Costume starting with A? and other things.

A is turning 30 on Friday and we're having a birthday BBQ dinner with an 'A' theme. That's all very well, he's all excited and organised to come as a character from Avatar - blue morphsuit and all! I, on the other hand am not a costume party kind of girl. I generally avoid them like the plague so I have no idea what to wear! I've suggested being 'A's wife' and 'a pregnant lady' but apparently they don't cut it!

Anyone got a better idea than 'astronaut', 'Albus Dumbledore' or 'apple'?

Apple was my dad's suggestion after seeing a my 22 week belly pic - thanks Dad! Oh yeah, and I have to be able to put it together for THIS Friday. While you're at it, if you have any good 30th gift ideas, that'd be great too. Nothing like having 6 weeks of holidays I could have used to work this out but leaving it until now!

Work has started for real and is going well, tiring, but well. The last two nights I've woken up with leg cramps and I'm really hoping they are just happening because my body is not used to all the standing and walking and stairs and that it's not a pregnancy symptom that is here to stay!

We got a bathroom quote. Are you sitting down? $39,000!!!!! Who are these people kidding??? How hard is it to remove a wall, put in a few pipes and slap up some tiles???? Ok, so I know I'm over simplifying things here but I didn't think what we had planned was that complex. Needless to say we'll be going back for a 'third time lucky' quote. The first one we got was $25,000 and we thought that was steep!

Finally, here's the cheekiest chicken saying hello through the (horrendously dirty) kitchen window. I was surprised and a bit concerned that she could get up there as it's a fair way from the ground and higher than our fences so I know she could get over them too if she wanted!

Dear Chicken, please do not take to visiting the neighbours yards when I'm not looking. They have dogs! Big ones!

Hope your week is going well!

Game of skill?

I've married a gamber! Not a problem gambler, just a bloke who likes the odd game of poker, plays on the stock market and is not turned off by the improbability of winning something on a timezone game machine. A went off on a bucks extravaganza last weekend and got home late last night. I was asleep but woke up when I heard the car pull in. This was our conversation...

A: Hey sweetie.
Me: Hey.
A: How are you?
Me: Sleepy (roll over and close eyes again)
A: Want to see what I won at timezone?
Me: Mmm, sure. (expecting some manner of ugly soft toy)
A: (holds up iPad)
Me: what? You won an iPad at timezone?
A: yep, game of skill. I was this close at winning a PS3 as well.
Me: what?! How much money did you spend trying to do that?
A: About $40. But most of that was trying to get the PS3.

So here I sit testing out the iPad. Unbelievable. I didn't think anyone ever won those things.

Yesterday I dreamt...

...that A told me he had worked out how he would rearrange our kitchen cupboards so our new short-term house mate would have room for her stuff. He told me he was going to put everything in alphabetical order. After telling him about the dream and the obligatory guffaw at the ridiculousness of it this is what he did...

That's right. Alphabetical order. Beans through to Tuna. Oh dear.

Spoilt!

Not New Zealand but hopefully the snow will be this good!

I've given myself the night off. I've got two classes of reports left to do and I'm feeling pretty good about getting them done on time so after two 10 pm evenings of work, work, work I'm taking a break!

So I'm checking out what's happened in the blog world, aimlessly trawling Etsy and Pintrest, marvelling at how much the chickens have grown and encouraging the cat to chew on a chicken wing (the vet says he needs to do this to avoid needing cat dental work and I'll be blowed if I'm going to pay for cat dental work)!

On to the title of today's post. I've been incredibly spoilt of late, I think I did well marrying a boy who likes shopping and can't resist a bargain. Not to mention one who is incredibly kind at report writing time.  Especially as I don't love shopping and usually can resist a bargain - thanks Mum for instilling the 'it's not a bargain if you weren't going to buy it anyway' response in my brain and setting it to default.

Two weekends ago, A cleared out of the house to let me mark assignments without distraction. At some point during the day he ended up at Oxford at DFO where there was a 'further x percent of the lowest marked price' sale. I'd mentioned a few weeks back I wanted to get a new winter jacket - he came home with three for me! I love them, they are so warm! This last week I also scored a big box of chocolates (report writing fuel) and have had more than my fair share of dinners cooked for me.

Tonight I came home to a box on the kitchen bench. A new ghd straightener. A work colleague's friend's hairdresser (?) had over ordered and was selling them very cheaply through A's work classifieds and so I am the proud owner of a pretty purple ghd!

And finally, when I do get through these next couple of weeks I have a New Zealand snowboarding holiday to look forward to! All organised and booked by A! A few days on the slopes, a couple heliboarding, a few relaxing at Hanmer Springs and Milford Sound. I can't wait.

So I'm feeling very lucky and grateful right now!

Hope you are having a lovely week!

Happy Birthday Husband!

It's A's birthday today! I have such trouble thinking of presents for birthdays, christmases and anniversaries and get a little stressed about it sometimes. Especially Christmas, when A will tell me weeks and weeks in advance that he's got everything sorted for me and spends the next weeks and weeks asking if I've worked out what it is! Often I do work it out but when I do I pretend I haven't!

Anyway, I think I've done well this time. There is an adventure race on this weekend in Canberra and I've entered a team. I know he'll be stoked because he's mentioned it a few times in previous years and normally it's not something I'd put my hand up for so he'll like that I'm going out of my comfort zone a bit! That is one of the downsides, the other is the forecast of rain but can't help that and we are going to get wet anyway, I believe it involves some kayaking and tubing down a river. I did only enter us in the novice race so the notes say it should be only about 2 hours long. 10km of biking, 3 of running and 3 of paddling. I thought the 5-6 hour version might have been a bit much for a first go!

I went to get a card and realised that, for the first time, I could buy one that said 'husband'. They were all so terribly soppy that I worried I'd need to buy a bucket to go with the card. But, I bought one anyway. Why not?

Off to cook birthday dinner - roast tandoori chicken, hope it's yummy. Luckily A wanted a cake from a particular shop that doesn't open work friendly hours so he went out specially to buy his own birthday cake. He won't tell me what flavour it is but boy is he excited about it!

Hope you are all having a lovely week!

Rainy Saturday

I'm loving the sound of the rain this morning, it's relaxing today. 4 weeks ago it would have been stressful. A couple of months ago we got someone around to give us a quote to sand and polish our floorboards (which like most things in the house had been DIYed averagely by owners past). He took one look at them and said "I'd love to say I could do them next week but...." and went on to explain that the ground under the house is damp and this is causing the floorboards to curl up a bit at the sides. We could sand them flat but the same thing would happen again. We'd need to do something about the drainage to stop the rainwater run-off resurfacing under the house. Back to the drawing board...

So a couple of weekends hard labour (harder for A than me), a bloke with a trencher, a long piece of ag pipe and a pile of gravel later we now have a drain around the front of the house that *should* fix the problem. We won't know for 3 - 6 months if it has worked but there's no water sitting along the front of the house today so it must be going somewhere.

So today I can enjoy the sound of the rain, the cat on my knee and think about A who is out doing a 100km mountain bike ride. In the rain.