Thanks to all who sent their condolences when Jes died. Even now, 6 months later I have my times when it all hits me like a flood and I cry yet another river. I don't know if it will ever be entirely real. Michael's other brother had a little girl who at 19 months was burned with boiling water. 4 days later she died of septicemia. I thought I'd never recover from that one. It was 8 years ago, and sometimes it still feels raw. But not in the same way. We didn't know her (they lived in the North Island and we were in the South Island) except through pictures etc. And also what happened to her was a horrible accident. There's a whole separate layer of things to come to terms with in Jes's case.
Anyway, I don't want to bog myself down with all that again right now, so I am going to switch gears and do a bit of a fill-in.
In June, Michael started a new job doing IT for a shire council in Roma (which is 7 hours inland from Brisbane, and only has 7,000 people). The girls and I are still in Brissy, but will be moving up there at the end of next week. Michael loves it, but we really don't want to go. I like having all the access to services, shopping etc that the city holds. But, on the good news front, we should be able to get Permanent Residency through the governments rural jobs scheme, so that would make it worthwhile. The current plan is to move back to Brissy by the time Samara is school age so she can go to a special school. I'm not a big fan of mainstreaming (having worked in that situation during teacher training) and I don't know that homeschooling Samara when the others have grown up and moved on would be fair on such a social child. But that's a few years away yet, we'll wait and see.
At Samara's regular paed checkup in May Dr Slaughter (yes, that's his real name!) decided based on Samara's sleep study that she needed her adenoids out. She was also failing her hearing tests, and had glue ear, so they put in grommets as well. They were going to take out her tonsils, but when they got in there they decided it was too risky. Her airways were so narrow they couldn't even get a ventilation tube down without giving her steroids. This meant that to get at her tonsils, they would have to tip her neck back a long way, and with the neck instability thing our kids can have (and there's a higher chance with her, as all my family has Ehlers Danlos Syndrome - a joint instability problem) it just wasn't worth the risk. Anyway, the upshot of it all was that she almost never snores now!! Her hearing went from being moderate to severely affected to being moderately affected. Not as good as we hoped. So she is waiting for hearing aids now. She hates anyone touching her face or ears. She won't wear her earplugs when she has a bath (to keep water out of the grommets). So I know that getting her to wear hearing aids is going to be real fun. NOT!!
Speaking of Samara, we are going to be having an early 2nd birthday party for her on the 4th (the day before we leave) so that will hopefully be fun. We're going to go with a Wiggles theme (this will be the 3rd Wiggles party I have done over the years!)
Last month, Renata surprised us with a visit home for a bit over a week. Michael knew she was coming, and I had a vague suspicion but didn't really know. It was nice to see her again.
Samara's new tricks include learning a lot of songs. Her favourites include 'rock-a-bye your bear' (Wiggles), D_O_R_O_T_H_Y the Dinosaur (wiggles again!), Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, and the welcome song they do at school. She is good at picking up the actions, and attempts the words too. She isn't walking yet, but can stand herself up without using anything to climb against. In the morning she asks to 'det up', then yells at the girls to 'det up' too!
As for me, I have started a new hobby busines
s making kids clothes. Here's a few samples.... 
My lovely niece Jayde in the dress I sent back with Renata (despite it being a New Zealand winter, and the poor child freezing!!)
My other gorgeous niece (who I missed meeting when we were in NZ), Autumn who is wearing a smaller version.
Amy modelling the dress as a skirt, and her little sister Emma in the dress. (These two are my adorable neighbours who we will miss terribly)
I have also been refashioning clothing by taking good quality used clothes and making them into something worth having! This cute little dress used to be a hideous mens shirt! In fact, Bryanna suggested we call it the 'ewwww, ahhhh' dress. Because it used to be 'ewwww', and now it's 'ahhhh'.
Another refashion (a bit small on Samara, but she was the closest model I had!). This one is made from new stripey fabric and button, new singlet with the bottom removed and given a 'lettuce' edging, a preloved shirt (for the shoulder frills and the skirt frill), and a pair of pumpkin patch jeans.
This one is technically refashioned (I am keeping this one for Samara) but I will be making them from new materials for sale. It is a corset top and a 3 layer skirt. The picture was taken at night with flash, so it isn't the best, but just believe me when I say it is adorable!
If anyone wants to have a look, become my fan on Facebook. Just do a search for Just Juniors. I am actually running a competition til the end of August (not much time left), where you go in the draw to win a Tutu Dress. One entry for each friend you refer who becomes a fan. (just make sure they let me know who sent them)
Well, it's 2.20am, and we have therapy in the morning, followed by a visit to some ex-Kiwi's we used to vaguely know (but didn't know were here until Mahalia ran into them at a homeschool sports day last week!). So I'd better go get some sleep. Tomorrow I will try and get here a post about the Tutu Drive I am doing to get little skirts for young girls who are seriously ill. I will be asking for donations of any dressups (boy or girl - seems a bit mean to just do the tutus...) but they must be new. Keep watchin for further information.........
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