The Obernewtyn series by Isobelle Carmody (may have minor non explicit sex in a later book, can’t remember) Abhorsen series by Garth Nix. Both great YA fantasy with female leads, Australian so not sure how widely available elsewhere. Most of the adult fantasy I read when younger was very male focussed but she still may enjoy them - Magician by Raymond Feist & Memory, Sorry and Thorn by Tad Williams are two that spring to mind.

It said 70/100 but I was sure I got 4 wrong. I'm not from the US though.

Last year was my worst year in a long time for reading, I did manage to rewatch a lot of tv series instead. I’m determined to do better this year. So far I have finished off Children of Ruin by Adrian Tchaikovsky (started last year) which I enjoyed. I have now moved onto A Confusion of Princes by Garth Nix, a YA novel. So far I’m thinking it’s not one of his best works but it’s interesting enough to persist with. I also started reading the Chrestomanci series by Diana Wynne Jones to my 8 year old last year, we are currently on The Lives of Christopher Chant.

According to google it increases the shelf life, but I do it just because that’s what I’ve always done. I thought it was an Australian wide thing, my parents (WA) did it and so did my husband’s (NSW), one of the few things that didn’t seem to change from coast to coast. Obviously you have additional considerations beyond just optimal storage conditions.

But what about your super glue!?!

Thank you, some good ideas. I like the idea of decorating cupcakes/biscuits but I’m in Perth in summer so it may be a bit warm for it (though it’s 18 and raining today!). The sharpie tie die looks cool, might save that idea for when all the little cousins aren’t around. Photo frames, I wonder if I can find ones that fit a Polaroid photo? Then I could borrow a Polaroid camera, I know a family member has one, and the kids could have photos for them on the day. I like that idea.

Sausages cooked on a barbecue ( grill in the US maybe?) and put in a piece of break with tomato sauce with or without bbq’d onions. An easy and common (in Australia) way to feed a crowd. If the sausage sizzle is held at a polling booth during an election it’s called a democracy sausage.

Hi Hive, It’s my daughter’s eighth birthday soon and I’m hoping for some help on a craft/activity idea. We are having a party but keeping it simple with basically just a sausage sizzle and snack food at a park. I don’t usually do party games etc but I do like to have something set up for the kids to do at their leisure. In the past I’ve done decorate a slap-band and those dinosaur egg digs, simple but the kids enjoyed them and had something to take home. It will be 5ish eight year old girls plus a dozen or so younger 4-7 siblings and cousins. Plus a few younger/older. Requirements: Not too costly Can be set up outside Interesting for the eight year olds and can be done mostly independently but still okay for the littles (can get help from parents). Thank you!

When my parents first bought land (mid 80’s) we lived in a caravan then a 2 room (large rooms with wardrobe dividers to make it into 5 rooms) cottage for about 8-9 years. Initially we had no running water but we did get cold water to the kitchen and I think the washing machine at some point fairly early on. The toilet was long drop out the back and a commode for night time, hot water was from a wood copper and shower was a canvas bush shower hung up indoors over a bath. We had electricity and clean drinking water. It was fine, I’d say I had a good childhood there, but I didn’t know any different. I could do it now if I had to, but I wouldn’t want to.

Both my kids had them for an extended period, on one child they kept getting infected. Washing with chlorhexidine regularly stopped the infections and also seemed to significantly decrease the spread, after we started that she still had them for quite a while but not a lot of them.

Yup. There are some woman who miss out on the government one, especially for 2nd children when they have them close together, but overall I think it does a fairly good job of capturing the majority of working mothers. It also includes self employed people. Of course as it's administered by Services Australia the application process is 100 times more difficult than it needs to be. Or was when I got it.

Casual employees are eligible for the government paid parental leave - as long as they meet the work test which is to work: 10 of the 13 months before the birth or adoption of your child a minimum of 330 hours, around one day a week, in that 10 month period no more than 12 week gap between each work day in that 10 month period The government one came in a few years before the birth of my eldest, and while it's not a great amount (given the push to breast feed for 6 months it should be at least that!) it was certainly helpful. I'm permanent part time (full time prior to children) but only got government mat leave as I work for a small business, most small businesses don't offer any leave above what they are required by law to.

The map is accurate for Australia. Primary care givers are entitled to 18 weeks parental leave at minimum wage. For biological children the leave defaults to the mother but they can transfer it to the father. 'Dad and partner pay' is 2 weeks at minimum wage for the non primary carer. These are minimum entitlements and are paid by the government. Many large employers offer parental leave on top of this - main ones I've seen are 12 to 18 weeks at full pay or double that at half pay. Unpaid parental leave is a minimum of 12 months but some awards give longer - Catholic school teachers get their job held for 5 years from the birth of their youngest which seems to create some issues around permanent job availability for young teachers. One side of government was promising to increase to 26 weeks paid, but I think the idea has been dropped for now.

