BEAM ME UP SCOTTY! Another teleporting accident waiting to happen

For the last few weeks I've felt a bit like I'm being beamed up by Scotty but still haven't rematerialised anywhere, let alone the Starship Enterprise. So my material self is currently a sparkly set of atoms bouncing off each other in limbo waiting for Scotty to somehow re-organise them back in to something half way resembling the original version of me. 

Once I explain my current exploded self, it will make complete sense, of course (I am being sarcastic but sort of not at the same time) Firstly the loveliest of friends found out she had Breast Cancer, and is now suffering through Chemotherapy, I can't even start to explain what this has done to my heart let alone hers and her beautiful family's. Secondly I ended up in the paper smiling broadly in stark contrast to my what my insides look like and then writing for The Punch last week, so feeling a little out there and suddenly awkward/embarrassed which is a bit unexpected. And lastly I am preparing to return to work in January after what will be fifteen months of maternity leave. 

All these things in differing degrees are disturbing the rhythm of my life, which pretty much resembles that of a toddler's, seeing I'm hanging out with two of them most of the time. And if you haven't heard, toddlers LOVE a consistent schedule, marked by simple, repetitive things like eating and playing and sleeping. Either new Mums and toddlers have a lot in common or I am severely stunted because with all this ambiguity and sadness and exposure, the schedule is well and truly out the window. And there's a lot of screaming going on in my head that is tending to resemble my 14 month old's reaction to an overstay at the supermarket.

Fact: It is difficult to write when you're screaming, even if only on the inside. 

So I suppose this is a lame attempt to explain what I perceive as a negative change in the content of my blog and tweet stream of late. (BTW Hubby has banned the iPhone from our bedroom which doesn't really matter as my atomised brain is finding it tough to come up with any twitty banter that would see followers lunging for the retweet button. Because, of course, before I got involuntarily stuck in a Star Trek transporter that was happening all the time. These thoughts remind me of why my husband married me, that is for my calm and logical mind.) 

To steer this away from a list of excuses, let's just leave it as this is me trying to paint a little picture of where I'm at. It is not a particularly nice place, my stomach always seems to be churning just a tad and my usual equilibrium that enables me to share all manner of nonsense seems a little damaged. We have the best engineers from Star Trek working on re-assembling me in the correct way, that is my usual incorrect self, and hopefully some time soon you may see some stream of consciousness stuff spewing forth here - defining at last, my ideal life. 

P.S. Some trivia only the amazing Jenny "The Bloggess" Lawson may appreciate: William Shatner is the only person to have actually said the exact phrase "Beam me up Scotty" in the audio adaptation of his novel Star Trek: The Ashes of Eden. Now there's a great dinner party opener!

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MUMMY'S FUNKY FRIDAY: Fly through the air

Carrie clearing her head on a Trapeze near New York. Image copyright: HBO.com

It seems that Summer’s coming twice this year after a return to Winter over the last week. When the 5 days of clouds parted today I put my scarf and boots away again (I hope for the last time this year) and breathed a huge sigh of relief. The warmth reminded me again that getting out in to the fresh air is like therapy for everyone, especially couped up toddlers going stir crazy, while their Mums lose their mind.

There are a few ways to stave off rainy week insanity, one is of course to read this blog, two is spend a small fortune on a mental health professional and a third is to do something daring you normally wouldn’t do. This Funky Friday why not show Carrie Bradshaw up and fly on a Trapeze.

The Sydney Trapeze School has set up its' outdoor trapeze rig in the Brazilian Fields of Centennial Park and are there until Sunday February 19. But wait for it, they have Mums and Bubs classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays 10:15am-12:15pm! The cost seems to be around the $55 mark for one session.

Nothing like hanging upside down, flying through the air and falling on your head to clear the damage a week of crying and whinging has done to you, and it may stop the kids screaming too or at least turn them into squeals of delight.

Don’t worry if you are not in Sydney there are outdoor trapeze setups all over Australia, here are some links to start you off. 

