2010 In a Nutshell

Well not really in a nutshell - I wouldn't want anyone with a nut allergy to be unable to read it.

It's been a massive year. Easily the biggest, most jam-packed year of my life. So excuse me while I go link crazy. I hope you'll click on some that take your fancy.

In life BT (Before Tricky):

• I turned in to an old man and had an interesting conversation with a transgender customer
• I've freaked out about becoming a mother and tried drugs in a room full of people
• Plus I bitched about hair growth and being told I was fat (at 9 months preggers)

But my proudest moment would have to be getting the drug-free birth I had dreamed about with Tricky!

Life Post Tricky consisted of your normal 'New Mum' stuff like:

• Learning how to breastfeed with a staph infection, sleepless nights and a getting so run down I ended up in hospital
• Encountering my first baby erection and discovering how hard it is to cut microscopic fingernails

And the not so normal or often talked about stuff like:

• Tricky being diagnosed with a skull deformity and having surgery
• My previously tamed Black Dog starting to froth at the mouth

But things started looking up when:

• I met a lovely bunch of women at Mothers' Group
• I realized just how freakin awesome my mum is
• I got sponsored to go to AusBlogCon2011
• My little blog turned one and I turned 29

So yeah, it's been a helluva year! Here's hoping that 2011 brings some new and exciting times, but hopefully less drama.

Happy New Year everyone!

 

The Christmas Period

'Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.
The stockings were hung at the end of each bed,
When Glowless had a visit from her old friend, Red.

Red! You're here! Who invited you?,
You've snuck up on me right out of the blue.
I knew you'd be back but just not today,
I was only expecting Santa, his reindeer and sleigh.

It's been fifteen long months since you went for a wander,
And the absence didn't make my heart grow any fonder,
Of the bloating and cramping and the ever present pain,
Plus the chocolate cravings are simply insane.

So off to the servo Map Guy and I drove,
To find it was a proverbial treasure trove.
Everything from milk to batteries and socks,
But all I needed was one little box.

I hunted the aisles like a woman possessed,
To find some items that could help my 'guest',
I passed the Pringles and the chocolate Magnums,

Even old Chisel and Farnsy albums.

There they are! What? They're nine dollars fifty?

That's a lot to pay for someone so thrifty!

I wanted to rant and cause a big stink,

But I didn't, I just paid, and the clerk gave me a wink*.

I returned to the car with my package in hand,

Another festive hiccup I'd have to withstand,

Why tonight, Red? Your timing's just shocking,

I'd rather a bracelet in my Christmas stocking.

I looked up at the moon, a bright silver crescent,

And reflected on my first Christmas present,

I don't like you much, you're annoying and icky,

But without you, Red, I wouldn't have Tricky. 
 

* Seriously, the guy who served me actually winked. I could understand winking if I was buying condoms, but c'mon, pads?!

'Tis the Season

It's Tricky's first Christmas so I have, of course, taken him to sit on some random fat guy's knee for a photo. We couldn't manage to get him to smile. But hey, at least he wasn't screaming.

 'Tis the season to reverse your stranger danger policy and get photographic evidence

I've put the photo in frames, in snow-domes (that are mocking the 38C weather prediction for Christmas Day) and even in baubles to hang from the tree. Every member of mine and Map Guy's family have now got some sort of Christmas paraphernalia with Tricky's non-smiling face on it. Whether they like it or not.

 'Tis the season to give crap, cheap present

But that's not all.

I've taken heaps of photos of him in his little Santa outfit. Then, because he's adorable it was hot, just his nappy and his Santa hat.

I is cute, right?

The child beams when I take a photo with my phone but will not crack a smile when I'm paying a photographer to do it.

 'Tis the season to be ripped off

Tomorrow, when Tricky wakes for his first feed of the day (usually around 4am - yes, he still wakes at least twice a night for feeds even though he's 6 months old - hence the bags under my eyes), Map Guy and I will hit the road for our long trek to Albany to stay with the Out-Laws In-Laws for the week.

'Tis the season to spend time with people you normally don't see all year

The Glow-mobile. Two adults. One baby. A dog. 430km of highway. And a partridge in a pear tree.

'Tis the season to travel long distances, pee in the bushes and have lunch in a roadhouse

So here's wishing you and yours a safe and very happy Christmas.

The UWA Extension giveaway is still running - if you'd like to WIN 1 of 5 tickets to a Toilet Training seminar run by Perth baby whisperers Caroline's Angels, then enter here

Baby Talk - A Giveaway

I am a knowledge junkie. Books are my crack cocaine. I cannot get enough. But since Tricky was born I haven't really had much time to sit and read, so I've been feeling a little out of the learning loop. So when the lovely people at UWA Extension offered me free tickets to their 'Baby Talk' series I totally flipped! Blogging definitely has it's perks!

