Rumours of my alien abduction have been greatly exaggerated.

 I went willingly.

But the anal probe was an optional extra. ;)

I moved my infinitemonkey.co.nz domain name off this blog and onto my own hosting space the other week, but somewhere upon the lines, my attempt to put a different domain name in its place failed. For a few days there, this blog drifted helplessly through cyberspace, closer and closer to the deep dark black hole of Total Oblivion until... Well, until I tried setting up a different sub-domain name, and now I'm back. I'm back, and the rumours about table dancing on board that alien spaceship were true. They were all true. And I regret nothing. (Although I'm not sure how I'm going to explain the green-skinned lizard tongued baby to the Lad.)

The problem is, I'm not sure that this rearrangement of URLS (I'm now located at http://agdf.infinitemonkey.co.nz) has broken my site for either those that follow it, or the kiwiwmummyblog directory it's linked at, so if you (you who? Anyone will do!) happen to be reading this, whoever you are, and you've come across this ramble via Kiwi Mummy Blogs or your RSS feed or whatever... Can you please please pretty please no I'm not begging of course not but maybe I am... Leave a comment?

A simple "hello" or "shut up you stupid plonker" will do! But better yet, because sharing is caring and all... Maybe you could comment by telling me something? Something about yourself? Yes, that's a good idea!

Tell me one thing about yourself that no one else in cyberspace knows.

Because in space, nobody can hear you scream.

Oh, and if you can tell me where that quote came from, I'll give you a cookie! (A special triple-choc candy coated internet cookie - yum!)

I think... I think my blog is moving...

I have not had much time to blog these days. In fact, I have barely blogged since January when I began creating graphics in exchange for the cash that funds our additional groceries (you know, the additional groceries we need by the weekend, after we've already spent our budget on the week's first wave of groceries, followed closely by 'money the teen needs for stuff like the school bus' and 'petrol to raise the gauge to empty').

And it sucks. It sucks because there is many a time when I want to blog, but I also need to finish a graphic job I've been commissioned to do. So when I weigh up financial gain against prosical soul purging (prosical? I made up that word. I couldn't think of the right word.) ... well... financial gain tends to win time and time again.

By the way - and this is completely off topic from my original topic - but no one even tried to guess what the fecal-looking matter was that was photographed upon a piece of toast in my last post. I am so so sad about that. That photo was my ultimate April Fools prank (April Fools day is 365 days a year in our household).  And I thought an open-ended question upon the lines of "guess what the poo-looking stuff on my toast is!" would generate feedback of some kind... :P

I did wonder if I'd offended people with my take on, eh, photographic art. But then I realised, Silly Callie. The scant few who read this blog never even saw the photo - they stopped reading when the opening paragraph suggested chilli sausage and labour would not make for a very ladylike combination!

Tree gum.

It was knobbly brown tree gum photographed on top of that piece of toast. We discovered it when geo-caching with friends at a nearby reserve. The Lily Bug ran towards me screaming "hold this poo mum!" and I nearly died. After finally being convinced it was tree gum, I collected up as much as I could find, to use in pranks on the family members. I'm incredibly mature like that.

 This photo contains no fecal matter at all. Though with a stormwater pipe running directly into Narrow Neck beach, I cannot offer a guarantee.

Anyway, back to the original point of this long-winded post...

While in the process of setting up my Infinite Monkey Design website, I've realised that rather than register yet another domain name (I have three already. Greedy pig I am.) it would make more sense to shift infinitemonkey.co.nz off blogger.com and on to my own webhost, which will revert this blog back to being infinitemonkeynz.blogspot.com. Unless I can redirect the subdomain blog.infinitemonkey.co.nz to my blogspot url.

Whichever option I go with in the next few days, I'm not sure if this blog's rss feed will become broken once the URLs change. So the gist of this ramble is, if you never have an update from me ever again, my switching about has likely disabled my rss feed, in which case please go directly to infinitemonkeynz.blogspot.com (or blog.infinitemonkey.co.nz).