Circus Arts, Sydney Olympic Park Aquatic Centre, Olympic Boulevard, Homebush (Also Byron Bay, Cairns and Ballina)

Flying Trapeze Centre, Melbourne

Cirque Espace, Novotel Twin Waters Resort, Sunshine Coast

SkyHigh Trapeze, Perth

Go fly!

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THE KEY TO A HAPPY BIRTHDAY: The Front Door

When you read this you could be forgiven for thinking I just make this stuff up. I wish I was making it up because I can't for the life of me figure out how I get this 'lucky'. I must just be special in a she attends a "special" class kind of way.

Birthdays come around once a year as you know, and so on this one day you can say things like:
"No dear, today I'm having a shower first so for once I get to spend 40 minutes in there and you get to spend 5 minutes after that while I yell at you to hurry up" or
"Oooh look Crash has done a big poo, I'm not changing him because it's my birthday".

In fact all bets are off when it's your birthday, well that's what I thought until today. It was all looking as I would expect from a family with two toddlers, I got a card and Happy Birthday sang to me, no present but that’s ok given hubby didn't get one last year (although I had a 3 month old I was breastfeeding so I was lucky to get out of the house let alone go shopping for a present, he doesn't have any such excuse).


Anyway I was even looking forward to the breakfast out with my boys until learning only minutes before that Boom had booked a Chiropractor appointment at 8.30. That’s when things started to feel less birthdayish and very every other day of the yearish. Even the breakfast at a nice café was the usual mayhem, where one of you is always lunging to catch a falling knife or save a full cup of coffee from ending up all over the table or you or both but little did I know it was about to become anything but an ordinary day.

I raced home as it was obvious the little guy wanted to sleep. With one toddler on my hip, another attached to my hand I somehow got the keys out of my pocket to get inside. But they looked strange, and as my conscious mind caught up to the vision in front of me I realised that the front door key had somehow vanished from the key ring.

It wasn't hard to put two and two together if you knew my husband. I quickly surmised he had taken the front door key off to take with him the night before as he was at a function. What the Einstein did with the key god only knows but I'd say it ended up on his key ring, next to his front door key.

After ringing him around 15 times I eventually tracked him down through an ad agency receptionist who was embarrassed to hear the story that I was determined to share with anyone who would listen. He was standing in front of her so I was able to "calmly" explain the situation. He was so “helpful” he said he would come out of his meeting if I got the boys back in the car and drove to him. Great! thanks sweet!

After staring at our 7ft metal side gate and imagining climbing over it using the bins as steps and then breaking a leg as I landed on the other side leaving two toddlers to play on the road, I started putting Crash back into his car seat. Then our elderly neighbour, Jack pulled up. "Wonder if I could jump their fence?" I thought. He was up for the adventure so all three of us bundled up to their backyard and Jack got his ladder out. The boys played with or really just got licked by their dog, as I scrambled over a 6ft paling fence landing unceremoniously in a magnolia tree on the other side. No doubt my tight, low cut cargos were showing an enormous amount of tradie butt crack, not to mention over-exposure of my mini-cleavage. What can I say? the outfit was not designed for scaling backyard fences.

I picked myself up and unlocked the back door and went and collected my little Irish twins who'd found the whole situation quite fun. I looked on the bright side I had sustained no splinters or broken limbs for my birthday, but I had also sustained no presents or relaxation. Hmmmm. So instead of being glum I put my boys down for their afternoon naps and started scheming an equally ‘Happy’ Birthday for my husband in a months time. That cheered me up no end, but I need some help so any ideas on how to make his special day that little bit more extra-special, you know like he did for me. (Revenge is sweet!)

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WIN A POCKET HD VIDEO CAMERA WITH A DOUBLE PASS TO THE BONDI SHORT FILM FESTIVAL!

UPDATE: AND THE WINNER IS : LISA from bylisajay.com


Sorry if you missed out this time around, thanks to all that entered and don't forget to subscribe so you know when the next giveaway's happening. 

Mummy's Funky Friday has teamed up with the über-cool dudes at Lenovo to give MyIdeaLife readers the chance to not only get out of the house, but attend one of the coolest Sydney events of the year: The Bondi Short Film Festival. And if that is not incentive enough to get involved they have included a VADO HD Pocket Video Camera. Small and easy enough to carry with you so you never miss those crazed moments we all want to see on YouTube or Funniest Home Videos.

