I Got My Phone Back!

I was without my mobile phone for approximately 10 days. Luckily Mark gave me his phone to use while I waited over the Easter break for my replacement phone to arrive in the post. I bought a used phone off ebay. It didn't cost much more than buying a replacement screen. 

I am just happy that I have a working phone now. Not that I wasn't happy using Mark's phone. I just didn't have the apps on it that I use and I didn't want to mess up any settings of his.  

All I need to do now is add all of the BGL readings that I had written down on a notepad  into the app I use to record all of my diabetes info and I'm set to go ☺

Playing Photographer

I was playing around with the camera on my phone the other night. Taking snaps of the boys.

I think the photos turned out pretty good. Although I do know that Angus, who is like me, hates having his picture taken. Just as well the flash never went off for most of these pics or he would've been Mr. Grumpy!

It's All About The Location

It looks like I have left the boys behind ...

Our little family all have smart phones. In fact we all have android smart phones. We also have the same free app installed on them. The app is called Live 360. It's a family locator. Basically it uses your phones GPS and it updates where you are. You or your family members who have the app can check on google maps where you are. You can also request updates through the phone so that you can get a more accurate picture of where everyone is. There is also a feature that allows you to send out a distress alert. Which I think is pretty good.

Mark & I got the boys to install in on their phones before we went on out 'aborted' holiday last week. Mark used it quite a bit on our return journey to make sure that we were safe. The boys and I all had the settings on our phone set up for different intervals. Mine was set to send details every 30 minutes. the boys had their settings on a much longer interval.

I had to laugh when Mark shared this picture of our locations on facebook. I had threatened to leave the boys on the side of the road if they argued in the car. The picture makes it look like I had actually done that. Surprisingly enough the boys behaved in the car but they made up for it the next day. It's no wonder I always feel stressed during the summer holidays!

Random Photos

Just some random photos that I had taken with my phone. The helicopter is a medivac chopper. It was 'parked' at the hospital where I took Brodie for an MRI the other week.

This afternoon I take Brodz for an EEG. He thinks it's to see if he has a brain but truthfully his neurologist wants to find out what kind of epilepsy he has. I'll make sure I take some knitting or crochet once I actually decide what project I am actually going to make. I've been searching for days to find just the right project but no luck yet. Cross fingers that I find something soon.

Almost forgot. A quick update on my computer. It seems the graphics card has died. I have ordered a new one. All I need to do is wait for it to arrive. Thank goodness Mark gave me the netbook to use :)

Point and Shoot

I've been having fun playing around with photos again (~_~) 

Here's some I took recently

My crochet brooch

I think I look better in black and white.

I look kind of scary here

Brodie teases me for doing "selfies" (taking photos of myself)
At least I look okay when I take my own photo :P

Love the pop art look (~_~) 

C.K.

Playing Photographer

I've been busy playing photographer again (~_~)

How cool dos this look? Almost like a drawing.

C.K. was getting some snuggle time on my lap.

C.K. 

A Win ..

I think I have worked out a way to get around the fact that Angus hates me taking photos of him & sharing them. I take photos and make them look like a cartoon or something not realistic. So far so good, he hasn't complained (yet).

Paper Camera

Mark bought an app from google play for his mobile phone called Paper Camera. There's a QR Code at the bottom of the post if you're interested in the app.

I liked the app so much that I got it for my phone too. It was on special at the play store as part of the 25 Billion download celebrations. I don't think its on special any more but it is worth getting.

As you will see from all the photos of my beautiful models that the app makes photos look like cartoons.

Hmmph! You are NOT taking a photo of me Mum! 

Angus was such a grump so I only managed to get one photo of him. I must remember to "sneak" some more photos of him later. 

Sleeping Beauty

I really like this one. Brodz and his new Stitch toy.

I love the sepia tones

Paper Camera

I Was Given The Universe .. Well A Galaxy .. Sort Of

I got the best surprise yesterday morning after the postie, Luke, had been to our home. I knew Mark was getting a new phone. He had ordered a Galaxy SIII and I was going to get his old phone. Which was fine by me as my old LG Optimus wasn't holding charge even with a new battery. I wasn't able to save much data on it or install many apps due to the size limitation (only 139 MB of storage was available to use) and I was unable to install things to the memory card. I was constantly needing to delete data to make room. I was very happy to get Mark's old phone because it could do things mine could not. Like save to the memory card.

Mark's new phone arrived and he brought me his old phone so that I could start 'making it mine' by adding the SIM card and the SD card. There I was beginning to set it up and Mark walks over to me holding a box all wrapped up in pretty paper and a card to go with it. Imagine my surprise when I open it to find that Mark had bought me a brand new Galaxy Nexus and a pretty purple cover to protect it. The cheeky thing!

