A letter to my teenager

Happy 13th Birthday Nicholas

 

I am just amazed at how quickly 13 years have flown by, it feels like just yesterday that I was holding my newborn son in my arms wondering what kind of person you would become and how I could be the best mother for you.

I am so honoured to be your Mum and so proud of the young man that you have grown into. We had bumpy  times along the way but we had lots and lots of fabulous times together and created so many happy memories.

You have been blessed with so many gifts and I pray that you use them all to the best of your ability. I love how you enjoy solving maths problems and I love how you laugh as your reading your latest book. I love that you share the funny stuff with me and that you are able to talk to me about so many things.

I love how you are willing to participate in so many things and don't need to be the best at those things in order to give them a go. 

At first I didn't like the idea of you getting taller than me and yes I tried to fight it for a while and made sure my heels got higher in order to stay that little bit ahead but now I love that you have grown so tall and so capable. It is wonderful to have your help with daily things and I am so thankful that you are so willing to help without complaint. 

Your are 13 years old and you are 6 foot tall, I am so pleased you enjoy your height and don't slouch or hunch your shoulders. I do however hope you slow down a bit because if your size 12 feet continue to grow so quickly you will struggle to find shoes that fit you :-)

I can continue to say so many more wonderful things that I love about you but I prefer to tall you in person and I will make sure that I continue to do that every day. 

You are an amazing son and I am a very proud mother and I look forward to watching you grow into an awesome man.

Love Mum

xx

Nicholas 13th Birthday Inspiration

My big boy turns 13 in just over a week. It is amazing how time flies and last week I finally ordered all of the supplies and am getting organised for his party.

He seems to be quite excited about it and I thought I would share my inspiration pics with you all.

All images can be found on my pinterest board and from there you should hopefully be able to trace the original source.

Hope you are all having a great week 

and any tips on keeping a dozen teenage boys manageable would be appreciated :-)

 xx

Second Chances

Last week I was reminded of how blessed I am to have the life I do. I am blessed that I was given a second chance at love and at happiness and I am so thankful that I chose to take it.

 Last week my wonderful husband bought me a gorgeous bunch of flowers and hand delivered it to me with a hand written card expressing his love and happiness.

Six years ago I met the man who was to become my husband. For me there was no lightning bolt or any particular moment when I knew he was the one. In fact the thought never crossed my mind. For me love came slowly but then quickly.....

I had finally decided that it was time to stop waiting for things to change before I did some of the things I wanted to do. I had always wanted to learn ballroom dancing and unfortunately following my failed first marriage I had been single for over 5 years. I decided that even though I didn't have a partner I could still learn, so off I went to the local bowling club where a group met once a week for social dancing and lessons. It was great, there were many older males who didn't have partners and who were only too happy to help me learn. I quickly discovered that the older gentlemen were much better to dance with as they new how to lead and that made it much easier for me to learn how to dance. 

Anyway..... one week at dancing my future husband's mother came. I knew Nick's mum from Nicholas' school. Nick = husband, Nicholas = son. That's how we distinguish them in our house. It still gets confusing at times, Nick's family still call him Nicholas occasionally and Nicholas' friends all call him Nic, it makes for some interesting conversations sometimes until I realise I am talking about the wrong Nick :-)

Nick's mum was a teacher at Nicholas'school as well as my P & F buddy (it was a small P & F, I nearly 

walked out of my first meeting when I thought I might have to take one of the three positions on the committee, fortunately a fourth person walked in late and I was saved) One night Nick's mum came to the club for dancing as her eldest son was getting married and the bridal party, as well as the family wanted to learn how to dance for the Bridal Waltz etc. They ended up getting private lessons but a few months later just after the eldest's wedding it was time to prepare for Nick's sister's wedding. The family had all enjoyed dancing so much they decided to continue with lessons however Nick no longer had a dance partner and his Mum thought of me. 

Like I said I had no romantic inclinations at all. Nick was only 22, I was almost 30 and a single mother of a 7 year old. I was just there to dance. I enjoyed the company and his family are all lovely, even when I was invited to the wedding as Nick's partner I thought nothing of it, just figuring that we were able to participate in the family dance together. 

