Some days you just gotta......

.......laugh. I figure it's all you can do really when things unexpectedly go a bit tits up!

It was an early start to the morning, with an excited boy ready to start his birthday before 5.30am.

Chatting to Nana & Poppa on the phone before breakfast

Which turned into a loooooooooong wait till 6.45am before we were all ready to start opening presents.

He's been hanging out to get a new lunchbox so he's ready to join all the other four year-olds on Wednesdays at daycare with their lunchbox treats.

We'd decided we'd finally give him the cool Smartmax Magnetic blocks that I've had hidden away in the cupboard for a rainy day before the kids start to grow out of it.

 

The boys were also completely in awe of the Playmobil football game that Daddy found online. He's good like that.

It was a pretty fun morning for the boys here at home, and I'm pretty sure they'd have happily stayed home all day to play. But off to daycare, school and work they went.

We all met up at daycare this afternoon to have a celebratory birthday afternoon tea for the birthday boy. And Mylo was BEAMING when we arrived, enjoying being the centre of attention for the day. He was so excited to be seated at the head of the table, and choosing the song that everyone sung while the food was being prepared. He loves the national anthem so with hand on heart they all patriotically sang God Defend New Zealand.

The kids all enjoyed a slice of the football field cake we'd whipped up in a joint effort, Mark the baker, me the decorator.

So it wasn't till after we left all the celebrations behind that the afternoon started getting a little more interesting. 

After leaving daycare - well trying to leave three times mind you after I forgot the board the cake went on and the container we'd brought it in - we went off to get a warrant for my new little car which expires while we're away. And I wasn't really expecting it to fail - boo! So now we've got to try and get the car fixed and re-warranted in the next two weeks. Just what I needed to add to an already long list of to dos to be done before we board the plane. Sigh!

We then headed over to Jules aka Baba's for a special birthday dinner. The car was chocka full of stuff by this point and I made the decision not to bother getting the jackets out of the car as it was quite warm. That piece of information only becomes relevant a little later in the story. Baba is like a surrogate grandmother to our kids and it was ages since we'd hung out at her place. She also had her 13 year-old grand-daughter and friend there for the afternoon. Coincidentally, it was her granddaughter Kiki's birthday today too!

Mylo, for reasons unknown to man, got total stage fright at seeing these young ladies who he wasn't expecting to be there - it was like the worst case of stage fright I've seen in him. He wouldn't talk, wouldn't move and I finally managed to coax him after several minutes into sitting next to me in one of Baba's lovely antique chairs. He curled up like a little cat as close to me as he could get.

Which should have been fine. And it was for about fifteen minutes. But he was obviously so out of sorts with his stage fright at seeing these young ladies that the next thing I knew we were both sitting in a pool of wee. Yup. And this is the boy who has not had an accident for the better part of a year and a half. Sigh. 

So he was soaking, my jeans and knickers were soaking. Baba's flash-looking chair and cushion that we were sitting in was soaking.

Luckily I still had his daycare bag in the car which had a spare set of trousers although no undies. So commando it was. And even more luckily for me, Baba and I are roughly the same size although she's a lot shorter than me so I was able to borrow a pair of her jeans, walking around for the rest of the evening in tight jeans at half mast and commando-style too.

Daddy turned up with our KFC which we enjoyed until the mother of all thunderstorms hit just before 6pm. During dinner we'd also been talking a bit about the earthquake as Baba had been away overseas and missed them both so we were recounting a little the events as they'd happened. I noticed that Noah suddenly looked quite pale and he said he felt sick. Just as Mark decided he'd better get going to take him home, the thunder and lightning and torrential rain kicked into top gear.

Remember ALL our jackets are in the cars at this point.

By now the thunder was literally overhead and shaking the house. Mark and Noah disappeared off into the darkness just as it started hailing. Luckily, Baba also had a jacket I could borrow. So now I was dressed head-to-toe in Baba's clothes. We cut a hole in a plastic bag for Mylo to wear as a makeshift jacket to get back to the car.  And off we went into the storm.


We had to cross 2 virtual rivers running down Baba's steep street just to get to the car and you can see from this wee video clip that the back wheel of my car was covered in an almost waterfall the water was gushing so fast down the street.