Because... Seriously... Oh invisible and most likely non-existent readers... You don't want to miss out on my next blog post that's all written up and ready to post. 

It's all about perenial tears.

I've never had one, just for the record. But my next blog post is going to be all about them and you don't want to miss something like that, right?


RIGHT???!!!??

Things you probably don't want to know about me #37

What I'm about to tell you should not be revealed to anyone.

 I mean it.

I shouldn't be telling you this.

Why?

It's not highly classified government information. I'm not whistle-blowing on a large organisation. It's not a deep dark childhood secret that only a trained professional should ever have to deal with.

It's just pretty distasteful really.

In just a couple of days, Guy Smiley will celebrate his 2nd birthday. And I've been reminiscing on the events that led up to the birthing of my 10lb monster (sweet, lovely, loving monster that he is). Events I wish to share. Events that are perhaps, best kept between me and those poor hapless souls who were present in the room at his birth.

You see, I made the mistake of eating home made pizza with large quantities of chilli sausage & cheese the night before labour.

I don't know what drove me to it, especially when I knew the bun in my oven was well overdue. And especially after having endured a few weeks of excruciating 3rd trimester constipation. So as my own personal brand of Murphy's Law would have it, I woke the next morning at about 6am with bowl cramps that surpassed the labour pain I also found myself experiencing. Yup. There was no way I'd be having a water birth now.

I know. Whether or not you know me in person, this is already more than you've ever wanted to know about me. But wait, there's more...

So, a couple of weeks later when I had the courage to ask (and because I have a strange poo curiosity at times), I asked my midwife how common it was to poop oneself during childbirth.

"Every time." She told me. Every time?

"Yes. But usually the mummies have no idea, and even the dads don't notice - I'm very good at cleaning up discreetly."

I should've left it at that. Much as you should've left this post after my opening sentence. But like a rubber-necking passing a road accident, I had to know.   "So... Did...?"

"Absolutely."

Oh. I was so hoping she was going to lie to me.

But being as frank as my wonderful midwife was, she felt compelled to elaborate. "But don't worry, I just kept layering the paper towels over top. Again and again and again...."

Oh. Dear. Gods. No.

Which is probably the same thing you're thinking, as you wonder why I'm sharing this.

So I'll leave you now, with that to mull over. And I'll also leave you with this photo I took the other day. 10 points if you can tell me WHAT ON EARTH is on that piece of toast?

Seriously. I'll give you 10 points if you guess correctly. Because I'm generous like that. I'll also throw in a free piece of toast.



dɐs ǝǝɹʇ s,ʇI :ɹǝʍsuɐ ǝɥʇ

All this talk of food is making me hungry

The folk at Be Natural always seem to know when I've skipped the cereal aisle during a supermarket derby dash with the kids. They recently sent out an invitation to partake in another product review and, knowing how super yum their breakfast cereals are, I was more than happy to put my hand up and say "For the sweet sweet love of all things good in this world, pick meeeeee!"

This time the flavour was a new one due to launch this month (or has launched already? I suspect I should have written this review a good fortnight ago...) Manuka Honey & Spice Clusters with flakes.

The lil blurb on the back of the box told me the spice blend was cassia, nutmeg, cloves, white pepper, cinnamon & cardamom. White pepper eh? Interesting...

After lovingly stroking the cereal box for a while, much to the growing concern of my family, I ripped in and poured us each a bowl. Who cares if it was 4pm? Cereal is a 24/7 food in our house (which is why it always runs out so fast).

The spicy aroma was intriguing. Cloves. Hmm. Admittedly, I wasn't sure about this at first. Of course, I was sure I'd like it, I just figured the kids wouldn't, nor would the lad, and thus it would fall entirely upon my shoulders to finish the box off. ;)  And then I got about halfway through my bowl and I realised the kids were already draining the last of theirs. The Lily Bug had the bowl up to her mouth, head flipped back, slurping the last drops of spicy milk before scooping out the last few loose linseeds. So much for hogging it all to myself.