The event is near sold out giving some indication of the calibre of the 14 filmmakers that will be showcased in Bondi Pavilion on Saturday November 26th. So get commenting and liking to be in the running! 

For your chance to win just answer this question in the comments below: 

WHAT'S YOUR DREAM NIGHT OUT? and like the Lenovo and MyIdeaLife Facebook pages

Go out, have fun and Good Luck!

The stuff the lawyer wants you to read:
Competition closes on November 23rd at 5pm AEST and winner will be notified by email the same day. Competition open to Australian residents who are able to attend event in Sydney.

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DAMN YOU CORRECT! HUH?

You probably don’t need convincing to appreciate the perfection of the iPhone. It is a beautiful thing that people would quite happily have sewn in to their arms if they could, such is the attachment it evokes. But like everything it has it’s quirks, and autocorrect is probably it’s most infamous. 

The annoying word changes iPhone Autocorrect comes up with have made teenage girls tell their mothers they’re pregnant (pregnancy test instead of practice), straight guys announce they are Gay (out of closet instead of clinic) and my personal favourite, a first date crime due to lobster and fillet mignon (killing instead of kissing)!

So it is logical that Apple has decided to fix it, releasing software last week that will stop this embarrassing, annoying, life-changing tool, and bringing it more in line with the superior Android spellchecker. So once again the iPhone is perfect and you know what, I’m disappointed. Maybe I wouldn’t be if I was someone that told my partner I wanted to jump them but iPhone changed it to dump, but I’ve been lucky to be one that has just stood by and LMAO at some of the epic Autocorrect fails. And an Aussie hacker found a work around for those that really have been burned anyway. So now what are we going to do? Perfection is boring Apple. 

The software update, that was released on Thursday also helps with battery life on devices running the new iOS5 software and enhances Siri for the Australian accent. But I reckon putting up with these two issues is worth it if one day you get to tell your Dad you want his P¢nis (*Prius)! 

Will you miss the old Autocorrect like I will?

  

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YOU SCREAM, I SCREAM, WE ALL SCREAM...

The innocuous source of pure mayhem

I have two boys, now 2-and-a-half and 14 months, commonly known as Bang and Crash. By all accounts things are getting a little easier as Bang can now tell us off pre-tantrum so at least we know why he’s about to turn into a writhing hyena and Crash is walking about and therefore not living up to his namesake as much. (He also happens to tell us off but luckily incy wincy still works a treat on him). 
  
One way I’ve noticed to get them both going in tandem is to offer to buy them ice cream. Now you would think this would be a cause for great excitement and joy in their young minds. And yes there is some of that, but only if you purchase the ice cream in a certain way. Yesterday we did not follow the Toddler's guide to Toddlers rule on purchasing ice cream and we copped an earful as a result.


RULE No. 173: DOGS, CHIPS & SLIPPERY DIPS ARE FUN
We had just been to a park to eat Fish and Chips and watched doggies of all shapes and sizes chase balls into the water. Crash even tried to have a go and managed to nab a particularly wet Labrador’s ball. Luckily the dog didn’t mind as he was more interested in the chip buried deep in Crash’s little fist. To the dog’s dismay Crash ended up with both until I wrenched the dripping ball from his hand and apologetically returned it (always nice to mix some dog saliva with your meal).
  
To extricate the boys from the park my Husband’s standard manoeuvre is to bribe them with a smoothie. This night though he strayed from his usual and offered ice cream (mainly because he wanted gelato for himself!). Bang was so fast off a slide I may have muttered under my breath “Good one daddy” and off we went, smug in how well we mustered toddlers.


RULE No. 68: STATIONARY CARS ARE NOT FUN

It may have been over-confidence, or a lack of thought, but our grand plan of a fun afternoon quickly evaporated into duelling banshees. You see we didn’t take them in to the Ice Cream shop, I stayed with them in the car while my hubby went in. First mistake. They lasted for about 30secs before the whining started, and then some full-blown screaming ensued. I would have paid a digger driver to roll past at this point but instead I screamed “Stop screaming!” I know, I know, it makes things worse but I had silence from their shock for about another 30 seconds and I needed that silence. I was tired and disappointed that all the points we deserved for the chips and the doggies and the slippery dips suddenly didn’t count because they were in a stationary car for more than a minute.

