quick trip to Toowoomba

Last Thursday and Friday the girls and I made a quick trip to Toowoomba.  I wanted to visit some friends who I had always talked about visiting, but never zoomed up the Warrego to do.  So I made it happen!

We had lunch with the lovely Kate, who I know from a long time ago.  Let's just say 'before children'.  When I was younger.  And I think I persuaded her to go into speech pathology as a career - pretty sure it has worked out for her.  Anyway, she has never sent me an angry letter about it.  It was so nice to catch up and see her beautiful children.  Her little ones made me a tiny bit clucky...move on.

We then visited with Yasmin and her girls, where we had arranged to go on a horse ride together.  Sounds charming and country, doesn't it?  We all piled into her car (after petrol stops and toilet stops and afternoon tea stops and dropping off my car stops) and set off - Yas was driving and I was navigating.

She did an excellent job of driving.  My navigating however, led us up the bush track.  Yas had never down 4WDing before.  She learnt quickly, as the paths we were following were more like little cow tracks through paddocks with puddles and potholes. I don't know if it was the combination of our personalities, but we decided to push on through the paddocks until we got to our destination, rather than going back and trying another road.  We both got a terrible case of the giggles, and the children put blind faith in their mothers that they would get to their destination.  Although Gabby did say 'Are we lost?'.  Not really, we are exactly where the blue dot on the ipad says we are.  We just didn't go directly.  And then we drove down a road called Bum Bum Road. 

Gigglefest from everyone in the car.

Here is the route we took in red.

 The route we SHOULD have taken was in blue.

We were a bit late for the horseriding. 

I loved getting on a horse again.  I have always loved riding a horse and take every opportunity to do so.  It was a lovely time wandering through the bush on horses at sunset.  My horse was also quite nice, actually responded to my instructions and gave me a good trot/canter.

 Thanks Yas for our horseriding 4WD adventure.  Bum Bum Road - hee hee hee.

Our next stop on Visiting All The People I Know In Toowoomba was with my lovely friend Deanne, who is travelling with me overseas in March.  We planned what we are talking about in our speech therapy conference in the villages, and chatted travel plans.  Very exciting! I have a whole two pages of notes to turn into a few hours of presentation...hmmm.

Then Deanne asked if we wanted to go to her mum's house and see a baby Clydsedale.   OF COURSE we would. It's not every day you see that!

Awwww.  Hi Baby!

Little fluffy tail!

Awwww.

Those baby legs are long.

Picking cherry tomatoes.  Yummy.

 Our trip to Toowoomba was heaps of fun - thanks to everyone who we visited!

Ice skating

So the logical thing in hot hot Brisbane at the moment is to take the girls ice skating. Which is what I did today, along with another four kids I was babysitting for the day. We had to find jumpers and beanies and imagine wearing them as we packed in the heat of our house.

We had a lovely time. I had to sit by the side of the rink and drink hot chocolate. I sacrifice as a mother sometimes. The girls played red rover and limbo on the ice, and they squealed when the disco ball came on.

But there was one thing that marred our trip.

The ice bogan.

The twenty year old guy in a cut off flannel with his own skates who zoomed around the ice and did donuts and handbrake turns in front of beginner four year olds. The testosterone loaded ice hog who won all the red rover games and made small people cry. The attention seeking ice hockey wanna be who used beginner skaters as witches hats for complicated backwards high speed weaving.

The mother tiger in me started to flex it's claws and twitch it's tail. This guy was rattling my cage. I stood at the edge of the rink. Then another bystander said, "that guy is ***** rude". I nodded and agreed.

Take THAT ice bogan.

Then he fell over in a big stack and left the ice. And my girls kept skating in the reverse direction.

The girls had a lovely time at ice skating thanks to my vigilance. No ice bogans get to my kids. Not on my watch.

my trip

Time to update you all on my big trip that is coming up in about seven weeks!  I am pretty excited and nervous at the same time.  I am writing lists and checking them more than twice.

I am off to Central Asia and Asia for three and a half weeks.

Why?
I have been asked by my friend, an OT who lives there, to come and do some training in alternative communication and feeding/swallowing with parents and carers of children with cerebral palsy and Down Syndrome.  I am going to do a mini-conference for a week, then visit some smaller villages, and then go back to the capitol to see some more kids.

My heart has often wanted to go back after we lived there for 6 months in 1999.  And I feel that what I can support people with is very similar to my work here in Brisbane, that is, professional speech pathology support and training for teachers and parents.  So my time will be spent constructively.

I am planning a to take a lot of resources electronically, including some  picture making software and a laptop to make symbols for the kids to communicate with.  I am yet to purchase this....!  I don't know what kind of kids and parents will turn up, so I will prepare much and be ready to use a bit of it.  I also need to be flexible with time frames and interpreting.

I have done some research on language development in other languages.  From my reading it appears that the development of communication before and up to single words is similar for most languages.  When children start combining words the grammar and articulation differences start kicking in.  So if the children I meet are early communicators I should be fine.  I think my other-language speaking will be similar to their language development stage!

How am I getting there?
I am going in pretty much a straight line from Sydney to Central Asia, all with one airline.  On the way back I am popping in to see the Terracotta warriors in Xian and my friend in Wuhan.  On both the way in and the way out I am staying a night in Urumqi - way out west in China.

Travelling companions?
 My mother-in-law, a physio, and one of my best friends from uni, another speechie, are coming with me.  I asked them and they said yes.  I feel the responsibility of hoping it all turns out ok!  I am looking forward to travelling with them and sharing the adventure.

Will it be cold?
Yes.  About -10 to 5 degrees.  I am planning to wear ski pants and a ski jacket the whole time.  If I can fit into my ski pants....Christmas kilos are preventing this happening at the moment.  My friend Juliet has knitted me an awesome beanie.  I will wow the locals with my stylin.

I am hoping to update on the blog while I am there - I will see how the connection is.

For the moment I am planning, thinking, trying to fit into ski pants, and pulling together resources and training I want to do.  The girls need to start school and I will start work next week. 

I will miss the girls and Chris terribly while I am away, but I feel this is a great opportunity to use skills in an overseas context.  And inflict my terrible Russian on unsuspecting children.

the grass is always greener

I was given some turf for Christmas - a big THANK YOU to Gen and Al.

It transformed this space...

Oh thanks Matt,Gen, Tony and Al for digging up the yard for me!  We (I use 'we' loosely here) dug the ground up about ten centimetres with the mattock, then wet it with the sprinkler, then made it level (ish) then slapped the turf on top then left the sprinkler on it.  Muddy and wet.  Scooter loved it.

My newly turfed garden.

Complete with stepping stones.

And I am pleased to say due to great preparation none of the turf has died since being laid four weeks ago.  In fact it needs a second mow.

The grass is definitely greener.