The thing I like about the packaging by the way - asides from its texture - is that it looks really nice sitting on my pantry shelf. I don't mean to sound like some kind of superficial person who determines a product's worth by the quality of the packaging, but the box is really really nice. Everything upon it from the graphic design to the product descriptions is just really appealing. Good grief, listen to me, I'm whipped.

Oh, and about that taste. Delicious spicy clusters with even-more-delicious Manuka honey and perfect-crunch wholegrain flakes that no other flake (apart from the Cadbury chocolate kind) can ever live up to? It's like an out of body experience.

For crying out loud, I really really am whipped, aren't I?

Finding My Wonderwoman Alter-Ego

I doodled a series of stick figure pictures the other night, when I was waiting for a turn on the computer. I had been wondering how I'd ever get time to finish the various graphic & website projects I've simultaneously begun, in the variable time between getting fractious children to bed, and one of them waking up again (thus causing me to fall asleep along side him/her, for the rest of the night.)

This one's dedicated to any parent who's ever found it difficult to have quality time for themselves:

Now it's time to go. As I sit here wasting time on the computer, I'm missing out on serious quality time with the kids, quality time with the dishes waiting in the sink (still), the vacuuming, the large pile of 'too much stuff' to sort through in the bedrooms, the pantry that needs cleaning out (don't get me started on the fridge), the sprawling train tracks waiting to be rebuilt across the lounge floor (after the vacuuming), the batch of playdough waiting to be made, the overgrown lawn....

I'd like to have a Wonder Woman alter-ego to deal with the majority of this (or a paid cleaner, or a Really Helpful Teen as opposed to Really Apathetic), but who am I kidding? This is all just Normal Every Day Woman stuff. Suck it up Callie!

Mirror Mirror on the wall....

Avoiding the mirror is why it's taken several weeks to realise I once again have Trump hair. A clear sign that I should probably make more of an effort. (Or 'an effort'. In general. Truth be told.)

My weekly make up routine is to coat my eyes in black eyeliner at some point throughout the weekend, and spend the rest of the week pushing that same application back up under my eyes until it finally wears itself off. A 'mud masque' is what the Lily Bug gives me when she's been outside jumping in puddles and has squeezed my face with her hands as a way of saying 'shuush mum, don't tell me it's time to come inside yet'.

In all honestly, I barely even remember to look in the mirror before I leave the house.  Most days, I can actually have a shower and brush my teeth without flicking a single sidelong glance at the looking glass. I probably walk around with toothpaste at the corner of my mouth far more often than I'd ever like to know. Which is why ignorance is bliss.

So when a skin care product was sent out for me to review, I was slightly bemused at the notion that I now had a reason to push my face up to the mirror (you'd think a little bit of pride in ones appearance would be a motivating factor in the first place eh?)

Here I am, prior to Olay. Serious.

The product? Olay Total Effects 7-in-one Day Cream with SPF15. The back description of the packaging promised to fight the following:
1. Fine lines and wrinkles.
2. Uneven tone.
3. Age spots.
4. Uneven texture.
5. Dryness.
6. Dullness.
7. Pores

Wow. Did this product have its work cut out for it with my lined, tired, dull, dry, uneven and open pored skin!

As you can probably determine by my opening sentence alone, I'm not a skin care routine kind of person. That whole process of cleansing, toning, moisturising... even applying sunblock. Way too much effort for me. Partly because I'm deeply cynical of beauty product pick up lines, and partly because I've been existing on a combination of 4 hours sleep per night, a bucket of caffine per day and sheer force of will for so long now, I think anything that promises to fight my body's age signs is facing a losing battle.

But, I gave this product a shot. And okay... Maybe I even hid it greedily from the rest of the family, and secretly reveled in having something to put on my skin other than coffee dribbles and toothpaste.

First thing I noticed about Olay Total Effects is that it was nice to apply. It felt nice and light on my skin, didn't leave a grease slick in its wake, and absorbed quick enough for me to apply make up shortly afterwards (yes, I busted out the all-but-forgotten Shisedo Moisture Mist for the occasion. Being that I was finally at the mirror and staring bleakly at my tired tired face, I realised I needed it.)

