Yoga with the Birds

When I get back from my bike rides I like to spend about 15 minutes doing some stretching. Amy often brings the birds out and chats with me while I am stretching. It is lovely out in the lounge room when it is sunny, the sun just stream in. It can get a bit difficult you with birds flying on and off and keen to see what is going on.

Here are Ziggy and Zoe, as you can see they have settled in together well and enjoy each others company.

Red Cross Blood Donors

500 mls of precious Amy blood! Amy decided a few months back that she would like to become a blood donor. I used to give blood about 15 years ago, but once I returned to the work force I just got out of the habit, so Amy dragged me along for some moral support- not bad from a kid who used to be petrified of needles! All those piercings have toughened her up.

We actually went two weeks ago and as Amy had been unwell the week before she was ineligible so had to come back in two weeks. I was able to give blood, but returned with Amy two weeks later when she went to try again. This time she got through all the questions but when they went to test her hemoglobin levels it was too low. The decided to take a sample from her vein and that gave a better reading and it was high enough for her to be able to donate. She enjoyed the milkshake and goodies that they had afterwards!

We are both booked in again in 6 weeks time to give plasma- you can do that every 6 weeks, it does take longer but they are always pretty keen for plasma and they said Amy had veins that would be good for plasma so we will see how that goes!

Lachlan's Birthday

Lachlan celebrated his birthday last week on the Monday. He was up in Sydney catching up with Jos and Steve, his cousin Chris and his wife Siobhan. Looks like they had  a pretty good time. Jos and Steve took him out for breakfast at Cumberland State Forest. We brought him pizza from Crust when he got home on the Tuesday- think he might have been  happier with his birthday breakfast!

Stuff- I Phone Photos

My Blog has been a bit light on this year- here are some photos from the last few weeks or so.

On Friday I went to the War Memorial to meet a friend who works there, she took a couple of us around an exhibition on Camouflage that she had curated- it was really interesting and lovely to catch up with Ally. Afterwards I went for a bit of a wander through the memorial and had a look outside as well.

This is a new garden bed at the war memorial it is called the Flanders Memorial Garden, it has soil in it from Tyne Cot Cemetery in Belgium and soil for the Belgium Battlefields where Australian Soldiers fell. It is mixed with Australian soil as well and is a joint project between Australia and Belgium.

One of the lovely sculptures in the grounds of the War Memorial

A view down ANZAC Avenue to Parliament House that never fails to impress and make me feel lucky to live in Canberra.

Frozen bird baths above and below- we have had some cold mornings- minus 4 degrees but lovely sunny days. Today was  15 degrees - not bad for a Canberra winter!

Have been doing a bit of walking, training up for our trip to NZ in November. This is the back of Conder around the side of Tuggeranong Hill which gives  you lovely views across Lanyon Valley.  Below is Stranger Pond at Bonython Saturday morning, all places I can walk to from home.

Amy was giving Jack a trim, at one stage she had both Beau and Lyra on her arm watching and Luna sticking her nose right in trying to start a play fight with Jack. Luna disappeared once Amy tried to trim her nails!

Here is Zoe- Bill's macaw- she is lying on his lap being cuddled, she is happy to lie there for ages- I think Bill is very taken with his new bird,

Lachlan Officially a Sparky

Lachlan is officially licensed as an Electrician- he has completed his apprenticeship and been issued with his licence. About two weeks ago he got his transcript from CIT which had his certificate and all his subjects. He then had to submit an application to apply for his licence, his submission was accepted and then he had to pay for his licence and wait for that to arrive to be a qualified electrician. I had asked him several times last week if he had heard anything, got a not yet reply. Sunday afternoon I asked again, only to get a sheepish grin saying it had arrived on Friday afternoon! Not sure when or if he was going to tell us! Bit it is now official, and we did get a maybe out of him when I suggested we go out to dinner to celebrate!