Meet new Baby Cole

Today a new baby boy joined our family. The little fellow was born at 12 minutes past 3 this afternoon. He weighed 8 pound 1 ounce or 3.67 kilograms. He is 52cm in length with a head circumference of 34cm.
It was a fast labour, lasting about an hour and a half. After coming home from work, and then dropping the kids off to Nana's place, we made it to the birthing centre with about 20 minutes to spare! Sharlene had a water birth and I delivered him, which was a lovely experience. He attached and fed well from the start. All testing so far looks great, and Sharlene is going very well.
And here's the big reveal...

Azariah has had a Birthday Too!

I was just looking back on the time that had passed and realised that I hadn't put up any pictures of Azariah's birthday this year! Well, I ought to remedy that right away.

Riah's second birthday was held at Big Camp in Townsville. I had only just started my new job at the Early Learning Centre a week or so before, but I took the day off to travel up and celebrate it as I had originally planned. Sharlene and I designed his cake the week before. Azariah at the time (and still does really) had a thing for backhoe loaders, or 'backhoe lo-oa-ders' according to him. The cake design was that of a backhoe loader, cut and iced by us at camp. It was great fun to make and was good to have some friends around to celebrate with us.

Pictures....yes, of course. Here they are.
The cake...

The guests...

The spoils...

The fun and games...

Zemiel's Birthday

Zem turned four this week and although we didn't celebrate in grandiose style, we did have a party none the less. On Sunday, Sharlene and I made a number 4 cake. It had solid chocolate topping with road markings drawn out of icing and tic-tacs. I made some little cars from smarties and strawberry creams. Zemiel has been coming to kindy with me for the last few weeks on Monday, and so was able to share the occasion with his friends there as well. Sharlene made some cup cakes for him to share. He has been super excited about his birthday, calling it his 'happy day' and wanting to blow candles out all week.

Sports Day at CACC

On Friday we held our annual sports carnival. It was a beautiful morning. This was a relief because the previous week had been rain, drizzle and cold. Our kindy group joined in for the first hour and a half. We did some tunnel ball, ball passing, running races and a lolly run. We themed the week after superheroes, and so dressed up as superheroes on the sports day. It added a lot of fun to the carnival atmosphere. All the ELC kids received a medal after their race.

Back Online

We're back again, after a significant hiatus without internet or home phone. The reason for the hiatus is that we've recently moved house. The reason that we have moved house is that I have a new job. The reason I have a new job is because Sharlene finished her old one.

So, now we're kind of organised again. We have moved to Mackay. I am working as the Group Leader/Director of the Early Learning Centre at Carlisle Adventist Christian College. There's plenty of work to do there but it is also a lot of fun. I have a great team working with me. Zemiel has started attending once a week and is improving his social skills. He also goes to the Early Intervention Program twice a week. His talking has become clearer and he is also talking in longer sentences now. He is even starting to experiment with the words he's learnt. Azariah continues to impress us with his clarity and vocabulary.

Sharlene now has roughly 5 weeks to go in her pregnancy. We still don't know what gender the bub is.
She is enjoying the change from work and looking after the boys at home. Although she doesn't get to relax too much, she has easier days than working full time. She has also done a little relief at CACC over the past couple of weeks to help out our budget.

Anyway, it's time to go now. Hope your day is pleasant.

Car Upgrade

It's time to break radio silence. Zemiel and I have grown closer over the last few weeks while we were spending so much time together in New South Wales. We spent a day at CCAS catching up with past students and friends. We also attended a few playgroups with Leia and Becky.

I am greatly indebted to Ben and Becky for letting me stay at their place for (what ended up being) a week, and also to Sue and Glynn who let me housesit for few more days until our car loan was ready. Gaining said loan was really a comedy of errors. Between misunderstandings, delays, signing and faxing pages and a lot of phone calls made to the bank, we finally got our approval on Tuesday 24th May. I picked up the car on the Wednesday and started on the way home and arrived in Bowen on Saturday night. It sounds shorter than it really was, however, when the original plan was to be away for two weeks and that time doubles to 4, it takes its toll.