Once we finally made it into the car, Mylo and I paused for a minute looking at each other soaking wet, and he gaily informed me 'that was fun Mum, can we do it again?', whilst I'm thinking 'on your own love'.

The roads home were treacherous with massive surface flooding everywhere and manholes being dislodged on a few streets with the power of the water buildup behind them.

Two drowned rats happy to be home

We finally got home to a warm bath having been run by Daddy (my hero!), but a cat who was MIA after being locked out in that storm. While we bathed, I talked through with Noah his feelings and apologised for bringing up the earthquake - it seems the combination of reliving the memories of that day with the storm hitting right at that moment with some pretty loud thunder crashes had been a bit too much for his sensitive wee soul so it was a lesson to this mama not to assume that it's fine to discuss stuff like this so openly in front of him and to be a bit more circumspect.

Thankfully, Murphy (the cat) finally turned up after Mark spent a few minutes walking up and down the street calling for him.

We ended the night quietly with the boys playing a little game of footy together on the new mini pitch, Noah reading me a poem about the Moa they are studying at school, and telling me some facts I didn't know about Troodon and Utahraptor - that kid is ALL about the dinosaurs at the moment - his knowledge is quite astounding.

 

And with two tired and sleepy boys tucked up in bed, it felt rather lovely to get into PJ's (and fresh knickers after having to go commando in jeans that then also got soaked through in the rain) and to sit down with a hot lemon and honey drink!

Some days you just gotta go with the flow and laugh the craziness off right?!

Things I'm Loving {This is your life kiddo}

I wholeheartedly believe that no matter what is happening in your life, there is always something you can be thankful for..no matter how simple it is.

It seems barely possible it's a whole year since that crazy colour party. More to the point, it's harder to believe it's a whole year since a certain little guy turned three!

In keeping with tradition, I've put together a video of some of our favourite shots of our wee guy to celebrate the year that's been.


This is your life Mylo age 3-4 from mnms on Vimeo
At four, Mylo is super interested in numbers, quite happily adding 1 onto any number up to 20 and telling us the equation. He knows all his letters and is writing his name and a few other letters quite well. He loves doing activity books and playing games like Sleeping Queens and Uno and gives us all a run for our money too!

At football, he's playing with a lot of older kids now which is giving him a great challenge. He's learning that he needs to chase after the ball once he's kicked it and tackle other players too. He's a dab hand on the Wii U console especially on Nintendoland, Mario Kart and also Fifa 13.

His favourite colour is black 'because this is the colour of Barcelona football team and Ninjago', and his favourite number is 10 'cos I just like it'. He loves coming up behind us when we are kneeling down in the kitchen getting things out of the fridge and giving us big hugs which nearly send us toppling over.

At night, he has a cute goodnight tradition. As you leave the room, he calls out 'night night love you' to which you have to reply 'night night love you'. That's promptly followed by 'love you night night' to which you have to reply 'love you night night'. Only then will he settle down for the night.

He tells me his favourite animal is a crocodile 'because they're bigger than alligators' and his favourite movie is Despicable Me 2.

 Decorating the mid-winter Christmas tree

 Enjoying the snow on Mt Egmont

Practicing his name at daycare

Wanna-be speed demon 

Using the force

 Making mum a yummy treat

The cuteness of the hat kills me!

 Our very own milky bar kid

Wow....an ice-cream bigger than me

We love how much spark and character this little guy brings to our lives. People often say that they can't help smiling when they look at him, as he has the most delightful cheeky face which I hope he never grows out of. I find myself lost in his gorgeous brown eyes and long dark eyelashes on a daily basis.

I'll never forget waking up to 'wipe my bottom please' and coming into the bathroom at 5.30am

to find this sight! 

Our mini Messi

We are so blessed to be your Mum and Dad little M and may God richly bless you in this new year of life.

Here's how you can join in this week:

Link up below with your blog post telling us what you're loving, and grab the Things I'm Loving button below for your post too. Don't forget to share the love by visiting all the other lovelies who have joined in - the linky is open till same time next week!

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Family Fun: Real-life Ghost Mansion

A few months back Mark invested in a Wii U game console. It came with a whole load of games that are straight forward enough for the kids to play. One of these games is called Luigi's Ghost Mansion.