After the wedding Nick told me how he felt and I was quite horrified, I even said "What will your mother think?" Lucky for me he was quite persistent and very convincing and after a few months I agreed to officially date him, six months later we were engaged and then a further five months and we were married.

It was a wonderful courtship but also very difficult. I had a lot of healing to do and Nick prayerfully, patiently and lovingly helped me begin to overcome all of the baggage I still carried from my past. So while it took me a while to realise I was in love, once I did I fell head over heels.

I didn't make it very easy to love me back, I pushed Nick away many times expecting him to react in a certain way and he always surprised me by responding with love and understanding, he showed me that whilst he loved me and wanted to make me happy he still stood firm in his beliefs.

Our first year as a married couple and blended family was not easy either, we had lots of disagreements, I had lots of tears, Nicholas struggled to adjust to having a male authority figure around as well as sharing his mum with someone else. It was definitely an interesting year but through that year I grew to love my husband more and more every day and I still do. He is my best friend, I love spending time with him, in fact I prefer hanging out with him more than anyone else. He makes me so happy, he challenges me and makes me want to be a better wife, mother, friend and human being. 

Thank you Nick for the last 6 years, they have been the best and I am looking forward to spending many, many more with you and facing all of the tough times together, celebrating all of the good times and just hanging out with my best friend. 

xx

Have you been given a second chance that has changed your life? I'd love to hear about it.

Inspire Series - Canvas Wall Art

I've just listed these gorgeous canvas prints in store

Each Print is 15 cm x 15 cm and is mounted on MDF ready to to hang

The prints all feature inspiring quotes and there are 12 in the set.

The best thing is they are only $7.95 each and you can find them here

They make great little gifts for encouraging the special people in your life.

I am off to Sydney in the morning, taking Nicholas to the State Athletics Carnival at Homebush

I am so proud of him, this is the second year in a row that he has made it 

I am going to stay the night and catch up with my sister, brother in law, niece and nephew while I am there

I am looking forward to it

Enjoy the rest of your week

xx

Wednesday at my house

Today has been quiet

Nicholas left to go to camp this morning for 3 days and I miss him already 

It's always nice for hubby and I to have some time alone but this time I am particularly missing my big boy (must be all those extra hormones racing around)

I am sure he will have a great time away and I did offer to go as a parent helper, his response "Mum, I'd like some time on my own" Fair enough, I would just be continuously reminding him to wash his hands before he ate, make sure he had dry socks on etc..... being a typical mum :-)

There is not much new happening in our parts, I have new stock which I am slowly adding to the store and I currently have 20% off everything store wide, just use code FD20 when you checkout.

I have had people pop in to check out my goodies so I have started putting price tags on my store items to make them easily identifiable and because I can never remember how much something is when people ask.

I am also going to market in a few weeks time, so I figure pricing everything now is a good idea.

I have never been to market before so if you have any tips for me on running a stall etc I would love to hear them.

Hope you are all having a great week.

xx

Zone Athletics

We had a great day in Dubbo yesterday for the Zone Athletics Carnival. 

It was sunny with just a slight breeze, Perfect.

Nicholas had a fantastic day and came 2nd in shot put and javelin so it looks like we are off to the State Carnival in Sydney next month.

I am so proud of him and so thankful that I was able to go and spend the day with him.

Here is another sneak peak of our photoshoot on Monday, more on that still to come.

xx

Busy Days

We are having a busy time here lately but it is all good and very exciting!

We had 4 birthdays to celebrate in our family last week and that  is always fun :-)

Nicholas has made it to the Zone athletics carnival for 4 (maybe 5) events, yay! So we are off to Dubbo tomorrow to watch him compete  

and today I had the pleasure of working with some fantastic ladies and some gorgeous girls.

If you follow me on Instagram or Face book you may have already seen this sneak peak of our day today.

I have some behind the scenes photos to share with you next time.