RULE No. 235: WHITE ICE CREAM IS EVEN LESS FUN

Second mistake, hubby forgot to take his phone that I was calling to make sure he got Bang a pink ice cream. On the appearance of a white one, you’d think we had grabbed the child and broke both his arms. “I don’t want a white one, pink one, pink, No, not white one, Noooooooo” was just comprehensible as it came out all dramatic and high-pitched from a collapsed and bubbling face strewn with tears and snot.
  
I know what you’re thinking. And yes we probably should have shoved the white one into his hands and said something along the lines of “You know there are children in Africa who don’t even know what ice cream is, they’re lucky to eat dirt for lunch!” But instead I told my hubby off for not having his phone and upon assessing the mayhem he quickly turned to go and get a PINK one.

RULE No. 4: DO NOT EVER WASH MY HAIR
I can safely say we lived happily ever after (if by ‘ever after’ you mean the 15 minutes until the next meltdown), because once the pink one materialised and the car started moving the hysteria subsided. And besides it’s difficult to moan when you’re using your mouth to move ice cream off a cone on to clothes and car seats. But don’t worry we don’t always pander to their every whim, that night we got them both back by washing their hair. That is definitely a no-no in the Toddler guidebook and we knew it - AH HA HAAAAAA

©MyIdeaLife, 2011, All rights reserved

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MUMMY'S FUNKY FRIDAY: Street Art

Give me Streets around the world over a stuffy gallery any day!

Welcome to the second week of Mummy's Funky Friday, your weekly dose of my new favourite word, alt-worthy stuff that will revive your inner cool. Funnily enough the music of last week could be the soundtrack for this week. Enjoy!

I am not one of those types that is going to try and convince you that graffiti is cool. Most graffiti is bloody awful and it costs normal people lots of money to make their suburban home look less like the local meth lab.

But in cities around the world there has been a craze growing that actually enhances the urban environment – it's called Street Art and it's nothing short of inspiring. 

And until December 11 you can see some of the work of the most famous international street artists at Cockatoo Island in Sydney. Among the collections exhibited the Oi You! one is a must-see boasting the largest private collection of the enigmatic, stencil guru, Banksy. And this guy(see below), Ethos from Brazil, has peeled himself from the wall of a five-storey building in LA to come and paint live on Cockatoo Island. Now that’s sorta yeow^ and is just how he rolls (see how alt-worthy^ I’m becoming….don’t answer that). 

So when the kids are yelling at you this week to buy them a present or give them a treat, throw them on a ferry and go and see some industrial urban transformation. Their eyes will be wide not just with the mint^ cool art but with how hektik^ their rents* now are! 

For more info visit http://www.outpostproject.com.au 

Teenglish glossary:

*rents=parents
^hektik, mint, yeow and alt-worthy all sort of mean cool…I think

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OUR FIRST KISS

Rodin's "The Eternal Idol"
Sketched by love-obsessed 25 year old me.

I sketched this in Vienna when I was 25. I was sitting on the floor of a Museum, as you do when you're a backpacker. It felt like my whole life's dream was encapsulated in this beautiful Rodin sculpture. I had left my then-boyfriend to travel for six months (which turned in to three years) and so my heart was aching as I drank in the lust this depicted. I obviously wasn't that heartbroken though as only days later I ran off to Bruges with a very hunky American. What? I was confused and besides the boyfriend ended up being a completely deluded, selfish git masquerading as a snag, so thank goodness I didn't save myself for him.

In fact ever since my first kiss 10 years earlier, I'd been in love with love. It was at a summer party and I don’t even know how it happened, I was sitting on this guy’s lap and next thing you know we were snogging and with tongue! It was divine, and as I closed my eyes I'm sure I saw stars (that had nothing to do with the alcohol consumed of course).