I was glad that I had something to distract me yesterday afternoon. I was busy installing apps and playing (~_~) it's nice to know that I wont run out of space on this phone. Well not in a hurry anyway. There's 16 GB of storage with 1 GB of memory! The camera in it is pretty good too. I managed to sneak a photo of Brodz and a pic of Angus (who willingly let me take a photo). Those two are so camera shy. I wonder where they get that from ... it has nothing to do with a girl who used to hide behind doors and things because she didn't want her picture taken. Nope nothing to do with that at all!!

How gorgeous are these two boys?? Don't tell them I posted pics of them here though. They wont be happy with me.

Well I'm off to hang out some washing and hopefully get it dry before the weather changes. Then I am off to play with my phone and do some crocheting once I work out what I am making next.

Random Mobile Photos

I thought I would make a collage from some photos that I had taken using my mobile phone.

Plus it gives me an excuse to move the photos from my phone to my computer (~_~)

My sleeping beauties! 

As you see I love taking photos of Rory.

Random Mobile Photos

I was looking at the different photos I had on my mobile phone & wondered if there was a way to share them all with you. I didn't use all of them. I chose them randomly.

Top row: Robin Hood, Angus, The Bakers Bean, Maid Marion
Bottom row: Strangely low to the ground car, The Bakers Bean, Brodie

I made them into a collage (a great way to share them I think) plus I wanted to make the overall file size of the photo smaller so that it doesn't take forever to load, cos I'm nice like that :P

Photos taken while waiting for Angus after school & a bracelet that Mark made for me.

Did I Ever Tell You That I Love Flowers?

I've been in a bit of a funk as far as blog posts are concerned plus I wasn't at the computer a lot over the weekend. I've been outside enjoying the sunshine. Angus & I even went for a walk yesterday morning before the weather turned cold again. Mother Nature reminded us that it's still winter even though we were teased with some beautiful Spring weather over the past couple of days.

Of course while I was out I had to check out some more pretty flowers in peoples gardens. I wonder what they think of this strange lady who points her mobile phone towards their plants to snap pictures. I guess if they minded they would come out and say something if they saw me :)

I am using this photo as my desktop background. I am really impressed with how good the photos look from my phone.

I have no idea what the flowers are but they sure do look pretty. Did I mention that Spring is my favourite time of the year?

Health Update

I had a check up with my GP this morning. He had asked me to come and see him 4 weeks after I started taking Diabex. It has actually been 5 weeks but that's only because he was away last week.

I showed Dr. F the program I have installed, OnTrack, on my phone that I use to record all of my blood glucose levels, weight, blood pressure etc. He loved the program so much that he looked to see if he could get it for his iphone. He couldn't find that one, it is for Android, but he did find another one that he said he may look into.

After checking out my BGL's recorded on my phone and getting me on the scales. Yes the scales, which I no longer hate because the numbers are going down!!! I have lost 6 kilos (about 12 lb) since being diagnosed with diabetes. Dr. F is absolutely rapt with how well I am going.He said that I am doing a fantastic job. I never tire of hearing those words! Although sometimes I feel like I am behaving so much that it is making me sick. Not sick as in ill just sick & tired of being so good.

I also asked Dr. F to fill in a form for VicRoads notifying them that I now have diabetes. Basically its to cover my butt if I have an accident so no one can say I was irresponsible and state that I didn't declare my illness. I need one of these forms filled out once every 3 years. Lucky me.

Since things are going so well he doesn't need to see my until the end of September when my HbA1c test is due to be repeated. Well unless something crops up before then. Although I do have an appointment on Friday with the dietitian. I don't think I have any questions for her at this stage and I don't really know if this appointment is truly necessary but I will go any way.  But for now things are going well and I am being a good girl :P

Playing Photographer

I have been playing with the camera on my phone recently just because I can & I wanted to share some of the photos I took with it.

My gorgeous boy looking all trendy in his cap. He looks like he could use a sleep from the look of this eyes. Hmm looks like his glasses could use a bit of a clean too. I'm forever telling him to clean them (and yes they are the expensive glasses I mentioned a while back).

This was a scrumptious hot chocolate that I had last week when Mark & I went out one morning for breakfast. We went to this little cafe here in town. It was the BEST hot chocolate EVER! I will definitely have to go back there and have another one just to make sure that it was as good as the first one.

I took this one while waiting for Brodie as the bus stop last week. Of course I had a little fun cropping and framing this one. I don't think it turned out too bad. At least every thing looks nice & green, well except for the Traci Tree (that's what I call deciduous trees because Traci just adores autumn and all of its colours) there in the middle of the photo but that looks pretty any way.

