Happy New Year!

There is so much to report on that I don't really know where to start! Firstly let me wish you all a very Happy New Year - I didn't get to speak to as many of you as I would have liked but please be assured that I was thinking of you all.

A lot of you were following St Jude's progress in the Sydney-Hobart and thank you for all your lovely messages. As you know, St Jude was leading on handicap for about 10 hours during the second day due to a strategic decision to move off shore and benefit from the current to carry them down. Unfortunately, they did end up relinquishing their position in the lead but still did incredibly well finishing fourth in their division and class. Jules has promised that he will do his own St Jude blog post with some pictures and more details of his adventure.

The weather here has been truly dreadful - Andy very sadly left today and I think he probably got about 4 days of sun out of the 14 he was here for. We can't remember such a dreary and rainy christmas since 1999! However, it has still been warm so when the rain has held off we've got out and about. The day after the Sydney-Hobart started we had decided to go camping but due to weather held off for an extra day and had a wonderful time at the zoo seeing all the baby animals - elephants, chimpanzees, binturongs, seals etc.

We left to go camping in torrential rain which lasted until 10 minutes before arriving at the camp site. We were very worried that we'd made a big mistake in going but once we arrived the clouds cleared and we had beautiful weather for the 2 days we were there. I took Andy and Kristie to Coolendel because I wanted to guarantee some wildlife spotting and we did very well with the kids patting a wombat and seeing lots of kangaroos, goannas and kookaburras. They had great fun swimming in the river - Tess was a star jumping off the high rocks into the river on her own and Tom constantly gave me (and all the other adults in the river) heart failure by swimming over to the rocks on his own and playing "dead" in the water! Our friends John and Leanne with Noah and Charlie came too and it was a lovely combination with the kids all playing beautifully together and our 4 kids benefiting from a bit of "dilution". The first afternoon we were there we'd got the kids ready to go for a swim when Tom and Sam discovered a big muddy puddle - 5 minutes later the two of them were unrecognisable but very pleased with themselves!

New Year's Eve was spent on Reef beach with a heap of our friends and their children. We took the shorter but steeper route to Reef beach which is only accessible on foot down a long flight of stairs but the children were brilliant and we only had to carry Anna on the way back up.

The rest of the time we've spent swimming in the sea which Andy developed a real taste for especially boogie boarding - even I went in on New Year's Day and caught a few waves. We've also been for a number of walks and coffee in Manly with Princess Anna who takes every opportunity to wear a crown and a pair of heels!