Apr 9
The past 4 weeks have flown by. Easter has come and gone (almost) and Emily is slowly but surely slipping into a bit of a routine (touch wood). She is growing fast and slowly learning that night time is for sleeping, although Jayden decided to wake up last night at 3:30am and wanted to get dressed and have breakfast!
I weighed Emily last night and she is around 4.5kg (9.9lbs). Also, she was born around 51cm long and is now about 57cm.
In trying to organise all my photos, I forgot about the pictures we took on our phones. They are interesting as they are more of the spontaneous ones we took along the way.
On Friday the 9th (around 20 hours before Emily was born), Julianne had a scheduled clinic appointment. There was a bit of an issue with her regular heart beat so Julianne was sent up stairs to be monitored. At this stage, Julianne was 2-3cm dialated and as you can see there were a few tightnings happening…
That graph looked “perfect” as far as the midwife was concerned so we went home.
By the time dinner time came around we were pretty sure things were happening so we started preparing for the night ahead. I even had a nap between 9pm and 11:30. We took this photo around midnight.
Come 1am, it as time to head into the hospital… With next to no cars on the road, it only took 15 minutes to get to King Edward Hospital from Koondoola and we were sent straight back up to the assessment ward. We had to sit in an empty waiting room for around 45 minutes before being assessed… Here was the result there:
There was no question that Julianne was in labour now and we were moved into the labour ward. After around 1 and half hours later Emily was born. Very awake and alert from the very start…
Mar 17
Emily is already 1 week old! Everything is going well and we are coping ok. She is feeding well although quite frequently. Sleeping is also going well, although it’s interupted between all the feeding.
We have had quite a few visitors too which has been nice. :)
Here are the latest photos…
Mar 11
Emily Anne Ellen Bingham was born 3:49am, the 10th March 2012. She weighed 3.23kg (7.2 lbs ). She was born around 3 hours after arriving at the hospital, and Julianne and Emily are now home after 1 night stay. Mum and Dad are very proud, and Rebecca and Jayden are just as excited to have a baby sister…
Dec 7
I would have liked to have done this before now, but I didn’t.
Either way, here is a photo video from our time in Malaysia and the UK earlier this year… What an awesome trip!
Just last night (Dec 6th) Rebecca did her end of year dance competition with her dance school, Dance Force. She was in 3 acts plus the finale which included Lolly Pop (Jazz), Secret Agent (Acro) and Dancing with the Mouse (Tap).
Both Julianne and I were very proud and Rebecca had a great time and loads of fun, although very knackered by the end of it. Unfortunately there wasn’t a photographer for the concert (I did mention that I could do it but it wasn’t possible) and going by previous year, I suspect the DVD they produce will be fairly average. However, here are some of the photo’s of Rebecca dressed up in her costumes…
Click on the photo’s to zoom in…
Nov 25
Back in July, Rebecca enter the CSTD Dance competition that was being held in Midvale. While she didn’t get a place she did exceptionally well. Mum and Dad are very very proud.
Play the video below to watch her dance.
Oct 29
Well, I when I say lucky it doesn’t feel like it, but the result is certainly lucky.
I visited my brother at the cemetery today. It was a warm day so while there I left the doors open to the car to let breeze through. I went up there with my camera and laptop to spent some time jotting down notes about a wedding I’m going to be shooting in a couple of weeks. I was there for a couple of hours in total but after an hour I noticed a couple of kids (late teens) walk past the car. I looked at them, and they looked at me but then didn’t think anything of it.
I drove home and went to pack everything away I noticed my camera bag wasn’t in the car. I started second guessing myself wondering if I had even taken it. After searching everywhere it was pretty clear I had taken it, and it had been taken out of my car. The contents of the bag included:
Canon 30d DSLR
EF 50mm f1.4
EF 70-200mm f4
EFS 18-85mm f4.5-5.6
1.4x multiplier
Speedlite 580EX II
plus other accessories like memory cards, lens protectors, etc
It would cost about $3700 to replace it all and it had all been stolen.
I spent about an hour at home feeling very numb and after digging through my insurance policy and discovered I wouldn’t be covered had I claimed. I decided to head back to the cemetery and Julianne offered to come too. I’m not even sure why I was going back. I said to Julianne that I was 99.9% sure I hadn’t pulled it out of my car and it wouldn’t be there.
We got the there and sure enough it wasn’t there. I saw the foot prints of the guys that had walk past the car (it’s a very sandy cemetery) and started following them. They lead into the bush near by and just as I couldn’t see where they were heading, Rebecca saw the bag opened up in the foliage, about 20 – 30 meters away from the car. I couldn’t believe my eyes. Everything, the camera and lenses were still in their place and hadn’t been touched. Some of the paper work and other bits and pieces had been pulled out, but everything was there. I guess they were just after a bit of cash.
It took a couple of hours, and beers before I had stopped feeling so anxious about the whole thing but thankfully I have it all back.
