Not the beach again!!

Happiness: colourful gerberas and a red KitchenAid

Our kids have no idea how lucky they are and each day this week when we've suggested going to the beach or out on the boat they have complained bitterly, put themselves back to bed, sulked and generally behaved appallingly.  Luckily, we're able to ignore them and carry on with our plans regardless.  With Nicola working in the film industry she felt that her trip to Sydney would not be complete without visiting Palm Beach where Home and Away is filmed.  We were happy to oblige and threw everyone in the car along with surfboard and boogie boards.  The surf was huge so we headed to kiddie's corner and both kids had a go surfboarding until Alex felt the call of the ocean and borrowed their board to catch a few waves.  Tom was seriously impressed and asked him which beach he had been practising on in the hope that if he went to the same beach he might too be able to stand up on his board!  

Jetty jumping

The La-La's (missing an A)

NYE dress up for kids

and for adults!

A Patio umbrella on a deserted beach

An attacking goanna

I'm almost forgetting to mention our New Year's Eve which was spent on Scotland Island with the Rumbolds and the Diggins.  As always it was a memorable 24 hours with the obligatory jumping off the jetty by the kids followed by vast amounts of food (and a little bit of beer/wine) and with Leanne and Angie making a last minute decision to take the kids to see the 9pm fireworks.  They left at 8.55pm and caught only the last 3 minutes of the fireworks which Tess was unimpressed by but the others enjoyed the adventure of heading out in the boat in the dark.  It's the first NYE that Jules has spent with us for the past 2 years and so I made a special effort to stay up and see the new year in.  Needless to say there were a few sore heads the next morning so we headed out on the boat to a remote beach where we sat under a patio umbrella (why waste time with a beach umbrella when you can use a patio umbrella complete with cast iron stand!) and got attacked by a hungry goanna.  

The McEnnie kids

Tess on the doughnut

Note Tom's walking stick just like Yoda's

The good weather has allowed us to make use of the speedboat and we spent 2 days with the Mennies swimming off Castle Rock beach and taking the kids out on the doughnut.  To be fair they preferred playing on the doughnut without the assistance of the speed boat but Tess was brave enough to have a short go.  The kids spent hours playing Star Wars (Hunter was Anakin and Tom was Yoda) whilst we sat and read the paper - blissful!

Tom desperately wanted a Penny skateboard (one of those plastic mini-skateboards) for Christmas which we failed to get him.  However, he was lucky enough to get money for his birthday from Aunty Ali and for Christmas from Uncle Nate and Sarah so we worked out that he could actually buy his own if he wanted to.  Of course he did want to and so entailed a huge search around all our local sports stores to try and find one.  After a futile morning's search we had to concede defeat and when we came home Tom was so disappointed he put himself to bed and cried.  Eventually I managed to find a store on the Internet with a head office not far from us and even better they had every colour of skateboard in stock.  We headed down there and a very kind man (actually more a cool skater dude than man) not only helped Tom choose and adjust his skateboard (he chose a red one) but also gave him a quick lesson on the best way to ride it.  Tom was in seventh heaven and has spent every waking minute practising ever since.  In a rare show of common sense Tom has, without nagging, been putting on his helmet as even he realises that these small skateboards go a lot faster than the big ones and are a lot less stable.  


Hugo William Diggin was christened today and we had a lovely ceremony at their local church followed by a delicious lunch back at the Diggins.  The kids spent most of the time in the pool as it was a hot and humid day which allowed us to chat and relax.  Jules was away sailing on Oka in the Harbour Island Marathon Race which he has won for the past 2 years so the race organisers upped him to the 1st division.  We're not sure of the results yet and although we know Oka didn't win she still did very well for her size.  

Back to work for Jules tomorrow.  Endless days of summer for me.  I could get used to this.