UWA Extension (the community arm of The University of Western Australia) have partnered with wonderful knowledge-buckets such as Jude Blereau (author of Wholefood for Children), Caroline Radford (of Caroline's Angels fame) and most recently Ngala to create some fantastic sessions covering everything from toilet training, toddler brain development, nutrition and sleep (precious, lovely sleep! I'll be paying extra attention at that one!).

On January 30th I'll be attending the toilet training seminar and I've got FIVE passes to give away valued at $49 each! 

At the seminar you'll learn the best ways to approach toilet training so that it's fun for kids and easier for you.

To be in the running to WIN one of these fab tickets and join me at the session you have to:

• Be a follower of Where's My Glow and
• Leave a comment telling me why you need help with toilet training your toddler! You can still enter if you have a younger baby, it'll help when you get to that stage!

To grab two extra entries you can tweet this comp (WIN tickets to a toilet training course thanks to @UWAextension and @Glowless http://bit.ly/g04iwo ) and share it on Facebook (WIN tickets to a toilet training course thanks to UWA Extension and @Where's My Glow http://bit.ly/g04iwo ). Leave a separate comment telling me you've done it.

If you win, you get to hang out with me - that alone should make you want to enter. Alternatively you can sit far away from me wearing dark glasses and a trench coat while I nerd it up in the front row taking notes.

If you need more convincing, check out the lovely things people had to say after the last session:

Well, its official, YOU ARE THE BEST!!! So THANK YOU....THANK YOU.....THANK YOU! Will be recommending your services once again to more people.

Michelle

Caroline has a lovely manner, a practical approach, excellent knowledge, great structure - very valuable and enjoyable session.

Justine P.

An outstanding presentation - thank you.

I feel I have greater confidence and knowledge to start the toilet training process when my daughter is ready. Thank you.

Great Course - very informative.

What a great initiative adopted by UWA!! We've used Caroline's Angels in the past and value their education, knowledge and advice, so to see the partnership with UWA is a great comfort to us 'mere' parents!

Michelle S 

Entry is open to WA residents only (unless you'd like to hop on a flight over?) and closes at 8pm AWST on 30th December 2010. Make sure you enter using a valid email address so that you can be contacted when you win! Good luck and I'll see you at UWA! 

For more information and to book your ticket for the Baby Talk series, check out the UWA Extension website or the Caroline's Angels website.


Win Free Stuff - Find the best Australian Competitions brought together all in one spot. It's free and updated daily!

T-ravelling With Style

When we go driving in the Glow-mobile we never ever stop to ask for directions. And whilst this can be the cause of much friction for some couples, for us it isn't an issue. It's got nothing to do with stereotypical male behaviour, it’s because he’s my Map Guy. He’s a living, breathing GPS unit. It is physically impossible for the man to get lost.

The Way to Map Guy's Heart

So what better way to review the GPS function of the Telstra T-Touch Tab than to put it in to the hands of Map Guy and take it for a spin!

Now, if it was just me I would have typed in the address and listened as the lovely computer voice (who I like to call Miss Direction – hehe, get it?) told me which way to go. But not Map Guy, he went above and beyond and put that baby through it’s paces.

For starters he spoke the destination we were after to test out the voice recognition – I didn’t even know you could do that. Almost instantly it had the location and loaded the map which was really easy to see on the massive seven inch screen (see I told you size matters!).

As we drove he started excitedly explaining how GPS units work, and how they’re accurate to around 5-10 metres and blah blah blah… luckily I was wearing sunglasses so he couldn’t see that I’d dozed off listening to his techno-babble (it’s OK, he glazes over when I talk about blogging so we’re even).

So there we are driving along and Miss Direction says to turn left… and Map Guy, with an evil grin on his face, turned right. Talk about breaking the rules, what a bad boy! But the Google Navigation software didn’t skip a beat, it recalibrated the route and told us to go to the roundabout 20 metres up the road and head back where we came from. It’s obviously not Australian software or Miss Direction, in her Stephen Hawking-esque voice would have just said “Chuck a U-ey, mate”.

Map Guy was having a lot of fun showing me all the different functions but my favourite was the layers. Rather than driving around in circles looking for a place to fill up, you can turn on the Petrol Station layer and voila, all the servos in the area pop up on the map. There is a separate layer for car parks, the latest traffic info, restaurants, even ATM and bank locations – so handy when you’re in an area you don’t know and the car is running on fumes or you’re desperate for Chinese food.

The T-Touch as GPS unit gets the Glowless seal of approval, but more importantly the Map Guy seal of approval!

This is the second installment of a paid four part review of the T-Touch Tab,
sponsored by Telstra and organised by Kidspot Australia.

Life on The Edge

It has been a huge weekend at Casa de Glowless!

