Let's see now, where do I start?
At the beginning, OK!
Born on 17 November 1963, that makes me 34, along with my twin brother Michael
who beat me by 35 minutes, I screamed the place down and had to be separated
from all the other babies, yes folk, it all started back then!
I already had 4 other siblings - Robert, Karen, Mark and Lynda, poor Mum was
kept very busy!
Auckland, New Zealand
is my place of birth, where I grew up and completed my schooling at
Waitakere College.
After working in NZ for a year or two I decided the economic climate in
New Zealand was not conducive to getting ahead so made the move to Australia, to Adelaide, where my eldest
brother Robert had already established himself.
It wasn't long before my twin brother Michael joined me in Adelaide soon followed by my sister
Lynda, however Michael decided after a couple of years that Australia wasn't
for him, so he returned to New Zealand.
About a year after arriving in Australia, Steve became a part of my life, and
after going out for a number of years, we married on 4 June 1993 in
Fiji. It was very casual, down by the
beach next to a lily pond; very romantic. We then spent 2 weeks honeymooning
there, some day we would love to return.
Our first son David was born on 22 July 1994 much to our great joy.
Two years and 10 days later Richard joined the family.
I am now a stay at home mum, and loving it, to my 2 boys and a girl, now aged 4, 2
and 4 weeks old respectively.
They have their own pages detailing their birth stories and interests, including links to child related sites.
CHOOK'S INTERESTS AND FAVOURITE LINKS
I have many interests, trouble is, so little time in which to do them!
My children would have to be my number one interest. I love to surf
the net looking for child related sites and chat to other mums.
Here are some great parenting sites and also sites that have great
activities for children (colouring, dot-to-dot, learning activities, etc.)
That brings me to my next passion, the internet. I have have found it to be an all-consuming, fascinating
hobby. I get the shakes if I am away from the computer for a day! A lot of
the cyber friends I have made can vouch for that! Creating my home page has
been a wonderful learning experience and I have had a lot of help and advice
along the way, thanks to my friends out there in Cyberspace. Thanks guys!
My chat name is Chook, I am always chatting somewhere!
I've had a lot of help creating my web site and here are some of the url's
that have been passed on to me by my cyberfriends that I have found really helpful:
Borders, sets, designs, graphics, icons, buttons, bars, etc.
I have always had an interest in herbs and indeed gardening of any kind.
My mother has always been a keen gardener and it must have rubbed off on me!
I don't get to spend as much time as I would like in the garden, but my
garden pretty much takes care of itself (a case of having to!).
I love to potter though and my children love to get dirty out there too!
David is getting to know the difference between weeds and plants now so
is getting to be a great help. One day, when we own a house with a lot more
land, (my dream) I would love to establish my own herb garden using a
traditional layout.
Here are some of my favourite herb and garden links:
Channel 9's great gardening programme - go here for the fact sheets
Reading has always been an obsession of mine. My mother has always said that
I should work in a library or book store. From the time I was a small child I
have always read (we didn't have a TV when I was a kid, so that probably had
something to do with developing a love of reading). When I was a teenager through
my twenties, I loved to read romances and adventure books, now most of the books
I read are cookbooks, gardening books, child rearing, self development,
motivational types of books.
Crafts of numerous types are another of the things that I adore.
I have sewn since I was 11, have always made my own clothes (though not since
the children were born), I am getting back into sewing now.
I crochet, embroider (specifically hardanger), cross stitch,
would love to learn how to quilt, and like rubber stamping and making my own
greeting cards. Basically just love crafts in general!! Hoping to reach
myself smocking in the near future, now that I have a little girl, I think
it will come in quite handy!
An Australia based sewing e-mail list - this is the home site
I have always been intrigued by self sufficiency and have been a buyer of
"Earth Garden" and "Grass Roots" for many years. Whether we will ever actually live the self sufficient life style is another story. Perhaps a city self sufficient lifestyle could be on the cards once we get that bigger house and yard! Here are a couple of sites related to this interest:
Channel 9's Our House Lifestyle Programme Home Page
Hope you have enjoyed getting to know me a little better and thanks for
visiting. Hope you can visit again soon, I will be trying to update my
site regularly, particularly the recipes, links and family album.
Chook with Richard and the Coyote at Movieworld (chook 6 months pregnant)