How about a self portrait? I took this one yesterday while I was waiting for Brodie at his bus stop. Of course I had to crop this photo. I didn't want to show everyone my double chins :P Thank goodness I had my sunnies on or you would've seen the bags under my eyes too. Considering how much I hate having my photo taken I thought I was very brave to even share this one being make-up free and all. Not that I ever really wear make up, except for maybe the lip gloss I had on that day. I'm not really a girly girl who dresses up a lot.

I think I take some pretty good photos with my phone :D

Playing With Photos

I have been playing with one of the photo editors Mark installed on my phone. While I was at it I thought I would test how easy (or hard) it would be to email a blog post from my phone. Apart from the typos it seems okay :)

*edited* Well at least the post worked. I just need to work out how to add labels via email, although I'm not sure that's an option.

Pretty In Pink

I got spoilt today. Mark & the boys gave me a new phone for my birthday. It's a VERY early present. I could've waited for another 2 weeks. It's nice & pink although it's not as dark a pink as my camera. I am now officially able to receive MMS's which my old phone wasn't able to do which was one of my pre-requisites for a new phone regardless of its other functions. It's an LG Optimus GT450 Android phone.

I got totally side-tracked from writing this post and I have lost my train of thought. Don't you just hate that? I know I do. Okay I have totally forgotten what I wanted to say about the phone other than I am having lots of fun playing on it. I have tweeted, updated my status on Facebook & I have even played that game Angry Bird that everyone seemed to know about before I did. Almost forgot I can Buzz too :)
Mark set up the wi-fi on the phone so I don't have to worry about using up the remaining credit I have on it either. So at least when I am home I wont have a problem.

I am sure that there is more that I was going to write, oh well. Just call me an airhead :P
Now its a toss up .. do I go prepare tea or do I play with the phone some more? Hmm ... what a choice.

Camp & Shopping

Brodie has been at an Interchange Camp in Walhalla since Friday night. Gosh its been awful quiet at home! Not that I am complaining or anything its just quiet! He phoned me up reverse charges last night to let me know that he didn't have any signal on his mobile. I knew he wouldn't because when the boys have been up at Rawson on other camps they've not had signal there either. And since Walhalla is in that same area I assumed that their mobiles wouldn't work their too. Anyway he said he missed me. I've certainly thought about him heaps over the last couple of days but I don't think I've missed him as much as he has possibly missed me.
It was really sweet of him to call at any rate. He usually phones at night to say Good Night. Its cute really.

Yesterday morning I tool Mark & Angus to Morwell to do some birthday and Christmas shopping. I kept my promise of getting Angus a new mobile phone but he almost lost it while we were in Mid Valley. He'd left it in the shoe section in BigW and only realised it as we were leaving the store. Thank goodness it was sort of shoved under some shelves when he tried on some shoes or he would've completely lost them altogether. I mean who wouldn't take a shopping bag with a brand new phone in it? Thankfully Mark found it and all is good.
Angus learnt a valuable lesson. If Mum has a trolley for all the shopping .. USE it or LOSE it!!

Update & Other Stuff

Here it is Sunday afternoon and I hadn't blogged at how my operation went on Friday. It's a bit slack of me I guess but I have had other things on my mind.

Everything went really well on Friday. I was the first to be called into theatre and one of the first to be back on the ward. It was all over and done with by 9:10 am. I have bruises all over the place from the anaesthetist. I guess he liked using me as a pin cushion!?!
I've only had a few crampy moments and they are becoming less and less which a good thing (maybe I spoke too soon). I've hardly been taking any pain killers which is fine by me. I don't want to take too many. I'm on antibiotics for a week as a precaution so I don't get an infection from the mirena. The only problem is with that is I can't do my UVB due to the antibiotics and needed to limit my sun exposure while taking them. I'm not too happy about that but there isn't much I can do about I suppose.

I had to wait until I saw a doctor before being discharged from the hospital. The only problem with that was I had to wait quite some time before one came to see me. It was meant to be my gynie but he was busy and sent one of his colleagues. Nothing new with that I guess. At least I was home by 12:50pm. Not bad considering.
I go back to see the gynaecologist in mid October unless I have a problem and need to phone/see him sooner.

Today I got a phone call from the boys father at 3:30 am. What an idiot! I bet he was drunk and didn't realise the time. The only trouble was I didn't get back to sleep until almost 6am. Sometimes I wonder if giving Victor a mobile phone was a smart thing to do. The jury is still out on this one I think.

