Organising teeny tiny lego

We have recently entered the world of teeny tiny lego... a bit earlier than I had planned. We have a great collection of duplo, which the three of us can play together. Which is why I've been a bit hesitant to introduce little lego - those pieces are too teeny tiny for Mr Fun!

But Mr Sociable was given some teeny lego for his birthday. He was really excited about it (it was a police set), so we put it together. I brought out my old lego from when I was a kid, along with some cool hand-me-down space lego we were given a while ago. We've been playing with it for a few weeks now and Mr Sociable LOVES it! But, with so much cool lego all stored in one box, it was really hard to find the pieces that we want. So I started to think about a better way to store it. I went to Bunnings, looking for a big box with lots of compartments. I found these boxes, which I love! They were 3 for $20 and have so many little compartments.

I sorted all the teeny bits of lego into type (roof tiles, doors/windows, wheels, car steering wheels, etc).

The great thing about these storage cases is that the individual little boxes are removable too, so Mr Sociable can get out the boxes that he needs.

I put all the regular blocks & large pieces into an IKEA tub, which is big enough to fit the storage cases inside.

Since sorting out the lego, Mr Sociable has been able to play more independently with the teeny tiny lego, finding the bits that he wants (although, when his creations finally depart from our dining table, I suspect I will have to help him sort all the pieces back into the right boxes).

Loving the lego!

Creating a balcony playground

In the past few months, Mr Sociable has decided that the world is his playground - literally! Everything is there to be climbed on, jumped on and explored. At home, we have pretty limited space for climbing. I want to let him climb, have fun and burn up some energy. But, I don't want to spend my whole day asking him not to climb on the lounge, not to jump on the stairs, etc.

Climbing a cool scramble net at Darling Harbour

We decided to give the kids some more outside equipment for Christmas. We don't have a large backyard, so we talked about ways to put some equipment on our balcony. I've been working on the balcony as a play area for quite a while - adding kids stuff (such as a sandpit and chalkboard) and relocating the grown-up stuff (the comfy chairs and the BBQ). Last year I put some shade walls on the balcony, to make it into more of a room. For Christmas, we bought the kids a scramble net, a pirate telescope and a steering wheel.

Here it is! (before I added the foam mats on the floor)

I'll show you around...

The steering wheel
Both boys love using steering wheels at the park, so we thought it would be a good addition to our balcony playground. We bought this here, but I have recently seen them at Bunnings (cheaper).

Mr Fun is at just the right age for pretend driving!

The telescope
Mr Sociable is really into role-playing about pirates, so we bought him a pretend telescope (installed at his height - the ones at the park are often too tall!).

The scramble net
We bought this here. We bought it without a frame, so that Franky could build the right size frame to fit the space. It took a little longer than I had expected, but Franky now has a new toy too (a jig saw).

The chalk-board
We've had this for quite a while. I actually made it myself from an old piece of wood we had in the garage (the back of an old couch). I painted it with blackboard paint and used dynabolts to attach it to the wall.

Mr Fun is really into drawing at the moment - he just needs to
be reminded about appropriate places to draw ;)

The swing
Mr Sociable was given the swing for his first birthday. Neither of my boys have really enjoyed being strapped into the swing (unless food, toys or tickling were involved). But it's useful if I need to contain Mr Fun for a short time while I do something outside (eg. mow or seasol the lawn). It's also great when friends come over with little ones (the seat reclines for baby-use).

Mr Sociable in the swing, age 1 (note the comfy chairs in the background - gone now!)

Mr Fun in the swing, age 1

The sandpit
We have used the clam shell on the balcony since Mr Sociable was a baby. It has served as both a sand pit and a pool at various times. It is easy to sweep up the sand from the tiles (although I try to teach my kids to keep the sand in the sandpit) and we have two doormats (one inside the door and one outside), which keeps the house pretty sand-free.

Water play when Mr Sociable was a baby

Brothers using the sandpit together for the first time

The wind chime
Both boys (and lots of our visitors) love to make a big noise with the chimes! I have hung them so that the kids can reach the wooden wind catcher and give it a good hard gentle shake.

Trampoline
A jogging trampoline that was mine when I was in high school. It's not as bouncy as a big trampoline - but bouncy enough for kids this age.

Foam mats
I bought foam mats from Bunnings to make the floor a bit softer.

I only put the mats down the climbing end - not
near the sandpit/walkway through to the house.

Visibility
One thing that I love about this area is that I can see a large part of it from the kitchen. The kids are able to play out there in the afternoon while I prepare dinner (with a few interruptions...).

What next?
I would like to install one shelf on the wall (out of toddler reach) that could house a bottle sunscreen, a box of baby wipes, a box of tissues, some bandaids, etc. I would also like to install a hat rack for all the sun-hats that currently live on the plant-hanger that the previous owners left here. Long term, I do have an idea about adding another climbing thing & attaching a fireman's pole to the brick wall... maybe next Christmas???

Growing an avocado seedling (Wordless Wednesday)

Months (and months) ago, we bought some massive avocados. We put an avocado seed in some water to see if we could grow an avocado tree. The first round of (very large) seeds went mouldy and ended up in the compost.

Massive avocado!

