Alissa's Baby Blessing

In the midst of selling our house and packing to move to Karratha, we had Alissa's baby blessing two weeks after she was born. It was the perfect time to do it because Clinton's parents were in Perth and my Dad wasn't travelling! Clinton gave Alissa a beautiful blessing and the part that stood out to me was that she'll be a "peacemaker in our home". Well, we could use one of those at times! haha!

We are so grateful that Darnae and Trent offered to have the lunch afterwards at their house and that Mum (Theone) made so much delicious food! Kerrin Robb said that the food was like eating at a restaurant. All of my family was there except Kate, Matt and Jack. Unfortunately they returned to Aberdeen just a week before, but at least they were around when Alissa was born and were able to meet her. Unfortunately the Mamouney's and Aunty weren't able to be there either. The Bakers, the Robbs and the Kimpton's came back to Trent and Darnae's house for lunch with us. It was a very nice afternoon...Alissa slept through most of it! Thanks Trent for taking these lovely photos.

Our family of five...

 

 

 

 

 

 

Saying Goodbye

It was a big decision for us to move to Karratha...Clint was keen to get some more hands on experience so we knew we would probably end up here eventually. When the opportunity arose we had to really think and pray about it. As we prayed about it, lots of little things began to fall into place. The Pilkington family just happened to visit our ward which enabled me to have a quick chat to Amy about living in Karratha. It was helpful to hear that they loved the lifestyle so much and that Karratha was such a friendly, livable place. Bryan also works for Woodside so he was able to talk to Clinton about work up there too. While trying to make the decision, a new boy joined Harrison's pre-primary class in term three and he just happened to come from Karratha! It turned out that his dad also worked for Woodside. I was able to get to know this boy's mum and get lots of valuable information about Karratha. It's amazing how Heavenly Father puts people in our path when we need them the most.

Once we made the decision to move, we put our house straight on the market. We were worried that it was getting too close to Christmas and that there wouldn't be many buyers around. We had 18 groups through on our first home open. Then three groups came back to look again a day later. We had two offers the next day, after some negotiation we got above our asking price and accepted the offer! Our house was under offer in less than a week. Another amazing blessing! They didn't need settlement until the beginning of February which was perfect for us too. Clinton also sold his car in a week...we were both sad to say goodbye to that car.

So many things fell into place for us and this increased our confidence in our decision to move to Karratha. Even so...it was hard to say goodbye to this house...we built it ourselves and lived there for 6 years. It was a lovely place to live and we had many happy memories there. We are happy that the new owners were so excited to be moving in!! I hope they enjoy living there as much as we did. Our real estate agent sent us these photos of the house as a little momento. I like them because we'd cleaned up the house ready to sell and it was clutter free!

Goodbye house...

Happy New Year

 

On the 1st of January 2013 Alissa Corinne Snow was born at 4.35pm weighing 3.100kg and 51cm long. On new years eve I felt very tired so we went to bed early, around 9.30pm. Then at 4am on new years day my waters broke. We called the hospital and were admitted at 6am, Harrison and Sienna woke up to Papa waiting on the couch! It was a long day of waiting for bub to come and my hardest labour by far. Alissa arrived two weeks early and was one of many new years babies born at Glengarry Hospital that day. My midwife Jo was wonderful, she stayed with me all day and even stayed back a bit late to make sure I was settled. I like this photo of Alissa because this is what she looked like as soon as she was born. She didn't cry at all after birth, her eyes were open like this and she quietly cuddled into me. We didn't hear Alissa cry until they weighed her and gave her an injection. Clinton and I couldn't have thought of a better way to bring in the new year! We love our precious little Alissa Corinne.   



 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Charlie Fletcher Grinceri

Charlie was born on the 27th of September, the day after Harrison's birthday. He is a beautiful little man and a very special addition to the Grinner family.

Smorgy Sen Strikes Again!

I left a packet of TimTam's on the couch last night....this morning I was on the computer and came out to find Sienna had helped herself. Obviously I supervise my children really well. Sienna thought it was fantastic.

We have nicknamed Sienna "Smorgy Sen" because that kid likes her food. She thinks the whole world is her smorgesboard and I guess it is really. I went on a picnic with some friends and Smorgy Sen helped herself to everyones food. She is very, very sneaky but way too cute to punish!

Halloween Party

Harry and his lollies from trick or treating

Super Bub!

Pen did her own makeup, so awesome! Sienna kept staring at her.

A friend from Canada threw a Halloween party at her house. Harrison didn't want to dress up and especially didn't want to wear "makeup". I convinced him that it wasn't makeup but face paint and then I did what any responsible parent would do and I bribed him to dress up with the promise of a toy. Worked like a charm! He dressed up as Dracula (luckily his Aunty Bindi had given us this costume a while back). Clinton also put up a fuss saying there was no way he'd dress up either (Snow boys!! haha!). Then I went to my Mum's house to borrow a wig and thought of the perfect costume for Clint. My Dad got some traditional clothing as a souvenir on a trip to the Middle East and then Mum had a fake beard left over from a recent roadshow. So that is why Clint looks like a terrorist! He got a lot of laughs.

Harry the Busker

Harrison came to me today and said, "today I'm playing a game called 'I am a busker' and you can play too Mum, you just need some money". He started playing the violin in the hallway and left his case in front of him to collect money. After the first song I threw in a few silver coins to which he responded, "you can only throw in gold coins in this game". So I told him I'd only throw in gold coins if he practised the hard pieces of music he was supposed to be working on this week. He worked really hard for his gold coins and collected a tidy sum after an hour or so. The only problem was by the time we got to his violin lesson that afternoon he'd had enough. His teacher said, "what's wrong with you today Harry?" he said, "my fingers are too sore from busking all morning". She just looked at me with a worried expression that said, "child labour?" Humph! More like "mummy exploitation".