We needed to get up early for Church today. Brodie was asked to see the Bishop early this morning before Sacrament. The Bishop had interviewed him and had a couple of good chats with Brodie over the past few weeks. He was ordained as a Priest this morning. The Bishop said the most wonderful blessing for Brodie. I hope that he is able to take on board what was said and that he is able to do the right thing. I'm sure he will do his best (most of the time).

I'm not sure what else to put other than I keep getting side-tracked while I am trying to type all of this up. Maybe my next post will be less disjointed.

Oh before I forget I take Mark to the spinal clinic tomorrow for a check up/review. I'm not sure what that will entail other than the fact that we have to travel about 90 km to get there. Not too happy about that but thats the drawbacks of living country & needing to travel into the city for appointments.

The Boys Father

While we were visiting my Dad I got a phone call from the boys father, Victor. I almost fell off my chair when I realised it was him. We had been in Adelaide for about a day or so when he phoned. Mid you sending him a letter telling him when we were coming to South Australia for a holiday certainly helped. He told me that he was organising his bus ticket from Whyalla to Adelaide and would it be possible for us to pick him up at the Elizabeth train station & take him to his brother Bill's home. I thought wow, sure, I can do that since you are (finally) making the effort to come and see your own sons!

So on Tuesday afternoon he phoned us to say that he was at the train station and could we please come and get him. The boys walked right up to him and he didn't recognise them at all. It wasn't until Brodie said Hello Vic that he finally realised that these boys were HIS kids. I was surprised to note that he didn't recognise them even though I had sent him their most recent school photos so that he would know how much they had grown. Oh well, I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised really.

I know it was nice for Vic to finally catch up with the boys BUT .. he has to realise that he shouldn't be trying to crack jokes and think that everything is all hunky dory just because he made the boys laugh. In some ways I think that Vic thought things would be like they used to be between him & the boys before he disappeared on us, & that they were still "buddies".

I know for a fact that Brodie is having such a hard time trying to accept Vic back in his life after a 7 year absence. I mean who wouldn't have a hard time trying to get to know someone after such a long time apart. Brodie even told him on the phone that he didn't want to call him Dad any more because he hadn't been in their lives for so long. Brodie heard Vic swear at Bill saying that the little f**ker didn't want to call him Dad anymore. Of course when I confronted him about it he denied it but why would Brodie lie about it?

Angus told me that even though Vic is his Dad he doesn't particularly like how he was treated while we visited with him & his Uncle Bill. Vic spent more time talking to Brodie trying to be buddies with him. Angus said he felt left out. Not a very good thing to happen especially when you are meant to be mending a broken relationship.

At one stage Brodie wanted to punch Vic. Of course he didn't, I wouldn't let him .. he saved that for Mark instead. I'll fill you in on that story in another post. There was a lot of anger brewing in the background & I certainly felt a lot of stress from it. So much stress that my skin paid the price for it while we were away. Now that we have been back a week it is slowly settling down again.

We bought Vic a mobile phone so that the boys can keep in contact with him. Not a very expensive one but its prepaid so we wont have to worry about any phone bills. One of Vic's nieces or nephews can teach him how to put credit on. We're all on the same mobile network so the kids can use their free minutes to call him if they wish to. You should've seen Vic when we gave him the phone. He was like a little kid receiving a Christmas present. He was practically jumping for joy. I had to laugh though he said he would keep it a secret from his brother, Dave, but I don't think he will. He was so excited that he would tell anyone who would listen that he had a mobile phone.

At least the boys can call him now and speak with him if they wish. It's better than the system we were using before when we would try and catch his cousin at home who would then pass on a message to him that we had called. Vic would then phone to say he was at his cousins and then we would call him back.

While we were there Mark spent some time alone with Vic. Having a heart to heart chat. Dad to Dad. Whatever Mark said to Vic must have been good as Vic told me that he has a lot of time for Mark & that he is doing a good job with the boys. It feels kind of weird that my ex-hubby approves of my 'new' man. Not that I needed his approval.

Any way lets see how things go with their father now. I hope that their relationship can grow and become a bit stronger than it is right now.

My New Phone

My New phone arrived today, oops I just realised that it's after midnight so I guess I should say it arrived yesterday! It's a Nokia 6085. I bought it on ebay last week. It' looks really nifty and has stacks more features than my old phone. Considering I haven't had a phone for such a long time it's going to be strange remembering to take this along each time I go out. But first things first I need to get some credit for my phone. I only ever like to have a pre-paid phone that way I don't rack up a huge phone bill.

Mark likes this phone so much that he is thinking of getting one like it too. Not that there is anything wrong with his current phone though other than it's a couple of years old. The boys are getting excited though. Now that I have a new phone it means that they are one step closer in having their own phones. I told them both that they wont get a new phone before I do. Now that I have one I guess they will start asking about theirs.