Suspending the seed in water

We have had more success growing seedlings from smaller seeds.

Seed pierced with toothpicks

One of them is ready to plant!!!

Leaves! Hooray!

Linking up with My Little Drummer Boys for Wordless Wednesday.

When Franky's shirt turned into pants

At Christmas, I made both boys some shorts to wear on Christmas day. Mr Sociable loved the way that they were "cool" (ie. loose-fitting, thin cotton). He told me that he would like to wear them every day. Rather than risk having the dirtiest and stinkiest 4 year old in my street, I decided to make him some more "cool" shorts. Instead of buying more fabric, I cut up some old clothes that Franky & I no longer wear.

The Christmas shorts (they are red with gold stars)

These shorts are made from an old work shirt of Franky's:

I'll admit these ones look a bit like pyjamas - even when Franky
used to wear them as a work shirt, they looked a bit pyjama-ish.

These are from a wrap-skirt I used to wear:

Really thin sarong-type fabric, blue with yellow elephants

These are from a sarong of mine:

Again, soft sarong fabric with yellow elephants

Cold showers, cooking on the dirt, being chased by killer goannas (and other tales of camping)

We recently went on our first ever camping adventure as a family. It was my first time camping & I was a bit unsure what to expect. My usual strategy for dealing with the unknown is to plan & organise - so I wrote a very detailed packing list, spent time menu-planning, thought about small toys that would interest the kids for 5 days (it was forecast to rain every day!) and strategised ways to keep everything clean and dry. I prayed that it would not rain all week, that the forecast would be wrong (thankfully, God organised for us to only had two mornings of rain in the 5 days!).

At the beautiful swimming beach - the flat, shallow water was great for the kids!

Some wonderful friends loaned us their camping gear & even came to set up/pack up the tent for us! It was a bit of a mission, as there is no car access to The Basin, so we hired a barge to take everything over from Palm Beach. On the second day, we were joined by two other families. The kids played really well together - Mr Sociable loved having another boy to play with!

Digging a deep hole - they actually continued to work on this hole over a few days!

Burying Franky in the hole

Mr Fun made a friend too!

The campsite does have toilets and cold showers, but the sites are not powered (there is electricity in the bathroom). It was a bit crisp showering in the cold - showers were very short!! After the kids screamed for the duration of their first cold showers, we gave them baths in our red bucket for the rest of the week (with water that we kindly heated for them on the stove). The red bucket was the most useful thing that we took - it served as a bath, a washing-up bucket, a container to catch the water coming off the awning in the rain and a basket to carry things to the beach.

Ah, brothers :)

Collecting the water that ran off the awning - Mr Fun thought it was a great place to play!

I was thankful that I had put time into thinking about toys for wet weather. The kids were occupied on those wet mornings and had lots of fun with the small toys. Everything fitted into one supermarket cold bag. I took:
* sticky slap hands
* playdoh & some cutters
* small wooden meccano set
* toy cars with a plastic car mat (the plastic car mat was made from tablecloth vinyl - it was actually really useful for keeping the floor clean in the kids' half of the tent)
* balloons
* drawing stuff (whiteboard, colouring books, whiteboard crayons)
* battery powered portable DVD player
* bubbles
* a beach ball (which got lost)
* parachute men (which we didn't end up using)
* small plastic tops (which we also didn't use)

Watching Cars on a rainy morning - note the plastic car mat on the floor

Mr Fun, inspecting the wet tent

Ok, so we didn't really get chased by killer goannas... but they were BIG & they did come close to the tents. We were also visited by ducks, bush turkeys, bandicoots and wallabies. The wallabies found their way into our garbage bag one night and sampled some of our rotten fruit scraps, which they thoughtfully spread out for us to inspect!

Goanna walking past the tents

We went on a day-trip to Palm Beach on the ferry. Both boys loved going on the ferry, although I was a little concerned about Mr Sociable standing so close to the doorway, playing with the chains that blocked the entrance (eventually I was a mean Mummy and told him to sit in the chairs). We bought fish and chips for lunch, which was nice (but pricey - almost $50?!?!). The older kids played in the playground while Mr Fun fell asleep in the sling (cuddly moments are rare these days - so I enjoyed the time holding my sleeping bubba).

Ferry trip to Palm Beach

My sleeping bubba

Taking in the view on the ferry trip home

Mr Fun spent most of his time wandering around, exploring. He pottered around on the beach, found muddy puddles to play in, said hi to the neighbours and ran around on the grass. He has been mourning freedom since coming home!

As a first time camper, my overall experience was pretty positive. I liked the simplicity of focusing just on basics - spending time together, preparing meals and cleaning up after meals/the beach. I enjoyed the lack of technology which can interrupt relationship time. I liked chatting to one another while we washed up, walking to the beach and playing as a family. I enjoyed all having "rest time" in the afternoons - when the kids would rest/sleep & the adults read books.

Franky was not so easily convinced - he likes warm showers and a comfy bed. Before we write off camping as a family, I'm hoping we can go to a site with car access, hot water and electricity. Perhaps having a few "luxuries" will make camping more bearable for my beloved husband!

What are your experiences of camping? Do you have a favourite place you like to go?