SPEAKING OF BULLIES...

A class of five-year old schoolchildren return to the classroom after playing in the playground during their break time.

The teacher says to the first child 'hello Becky, what have you been doing this playtime?'Becky replies ' I have been playing in the sand box'

'Very good' says the teacher 'if you can spell "sand" on the blackboard, I will give you a biscuit'

Becky duly goes and writes 's a n d' on the blackboard.'Very good' says the teacher and gives Becky a biscuit.


The teacher then says 'Freddie, what have you been doing in your playtime?'

Freddie replies 'playing with Becky in the sand box'

'Very good' says the teacher. 'If you can spell "box" on the blackboard, I will also give you a biscuit'

Freddie duly goes and writes 'b o x' on the blackboard.

'Very good' says the teacher and gives Freddie a biscuit.


Teacher then says 'Hello Mohammed, have you been playing in the sand box with Becky and Freddie?

''No' replies Mohammed, 'I wanted to, but they would not let me. Every time I went near them they started throwing sand at me and calling me nasty names'

'Oh dear' says the teacher. 'That sounds like blatant racial discrimination to me I tell you what, if you can spell "blatant racial discrimination" I will give you a biscuit'

SCHOOL PHOTOS

SCHOOL

Lilli is finally loving school.

It was a shaky start - from the second day she was reluctant to get up in the morning. By the second week we were having full on tears and needing to physically pull her clothes on her while she fought to keep them off. It was horrible.

I spoke to the teachers and principal. I felt that as the oldest child in the class and only one of two that spoke English as a first language that perhaps she would have benefitted from the next class up. I still think that, but apparently the cut off date for class placement is the 31st August, so she misses out by 3 weeks - I guess she will always be the oldest in the class while we are in the Northern Hemisphere.

By about the third week things had calmed down a bit but it was difficult hearing her say she didn't want to go to school everyday. So unexpected, there was never a day at Mikayla that this happened.

During breakfast one morning she happened to mention that she didn't want to go to school because some girls had called her "the ugly girl" and had chased her. Despite my wanting to go out and physically maim the offenders, we had a good talk about bullies and their low self esteem etc, gave her some coping strategies and later informed the teachers. It seems to have done the trick and she keeps me updated on what the ''bulls'' (her term) are up to. I did some face painting the other day at the school and was able to have a quiet chat in a couple of the "bulls" ears.

Interestingly I got blasted the other day at a roundabout when the driver behind me thought I should have been pushing into the traffic - one of the ''bulls'' was standing up in the back seat - like father, like daughter. One of the other bulls mother has quite a strong presence in the PTA and is lovely. She would be mortified.

Since then, life at school has improved and Lilli races to hug her teachers (1 main - Ms Marazanne and 2 support - Ms Carol & Ms Sam) in the morning. She has a little French girl, Lise, come and play sometimes and has a crush on the PE (or EP as she calls it) teacher Mr Eric.

ENCHANTED

The three of us went to see 'Enchanted' in the weekend. We all gave it 4.5 out of 5! It was silly, dorky, fun. I put it right up there with 'Birdcage', 'The Princess Bride' & 'Shrek I & II' as my favourite feel good, fluffy movies. We will definately get the dvd for home as well.

Favourite scenes:

Lilli - new dress scene.

Tim - hamster charades

Shar - anything to do with the Prince.

TESSIE WOO

Lilli has had some lovely letters from Tessie Woo. She is a very talented pooch - I think she should be writing children's stories. Here is the first letter she recieved:

Dear Lilli,

"Woof !!"that means "Hello" from Wentworth Falls to my best and youngest friend {YOU} I am having a lovely time living with uncle E and Ben and Wups 'cos they look after me and give me nice things to eat for breakfast and for dinner and they play with me and each day Wups and I go for a nice walk to the shops. Sometimes Jason comes with us and everybody in the street admires each of us and we get nice pats from people. I get more pats than anyone else. Ha Ha.

I am friends with Rosie too, she likes me because I am gentle. Wups is very rude and pushes her with his nose which she doesn't like. He is so big he could probably gobble her up for breakfast if he wanted, but he wouldn't do that to Rosie.

Wups loves having me to stay at his place and it feels like it is MY place now. Sometimes he sleeps on MY bed and leaves no room for me, so I found a great new spot to sleep. It is a triangle shaped step with carpet on it, high up at the top of the stairs outside Ben's room. It is a perfect size for me. It is under a window, so I get lovely cool fresh air when I'm sleeping there. I do have to be careful not to fall out of bed though, 'cos I would probably roll down the stairs to the bottom like a bouncy furry ball.

It is lovely having stairs to run up and down on, and I have my special door now at the bottom of that stairs and it is easy for me to pop outside anytime I want. Wups likes using my door and sometimes we race to get outside and I'm always too quick for him but he tries to squeeze thru with me and only gets his nose thru the hole until I am outside. He really is a big boof-head sometimes.

