How do you tame a monkey??

We've always called Kingston, Monkey.  And now it's official he really is a monkey.  Since he started walking about 6 months ago, he's been a climber.  No surface was safe, he'd climb onto the coffee table to dance, or use the chair to climb onto the dining table, and then into his high chair.  

He'd be so proud of himself, clapping his hands and saying "yay".  Then he started taking it to new levels, using the kitchen stool to climb up onto the bench and get the phone, he LOVES to talk on the phone, then he wasn't content to just climb onto the coffee table, he realised he could push it around the lounge and use it to climb 

wherever he wanted.  I know what you're thinking, just take away the stool and the coffee table, oh if only it were that easy! When we took those away,  he then decided he can push the dining chairs all around the house, and climb with those too.

Today was quite a day, Im ready to put the table and chairs in the garage and put an end to this climbing once and for all.  

First of all, while I was making hunter's lunch for school, I hear "stuck, stuck" coming from the computer room.  

Oh yes, my monkey can climb up but he can't climb down again.

He often climbs on the chair and sits at the computer, but today he decided to climb up onto the table too.

So rescue number one over with, the computer room door is now shut.  Surely, it's safe for me to go and make the beds.  While I'm down in the bedroom, I hear "hello, hello".  Uh-oh I know what that means, yep sure enough there he is sitting up on the bench talking on the phone.  Luckily he hadn't dialed an actual number!  So the chair gets put back at the table, he gets put back in the lounge with the kids.

Do I dare go and get dressed?  Well he seems to be happily playing, and it'll only take a few minutes to get ready.  So I finish getting dressed and head back out to the kitchen,  and there he is again.  Only this time, he's at the stove, all elements turned on, and trying to cook the spray & wipe bottle!  Are you kidding me?  So I get him down again, turn off all the elements, put the spray & wipe back into the cupboard, move the bread basket, which now has a nice burn mark on the bottom, and put Kingston in the car and strap him  into his carseat - let's see him climb out of that!  Then I get the kids in the car so we can take Hunter to school.  I have the feeling it's going to be a long day.  Did I mention it wasn't even 8:30 yet.

August already??

Wow not only is it August, but we're already halfway through the month.  That means we now only have 31 days until we hit the states, it's so exciting.  Craig left for Sydney yesterday, to start his new job today.  It was a sad goodbye, but he will be back home in 2 weeks for a quick weekend visit, then he'll be here again just in time to leave for our trip.  

We had my brother Kellum over from Brisbane last week, he stayed for 5 days.  It was fun to have him here, and as usual he ate from the minute he arrived until the minute he left.  You just can't beat the food from home.  We were fortunate that the rain held out long enough, and he was able to go along to watch Hunter's game on the Saturday, I bet that brought back a lot of memories for him, of playing when he was Hunter's age.

I've really been enjoying watching the Olympics, it must be exciting for those athletes after training so hard to be rewarded with a medal.  The kids have been learning about the Olympics at school as well.

Kingston and Kenzie were both sick for all of last week, they both get asthma, and they had a bad week.  Kingston had a double ear infection too, just to change things up a bit.

It's still raining!  That's one good thing about the move to Sydney, at least it'll be drier there!