There's another reason why I usually make no effort to wear moisturiser. In times past, I've had issues finding something that my skin doesn't react to, and that doesn't make my make up slide off my face and pool at my feet.

My lil' bottle of Olay Total Effects promised to be formulated for sensitive skin, but I'd tried 'sensitive skin' moisturiser before, and ended up with nasty itchy under-the-skin bumps all over my face and neck within a fortnight. With Olay, I was pleasantly surprised to find my skin didn't react negatively at all. Not a bump. Not an itch. Not after a week, not after three. And, my make up stayed in place over top of it. Bonus.

I was also really pleased to be wearing something with SPF protection. I HATE putting gross and greasy sunblock on my face, but my inner-goth tends to steer clear of the sun anyway so I tell myself it doesn't matter. Except for those days where I've spent 3 hours in the full sun while at the beach with the kids. Stupid inner-goth for forgetting the children LIKE to go out into sunlight with their mother. Thanks to Olay, I was able to spend an afternoon at Western Springs Park with the munchkins, and not wind up with a burnt nose. Awesome sauce.

But wait, what about those 7 Signs of Aging? Unfortunately I have to tell you I didn't have visitors stop by and jump back in shock while declaring "Callie! You remind me of that Star Trek episode where the people grow younger as they age!" But, that could be because there were no visitors...  But although my age lines are still present, I do think it helped with the dullness somewhat. I'm prone to skin breakouts once a month, but during this trial, I didn't suffer that problem.

I'm still sitting on the fence as to how effective Olay Total Effects was at fighting those seven signs of aging, but I have to admit that after a fortnight or so of applying it every day, I started feeling good about my skin. Maybe it was the power of suggestion, maybe it was my body simply feeling grateful for getting a bit of TLC. We may never know...

But, I've given you a 'before' picture, now I'll leave you with an 'after' shot. Let you decide just how effective this product was....

After Olay. Rrrooowl!

Never. Let. Go.

Dear Guy Smiley,

One part of me can't wait until you're of an age to make conversation - right now you love to talk about "Car! Car! That car! Red car! Yellow car! Look car!" but I reckon once you start slinging sentences together, you're going to be a right Well of Infinite Wisdom.

Mainly on the subject of cars I guess.


But the other part of me just isn't ready for you to grow past this age yet, because right now you're my little buddy who still reaches out a cherub hand for help down the steps, and I don't want to ever have to let you go.

Rainbow Face & Poop Hands

Make up artistry has recently become a field of interest the Lily Bug has shown some proficiency in. Since rediscovering the make up kit her big sister gave her for Christmas (it was previously tucked out of her reach, but you know how it goes when little girls have big chairs and long arms...) she has been applying make up to any thing she can pin down.

Her little brother is one of her favourite candidates for her experiments in duo-tone full-facial eyeshadow application. When she weilds the make up wand like a small baton and calls his name, Guy Smiley comes running - all big grins and dimples, crying "yay! yay! yay!" over to his place beside the mirror, as fast as his chubby legs can pedal him.

"Rainbow Face!" The Lily Bug declares his new name to be. And he loves his sparkly facial artist palette. Matches the rainbow hands he was sporting earlier in the day.

The Lily Bug loves to mix her colours until she's left with poopy brown. First she mixes the poop, and then she paints. And usually it's herself that she paints. In poop colours.

And then of course it's Daddy's turn.

The Lily Bug is very focused as she applies each brush stroke to her human canvas. And the result? A household of  zombie clowns! (Minus the Teen, who refused to take part and scowled behind a long fringe when Yours Truly tried to take a photo of her for posterity's sake. *sigh*)

Anyway, that was last week. This is the finish up of a post I began days ago and never managed to come back to.

In the past week we've gone on amazing adventures through enchanted forests, wild rugged shorelines, and lakes of boiling lava. (Or maybe, more truthfully, lakes teeming with eels and ducks and stuff.) I'll maybe do a photo recap later. Posterity and all...