Cue scary music.

The basic premise of the game is that the person with the game pad is the Ghost. The Ghost can see the other players wandering around the house and has to try to sneak up on them and grab them without the other players shining their torch on the Ghost.

The other players have normal game controllers and are looking at the game on the TV screen. They can't see the ghost but when the ghost gets close enough their game controllers vibrate so they know the ghost is not far away and that they'd better run or shine their torch quick smart.

If the ghost gets the torch shined on him enough times, he loses his power and the game is over. But if the ghost grabs the players twice, they are out for the count and the game is over.

The boys enjoy the game so much they asked if we could play a real-life version around the house.

Here's how we play:

1. Wait for it to get proper dark. 
2. Give all the players a torch except the ghost. 
3. The ghost then goes and hides somewhere in the house.
4. The players go looking for the ghost with their torches on.
5. If the ghost jumps out at the players before they turn the torches on, they are the winner.
6. If the ghost gets found first, the other players win.

Cue a whole lot of heart-pumping adrenalin, a fair bunch of screaming, and general crazy mayhem. 

A trap is set to make it look like there's a ghost hiding under the covers - but really it's just pillows

Everything looks waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay spookier in the dark don't you think!

It sure takes hide-n-seek to a whole other level!

Petite Kitchen: My picks #2

Last week after posting my first Petite Kitchen picks, I had quite a few enquiries about where I source some of my ingredients from. So before we get into this week's recipes, I thought I'd share first where to source ingredients:

Coconut oil
You can buy fairly cheap non-flavoured coconut oil from the supermarket these days. But to really invest in good quality oil so you actually get the health benefits you do need to get virgin organic coconut oil.

The first jar I bought was from Zenian - $38 and free delivery for 1L. I bought the jar at the end of June and it lasted nearly 3 months, making at least 2 lots of baking a week with it as well as putting it in a daily lemon and honey drink.

 

Most recently, I bought another jar from Lifefoods for $31 plus delivery (so $37 in total).

Almond meal
Where I make recipes using almond meal/ground almonds, I've been sourcing mine from Countdown, but at $8 ish for 350g it's not altogether cheap so for some recipes I do try and swap it for normal almonds that I grind up as much as possible.

For recipes using honey, I try and use manuka honey purely because it has added health benefits but I also try and buy one that's reasonable. A good alternative in some recipes is runny honey as sometimes getting tablespoons full of honey to work with in a recipe can be a bit messy and tricky! I often combine my honey and coconut oil in a pot and warm in the microwave until liquid so that they are a better consistency to work with in the food processor.

Dates
All Petite Kitchen recipes use medjool dates which I think are much sweeter and softer than normal dates but if you are going to making a lot of recipes then buying dates in bulk is a much better option. I bought 3kg of diced dates from Moore Wilsons (wholesaler in Wellington). Given that you have to chop up all the dates for the recipes, this saves me loads of time and I just add a bit of water and zap them in the microwaves for a minute to soften them up and absorb the water. Voila!

Here are this week's picks:

Raspberry and coconut chocolate torte
Gluten free, dairy free and sugar free
This torte came out more like a cake than a torte but was still pretty tasty. The only thing you have to get past is the crunchy raspberry pips in it, but overall the flavour was lovely and subtle.

Ingredients: raspberries, honey, coconut oil, eggs, coconut flour, cacao, baking soda.

Recipe here

Date and cashew slice drizzled in chocolate
Gluten free, sugar free (without the Whittakers), egg free, dairy free (if using nut milk)
This has to be one of my favourites so far. I'm sure that doesn't have anything to do with the fact I slightly cheated and put Whittakers Dark Chocolate on top instead of the original recipe cocoa/coconut oil.

Ingredients: dates, cashews, coconut, peanut/almond butter, normal or nut milk, apple cider vinegar, baking soda. Drizzle: coconut oil, honey, cacao, vanilla.

Recipe here

Old-fashioned gingerbread loaf
Gluten free, sugar free, dairy free
This one promised a lot and looked good but was a little disappointing in its taste. It tasted a wee bit too eggy and not gingery enough in my opinion. So when I make it again (which I will) I think I'll double the ginger.

