Mess

Following on from our assault on our neighbour's wet cement slab, the council have been round to ask them who made a mess of their handy work and are threatening Kirsty and Simon with a bill to re do it. This seems a bit absurd as they'd have to charge homeowners across the land who have made their mark in the quick-drying concrete. In the last few weeks Flo has worked out how to stretch her way out of her sleeping bag and therefore her cot. To this end, we've decided to start getting her ready for a move to her big girl bed. We've ditched the sleeping bags in favour of her own duvet and pillow set and put the side of the cot down so it's more like a bed. We've promised that if she's good and stays in bed, she will get a bed just like Scarlett's. It has been an entertaining few nights. She happily goes to bed and is left in a sleepy state snuggled under the covers. But then the stealth-like Mission Impossible Flo takes over. Without making a sound, she has been climbing out of her cot, removing her pyjamas and nappy and getting completely redressed. We don't discover any of this until she makes a surprising entry into the hallway looking pleased as punch. This is, of course, completely adorable and after some stern words of encouragement and the threat of a return to the sleeping bag, she gets straight back into bed. On Thursday night however, she

upped the stakes. About 40 minutes after she had gone quietly to bed, we heard a noise from her room. I asked Rob to quietly pop his head in. Next thing, he's calling me down the hall with a mixed expression of hilarity and dismay on his face. There was Flo, naked, standing in the middle of the room. In between her and Rob was a large fresh poo, that Rob had just squashed flat by opening the door over the top of it. I'll spare you the details involving the extent of the cleaning up, but let's just say, Flo's door won't need a draught excluder anymore. Other than that, she has been going well with her day time toilet training and has had 2 good days of undie wearing and is very proud of the stickers she gets every time she makes a trip to the loo.

In other news, here's a photo of Scarlett chanelling the girl in the pearl earring.

It's book club tomorrow night. Iam relieved to have finished The Little Stranger, a ghost story that had me awake in the night at the slightest noise or wind gust. Am interested to see if any of the other girls suffered from sleepless nights. Our next book is the classic The Fountainhead.

I am now into my 4th week of running podcasts. A 43-year-old smooth-talking Californian man talks me through when to run and walk, times the warm up and cool down and provided loud techno tunes to run to. I make quite a sweaty sight I'm sure as I launch myself around the bay at Glebe. V pleased with my efforts so far as I have been doing it 3 times a week. Well done me. Cream buns all round.

The Galvins come to town

The Galvins came to Sydney this weekend. For the last 10 years, we have visited them at their home in Bundeena. Our new house is the first one we have lived in big enough to accommodate our growing brood (we are now 8) and so this was our first chance to pay them back for all their generosity over the years. The weather was spectacular and after pizza for the kids, they were variously put to bed and in front of DVDs while the we got on with the job of eating, drinking and playing Triv - the girls won. On Sunday we managed a subdued (sore heads) day with the girls all playing beautifully together, while we sat about reading the paper and lolling on the grass in the park.



Slightly horrified this morning when chatting to our lovely neighbour Kirsty. They were all away for the weekend and missed our pavement handwork. Not long into the conversation Kirsty revealed the cement slab we ruined was paid for by them, to the tune of $300 and is part of the compulsary work they have to complete before their recent renovation will be approved by the local council. Oops.

Hilarious

Rob and I broke our recent trip on the wagon with a small outing last night involving 3 large gins. Thus lubricated, we sat down and laughed and laughed our way through the film Airport 75 on Fox Classics. The airline disaster movie, starring Karen "Which of my cross eyes is looking at you?" Black and Charlton" Make mine a shotgun" Heston, tells the thrilling and often hilarious tale of a light aircraft that crashes into a 747 on approach to Salt Lake City. The film is so close to the spoof film Airplane, it's a wonder anyone thought the spoof necessary at all. This morning we woke still chuckling at the memory of stewardess Karen Black taking the controls, with not a hair out of place, despite the massive hole in the cockpit.
We also received visitors in the form of Mark and John Russell, the Duthie family's oldest and closest friends, who are in Sydney from New Zealand for the weekend for tonight's Bledisloe Cup match. The rivalry between the All Blacks and the Wallabies is legendary and they had an inflatable Wallaby at the ready with which to insult Australian rugby fans. On our way out the door with them to the local growers' market, we discovered a huge slab of wet cement right outside the house, recently laid by the council. It was obviously too good an opportunity to miss, so after engraving the names of the girls and our next door neighbours kids for posterity, we also left a comment regarding the Ashes test going on in England at the moment.

Returning 2 hours later from the market we discovered our artwork completely removed, care of a council employee's trowl. That didn't stop us making a second imprint in the now quick drying cement. Ha!

Bundeena is brilliant

We have just spent the most magical weekend in Bundeena, one of Sydney's most southern suburbs on the southern rim of Port Hacking in Royal National Park. We normally go there once a year to stay with our mates Nick and Meg, but this time we were joined by top English pals the McPhersons for a weekend away at a fantastic rented beach house. Perched on the edge of a rocky sandstone outcrop, The House on the Rock couldn't have been much closer to the ocean.


The huge deck was rimmed by a glass fence and child-proofed gates which was just as well, with two of the gates opening out to a rock area with a sheer drop down to the rocks and ocean below. While we were sure that the kids could never go out there, Rob, Jules and I all managed a few moments of quiet time, with a beer or a wine, gazing out over the water at the swimming pool clear water in the bay below.


Jules and Lenka's kids, Tess and Tom, had a great time with Scarlett and Flo, with Tess and Scarlett inseparable throughout the weekend. We spent our days walking along the beach, watching the kids jump in the freezing water, and our evenings eating, drinking and playing Cluedo, Triv ("it's Jason!! The answer is Jason and the Argonauts!!") and Cranium.




On Sunday we were even sunbathing on the beach as the mercury climbed to 29 degrees. This is still winter, people! We were visited by kookaburras and had to keep the gates to the house locked to stop deer popping in too. The house was fantastically appointed and beautifully furnished and decorated so we all felt pretty special. That's the house on the top of the overhanging cliff in photos 1 and 7. Cream buns all round.