Hello everybody!

As you can guess, it’s been a busy time with our little girl and our blog has been getting neglected.

Willow is now 4 months old (where did the time go?) and we are still in the shed with the house a long way off.  Never mind … we’re comfortable and Willow loves the shiny silver walls in the shed.

Our plans for the house are in with council but of course now we are thinking of changing them which will make the approval process take a lot longer.  The aim is to have a house by the time Willow is in Primary School.  It is a joke but could possibly become reality.

Rob has been working hard as usual, his business has really taken off, he’s a doting dad and somehow he still finds time to chop wood, mow and basically keep the place running.  Thanks Rob!!

Things are a bit hectic at the mo, so the photos aren’t jumping on the web as fast as they could.

Here are some photos from the first day at the Hilton Hotel in Adelaide, our pitstop on the way home from Ashford to Clare.

Click to view the whole gallery.

You can probably tell that we are proud parents!

Here are a few pics of Willow and visitors to the hospital.

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Rob and Meg are proud to welcome our daughter Willow Lily Meri Mader at 9:53pm on 17/4/09 weighing in at 3.31Kg.

The three of us are healthy and happy and are enjoying getting to know each other.

If things go to plan, this will be the last update of pregnant Meg for all to see.

Here she is at 38 weeks, looking healthy and happy.

Maybe it is a little early, but the first baby fashion show was on tonight.

The reluctant model was a little shy, appearing to turn away from the bright flashing lights.

We’ll see in a few weeks time…

Yay, I’ve finally finished work!

So far I’ve had two days off and have managed to catch up on some sleep and get a few things done around the shed – even a little bit of study.

It’s a little scary though because this is the final stage before the baby arrives.  We don’t quite have everything ready yet, including the list of possible names, and there are only about four weeks to go.  I’m hoping the baby comes earlier though because my insanely huge belly is getting hard to cart around!

Well, not so much of an update of mega proportions, but an update about Meg (who some may say has reached mega proportions).

Meg’s Mum was after a photo update so I pulled out the camera and took a couple of shots.

What do you think? Is she beautiful or what?

Looks like the baby is coming soon… We’d better get ready!

With only about 10 weeks to go it seems like a good time to mention that the permanent population of the Journey will be increasing by one.  While Rob has been busy growing the vegies in the garden, I’ve been working on growing him a little helper.

The little bump in my belly, which initially looked like a beer belly, has been steadily growing in size and now looks like I’ve stuffed a watermelon up my shirt.  Maverick/Willow (as we currently call it - we originally named the embryo Wolfgang/Fernando) is getting more and more active as the weeks have passed making the idea of a Mini-Mader a lot more real.

We decided not to find out if it’s a boy or a girl but decided to have a surprise - and it’s not like there is a room to paint a particular colour as it will only be having a section of the shed which is the lovely unisex shade of silver.

As in most things we are pretty clueless to what we need to do or have prepared but figure we will learn as things progress like in everything else we do.  Through reading books and talking to friends and family who have had babies we have learned to expect the unexpected because no two pregnancies or babies are the same.  So thanks everyone for this support and also for all the new and second hand bits and pieces that have been given to us.