I've also been busy building a couple of websites and creating graphics for people...In doing this, I've learnt I don't quite have the stamina to trudge through source code deep into the wee hours and then still function as a parent the next day, after all.

I don't know how work-from-home mums find the time to do it. Really, I don't. :/

I creep away to load up Photoshop while the kids are otherwise completely immersed in an activity, and suddenly they're jumping all over my knee. Plagued by mummy-guilt, I step away from the computer to play with them, and they don't need me any more. Can't win!


Stay tuned Smurflings, as coming up soon is my second-to-last product review. Shall it be the Pantene? Or the Olay? :)

(I know I know, you're waiting with bated breath...)

Edited to add: I came across this cute site earlier today. Love the concept - check it out!

 littlesketchers.com

'

The Sun Did Not Shine, It Was Too Wet To Play...

 Hey, why do I get the feeling I've used that line as a title before? Oops. Well moving along...

Even by my own night-owlish standards, being awake at 2.20am is quite possibly one of the most stupidist ideas I've had in a while.

Well, it's not like I planned it. It just so happened that I've found a lot of entrepreneurial inspiration today, and you know... one coffee led to another...

Today (well, yesterday now, if you want to get technical. But let's not.) I made a somewhat random decision to make a facebook page to promote the dabbling I've done in Photoshop over the past several years, in order to hopefully propagate some kind of financial gain. Eventually.

It began when I created a quick banner for my FB profile page (I'm so loving the new Timeline layout for allowing me to apply a small scrap of individuality to my profile page!) One or two people inquired about the banner, and before I knew it I was designing a business logo for the ever-so-clever Claire from FinndieLoo. Claire's enthusiasm for her home-based business was infectious, and soon I had created my own Infinite Monkey Design. Thanks to Claire's pluggage, I've already had a couple of inquiries regarding business logos and site design!

So, that is my great excitement for the year to date!

Meanwhile... What did the children do while their mother was tapping away on the keyboard and pottering about in Photoshop for a good part of the day?

First of all, it was raining outside so we put up some umbrellas.

And then, we played with trains.

We got hungry. So we sacrificed the freshly cooked batch of playdough to the Gods of Magical But Inedible Food. (Lawn clippings are also an essential to this concoction.)

I'm still not entirely sure if I'll ever get all the floury goop out of the carpet...

Then it was time to set tents and tunnels up in the middle of the lounge. It was mum's theory that the children would amuse themselves with these tents and tunnels long enough for her to finish doing stuff on the computer. (Pfft. By the time mum finished snapping photos, they were ready to use mum as a jungle gym. While she tried to finish doing stuff on the computer.)

Cooking time again. Green pikelets with nutella. Because we're healthy like that. (And that probably explains why everyone in this house is just a little on the chubby side - except the Teen, who is a coathanger.)

It was still raining. Why? Because it's summer. And apparently in summer, it rains ALL. THE. TIME. (And according to the weather people, we're meant to be stuck with this gloriously dismal weather until March?!?!)

After a day of being cooped up inside the house doing nothing, it was time to play outside. This is what the Lily Bug decided, despite the rain. In fact, she put on her raincoat poncho thingie and stood underneath the dribbly waterfall that flows from the blocked gutter outside the kitchen window.

And that was our day.

Why are you interested in reading any of this? I'm sure you're not. I'm sure that if you have read this far, you're probably trying to figure out how to reclaim the minute or so that I've just stolen from you.

But I'm sitting here at 2.43am writing this all out anyway, because I drank just enough coffee to keep me awake long enough to look at Content Management Systems, but too much coffee to be able to concentrate on anything other than the inane ramblings of the chattering monkeys inside my head. Thus, I am no fat use to anyone.

But I am going to look further into Joomla  tomorrow-ish.

Goodnight!

Come Out And Play Sunshine. We Have Just Juice...

I have promised the kids that summer is going to kick in soon. I've promised blue skies that reach into eternity. Fluffy white clouds in the shapes of dinosaurs. Orange sunsets that stretch across the horizon. I've sent them to bed each night with the reassurance of stinking hot afternoons, ice creams that melt down their arms, waterslides on the front lawn, picnics at the beach...

