The baby who walks

Finally, after making very certain she was going to be good at it, Nina has decided to walk by herself. It's a momentous occasion for Phil and me, as it means we no longer have to walk around hunched over like Quasimodo as Nina clings to our hands (Phil more hunched than me, obviously).

She seems a lot happier now that she's able to reach out with both hands and pull things off shelves, benches and out of cupboards. The house is a bombsite, but we've given up on maintaining any semblance of order during the day, and just wait until she's in bed before we put back the DVDs, put away her toys, put the cookware back in the cupboards, put all my carefully ordered paperwork back in my in-tray and retrieve my credit cards from the bin, where she's posted them.

The book is here!

The book is here!
Originally uploaded by Mistress B

It's hard to believe, but after nearly 2 years of work, The Sixth Wave is finally published! It isn't due to be released in bookstores until the beginning of April, but I have in my hot little hands one of the first copies off the press. The website is also up at www.sixthwave.org.

Nina pumpkinhead

Nina pumpkinhead
Originally uploaded by Mistress B

Nina's nickname of Nina Pumpkinhead (one of many terms of endearment we have for this little munchkin) is particularly appropriate since she absolutely loves pumpkin. It's like catnip for her - add it to any meal and you can guarantee most of it will go down, although she inevitably gets it all over her face and ends up with orange eyebrows.
These pumpkins are from our garden - first time I've grown them - so I'm pretty stoked. The garden has done magnificently this year thanks to good amounts of sun and rain. We got masses of snow peas, beans, broad beans, spinach, rhubarb, quite a few zucchini (courgettes), a few asparagus, quite a few raspberries and masses of blackberry (although these aren't technically in our garden but on the strip of council land next door)
We haven't blogged in ages but it's been a manic few months, especially with Nina waking up every 1-3 hours at night. But we've just finished 5 days at a residential sleep school and she now sleeps through the night ... hurrah!

Why Bianca has been a bit quiet on the blogging front...

... apart from the fact that the delightful Nina fills our every waking hour (and there are plenty of those) with smiles, giggles, crawling, the occasional tantrum and plenty of general babyness, I have also been occupied with writing a book. Call it insanity, call it overly ambitious, call it an exercise in time-management and dedication, but somehow I managed to co-author The Sixth Wave with my equally busy friend James Bradfield-Moody, scientist, engineer, ABC celebrity and whizz kid whose ideas form the foundation of the book.
And finally, it's nearly here! The Sixth Wave is due to be published by Random House Australia on 1 April this year (click here for a sneak peek at the cover and contents).