Hope you all had a great weekend and a fabulous start to the week.

xx

Parenting

I don't blog much about being a parent, I'm not sure why. I am one and I have been for over 12 years. I love being one and if you have been around here for a while you know that we would love to have more children.

I guess most of the mummy bloggers I have come across all have younger children, when I started blogging my child was already older and he didn't really provide me with much blogging material, he went through a phase of not liking photos. Actually he may still be in that phase.....

I am really blessed to have a great kid, not that we don't have issues, but he generally responds really well whenever we have an issue and it goes away, at least for a while. Hormones and teenage years means that that we often get a bad attitude but we can usually deal with it and we have a break before the next one hits.

Parenting is one thing I don't usually doubt myself on. I am not perfect but I am pretty confident that as a mum I do ok. I was a single mum for 7 years and there were times I did doubt what I was doing and I really wished I had someone to support me and reassure me that I was doing the right thing, as wonderful as your family and friends are it is not the same as your husband partnering with you and helping you along the journey.

I am so blessed now to have a wonderful husband who helps me and supports me and shares in the joys of parenting. 

Becoming a family wasn't easy, we had lots of things to sort out. Our first year of marriage was our first year together as a family and we had some interesting conversations. I was so used to making all of the decisions in my life for myself and my son and Nick was not used to children at all. It was interesting....

Anyway fast forward to 4 1/2 years later and I am so proud of my boy, he is growing into a very fine young man. I love how he is getting stronger and taller and is so helpful :-)

I love how he can have a conversation with adults and be respectful, I love hearing his voice change and I love hearing him talk about anything really (my boy like most males has limited words for use during the day, me being a female often struggle with the lack of words from him).

Me thinking about parenting all started this morning when I sat down to have my coffee, I started to read Kate's blog which lead me to Laney's blog that then lead me to Rachaels blog and back to Laney's blog (I'm not even sure how that trail all happened but it happens often with me and next thing you know I have been at the computer for hours) 

I haven't read Rachael's or Laney's blog before but they both started me thinking about being a mum and then I read Laney's request:

"So please send me one short sentence describing something that is good about being a mum"

So I thought about it and for me it is this

"Seeing my son grow into the man that I know he can be"

Being a mum is rewarding and humbling and my prayer is that when he leaves home he is ready to be the best that he can be and that I have done all that I can to help him achieve that.

xx

Nicholas

I had a fabulous time in Sydney with Nicholas last week.

it was so lovely to be able to spend time with him and cheer him on in the shot put.

Thank you for all of you good luck wishes for Nicholas, unfortunately he didn't place in the top 3 but he felt that he did his best and I was just so proud of him.

Making it to State level was such an achievement in itself especially for a kid who didn't train at all : - )

His event was first up at 9am so we were finished before 10am and because my sister Gail took the day off work to hang out with us and we had the rest of the day to fill we headed over to Featherdale Wildlife Park.

It was great! Nicholas and I hadn't been before.

The park is a really great size to wander around without getting exhausted. Very easy to see everything in a few hours.

There are lots of birds to enjoy, including this cute albino Kookaburra.

and cute animals to pat and feed.

I highly recommend a visit, a lot of the animals wander freely and are happy to be fed and petted.

On Friday we were at the University of NSW in Randwick for the Robocup Competition. Nicholas' school had two teams involved.

Both teams were competing in the Dance section. As a team they designed their robots using Lego Robotic kits. The aim for each team is to program their robots to move around a specified area using as much of the designated space as possible without going outside of it. The program is set to music with the team also performing a dance in conjunction with the robots. The routine is to last between 1 - 2 minutes.

The team was to first introduce themselves then they had to approach the judges and explain their robots.

It was rather dark and I couldn't get any closer so the photos aren't the best sorry!

Nicholas' team performed really well, but unfortunately didn't make it through to the next stage.

I had a great time watching all of the teams and was amazed at what these kids can do. They are all so clever.

It was a fantastic opportunity for Nicholas to be involved in and I am just so very proud of him!

PS. Nicholas did dance a little, he "Shuffled" 

xx