Alice (James Grade 3 class mate)

On the 12th January, 2012 late into the evening we received the twitter message that everyone was dreading, Alice had lost her battle with Leukemia.  This beautiful family had lost their 8 year old daughter and 3 siblings had lost their sister.  Today marked the six month anniversary and our school had everyone wear something pink or green to celebrate Alice's life and her favourite colours.

I took these photos back in September last year when Alice was home from hospital and her family and relatives (and trust me there are many of them) had put on a wonderful 8th birthday party for her with a fabulous table decorated with sweet treats and very girly colours.  I'm not sure who was responsible for the table set up and I can't even remember what it looked like now, but I do know that I remember it was wonderful and it all looked so lovely.

Alice was diagnosed with Leukemia on the 5th September, 2011 and passed away on the 12th January, 2012.  These photos were taken 2 weeks after she started treatment and after a very big day of birthday celebrations so by 4pm she was pretty exhausted.  I especially love the photo of her yawning as I think it's so cute.  I was really pleased I captured the photos of Alice talking while they were listening as they are just so natural and real life.  I loved that I was able to capture those memories for this lovely family.

Six months on, our life is the same and we have our family routines.  Six months on for this family and I'm sure they wish they could turn back time.  When my own brother was killed at 17, Cher's song "If I Could Turn Back Time" was the number one hit and it was getting a lot of air time. I used to love watching the video clip and sing to this song whenever it was on the radio.  After my brother died I couldn't bear to hear that song because I longed to "turn back time" and it just wasn't possible.  Hearing this song after my brother died those words had a very different meaning to me.

Right now I think to myself how on earth do Libby and Tim and the kids get through each day as I couldn't bear it if it happened to my family now.  Even having lost my only brother (I have 3 other sisters) I don't think it compares to losing your own child.  It always comes back to one thing, and that is, they didn't get a choice in the matter.  This has happened and nothing can change it.  One day you are living your normal life and the next day your world gets turned upside down in the most tragic way. 

My family and I felt that it was better to have my brother with us for 17 years than not at all so that we weren't going through the pain of losing him however, it doesn't make you feel any better because you want them here forever.  When I think about it, I feel lucky that Paul was here for 17 years so in some ways I feel guilty (probably not the right word, but more grateful) that I was able to spend twice as many years with him than Libby and Tim because Alice was only here for 8 years.

I have no idea why these things happen, and why we all can't live until we are old and grey.  I do know that for Tim, Libby and the kids 6 months ago would seem like yesterday.  They would long for their life before they got the diagnosis but no matter how hard you might wish for it, absolutely nothing in the world can change things.  This is life and there are certain things that are out of our hands that we have no control over.   We like to believe we are in charge of our lives and for the most part we really are, however we can't control everything and in these circumstances I truly wish we could.   My heart goes out to them not only today, but every day they are waking up to such unbearable pain.  Every time I attend a Grade 3 function when Libby would be there for Alice I would be there for James I think of her as she is not in attendance.  Losing a loved one is one of the most difficult things in the world no matter what age the person is.  A bad day, kids fighting, traffic, a messy house all seem insignificant when peoples lives are changed forever.

I am so glad I was able to provide some family memories for them as they are simply "priceless" to this family.  I'm also really pleased that I encouraged Libby to join in with a "photo a day" last year and she captured more "everyday life" photos of the kids just lying around watching TV.  The girls playing master chef and dishing up (oops... plating up) french toast.  One of the first things she said to me after they received the diagnosis was that she truly valued all those "everyday photos" of their family she had been taking the past 8 months.

There is another little story to Libby's Project 365 that I'm sure she won't mind me sharing and that is whenever she forgot to take a photo during the day (being a busy mother of 4 I'm surprised she had time for anything as I'm flat out with just 2 kids) however, she started out by taking a photo of one of the kids in bed asleep if she forgot to take a picture.  As it turned out, there might have been a few days where this busy mother of 4 forgot to take her daily picture until the kids were asleep.  It then became Libby and Tim's little joke that whenever they would see the daily photo and it was of one of the kids asleep they both would knew that it meant that Libby had forgotten to take the photo of the day.  All these little stories that get attached to Project 365 make up wonderful memories and family stories to be told.

For now Alice is in heaven with my brother Paul and I'm sure he is taking good care of her.  Also my very good friend and flatmate Lance whom I shared a house with many many years ago is in heaven too.  He passed away from Leukemia at 27 years of age some twelve weeks after he was diagnosed.  He realized his dream of becoming a cop the year earlier, so if there is any trouble to be sorted out in heaven Lance is the guy. He was a really funny happy guy and always made me smile so she is in good company.