Kindergarten and Pre-Primary here are both supposed to be play based. In my opinion they are not. In our experience a good day care with a pre-k or kindy program is far more play based and age appropriate than school. When I went to school the cutoff was 31 December, now it's 30 June, so theoretically kids are 6 months older on average when they start. Really they are 6 months younger because pre-primary is now the first year of full time school instead of year 1. If they introduce another year before that I worry they will just push things younger - not the actual educational content but the structure. For reference I'm in Western Australia, school year starts January and currently kids are required to start full time compulsory school (pre-primary) when they are 4 or 5 (5 by 30 June that year). We have a year of optional but heavily encouraged free (government funded) 5 day a fortnight kindergarten the year before that (so age 3 & 4 at start of year). We are also very strict with cut offs here now, it is very hard to redshirt.

So the thing I have learnt today is that there are magpies that are not Australian magpies!

I'm in Perth, but not homeschooling, just the weirdo who likes to hang out on homeschooling boards. There used to be a fairly active Perth secular homeschooling message board which seemed to have a high representation of quirky kid parents, but it may have died as I can't find it now. If she is on Facebook there is a Homeschooling Perth and a Homeschool Western Australia group, no idea how friendly they are as I don't use them. There are also separate south of the river (SOR) and north of the river (NOR) groups. I have not come across any gifted/accelerated specific groups but they may exist.

We have rules, chores, and weekly pocket money. But If you ask my kids we probably have no rules as they are never really stated. We have no rule about where to eat but when they have food I ask them to go eat at the table or take it outside. We have no specific bedtime but we have a routine that has the kids in bed at around the same time each night, and it’s not an option for them to just say no I’m not doing that tonight. We have fairly strict screen time limits, they can’t just go and watch tv when they want. For chores they are required to clean up their areas (bedroom, craft, toys) on Saturday morning so my husband can vacuum. As they get older we will probably ask them to help out with things sometimes, but I can’t see us adding any more assigned chores.

My 7 year old really likes Phoebe and her Unicorn, I haven't read it myself though.

Things are odd here in WA. Our first community spread of Omicron was a month ago and yet numbers are still only around 15 a day. Optimistically it’s our high vacc rates and good contact tracing. More likely though I think is there is a much higher number of infections in the community that are not being picked up as the demographic it’s currently circulating in (from the many nightclub exposure sights) are reluctant to get tested and have to quarantine.

I’ve read the first 4 Wayward Children, enjoyed some and not others. But as you say they are very short so I’ll probably give the rest a try. The only other of the author’s books I’ve read is Newsflesh, I really enjoyed the first but thought it went downhill in the second and third.

I’m not sure. Delaying the border opening wasn’t super popular, so if we end up with high numbers and a closed border it’s not going to go down well. I think with closed borders we have a better chance to slow it down and not overwhelm our hospitals, so I personally prefer it. But most of my family and friends are here, it’s a lot harder for others. They should never have said the opening was set and wouldn’t change though - that’s lost a lot of trust.

Omicron has now started to spread in WA, we had 24 cases yesterday and 13 today. Most are traceable to known cases/location at the moment so still mostly under control I think. With ‘Australia Day’ celebrations still going ahead (at this stage) on Wednesday I’m not optimistic about keeping numbers low but we will see.

I am currently reading Coming Up for Air by George Orwell. I’ve been reading it since sometime last year, bits and pieces when I don’t feel like reading anything else. I’m on holiday right now though (with young children, not the sit for hours reading type of holiday) and it is a good one for picking up and putting down a lot throughout the day. I’ve reserved my next book club book at the library, The Antidote for Everything by Kimmery Martin. I’ve not heard of the book or author before.

I have not, but I will eventually! I somewhat unfairly pushed Sanderson aside for quite a few years since I associated him with Wheel of Time which I am not a fan of.

I finished off my book club read Maralinga by Judy Nunn yesterday and I can’t say it ever really grabbed me. I found it quite slow moving, there was a point about 2/3 way through when I though it was getting more interesting but it only lasted a short while. It did prompt me to learn a bit more about the British nuclear tests in Australia though. I’ve now started Cytonic by Branden Sanderson and so far it’s exactly what I expected - I easy and fun YA read. @bookbardI’ll have to ask dh what his thought on The Little Princess are, he recently finished reading it aloud to DD who has just turned 7. I’m wondering if a lot of it went over her head.