We believe, however, that the time away was used by God. For example, Zemiel has come back from the trip verbally expressing himself so much more than before. I've had a number of comments on how much he is now talking compared to the beginning of this year. He is also joining in with action songs and singing along. He is also sitting better for stories.

While we were away, Zem and I practiced a lot of remembering the events of the day and last night it all paid off. Yesterday, we went to the beach for a few hours and the boys swam and played at the park. At one point, we were eating lunch and a seagull landed on a post nearby, calling for food. Azariah took his piece of mandarin, walked over to the bird and reached up to offer it on his hand. The seagull refused and flew away. But that was the story that Zem retold us last night. It was a real break-through for us, as Zemiel has not told many stories. He continued to tell the story several times, adding more detail each time.

Azariah also has moved forward while Zem and I were gone. He spent a lot of his time with some family friends who also have little children. His spoken language and vocabulary has become quite outstanding. He helps with vacuuming the house and doing the laundry.

Trip to RIDBC in Sydney

One week ago, Zemiel and I left to come to Sydney and to spend some time in the preschools at the RIDBC to see what Zemiel responds well with. We hoped to get some idea of whether we focus on sign during his education or speech. Unfortunately (or fortunately), there have been mixed results for both preschool environments with significant advantages presented in each. So I fear that I may be no nearer a final decision than before. In any case, it enabled his teacher of the deaf to observe him and helped her to identify some strategies for working with him. Sydney has turned down the temperature! Even the locals are feeling the cold and it seems that it might be an early winter.

Here's Zem with some of his new warm clothes:

We stayed at the RIDBC in North Rocks for a a week and enjoyed the change of scenery and activities. Zemiel really enjoyed sorting out certain transport toys into their colour groups or vehicle types (sometimes both). Here's a pic of one of his sorting efforts.

We also set about to recreate a lego/duplo farm scene. Below are a picture of the original card and our effort.

I originally planned to pick up our new car from Sydney and drive home, but the top up loan for our house that we originally planned for has taken longer than expected to organise and so we are staying at Adrian's place for a couple of nights. I feel very blessed that Zem and I get to spend some extra time with him before he leaves for America.

Today, Zem and I went to the Australian Museum and stopped on the way at the ANZAC memorial. We had a blast all day. The displays were: Skeletons, Dinosaurs, Indigenous Australians, Chapman Mineral Collection, Gem Stones, Birds and Insects, Surviving Australia, Kidspace, Search and Discover, and Birds of Paradise. Of these, Zem loved the Birds of Paradise the best and closely followed by Birds and Insects and Surviving Australia displays. Kidspace was also a big hit with him. The mineral and gemstone displays were of little consequence to him and we spent about 3 collective minutes (out of about 5 hours) in both displays.

Here are a few photos taken from the day:

This fellow had all the birds attention.

The ANZAC memorial.

Seagulls living the good life.

Inside the museum, there was so much to see.

These blocks were cut by the original convicts. Each convict had their own particular pick mark 'signature' so their overseer could keep track of their daily quota.

Zemiel pointing out a starfish.

Zemiel showing me a butterfly.

The museum had a section for kids five and under. Here, Zem is getting excited over a funnel web spider under a large magnifying glass.

Still in the little kids area, Zemiel cheers as he completes a puzzle.

The entire museum boasted an amazing array of preserved animals. Here are only a few.

 I can't begin to imagine how many children must have patted this wombat. It is looking a bit threadbare.

One last thing, that we saw on the way out, was a huge sperm whale skeleton suspended from the ceiling in the foyer.  

Easter holidays 2011

This Easter we were blessed to have Damian and Ellie come and stay a few days with us. Of course, Joshua came as well and really got stuck into all the new gadgets and toys. Zem and Az also liked having a live-in playmate too. We enjoyed visiting Queens Park Beach on Sabbath, fishing and markets on Sunday,  and take-away Chinese food and the Anzac day parade on Monday before they headed for home again. Here's some pics of the long weekend.
Joshua, Zemiel and Azariah at the park.

