It's been a busy couple of weeks with John and Rae arriving on 16th December as mentioned previously. The 16th was a very exciting day for other members of the family with Nate and Sarah welcoming the beautiful Alys into the world - congratulations!!
Rae flew over to NZ for a couple of days and the kids had a few more days of school so it was John and I at home together and we soon got into a lovely habit of coffee and cake at 11am. John's not very good at being idle and within 2 days of arriving he had built the most amazing tree house.
Kristie and Andy arrived on the 23rd and within 3 hours of touching down in Sydney they were out on the harbour taking part in the Manly Yacht Club Christmas Race whilst the kids stayed at home with me spending almost all the time in the pool. Once the sailors were back it was more pool time for everyone.
On Christmas Eve we took everyone to Shelly Beach for a dip in the ocean - it felt very cold after the 29 degrees of our pool. We went to an early evening Mass and then had a quiet meal at home in preparation for Christmas Day.
The kids waiting impatiently to open their presents
An obscene number of presents under our tree!
It was cold and grey when we awoke on Christmas Day but some traditions need to be upheld so John, Kristie, Andy, Robert, Jules and I headed to Manly beach for a swim. The rain started as we got out of the ocean and continued for the rest of the day which was perfect given the amount we subsequently ate and drank. Another Christmas tradition is watching the start of the Sydney to Hobart up at Dobroyd Head - it always makes Jules feel a little twitchy watching the boats go off without him.
Tom adjusting Sam's helmet
A fierce Chess tournament
"If I can't see you, you can't see me!"
Grandad on the motorbike
Lunch at Robert Oatley's vineyard
More motorbike riding!
Sam flooring it!
Tess on a tree bridge
Toasting marshmallows
A wombat
To take his mind off the race Craig and Lisa very kindly gave us the keys to the Farm and we headed up there on the 27th. Within minutes of arriving Tom and Sam were kitted out for motorbike riding and that's what everyone spent most of the time doing. We managed to feed the cows and did a day trip into Mudgee where we had a fantastic lunch at the Robert Oatley vineyard (his boat had just won the Sydney-Hobart for the 6th time!). It was warm up at the farm - temperatures in the 30s each day but we made the most of it spending a lot of time sitting on the deck contemplating the amazing view. We also managed to tick off a number of australian animals including kangaroos, wombats, goannas and an echidna which was a real treat. Back in Sydney and the warm temperatures continued so the kids hit the pool. New Year's Eve was spent at Craig and Lisa's house with 3 other families so the kids had lots of people to play with and we had a great view of the Manly 9 o'clock fireworks. The kids forced us home at 10.30 as they were all collapsing from exhaustion after all the swimming so we put them to bed and stayed up to see in the New Year which was fairly impressive given our latest night prior to that was about 10pm!
Expect more family shenanigans in the next blog post!
2 comments:
I love reading about your family life - so similar to ours but so completely different too (eg. echidnas and swimming pools!). Much love to you all for 2013 N xxx
Am looking forward to swimming in that pool. I seem to recall our last dip was a tad cool. Happy new year.
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