Loving our neighbours

We have had the nicest weekend with our neighbours, who we think may soon believe we are weirdos from a neighbour-loving cult. (Which is ridiculous because everyone knows we formed our own splinter cult from the neighbour-loving cult months ago.) Saturday started with aslightly more successful ballet class for Scarlett who only had to be talked into dancing for the first 20 minutes of the 30 minute class, before finally joining in, and then only with Margaret the 56-year-old teacher. In the afternoon we went in to see our next door neighbours Kirsty and Simon for a bbq. Scarlett and Gabe play so well together we hardly saw them and Florence and two-year-old Charlie pottered about in the garden. Watching the kids play swingball, took me back and made me feel old all at the same time. The grown-ups in the meantime settled in for an afternoon of Singapore Slings, thanks to the generous donation of bush limes from another neighbour, while the sausages and chicken cooked and the potatoes roasted. When it was time to eat the kids all sat together at 'the kids table". My god, it really doesn't seem that long ago that I was sitting at such a table, when mum and dad had friends over to our house. After dinner they jumped in the bath together before being snapped, ensuring embarrassing incriminating photos to be produced at 21st birthday parties in the future.

This morning was gloriously spring-like, despite the season still officially being about 4 weeks off. After soccer,  and with Rob sleeping off a night shift and Florence out for the count in her cot, I sat on the front verandah in the sun reading the papers, chatting to Kirsty and Simon, doing the same on theirs, while the kids zoomed up and down the footpath on their scooters. It feels like home.