Easter Adventures

Every year at Easter our church all go off to Mapleton for the annual church camp. Last year we all went and managed to have a good time even though Max chose that weekend to push out 3 teeth and was more than a little grumpy because of it.

Unfortunately this year was not any better. We arrived at camp on the Thursday evening and had a good car trip since Max slept for most of it. When we arrived, however, he decided that he had enough sleep and didn't need any more. I stayed in our room with him and every 10 minutes, had to go over to his portacot, lie him down and tell him to go to sleep, while attempting to do the same myself. After at least an hour of this, Cam came back to the room to find me attempting to put Max to sleep in the bed beside me, and rescued both of us by taking Max for a midnight walk in the pram to try and soothe him to sleep. This attempt also failed, since Max was still wide awake and would every now and again say 'moon!' or 'stars!' or 'trees!' or something. Cam gave up on the pram and tried to tire Max out by hanging out with some of the other men who were still awake and chatting, but once again Max foiled these plans by enjoying every minute of it and high-fiving everyone around. At about 1.30am Cam decided that was enough and came back to the room to try and put Max down again, which he eventually managed by 2am by lots of patting on the back.

Friday was a fun day at camp, despite our lack of sleep. In the afternoon we had lots of fun sports activities out on the very wet field, where Max decided to show off his forward-rolling skills and got so very muddy in the process. While Cam was showering him he noticed a bad rash that Max had been developing for the last few days. I originally thought it was just nappy rash, so put some cream on it and waited for it to go away. It had gradually been growing worse and spreading to other areas, so we thought we should go and get it checked out. So Friday afternoon we all drove down to Nambour hospital, only to find that Max actually had 'school sores', which is a type of staff infection that often goes around in schools or daycare centres, and which is highly infectious to children. We didn't want to risk him infecting the other small children on camp, and so decided to pull the plug on camp and head to Bli Bli to Nanny and Poppy's place instead.

It was probably just as well that we didn't stay, since Cam caught a tummy bug that apparently a few other people on camp also came down with, and was stuck in bed for much of Easter.

But it turned out ok, since Max loves visiting Nanny and Poppy and had a great time. He loved the chance to eat lots of 'chockit' as well! Bronwyn and Lance even came down from Hervey Bay to visit, and Max loved playing with his uncle Lance.

Max's First Sleepover

Last Saturday was the wedding of Shona and Aaron, two good friends of Cam and I (congratulations guys!). And although we took Max along with us to the ceremony at the church, we knew he wouldn't handle being kept up so late and expected to stay still and quiet at the reception while his Daddy was busy being the MC, so we had to try and think of who we could ask to babysit for us.

All of our relatives who live in Brisbane are over on the north/west/east sides of town and it's a major effort for them to come over to our house to stay here and put Max to bed, so we thought a better plan would be to drop him off at the twins' house to sleep over with them. It was on the way over that Max surprised us by saying 'cousins!' when we told him that we were going to visit Gabbie and Elke.

By all accounts the three of them enjoyed the visit a lot, especially Max. He wasn't at all upset about Mummy and Daddy leaving him at their house since he was having too much fun riding their bikes and playing with their toys. Shortly after we left they piled all three kids into the car and went to the park, which was another huge hit. Sounds like even the car ride was fun since they were all giggling away in the backseat.

When they got home it was time for dinner and a bath, which was yet another fun experience since usually Max has to bathe alone, and he definitely had more fun being able to share it.

After bathtime the three of them had fun building some block towers, and had even more fun sending them crashing down. Max and Elke thought this was a great idea so they also decided to crash on the floor!

Another great way to have fun with your cousins is to race them around the room. Apparently the three of them just kept running laps from the living area into the kitchen and back again. This was fine except when they decided to do it with a bucket over their heads so they couldn't see where they were going!

After so much fun it was finally time for bed, but not before Max gave Elke a goodnight kiss.

(That's right mate, hold them down so they can't get away!)

After a nice drink of milo, all three were happy to go to sleep and didn't make a peep until morning. Cam and I also slept over at the Mutzelburg house, so we were there to get Max out of bed in the morning (much too early!) and head back over to our side of town in time for church.

Many thanks to the Mutzelburgs for giving Max such a good time so that Cam and I could enjoy the wedding, and congratulations to Aaron and Shona!

How Cool Are You?

Max is generally going through a very cool phase at the moment. He is at that precious age where he just does stuff that makes you laugh or go wow I didn't know he could do that.


Here are some cool things he does from time to time:
Max likes to race Jo up and down the drive way and then he gets to hit the metal garage door to prove he has finished. The whole time he is running he giggles and says go go go...

Yesterday in the car on the way to see his cousins we told Max that we were going to see Gabi and Elke he replied with a joyful "Cousins"!. We had no idea he could say cousins let alone know who they are.

He has started to walk around the house backwards and then when he hits something slides to the ground with lots of chuckling.

He has started imaginary play so he feeds his toys or yesterday he told us Leo had done a poo. Unfortunately when you ask Max if he has done a poo which he clearly has from the smell and his strained facial expressions give us a joyful "Noooooo".

He loves to spin around on the spot and then fall down.

At the fruit and veg shop last week he gave the lady his compulsory hi-five and then pointed to his hand repeatedly saying "dicker, dicker, dicker" I then said no mate they only give you stickers at Woolworths. I am glad we get given spares from Woolies which we keep in the car for such occasions.

While enjoying our family pastime of reading junkmail Max has ability to point out every time a wiggles dvd is featured. He can now say all of there names. Murray is his favourite we think because he likes to play air guitar.

Somehow he knows what chocolates are when he saw ferrero rochers in the coles catalogue he said "yum, chocolate". Jo denies sneaking him chocolate when I am not around.

He does lots of other quite cute thing which I shall not bore you all with now. But we really love Max and the adventures he shares with us.