Karen's Journey

Rachel and Santa 2007



Rachel and Santa 2006


I still can't get over the difference between them! Yes I know the obvious fact that she one year older but I just can't stop going back and forth between the two of them! Though this year, it wasn't as easy as handing her over... we had a huge screaming fit from her when I passed her to Santa so in the end I had to kneel by Santa (ain't no way I was gonna sit on his knee) and hold her hand to get that photo taken (and I cropped myself out)!

Can't believe that this time next week we will be in Christchurch!!! The time has flown by so quickly! We are so looking forward to catching up with Paula and Chris (who we are staying with) and then spending time with my brother and his kids (17 and 20) while we are there. I am also going to have a catch up with a work colleague who I talk to every day on the phone! Jules - I remembered yesterday that I never got back to your question re when I was coming down - well we fly in on Boxing Day and leave to come back home on the 2nd. Will email you my cellphone number and perhaps we can try to catch up too if you are going to be around and if you are keen that is! :)

We have had a full on week with last week Rachel and Steph being sick - yay I managed to avoid getting the bug! *phew* however this week we have gone to the other extreme (SHIT JUST HAD AN EARTHQUAKE) with Rachel having major constipation issues! Ended up at the After Hours with her last night as her stomach was rock hard and she was screaming every time she lay down and wouldn't let us touch her! So once again, she had an enema put up "there" but this time it did work so no manual work required this time! *phew* We were also advised to increase her dosage of lactulose as she was still on the infant dosage - though we had never been told to increase it whenever we got a repeat of it. So she has gone from 1ml twice a day to 5mls twice a day! Lets see what happens now...

Monday was great as our friends Paula and Chris (from Christchurch) and Paula's mum came up to Wellington for a 24hr visit as they had gotten $8 return fares on www.grabaseat.co.nz sometime ago. So we all went out for dinner along with our friend Lynaire (unfortunatley Kev was working) to a local carvery for a 3 course roast meal! It was a lovely night and we all had a great time and Rachel was very well behaved considering she ended up staying up approx 2 hrs later than normal...

Work has been chaotic over the last few weeks and there has been some yucky snapping etc going on around the team (myself included) - so I will be glad come midday tomorrow when we can go home and all have a break from each other for 2 weeks! 2 of the team are working the 3/4 January but the remaining 3 of us return on the 7th Jan. The 3 days in between are known as "Departmental" days which are great. We missed the group christmas do yesterday which was held at the Zoo however we had the Head Office BBQ today and that was fantastic. Some very talented people used the tunes of some popular carols and rewrote the words to fit around local DOC issues! :) We also got our company gift this year - and as it is the 20th anniversary of DOC being around we all got this really cool travel/gym bag! No goodies in the bag but compared to what we can usually get this is fantastic! :)

Anyway, best I get moving - still want to do an update on the parents forum that I belong to... and still need to finish off my christmas cards! Leaving it a bit late I know but will see how I go.