I actually think that kiss more than any Hollywood movie was the reason it took me so long to find 'the one'. From that moment on I judged the potential of every relationship by the first kiss. This was so illogical, not that kissing is logical at the best of times, but most of my best kissing had been with the biggest bastards on earth, and really that was all they would good for. A good pash and then see you later really. But for some reason I forgot this as my knees turned to jelly and my imaginary world clouded out any sense of reality. 

Think I might give my hubby a snog when he gets home as feeling a little inspired, not sure it will be quite the same with toddlers attached to both legs, but I'll give it a go.

What was your first kiss like? 

Did it turn you into a pashing bandit like it did me?

©MyIdeaLife, 2011, All rights reserved

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MUMMY'S FUNKY FRIDAY : Pumped Up Kicks

My recent Friday Night Lights stories got me thinking about how life as a parent can be so boring that a loud street party you're not at and a bit of car bashing being done by a drunken lout to your own car is about as exciting as it gets. TRAGIC! And then this song came on the radio (I haven't yet given in to the grown up impulse to switch to talkback radio) and I found myself dancing hands in the hair, dance party style in the front seat of our car (don't worry I wasn't driving, god help us if I were).

Source: Fosterthepeople.com

This reminded me that I used to be an obsessed music chick that danced whenever she got the chance but especially in front of Chris Cornell in Rotterdam, ColdPlay in a muddy field in Byron Bay and Foo Fighters at Big Day Out to name a few. Although my true claim to fame was when a girlfriend and I cleared the dance floor in Nottingham when Run D.M.C's 'It's like that' came on. Today you are more likely to find me rocking out to Toot Toot Chugga Chugga Big Red Car (one day I might show you the video, 'lovingly' recorded by my hubby) and although I love The Wiggles for the smiles they bring to my children's faces, they have nothing on the strong guitar riffs and unshaven growls of the likes of Dave Grohl, which I had forgotten...until now.

So I bring you (and me) the first instalment of MUMMY'S FUNKY FRIDAY, your way out of being a boring parent who's only view to the outside world is somewhere between Larry & Kylie on The Morning Show and Tony or Alan Jones, depending on your political sway. And although all of these people make an amazing contribution to society in their own way, you don't want to find yourself quoting them during the rare times you get out of the house and talk to people taller than 4ft. Instead you can now say "Have you heard of that band 'Foster the people'?" and there you have it - instant COOL.

Pumped Up Kicks is their first single and it has made them a global hit. If you can ignore that the lyrics are about a dysfunctional youth with an absent father who's recently got his hand on a gun then this is the perfect Summer anthem. Jill Menze of Billboard describes why saying "[it] boasts a laid-back, lo-fi '60s vibe, a slick bassline and an undeniably catchy chorus" all which make it impossible not to at least tap your foot to, even with a toddler on board. In fact I challenge you not to start bopping up and down in a daggy Mum kinda way!

And so you can appear amazingly informed Foster the people was formed out of LA and was originally named Foster & the people after frontman Mark Foster, but this was continually misheard and the band gave up trying to correct it and changed the name. They played at Splendour in the Grass (that field I was talking about above if you didn't already know), in July, which I didn't attend because I was up at the same time rocking in a not-so-fun-way with my then baby. But now that I'm cool again maybe I can get to their rumoured appearance at Big Day Out 2012 (Stop laughing!)

Luckily the video above is just snippets from this young band's tour footage rather than teenagers outrunning gunmen, and although I've never been a rock star, well not in real life anyway, I have been that girl in the front row, wearing not very much and dancing like my life depended on it, all the while making eyes at the lead singer. This song is all types of nostalgic and this Mum is completely dreamy about it, I hope it has the same affect on you. 

HOW COOL ARE YOU NOW? (or how behind am I?)

©MyIdeaLife, 2011, All rights reserved

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Friday Night Lights - Part 2: Flashing

I'm sure my single, not-so-sober self of 2004
would have nothing to learn from this situation

The teenagers were gone and the only hum I could hear was the soft yet extremely annoying sound of my hubby's snoring, but that's why I have earplugs and once they were in I was happily stepping off my cliff to lala land. I had only just hit the ground, Wile E Coyote style, when my cartoon desert melted back into our bedroom, a space suddenly filled with the angry screams of a teenage boy. He wasn't very imaginative in his song to our street, it was essentially various forms of the word "F*CK". Loud ones, long ones and staccato ones with the word 'IT' sometimes applied.