I've celebrated a birthday, had mastitis (TMI? Sorry), gone ten-pin bowling, almost broken a tooth on a non-pitted olive on a pizza (seriously, why put olives with pits on a pizza? That's just asking for trouble), celebrated Christmas1.0 with my family and Tricky got his first tooth!

But the most memorable, amazing and sore feet inducing part of the weekend was going to see U2 with Aunty Penny! It was so nice of them to come to town for my birthday (and super nice of Aunty Penny to buy me a ticket for said birthday).

It was unbelievable! The stage was totally awesome and looked like it was straight out of War of the Worlds. If Tom Cruise and Dakota Fanning had popped up I would not have been surprised at all.

Take me to your leader

Other than "Elevation", the best bit was when Bono compared himself to David Boon and a massive "Boonie" chant echoed round the stadium. I had no idea U2 fans were such bogans - I fitted in really well.

But Aunty Penny and I were a little bit naughty... 

We bought a bottle of water - but there were big signs up saying that we couldn't keep the bottle caps. That it was a request "from the band". Hrmmm, how am I supposed to jump up and down, singing my lungs out if I'm also being careful not to spill my water? 

What if, in the hype, I flicked water on someone? Perhaps mosh-rage would ensue? There was only one solution... hide the bottle cap. I am totally hard core, sticking it to The Man.

I know, I live life on the edge. Not The Edge*, he's still in town but I'm pretty sure that'd get me arrested.

Aunty Penny and I with the contraban! We Rock.

So with a concert and a teething bubba I've had about ten hours sleep since Thursday night. My eyes are hanging out of my head. But with my new GHD from Map Guy, at least my hair looks pretty.

*For the uninitiated, 'The Edge' is the name of the guitarist from U2.

Just Me - Bah Hum Bug

Have you seen the awesome 12 Days of Christmas special that Sarah over at Just Me is hosting?


Each day she has a blogger talking about what they want for Christmas... and today it's MY TURN! Yay!

Head on over to find out what this picture has to do with my Christmas:

Bah Hum Bug!

Honorary Super Parent

Today I'm an Honorary Super Parent! That means I'm wearing my undies on the outside and I'm rockin a cape (a dirty tea towel slung over my shoulder counts).

Colin has invited me over to guest post about how to beg for money request sponsorship for the Aussie Bloggers' Conference.There's a little disclaimer above it pointing out it's not his usual PG13 rating because I said ass... oops.

So if you'd like to know how I got sponsorship or if you'd just like to see the word ass appear on a parenting site, head on over now and have a read.

Glowless is attending the Aussie Bloggers' Conference thanks to HealthyChart

Happy Blogiversary!

My little corner of the interwebs turns one today! A very happy un-birthday blogiversary to me! 

What should I wish for?

This little blog started out when I was 17 weeks pregnant and I was needing a place to rant and rave a creative outlet that didn't involve spending money.

I had no idea how addictive blogging would be or how freakin awesome and supportive the blogging community is. I wish I'd found the forums sooner than I did - I was a late bloomer and only got in to the swing of things in August - but I claim the insanity defense, I had baby brain.

Enough of the schmaltz - SO MUCH has happened in a year, let's go on a quick trip down memory lane (I prefer to skip, but you can walk or jog or tip toe, it's totally up to you):

It all began when I was up the duff and never got that elusive pregnancy Glow

Whilst I wouldn't wish it away, there were parts of pregnancy that just weren't fun - like having to have my ass taped

The highlight of the year would have to be the birth of my little Tricky!

I battled my way through the joys of Golden Nipples 

My world came crashing down when we learned that Tricky had Craniosynostosis and at just 14 weeks old had surgery

But things started looking up, enough for me to get my boobs out in public and go back to work, though luckily not at the same time

Which brings us to now. One year, 127 posts, and a whole lotta verbal diarrhea. Thanks for reading, thanks for commenting and here's hoping you stick around to listen to me waffle on a bit longer.

Cheers,

Drumroll please...

There was such a fantastic response to the HealthyChart giveaway, thank you all so much for entering, sharing it on Facebook and Tweeting your little hearts out! 

Now y'all (oooh I sound so Southern) are gonna click away as soon as I announce the winner if it's not you, so before I say who won I bring good news to those who didn't win:

Get your kids off to a good start in 2011 by ordering a HealthyChart before the 31st of December and you'll receive a FREE pencil case to store your tiles in AND get FREE postage (within Australia) too! Hooray! High five!

Of course there can only be one winner, and since you're still drumrolling and have probably drowned your keyboard in drool, I should hurry up and announce it:

Congratulations CRAPmamma!

Keep an eye on your inbox, CRAPmamma, you'll be hearing from me very soon!

Thanks again to everyone who entered and help support my fabulous sponsor.