The grieving process is hard, long and very painful and I'm very sad that this family has had to start that journey as my family did on the 25th November, 1989.   You go through shock, anger, tears, sadness and then back to the beginning and start that all over again. Every song you listened to on the radio during that period of time immediately takes you back there again.  If for some reason you catch yourself laughing, you feel guilty because you are sad and it seems disrespectful to laugh.  There are so many emotions that go with losing someone and working through them all takes time and lots and lots of it.  There is no magic formula, no quick fixes, just lots of chocolate and lots of tissues and lots of hugs from family and friends.  I have been honoured to take these precious memories of Alice for her family and since they were celebrating Alice's life at school today I wanted to share these photos today.  Libby, Tim, Emma, Ged and Mr Personality himself, William; you are in our thoughts and I know the place you are in. Sending big hugs to you all. Love Kathy, James and Sienna xxxx

Homework the fun way

I needed a fun way for Sienna to learn her sight words as she is struggling with them at the moment.  During the holidays we had a fine afternoon after about a week of heavy rain so we walked across the road to the easement and drew hopscotch with chalk with words instead of numbers.  Nanny wrote the words in pink that Sienna had to learn and whilst James didn't have any word to learn she put some words for him in blue all starting with "ph".  I must admit I have difficulty with spelling some of those words myself sometimes and really have to think about them before writing them.  The kids had to throw their little stone into the square and then had to hop on one foot five times and repeat the word five times.  When Sienna hopped onto the square instead of saying the wordwhich was written she hopped five times and said "one, one, one, one, one" to which Nanny replied....no you have to say the "word" five times not "one" five times.  In one of the photos Sienna is leaning back like she is scared or getting in trouble, but she's not, and you can seefrom her body language and the cheeky grin on her face that she is laughing inside...it's funny.

We only got to play hopscotch once because it kept raining the following days however it paid off for James because on Monday night he was reading his "Goosebumps" story to me and he came across the word "philosophy" and he knew the word instantly.  How great is that, that there was an opportunity to see the word in a book he was reading.  Here's the photos of homework done the fun and exciting way.

Focus for July

Inspired by Elise's "goals for the month" in 2012 I have come up with a set of my own to focus on in July.  As Elise points out it's not about "New Year's Resolutions" because what might be of value at the beginning of the year may change throughout the year.  So to do a simple list of achievable things to "focus" on keeps it out there in front of you. I took a photo of myself in the mirror like Elise and typed up my goals for July. Family and a healthy lifestyle are the main focus this month.

If you are having trouble reading the fine print double click on the picture or see the list below:-

to eat healthy

to start walking 2 times per week

to print July photos for Project Life

to read bedtime stories to kids Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday

to put 5 things on ebay to sell

to complete 1 craft project

to take at least 5 photos of me with the kids

to spend time with the kids helping them with their jigsaw puzzles

Not a huge lot of pressure (maybe on the healthy eating front as the chocolate has slipped in daily) but the rest of the things is about family and some creative time for me.  I have a lot of projects "pinned" on Pinterest and have bought a few supplies but haven't got stuck into them yet.

Getting 5 photos with the kids and I could prove easy or difficult depending upon the mood of the kids.  Still it's a challenge and getting more photos with the kids is really really important.  I actually gave my girlfriend the task of taking 10 family photos with her in them while they were away on holidays.  If you focus, you will achieve.  Most mum's end up out of the photo because they know their camera and they just take the shot rather than pass it over to a stranger to take a photo because we've all been there and done that when you do hand the camera over and you get a blurred shot or one where you are a tiny part of the photo however it's a must do to get in your family memories.  I originally put down 1 family photo and then I thought if I get 5 surely I may get one I really like.  It's a challenge but one that I'm going to tackle.

I'm going to do my goals one at the beginning of each month sort of like a "to do list".  If it's written down you are more likely to focus on it and again after the month is gone you can see what you achieved rather than life just going on day by day.  I've already got a few things in mind for the month of August.....it's a simple idea so join in with me if you have 10 mins to think about it and of course get a photo of yourself.

More pictures from Rainbow Bay

The kids loved getting out on the beach and exploring and James and I played noughts and crosses and Sienna jumped in puddles....getting outside is so good for them and we just love being at Rainbow Bay as it's such a kid friendly beach.  I put the camera down on a towel and lay on the towel to set up a shot of the three of us on the beach.  Given the sand was so wet I actually got wet even laying on the towel.  We took a shot on self timer and when we ran towards the camera and James jumped over the camera with sand being flicked up a bit I decided that was probably not a good idea.

Rainbow Bay

We were lucky enough to spend a night down at Rainbow Bay with our good friend Donna and on Thursday afternoon we went for a late walk on the beach.  While the kids look as if they are on the beach in summer I was rugged up with long pants and jumper and I was still very cold even though we had a sunny afternoon.  I noticed the waves were coming onto the shore and as they subsided there was a thin later of glassy water still left on the sand which created the most amazing reflections.  I got the kids to run towards me on the beach and they did it over and over again laughing and enjoying themselves.  Take a look at these wonderful photos.

In the Garden

This week we have had a few days of sun and we got out into the garden.  Nanny has been up from Melbourne (must have brought that cold weather and rain with her) as the first week she was here it was pouring with rain and freezing cold.  This week the sun has been out but our mornings are 5 degrees which is freezing for Brisbane.  Back to the gardening...... here are a few pictures of the kids gardening with Nanny.  We planted a dwarf mandarin tree and a dwarf lemon tree in big black tubs and lots of other veggies which I will post more photos tomorrow.

Instagram Grid framed

The Instagram grid is now framed and hung in the hallway.  Every time I walk out of my bedroom I see it and I love it.  It looks great framed in the square Ikea frame (11.5x11.5 inch square inside the mat).  It was pretty easy to do and didn't take that long for a nice way to get the Instagram pics off my phone.