Now back to the wedding photography planning…
Oct 29
Well, it’s almost over (we are flying back tomorrow morning, Thursday 26th May) and while it’s been a really good, full and fun trip it’s also been pretty exhausting. The exhaustion has probably come from squeezing in so much into the holiday as well as trying to manage a normal-ish routine with the kids. Would I do it again? Probably. It’s hard to image being on holiday and not trying to make the most of the time I have, even if that means making it tough on ourselves.
Speaking of the kids and routine, as much as we have tried to keep things normal, the kids have got away with blue murder and when we do get home, I think they are going to find it’s not going to be dissimilar to boot camp getting things back the way they were. Bed times are out to around 9pm, getting out of bed around 8am in the morning. Cartoons on the TV (or ipad or laptop) first thing in the morning. Lollies and all sorts of other rubbish food throughout the day. All in the name of keeping things a little easier to deal with day to day. I’m not sure how much work it is going to take to get the kids to realise that they only get away with these things on holiday. I’m confident they will try hard to keep all these things in place at home but they will be in for a rude shock. :)
The trip has basically been split into 3 sections each with their own itinerary. They are 1) First week in London 2) 850 mile road trip around the UK visiting friends and family 3) Final few days in London
1st week in London
After arriving at Heathrow at 5am we arrived on James’ doorstep at 6am. A record time to get out of the airport. Amazingly jetlag wasn’t much of an issue and we were off our favourite London market the Borough Markets. The day after was BBQ hosted at James’ house with Si and Goz. Pretty much the same event from 20 months ago.
The rest of the week consisted of lots of shopping on Oxford Street, mainly in preparation for the wedding, a bit of time in Hamley’s for the kids, also a day trip to the awesome Natural History Museum and what is a trip to London without a Thames River cruise from Westminster to Greenwich.
The 10 day road trip
We hired a car, loaded up the luggage and hit the road. Thank goodness for Google maps on the iPhone. With Julianne as the navigator, it made it a lot easier getting around than reading an A-Z. All up we did around 850 miles over 10 days. Although the kids weren’t angels for whole journey, they did pretty well being strapped in their car seats for at times around 4 hour journeys. Here is a map of each leg of our trip.
Birmingham and the wedding
Well, this weekend was quite the highlight. Without even mentioning the wedding itself, we were made extremely welcome by Goz’s family, not only being offered to use Aimee’s (Goz’s sister) house for the whole time we were in Birmingham (it made things sooo much easier and less stressful), but also being invited to Nikki’s parents house the day before the wedding for lunch and dinner as well as for lunch on the Sunday after the wedding. It was excellent chance to spend a little more time with Si and Goz while we were in The UK but it was also good to meet and get to know Si and Goz’s family and friends.
I’m not entirely sure how but Alison and Geoff (Goz’s parents) even found time take Rebecca and Jayden to the park for an hour or so before it started raining. They loved the kids and I know the feeling was mutual and you can just tell they are so ready to be grandparents (wink wink, nudge nudge). :)
Still got more to update but that will do for now…
Manchester
The Chill Factore
Joan and Roy
Mansfield
Feeding the lambs
Wales
Tricia
Accomodation
Walk
Steam Train
Carno Farm
Final few days in London
Alphabet with planning-inc
Science Museum
May 13
A touch of high street shopping
Well, the flight from KL to London was a bit of a contrast compared the one from Perth to KL. Of the 13 hours, Jayden slept for the first 6.5, woke for about 3 for a bit of grub and iPad time, then slept for the rest of the flight. That seemed to help a lot with jet lag because we all adjusted to UK time straighaway.
After arriving at Heathrow at 5am, we had a very quick and smooth run out of the airport, into a black cab and we arrived on James’ doorstep at 6am. A couple of things I would change for next time:
The next 7 days were just time for us to kick back and settle right back into living in London. First thing was a trip to our favourite London market, The Borough Markets. A market with an amazing array of fresh produce located on the south side of the Thames near London Bridge. Apart from a lot of tasting of meats, cheeses, jams and other goodies, we picked up some food for a BBQ we were having with Si and Goz on the Sunday.
hmm, those sausages look like they could do with a turn
As expected, an action no man can resist
Good food, good friends, average beer
The BBQ was really good. Seeing Si and Goz for the first time on our trip, talking about the wedding and the plans and just generally catching up with great mates. It turned out to be a really fun first weekend in London and built up the excitement for Julianne and I for the rest of our time in The UK.
The rest of the week consisted of lots of shopping on Oxford Street, mainly in preparation for the wedding, a bit of time in Hamley’s for the kids, also a day trip to the awesome London Natural History Museum and what is a trip to London without a Thames River cruise from Westminster to Greenwich.
The building was impressive enough let alone the contents
We also squeezed in a few dinners with friends including Helen and Paul one night and Ian on another. Before we knew it, Friday was upon us and we were busy packing up the suit cases again ready for our 10 day “road trip” from London to Birmingham to Manchester to Mansfield to Brecon (in Wales) and back to London. It’s no wonder we filled up the Peugeot 207 boot full of luggage.
It's hard to resist a river cruise on the Thames and listening to those same old jokes by the captain