My heart leapt into my throat, "this was my fault, if I hadn't paraded around outside like a deranged fool, then this wouldn't be happening" I thought and worked hard not to show, my hubby needed no more ammo as he stood at the window trying to catch a glimpse of the psycho pacing around outside.

'Is he out the front?' I scream whispered
Boom: 'Shut up...he's in front of next door's place'
Me: 'What's he doing?'
Boom: 'Shut.up' 
Me: 'It's not like he can hear me, the voices in his head are clearly draining all sense of reality' 
Boom: 'I'm trying to hear'
Me: 'Well he's not exactly whispering is he, I'm pretty sure the guy in seat 7D of the plane that just flew over asked his wife "who's that shouting 'Faaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrkkkkk'?' so what exactly are you trying to hear?'
Boom: 'Shhhhh'

At this point with curiosity that has killed many cats and a conscience desperate to be cleared I jumped up too and joined him at the blind.

Boom: 'Go back to bed' 
Me: 'No, I want to see what's going on'
Boom: 'You're opening the blind up too much he'll see'
Me: 'Sweet, the guy is having a conversation with an invisible purple martian that is probably trying to kill him, he's not going to see a 4cm gap in a blind 30m away'
Boom: 'Fine'

For the next thirty minutes we rode the wave created by our screaming friend that oscillated between being lulled into a false sense of 'we can go to sleep now he's passed out' and jumping back up to peek out the window when a renewed round of F-bombs were dropped. As I had already had a nice conversation with a police officer earlier in the evening and was now getting a little bored with the show, I was gagging to call the police.

'Should I call the police?'
2mins later
'Do you want me to call the police?
2mins later
'I don't mind calling the police, what do you think?'

Suddenly the game changed and our lunatic discovered an uncovered skip bin that obviously was the martian's spaceship as he started attacking it physically and giving it a strong piece of his crazed mind.

'I think I should call the police.' was met with around 5 seconds of silence before a much louder crashing sound occurred at which point my usually calm and quiet hubby started yelling 'Call the police! call the police! he's smashing the cars, he's just smashed Ben's car, there goes ours now, call them!'

I dialled 000 and it was then, and only then that he decided to run off. 30 minutes of loud mayhem and the second my fingers touch the phone he disappears. I couldn't believe it. The police arrived and Boom spoke to them briefly and then for about the fiftieth time that evening we crawled back into bed.

A few minutes went by and my cartoon life was returning when Bang decided that the new found silence was disturbing and started crying. Hubby took this one and returned again to sleep, by now it was 1.30am and I was well and truly over all this. But it wasn't the agitation that kept me from sleeping next, it was a knock at the door.

'What the...?'

We opened the door and the police had returned, they needed a full description as another police unit had found our noisy friend, his mind-free state obviously hard to miss. We obliged, of course, and as developments occurred loudly over radios on our balcony it was obvious we were in for the long haul. A full official statement was required, the teen was arrested and my Hubby had to identify evidence and describe everything he saw, all this under the curious eye of his wife and 2 year old, who of course had been woken by now.

At 2.30am we tried to go to bed again, but it seemed this particular Friday night was determined to keep at least one of us awake all night. So my hubby ended up in the spare bedroom for the rest of the night being kicked by a deep-sleeping 2 year old.

There is much to learn from this cautionary tale like:

• don't confront teenagers in your PJs (you'd get a much better reaction in the nude)
• when someone shines a laser in your bedroom pretend you are 17 again, at a dance party and about to pass out intoxicated
• don't introduce your 2 year old to a Policeman at 2am in the morning, he is likely never to sleep again, and my favourite;
• don't be mean to your wife because Karma is likely to be more of a bitch than she is! 

What did you learn?
(Please don't say "You're a nutbag" I am aware of this fact already! LOL)

© MyIdeaLife, 2011, All rights reserved.

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