There is a nice lady living at your old house and she has kids who are the same age as you. They love me and are gentle with me and invite me over to play and often I stay all night with them. The kids love using the swimming pool 'cos everyday is warm and sunny here now. I don't bark at them though, 'cos i know they are safe as their mother watches them while they are in the water.

Uncle E gives me lots of cuddles and pats every morning when I wake up and every night when I go to bed. He feeds me all my favourite food. Wups gets jealous, but he gets cuddles too and he sleeps on Uncle E's bed. He told me that you had a sore throat. I do hope it feels better now.

Sometimes I lie still at the top pf the stairs, and, 'cos i am the same colour as the carpet, no-one can see me unless I move. It's like magic and I'm invisible. Then I jump up to surprise Ben and Wups who don't know I'm there cos they can't see me. We have great fun.

Wups plays chasey wth me in his back yard and sometimes we wrestle and he always lets me win. Then I get to stand on his chest with my two front paws 'cos I'm the Champion and Wups is lying upside down on the ground with his head on the grass. He pretends that he's been knocked over, but I know he isn't hurt because his tail is always wagging. We take turn in fetching the ball too, but Wups chews them up into little bits when he can and now we don't have a ball to play with at all. Uncle E promises me he will try to find a solid rubber ball, so Wups can't chew holes in it.

We have a new game with the hose: Wups lives biting the water as it comes out of the hose in a stream and chases the stream everywhere that uncle E points it. Wups gets very wet and I laugh at him. Naughty Wups chewed the end of the hose while no one was looking and made a hole in it annd the water squirted out of it because the tap was turned on. He got all wet and muddy but I didn't. I was good.

We have our own separate bowls for dinner, but when Wups is not looking I like to pinch some of his dinner. He says to Uncle e, "Who did that? " and doesn't know it was me, and Uncle e smiles and pretends he doesn't know either and then gives Wups some more.

Wups and I like to hunt little wiggly lizards every day. We never hurt them but love trying to catch them. Wups found a brown snake in the front garden and told Uncle e, The snake didn't bite any one because we weren't nasty to him. We let him slither away safely. We also have some Cicadas in the yard. They are big orange beetles with lovely wings like fairies or dragonflies have, and they are easy to hear as they make loud sounds like crickets do. They are hard to find, cos they hide deep in the ground. Sometimes they come out and rest on a tree trunk and crawl ot of their old shells when they get too big for them. They leave their dark brown shells holding onto the bark. These look like big beetles but they are completely empty inside.

Sometimes Wups and I go for walks together up the back lane and around the back street without telling uncle e. We are a bit naughty doing so, cos it is not always safe as Wups sometimes walks on the road, but I tell him to stay off and we always end up back at Uncle E's place usually on the mat at his front door where he lets us in and tells us we have been naughty and gives us both a treat and a drink.

I do miss you and Tim and Shar, but I am never sad as it is nice being with Wups and Uncle E and Ben is very kind to me too. He thinks I'm nicer to walk than Wups, because Wups pulls his lead and I don't. Wups is really very rough sometimes, but not with me. Because of the holidays, lots of kids visit Ben every day I'm never bored and I seem to be busy all day so I do not often get time for a nap like I used to. But I go to bed straight after dinner and sleep well all night.

I do hope you like your new home and that you meet some nice kids. Perhaps you could tell Shar some things to write to me on the email and then Uncle e can tell me your news.

Lots of love and warm licks from your favourite puppy dog, TesSie WoO

PS: See you later, alligator. In a while, crocodile. If you wish, Jelly fish.

THE TREE OF LIFE

Despite sign posting most of the way, we nearly missed the 'Tree of Life'. We had expected a bit more pomp and ceromony surrounding it - but no, there it was, a tree in the desert.

There is nothing particularly special looking abouty the tree itself, it's a nice big mesquite tree with big sweeping branches. The amazing thing about it though, as I found out later (no information centre or plaque at the site) is that it is hundreds of years old - nobody knows how old exactly, and nobody knows how it managed to get establish and survive - there is no water for miles and miles. Some say it is magical - in a youth fountain kinda way! it didn't work on me, perhaps because I found the camel poo more interesting.

It was a freezing cold day and we were not dressed for the cold wind, so did not stay long, but apparently it is a nice place to go camping. Come and stay and we will take you there!

SLIDESHOW INSTRUCTIONS

I am having fun with a website called 'Slide' and have put together a few photos taken in January. I will try to create a little collage like this each month.

For those of you who have not ''used'' this before, just a few hints:

• If you are sick of the music just click once on the speaker symbol at the bottom left of the picture frame.

• If you want to see stills of the photos, click on View All Images.

Please let me know by leaving a comment if you can't view the pictures.

JANUARY SLIDESHOW