Christmas Day

Christmas Day was pretty relaxed at our house as we had done everything Christmas Eve- I loved it! I woke up early as usual so took the big dogs for a walk and made my Christmas pudding.

Amy went over to Bindi and Simon's for Christmas Lunch, the rest of us stayed home and had croissants with ham and cheese for lunch. Later that afternoon Bill, Lachlan and I joined Amy at Simon and Bindi's were we had fun playing Christmas bingo!

  Here we all are concentrating very hard to keep up with Simon's calling 

Lachlan won these glasses at Bingo!

Christmas Eve Present Time

After coming home from the Hyatt we opened our presents. Now the kids are adults waiting till Christmas Morning becomes a bit of a non event, they all sleep in so we do it Christmas Eve. The new tradition is seeing what ridiculous ways Bill will wrap his presents- he is very much a Christmas Grinch and thinks it is all one big waste of time and money but he conforms is some small way. This year he put some money in is hold army socks filled with shredded paper so Amy and Lachlan had to search through that to get their money, My present was a re gifted Christmas card and probably chocolates wrapped up with old paper work notes tied up with old electrical cable- he puts great thought into the wrapping! We had lots of laughs and it was a fun family time.

 

 Jack keeping and eye on things to make sure they don't get out of hand

Benji and Luna

 Meet Zoogles- Amy's new Macaw- the only bird I will ever buy her!

Ziggy meets Zoggles!

 Maybe I can keep Zoggles on my head to keep Ziggy from landing on it!

 Beau and Lyra opening up their present

 Bill just loves opening presents! We only buy him something he needs-this year it was a short sleeve shirt and some new crocs- maybe he will wear them before next Christmas.

 Lachlan and Jack

 Zoggles the new macaw!

 Trying to find the money in a sock full of shredded paper

 My beautifully wrapped present!

He did show a bit more enthusiasm through the whole process believe it or not!

Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve we went to the Hyatt with Bindi, Simon, Mia and Charlie. We had a lovely night and enjoyed being able to share it with our Canberra family. Good opportunity to get some family photos as well. 

 Simon and Charlie

 Mia with her bag of orange birthday presents

 Lachlan and Bill

Bill and I 

   Family Christmas Shot

 Simon, Bindi, Charlie and Mia

 Canberra Cousins

 Amy 

Bindi

Star Wars Movie

A week ago we went to see the new Star Wars Movie. Daniel from church had organised booking the whole theatre. Simon, Bindi, Mia and Charlie came and Charlie and Simon were dressed up. We had a fun night, afterwards we went to MacDonald's for an ice cream- Goodberry's was shut!

Lachlan walking in with Simon AKA Jabba the Hut

Me and my little brother, Simon

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Charlie dressed as Hans Solo- this photo really doesn't do his costume justice but the only one I had!

Amy's Birthday Trip to Melbourne

For Amy's birthday this year she and I had a trip to Melbourne. We stayed one night in the city at the Stamford Plaza Hotel and then had one night out at Berwick  with my mum. Amy had missed out on coming to Melbourne for Pam's 80th so wanted to catch up with her Grandma.After flying in we picked our hire car and had lunch with Bill's sister Hilary, her husband Stuey and son Tom. We had a lovely time catching up with them, We headed to our hotel and after settling in we headed out to make sure the chocolate shops we love were still all up and trading-fortunately they were.

 The lovely Royal Arcade all decorated up for Christmas- it has a Koko Black so Amy had an ice chocolate and I had a yummy hot chocolate. You sit up stairs in and can see all the shoppers wandering along the Royal Arcade.

 Good to see Haighs was still doing well- we helped them along with a few purchases!

Bourke Street Mall was full of people, we stopped and watched this busker for a while- he was so good!

We had dinner that night at a Spanish Tapas restaurant and also had foot massage at a Thai massage place- it was lovely. In the morning while Amy slept I went for a wander along Southbank, down to the Pollywoodside, back into Melbourne for a quick look at the Myer Christmas windows while the city was still waking up. Enjoyed looking at all the Christmas decorations including the Lego Christmas Tree in Federation Square.

After our buffet breakfast at the hotel in the morning and a quick bit of shopping we headed out to Berwick and spent the rest of the day with my mum. We helped out with jobs around the place, took her shopping and then went out for dinner to an Afghan restaurant in Dandenong for dinner. We had a lovely meal and plenty of food!

All that remains of 22 Lyall Road Berwick where I spent my teenage years and mum lived for about 40 years!

The next morning we drove up to Narre Warren North and visited Tracey O'Keefe who used to live in Canberra and now is in mum's ward. I experienced chook house envy when I saw her chook house Amy had great fun with all her animals- a massive rooster and below an even bigger turkey. Tracey had lots of chooks and turkeys and babies hatching it was chook heaven for Amy!

All to soon it was time to head to the airport and back to Canberra- it was a lovely trip away and a nice way to celebrate Amy's birthday.

Alexander James

I put up a post about Alex earlier in November but needed to take it down for a while, Alex collapsed and died suddenly in early November, he was 23 years old. Alex is the son of Bill's cousin Jocelyn and her husband Steve he live in Sydney. They have another son Christopher who is 25. Our families lived near each other when we were in Sydney, and we spent much time together, we can never remember what type of cousins our kids were to each other- 2nd cousins once removed or something, but our kids were as close as any real cousins. After we moved to Canberra we went on many family holidays together over the years, Dubbo Zoo, Kangaroo Valley, Mollymook, Batemans Bay, a road trip to Melbourne just to name a few. Often in the school holidays the kids and I would go up for a visit, Lachlan would often cry when we left! Sometimes we would meet in Bundanoon and do a kid swap, we have many wonderful memories of Alex and so it has been a sad and difficult time for us all. Whenever I think about how sad I feel I think about Jocelyn and Steve and Chris and can only glimpse at the sadness they must feel.

We knew Alex from the day he was born, we knew him as a little boy, and we saw him blossom as a young adult and work out where he was going despite the struggles he had as a young boy and teenager growing up with ADHD, he and Amy were always close and shared a love of animals and were similar in so many ways. He was always comfortable with us and he knew he could be himself with us. We feel privileged to have known him and grateful he was part of our lives even for just a short 23 years. We miss you Alex along with so many others who miss you as well.

Bill's 60th Birthday Weekend Get Away

Bill turns 60 this week so we had a weekend away at Burradoo in the Southern Highlands. We stayed at Southdown Stable a lovely 2 bedroom/2 bathroom cottage on Southdown Estate just near Bowral. Jos and Steve came down from Sydney to join us and we had a lovely relaxing 2 night stay. Didn't do a whole lot- but that was the point of the exercise, came home feeling very relaxed.

 The cottage was set on a block of about 6 acres with lovely gardens which we could wander around, so many little areas and nooks and crannies- it was just lovely.

 Bill as the entrance to Southdown

 Our cottage for the weekend- Southdown Stable- just lovely

 On Saturday we headed out to Mt Gibraltar- this was one of the many views

 Bill and I

 The soon to be birthday boy contemplating life

The lovely Corbett Gardens in Bowral where we visited the CWA Garage Sale and sampled some of their cooking and ended up going home with a packet of 6 scones for free as they were closing for the day!

It was so nice to get away after a very difficult November and recharge the batteries.