This perfect utopian summer of endless azure forms the basis to my happiest childhood memories. The kind of memories I hope my own children will look back upon some day.

So far, the sun has been a little slow in arriving; grey is the new blue it seems. The Lily Bug asks each morning, "is it summer yet mum?" And as much as I nodd and smile and claim that it is indeed summer, she doesn't quite believe me.

When a courier van arrived shortly before Christmas, bearing three cartons of Just Juice to review, I felt a little as if Santa had just swung by bearing the gift of the Great Kiwi Summer. In liquid form.

Summer Strawberry & Kiwifruit
Sun Kissed Orange
Farm Style Apple

These were the three flavours sent out for us to review, along with the guarantee of no added sugar, preservatives, artificial flavours or colour, and 100% of our recommended daily vitamin C requirements in a single glass. I gotta admit, I skimmed these details when I first glanced over the media release, and allowed my sun-starved brain to pause on words such as "awaken" and "summer".

The munchkins eyes lit when they saw the treasures I had stashed in the fridge. Fruit juice - that's a little like nectar from the Gods as far as they're concerned.  I was torn between wanting to rip into them there and then, and wanting to savour them - or at least give them time to chill in the fridge. Fifteen minutes chill time. That was the agreement my two inner selves came to. Summer was a-calling...

We started with Sun Kissed Orange. Not too much now kiddos, just a taste... Okay, that's good. It tastes like orange - as it should. Nice & refreshing. Not too sweet, not too face-scrunchy. Add some vodka for the adults, and you've got sunshine in a bottle right there.

Let's just have another taste and then back in the fridge it goes - this one is coming with us on our picnic.

"We're having a picnic?" asks the Lily Bug, her face all alight in excitement. Damn. Did I say that out loud? I look outside at the bleak grey sky with it's threat of rain etched upon the darkening horizon. Well...

Childhood memories resurface. Sitting on the swings at the local park with single-serve juice cartons. Ever-so-slightly piercing the straw-holes, discarding the straw and slowly sipping the juice through the tiny gap. Savouring  the very last drop. Is it the perfect weather I remember most about my childhood? Or the moments shared?

"We are now."

Thanks for the picnic inspiration Just Juice :)

Farm Style Apple accompanied us a few days later on a trip to the park.  I didn't expect to like it all that much - I'm not usually a fan of apple juice. Surprisingly, I liked it. Refreshing. Delicious. After a hot afternoon chasing children, it was so so very easy to keep almost exclusively to myself (the Lily Bug did force me to share, but only when she was within vicinity of my attempts to drink it all sneaky-like). 

Strawberry & Kiwifruit  was the least favourite amid our family. It tasted artificial. The kids handed me theirs and asked for that yummy orange again. The Lad winced and said it tasted like lolly water. Actually, there was once a time when I had some jelly lollies in a cup, and while in the midst of making a coffee, I poured hot water into the lolly cup. I had a sip. It tasted quite like this. Left for me to finish off, I thought this flavour might be an okay base to a fruit smoothie. Never got around to carrying out that theory though - I gluttoned it too quickly, despite my reservations.Greedy glutton that I am.

As Meatloaf once said, "two out of three aint bad" and that pretty much sums up our experience with Just Juice's new flavours. Do I recommend these for your next sunny picnic at the park or BBQ on the beach or to wash down a dry throat after a backyard ball game?

Yes. And no. Depending on your budget. At $3.99 for a one litre, it's just not realistic for our household of 5 on a making-ends-meet kind of income. But hey, if that's not an issue for you then yes - absolutely.

Visualise sweltering hot days - cool ocean breeze - swing ball - a tall refreshing glass of semi-frozen Just Juice - and some sunshine...   That's the Great Kiwi Summer in a nutshell, right?

Edited to add: The Lad pointed out tonight that what the juice market really really needs is a decent grapefruit juice. And none of that Pink Grapefruit nonsense. Real grapefruit juice. The kind that makes your face pucker. Hell yes. Now that would make the top of our Summer Must Have list.