Week 2 of the school holidays

Tess on Cal

Tom had surf school 4 mornings this week and for the first time I saw him go in a barrel although he was crouched down to mini-me size in order to fit!  Tess spent a day horse riding which was a huge success - I was very jealous - and had another day at Art Camp where she made a clay pot and painted a canvas.  In between all of that we had various friends over for play dates and managed to fit in Despicable Me 2 at the cinema.  I just love the holidays.

Tom in charge of the sausages

On Thursday afternoon Emma and I took the 5 kids to Manly Dam where we lit a fire and cooked sausages and marshmallows for dinner.  A particularly persistent kookaburra managed to steal one of the freshly cooked sausages whilst I was sorting out the bread rolls so we were all very careful with our hotdogs but spent the entire time watched by 3 kookaburras in case we let down our guard!  The kids had a ball climbing trees, pretending to fish, collecting firewood and once it got dark they played hide and seek spotlight.  Poor Jack was hiding behind a tree when a big fat possum decided he wanted to climb that tree and mistook Jack for the tree!  The possum then ran to the next tree where Tess was hiding and tried to climb up her too.  There was a lot of screaming.  

Noah, Tom, Tess, Charlie

On Friday we headed over to Scotland Island for the day.  The kids disappeared the moment we arrived and only came back occasionally to ask for food.  That gave Leanne and I plenty of time to work on some projects which involved putting up new coat racks and attaching a handle to one of the patio doors.  I was pretty impressed with our electric drill skills.  

Robert arrived back from the UK on Friday evening and we spent the following day helping him move into his new flat.  It's a really lovely flat - newly refurbished with lots of natural light.  Tess was a complete star and did lots of furniture moving and cleaning until we had everything just right.  

 Jules

 Tom

The weather was glorious on Sunday so we headed down to the beach and both Jules and Tom hired fibreglass boards.  It was Tom's first go on a fibreglass and it took a bit of getting used to but he did really well and is becoming a pro at catching waves on his own which is good news for Jules.  

In the afternoon Rob and I played tennis with the kids for a short while before kicking them off the court and playing just the 2 of us.  I'm clearly rubbish compared to Rob but it's great practice for me and thank goodness he's very patient!  We finished off a pretty perfect weekend with dinner out followed by an episode of River Cottage Australia - just brilliant!