Celtic Nights

(had to add this pic of boy in the head gear! Minnie carpenter in the making-- watch out girls)

n.b: if you look quickly past this pic it looks like he is flipping the bird, just sayin.

The week before last we went to the ward Celtic Night.

 I wish I got a picture of the groupies (the band actually had groupies wearing Om Doru t-shirts)

I threw my bra at them.. ok, I didn't but they were hot for old men right?

A wee leprechaun was the presenter for the evening..

Ok its my father-in-law disguised as a wee leprechaun.. 

Ok, OK - hes not a leprechaun are you happy?!

There was eating and singing and dancing.

Until we all collapsed onto each other exhausted and headed home at 8pm (what! I'm an old man now ok!!)

As a side note, I cannot understand scottish. Even if it is a base level of English. who says A F R I C A N like efreikenng anyway!

This makes living with hunnas scottish parental (#uno- above) a constant comedy..

EXOH- oh oh 

Wangling Life

Down with the funk and up with the small things.

Things I am crushing right now.

Will & Boy sharing bestie time together.

Hunna spending special time with Boy.

My favourite swim activity, walk the plank.

Macarons - Please Please may I have 10 EVERY day.

Strawberry & Cream Macaron = Delicious! 

Boy learning to ride a bike

OK, so we taped his feet to the pedals - how else could we teach him!?

Catching pre-caught snakes in the back yard and being brave enough to photograph it so we can identify it.

Playing super hero's

swoooosh.... (yeah, I made that cape.)

FLASHboy

eXOheXOh

Valentines Shenanigans

Oh Valentines, how I love thee...

How could a girl be more spolit than waking up to this?

"Only the breast for Mumma"

served by my little waiter.

Chicken Breast, Avacado and eternity mayo swirls on toast.

Until the waiter got tired of holding the plate and threw it all on the ground, oh well - maybe next year I'll be able to eat my brekkie!

After I was presented with some beautiful pink roses and a rather interesting message dictated by Hunna and sent by Siri. 

I ran some errands and was surprised with a special family outing. Of the outdoors kind..

Jazz packing. (It amazes me how much we can fit in this car)

Even Cocoa got to enjoy a few hours with us on the river. Of course, Kyle paddled the "gondola" while I relaxed in the back with Boy. (couldn't take the camera on the river, too risky!) but we floated through some lilypads and pointed at birds and laughed and sang to our hearts content.

Ok, really when they say don't work with children or animals (who says that?) Well, whoever they were, they were right. I didn't relax at first because Boy was being choked by his life vest every time he sat down and ended up lying on top of me with half his little face poking out of the top before he figured out he could stand up and not fall out or be bothered by the vest.

Then Cocoa was looking like she was about to drown because she was having so much fun she refused to paddle to the side and walk down the bank. I think she went under a couple times before deciding it was time to give it a rest!

On the way back the current was strong and it kept taking the back of the 'gondola' out from us which left us spinning in the middle of the river. It actually took twice as long to "float/spin" back down the river than it did to paddle into the current up river. There were professional rowing teams practicing on the river and I am pretty sure they were wondering what we were doing.

At one point (they were being coached by a man in a speed boat with a loud speaker) he remarked "the best seats in the house, and the tickets are free" as we, flounder/floated away trying to look pro but failing miserably.

After a fun afternoon we went home and put the boy to bed (and the dog, also exhausted).

Before heading out to dinner at Lamby's.

Suiting up.

(above) practicing seagull impersonations.

The Valentines outfit. Note: firehosiery stockings. yipee..

The menu

The ambiance

The food.

Thanks for being me Valentine boys.

ex oh ex oh

Funk Funkety Funk

To be honest with you I have been in a bit of a post holiday funk.

Its seemed as if the whirrling ball of life had come to a grinding halt after being so fast paced in the weeks leading up to Christmas.

I have a LOT of bored photobooth pictures accumulating.

(just realised I really should start making my bed in the morning)

I am pretty sure Boy experiences the same thing on the train..

(train funk)

It seemed as if this particular post holiday funk was going to be a hard one to shake.

The weekend before last I contracted the flu and I lay in bed ALL weekend just to show HOW sick I really was and only just made it to church on Sunday (begrudgingly) dragging my heels the entire way.

Usually when  I am getting down in the funk I make a change.. which usually means  

A) I write a monumentally HUGE list of things I have been putting off forever. or

  B) get a hair cut/colour.

However!

Its the hair cut cures which have led me into into some hideous situations..

I am pretty sure that crazy reds are not going to cut it when I am trying to capture the demure of Audrey Hepurn ..

And the lists .. well, they are just plain ridiculous...and very LOONG

(above, non funk list size)

The day after Australia Day I woke up and went on facebook only to be shocked with the sudden death of a friends Husband. Her Son had passed away only 4 months prior. I was devestated to hear the news and booked a flight to Tasmania that afternoon to attend the funeral.

Now I was in Tasmania (still in a funk) with a funeral to attend and the 10 year anniversary of my own Fathers death coming up.

I called Hunna and gave him the compulsary funk talk (the one where I complain about how he ruined my life) It was starting to look like a 1950's horror movie and I played the creature.

On Tuesday at the funeral when Lisa was giving the Eulogy for Aaron she said something that made me start to think.

On the day that Aaron passed away we spent some time at Binalong Bay.  The weather turned bad but that didn’t stop him from spending ages in the water, jumping the huge waves with my brothers and brother in law Alex, until me and my sister Nicki decided to join them.

I don’t often go swimming in the ocean as I find it too cold, but for some reason that day I just decided to run into the water and join him jumping in the waves.  After a while I started getting cramp in my leg, so decided it was time to get out, and so did Aaron, but after a while he ran back in with Alex.  It was very windy and rainy and the kids were all freezing on the beach, so we decided it was time to pack up and go. Everyone kept telling them to get out of the water, but Aaron decided that he wasn’t keen on getting out and gave us all the forks to tell us that he wasn’t getting out. 

He said to Alex that you can’t waste that kind of day as the next day the waves mightn’t be so big

I decided instead of colouring my hair a crazy colour - or writing monumentally HUGE lists of things to do and not doing them. Instead of giving Hunna the proverbial funk whinge. I am not going to worry about the ALWAYSERS so much.

I can't always have everything clean or tidy, I cant always be the Mum, wife, cook, cleaner, doctor, entrepreneur that I want to be.

Instead I can choose to make the small things count.

Because tomorrow the waves might not be so big.

Jess x

Will turns one.

January 26th was Australia day, lucky us got to go celebrate a first birthday!

snags on the barbie and friends in the park, there wasn't a better way to spend our Aussie day.

Hunna cut his hair especially for the occassion (getting a bit of a tan up on the ole head there)

Bastian had so much fun throwing all the balls around - its always good when other parents are well prepared and we get to enjoy the spoils!

I am a little behind on the blogging! eek.. more to come.

Jess x