Here's Damian playing with Azi, Ellie smiling (in a case of perfect timing), and Sharlene... ...doing something.

Earthquake

Just felt an earthquake and its aftershock. We were talking to a friend on our stairs when we heard a possum run across our roof. Immediately following this a deep rumble sounded and our house began to shake. It sounded like a herd of cattle were running across our verandah! It passed in only a few seconds but it was my first first-hand experience with an earthquake.

First, a picture of where it hit:
Click for a larger view.

Source: http://www.townsvillebulletin.com.au/article/2011/04/16/224201_news.html

And now,  a few of the statistics surrounding it:

Magnitude	5.2
Date-Time	Saturday, April 16, 2011 at 03:31:19 PM at epicenter
Location	20.034°S, 147.659°E
Depth	10 km (6.2 miles)
Region	QUEENSLAND, AUSTRALIA
Distances	124 km (77 miles) SE of Townsville, Queensland, Australia 145 km (90 miles) E of Charters Towers, Queensland, Australia 991 km (615 miles) NW of BRISBANE, Queensland, Australia 1697 km (1054 miles) N of CANBERRA, A.C.T., Australia
Location Uncertainty	horizontal +/- 17.4 km (10.8 miles); depth +/- 3.3 km (2.1 miles)
Parameters	NST= 45, Nph= 49, Dmin=146.9 km, Rmss=0.92 sec, Gp= 76°, M-type=body wave magnitude (Mb), Version=6
Source	USGS NEIC (WDCS-D)
Event ID	usc0002stu

Source: http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/recenteqsww/Quakes/usc0002stu.php

Sounds of Life

Today we took our family to the doctor and heard our new baby's heartbeat on the dopler. Its rate was averaging 145 beats per minute and was coming in quite strong. It is now fifteen weeks old. Today also marks the first day that actually felt like Autumn. Just walking outside today, I could feel that Summer had departed and that Autumn had fully arrived.

Zemiel has recently recovered from another ear infection. We were able to catch this one quite early thankfully and do something about it before it got too severe. He continues to improve his speaking ability for individual words and is showing signs of trying to join conversations - but no one can understand him when he does that. His loves at the moment continue to be steam trains and he watches some documentaries we have about them regularly. He also is very attached to his ipad and especially the puzzles thereon. To be honest, he is getting quite good at them. He loves to help with the washing up and the only thing that he likes more than yoghurt is nectarines. But nectarines are now out of season for another nine months, so we return to the ol' fallback. He also helps watering the garden and pot plants.

Azariah is cheeky and mischief rolled into one. Last week in Townsville, we called in at Australian Hearing to get some more batteries for Zemiel. Azariah was immediately recognised and the ladies in the reception and office areas went goo-gaa over him. (Azariah usually spends quality time with them when Zem does his testing). Azariah is also managing to climb the ladder up to the top bunk during rest times. Thankfully, he hasn't attempted to get down yet. He has had a few prickles in his feet recently and tonight we held him down and used a needle and tweezers to get them out. He complained that they were sore but when given the option to go to bed or get more prickles out he opted for the pain! Ha ha! Sharlene thinks it is because he is such an extrovert and just doesn't want to be shut away. He has been helping with the laundry and really enjoys throwing the dirty items over the stair rail to the cement, where I stand to catch them. Fun times!

Sharlene is in her last week of a 12 week term. She has been quite ill for the last 10 weeks and has lost weight compared to the start of the term. There are signs that it might be starting to ease up, so hopefully things will improve for her over the Easter break.

My Dads' Playgroup is still happening, despite being almost canned due to lack of patronage. It is now opened to the whole family with the focus remaining on fathers. I have the SES coming in tomorrow for a special event and hopefully we will get a decent turnout. I have finally put in my application for registration in Queensland for teaching. Hopefully, we will here something about that in a month or so.

Looking forward to some great Autumn days at the beach.