Ingredients: ground almonds or hazelnuts, eggs, dates, ginger, cinnamon, apple cider vinegar, baking soda.

Recipe here

Stay tuned for more great Petite Kitchen picks next week!

Things I'm Loving is going on holiday too!

So y'all know I'm off-ski to England in only a couple of week's time.

Random fact for the day: did you know that as at the time of writing I've written 138 Things I'm Loving posts and have been the weekly host for 70 weeks (since taking it over from the original host Paisley Jade)?! Wow.

It is still one of the favourite times of my week - to jump off the crazy roller coaster ride of the busy week long enough to just sit quietly and reflect on what snippets of life I'd like to share, funny Internet happenings, videos, songs. You name it, I've shared it.

With our imminent holiday approaching, I thought it would also be the perfect opportunity to have a short 4-5 week break while we're away. So this is a shout-out for an eager volunteer(s) to take the Things I'm Loving linky on a little holiday over to your place for a few weeks.

Not that there won't be plenty of Things to Love that I'll share while we're away. In fact there will probably be blog and photo overloads I am sure - and I may even link up with the holiday host! But it would also be nice not to have the pressure of a schedule to keep while we're away and to just blog when the time and fancy takes me.

If I get more than one offer (ha ha - I should be so lucky!), the linky might be able to go on a bit of a blog hop from week to week - I also have all the linky code set up for each week ready to go to make it easy for the new host!

STOP PRESS: After a lovely offer from Cat of Catalina's Cottage Things I'm Loving is packing its bags and heading to warmer climes up north for those 5 weeks!

Things I'm Loving: What does the Fox Say, Giant Slides, Crochet, Madman Jumpers and much more

I wholeheartedly believe that no matter what is happening in your life, there is always something you can be thankful for..no matter how simple it is.

Meet the MNM's makeover
I've been doing a fair bit of behind the scenes work on the blog. Nothing too much has changed from a reader perspective yet, although I am rather loving the new Meet the MNM's page I designed the other day. Sneak preview here.

What Does the Fox Say?
This quirky video has become an overnight Internet sensation this past week with 16 million views - how mad is that! It is pretty hilarious, if completely random. The kids absolutely love making all the fox 'sounds' too. Guaranteed to bring a smile to your Friday!



Amazing skies
Loving the amazing skies that I've captured via iPhone and posted to Instagram lately. Morning or evening, stormy or clear skies, they've all been breathtaking. It's been hard to keep my phone in my pocket that's for sure!

Scooter reflections
Also loving these 2 shots I took reflected in the same scooter on different days.

It is finished

My first ever crochet project is done. It took a few weeks in amongst a lot of other busy stuff but I did it. Nikki kindly said it looked better than her first attempt, but I think she was probably just being nice! I think I did a row or 2 too many in the end but guess it's better to have one's ears covered than not!

A slide and a half
Loving the amazing covered slide Noah introduced us to at a local school. He goes to this school each week for swimming lessons in Term 4 each year, and Mylo is taking some introductory lessons there as well for the next few weekends. Noah was gagging to show off how cool and big this slide was.  We had to agree when we saw them zooming down it that this was indeed no ordinary slide.

This is only the half of it too. Once you jump off this one there's another just as big one that carries on further down the hill. Kid heaven!

He's not scared of heights
This is one amazing video of a guy free jumping all over buildings and rooves - not sure where - it looks a bit like Europe but it is pretty mind blowing. I dare ya not to say 'WHOA!' at some point while watching it!


Lots of letters
We spent a rainy Wednesday afternoon writing a card to our World Vision children in Bangladesh and Uganda this week. I was somewhat blown away by a) Mylo's flower and b) his letter writing - he wrote that all himself with no help from me! Not bad for someone not turning 4 till next week!

I find it hard to believe that in 3 weeks today we'll be winging our way to distant shores. It feels like there's still so much to do, including another birthday party to host next weekend, not to mention the actual packing up and going.

Oh well, taking it one day at a time is the best plan of attack methinks!

Here's how you can join in this week:

Link up below with your blog post telling us what you're loving, and grab the Things I'm Loving button below for your post too. Don't forget to share the love by visiting all the other lovelies who have joined in - the linky is open till same time next week!

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