Gaming Addicts Anonymous

I pride myself on being a bit of a tech-head but I’m not a hard core gamer. I’m not the type to get so enthralled with a game that I want to play it until I finish it. I don’t have the drive, but mostly, I just don’t have the patience. Well that’s what I thought anyway, until I got my hands on the Telstra T-Touch Tab.

Because the Tablet is powered by Android it means I have the fabulous Android Market at my disposal – there are over 100,000 apps of which a whopping 57% are free, and who doesn’t like free stuff, right? I just cannot get enough. Hi, my name is Glowless and I’m a free games addict. 

I have tried my hand (or more accurately, my finger) at all sorts of games, from ten pin bowling to air traffic control. And of course, who can resist Angry Birds? It is the epitome of mobile device games. Those birds can really hold a grudge- through no less than 150 levels. And I WILL get through them ALL!

Tippi Hendren's favourite game

Playing the games on the 7 inch screen was awesome. I must admit to feeling uber cool whipping out the T-Touch next to my techie friend as he played the exact same games on his Android phone’s 2 inch screen – yeah, size matters, baby. Plus if your hand gets sore from holding the Tablet whilst playing non-stop, you can pop out the little stand and voila! It sits up by itself and you can play with one hand leaving the other one free to get on with those pesky tasks that keep getting in the way of valuable game time, like brushing your hair or feeding the baby.

7 inches of awesome

But the games aren’t just for me – my little 6 month old boy ‘Tricky’ loves the colourful flash card app  I downloaded for him. And by that I mean he likes to try and smack the screen when the bright pictures come up. But I can see the T-Touch coming in super handy when he’s a little bit older and we’re stuck in traffic and he’s lost interest in, say,  the 15^th round of “I Spy”.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have 27 more levels of Angry Birds to get through.

Cos honesty is the best policy I'll point out that this post is part of a paid four part review of the T-Touch Tab, sponsored by Telstra and organised by Kidspot Australia.

Oh and the HealthyChart comp has a few days left, so head on over here to enter if you haven't already! You KNOW you want to!

A Boy And His Dog

As Tricky is becoming more mobile (he's up to three crawls in a row before belly-flopping) he is getting a bit more attention of the canine variety.

Sprocket has started to think that this thing that was previously just a big lump with flailing limbs is quite possibly the Best.Toy.Ever. And as with all fantastic dog-toys it needs to be sniffed and licked (though hopefully not chewed) incessantly until it is covered with doggy drool. Lovely.

I'm stuck in between wanting Tricky germ-free and wanting him to build up a robust immune system. So my attempt at creating the best of both worlds is to have Puppy Play Time rules. Yes I know how stupid that sounds. But there's only three so gimme a break:

• Licking of the face is a no-no,
• Puppy Play Time is followed by Soapy Hand Washing Time, and of course,
• It always has to be supervised (duh)

And so far so good. Sure there's been a few face licks but Tricky is learning that licking fur is yucky Sprocket is learning to resist the urge to cover Tricky in kisses. I'm so happy my boys are getting on well.

 

Let's hold hands

Nooooo! Mamma said no face licking!

On a side note, for those of you playing "Spot the Spring" at home, Tricky's springs are really visible in these photos. Most of the time people have no idea he is the Bionic Baby until they are holding him and his head is right at their eye level and they see the halo of the springs - then they think "Woah this kid has a really weird head!" and try to quickly cover the look of shock on their faces. It's quite amusing really.

Now where was I? Oh yes, do you have pets and kids? Do you have any rules?

The HealthyChart giveaway is still going strong! Be sure to enter here!!

Letter to Tricky - 6 months old

Dear Tricky,

Happy half year!I can't believe how fast these past six months have zoomed by. You've grown from a (not so) teeny little baby to a big smiley chubba bubba.

In this past month you have done sooo much!

You’ve mastered sitting and have almost perfected crawling – the hand/knee coordination still needs a little work so sometimes you flop to your belly and worm along. I can’t blame you though, it’s much fast that way and you NEED to get to the toy.

You’ve been enjoying some really special one on one time with your Daddy on Saturdays when I’m at work. Daddy has even taken you out visiting people – he says it’s because he wants to see them but I know he just wants to show you off! He is such a proud Papa Bear.

We’ve been spending a lot of time with your Pop recently because he isn’t too well – but whenever you are near him he is fine… you are his medicine, his elixir of life.

If the decorations are any hint, it’s almost your first Christmas! I apologize now because I will make you sit on a random stranger’s knee and have your photo taken and I will dress you in cute little Santa suit on Christmas day even though it might come back to haunt you one day (your 21^st perhaps?)… there is no point fighting it, it’s a rite of passage for both of us.

We did think your springs would be taken out by now but they have to stay in for a little bit longer –but that’s OK, because they look like a little halo and now you can be our Christmas Angel!

Happy first Christmas, my Angel.

Love Mummy xxx

The HealthyChart Giveaway is still going, be sure to enter HERE