Happy 18th Birthday Matthew - A year in Review

 March 2011 - Matthew celebrated his 17th birthday with friends at paintball.

 Elizabeth and Matthew working together at the newsagency.

 After Sports day at school

 A new addition to the family - Matthew fell in love with Cleo the moment he held her.

 Enjoying his new room

 Sharing a moment with Daddy

Celebraing Dad's birthday in November

 Playing in the park

 Helping out in the kitchen

Christmas morning - the banjo you have wanted forever

Hello Bella -

January 2012 in Disneyland

 Disneyland hotel pool - cool dude!

 Donald Duck and Matthew

I'm not scared Dad - are you?

March 2012 - Sarah's birthday

Happy Birthday Matthew - I hope 2012 is as fun filled and successful as 2011

Happy 14th Birthday Sarah

Happy Birthday special girl - we hope this little Bonsai Tree grows with you through your journey to adulthood. Enjoy nurturing it as much as we love nurturing you.
All our love and best wishes to you.  Mommy

Another Great Birthday

Happy Birthday Mum - I love both you and Dad so much

 Today for Mum's birthday her and Dad took us to a lovely restaurant in Toowoomba about an hour's drive away - I drove so Mum and Dad could relax.

The restaurant was called the Stone Grill and serves up the most amazing meals.  The stone platters are heated up to 400 degrees and your steak, chicken or fish arrives on it raw. You then slice up pieces and cook it to your own desired taste - oh my goodness what a treat!  I haven't had such a beautiful meal in ages and I know that I will not need to eat for another month.

My food cooking in front of me.

Sarah wanted the dessert - it was a 'Chocolate Strawberry Tower'

 The strawberries were placed on a spike and covered with chocolate sauce, with a jug of spare sauce - needless to say she was in heaven.  Elizabeth had divine chocolate mousse and I had chocolate baskets with ice-cream and berry compote - Just YUM!

 I had to add this last photo for everyone, Elizabeth has not eaten much meat for ages - but decided to try Mum's steak - I love the look on Mum's face - wonder what she is thinking?  My caption is:

Hope she doesn't like this too much?

Happy Birthday Mum - have a wonderful year.

Birthday Celebrations

November 16th & 17th are very special days in our house.
First Ivan celebrates his birthday on the 16th and then Mum celebrates hers on the 17th - so it is a double treat.

Yesterday Ivan came home from his 4 week trip - very tired, but glad to be home.

For those who have been following the renovations - his reaction was HOLY S**T!  (repeated a number of times as he took in the work we had done).  It was wonderful - even this morning when he woke up he was still talking about how beautiful it all looks.  So the effort, work and secret was worth it all.

We also decided to decorate the front of the hosue for Ivan for his birthday - so often he is away and to have him come home on the day was special.  So here are a couple of family photos.

I think he is loved!

Happy Birthday love, stay awake for another few minutes!

A very tired and jet-lagged Ivan enjoyed his presents with the family and a piece of cake and then it was an early night. 

Internet on Strike

Slow week for the internet - children used up all our Download/Upload

Posts will come later in the week.

Happy Birthday to my Dad for tomorrow - August 1st.

Paintball fun

Matthew celebrated his 17th birthday with 5 school friends yesterday. It was a great day and the boys came out with the appropriate number of bruises.

Looking cool and collected, ready to do battle.

Hot, sweaty and tired after 3 hours

Just one of many bruises - I think this one is going to be a beauty.

It was three hours of fun in the bush for the boys. I sat quietly and enjoyed reading my book and supplying them with cold drinks between games.

Happy birthday Matthew for tomorrow 29th March.

Celebrating a birthday

As you will have seen on my previous post we celebrated Sarah's 13th birthday yesterday.
In the morning we had a cooked breakfast.

With her gifts this year we had a surprise for her, tickets to the theatre production of 'WICKED' - I had bought the tickets back in November and kept is a secret all this time. She was thrilled, so we all dressed up and headed out for an afternoon show - which was amazing.



Tickets for Wicked!

 It is the first time we have all been to the theatre together and I had managed to get great seats. Elizabeth and I had seen the show in London, but we both thought that this production was in many ways better. Especially the voice of the 'Wicked Witch'.

We then went and had a lovely dinner together finishing off a special birthday.

Happy 13th Birthday

Welcome to the world of the Teenager - my beautiful Sarah

Wearing the Necklace Elizabeth gave you

Look at that figure - Dad where is the shotgun?

I hope you have a fantastic day and an amazing year.

It's my birthday and I'll smile if I want to!

Yesterday we celebrated my 'Un-birthday' - today is the first day of school, Ivan and Elizabeth are working and as it was Sunday, and we were all together we decided to celebrate.

My lovely children spoilt me with a beautiful necklace "B", earrings, a purple teddy bear and music. Ivan gave me a Kindle and also another beautiful 'Fairy' tile.

Elizabeth chose this beautiful necklace for the children to give me.

This beautiful wall tile was from Ivan

Not quite 47 candles, but I still couldn't blow them out - we celebrated with a chocolate, Australia-day Mud cake, it was fun.

Happy 72nd Birthday Dad

Sunday was Dad's birthday. We had such a lovely roast dinner down with Mom and Dad and I had the chance to have this lovely photo taken with my Dad.

It hit me for the first time ever, that he is 72 - he is so strong, healthy, active and well, that I never think of him aging. Still we are both getting older and it was lovely to share this wonderful meal together.

Dad, I know you plan to celebrate at least your 140th birthday, so I guess we will have a lot more of these photos together.

Happy 16th Birthday Matthew

Our wonderful son Matthew turns 16 today.

I wanted a couple of photos, but the glare was in his eyes, so this was the best I could get (for now).

Happy Birthday Matthew.

Birthday girl

Sarah's birthday party and sleep-over was a great success with 4 friends for the party and 2 who stayed overnight. The girls had a swim and we played games, including this great dress-up game.

Emily and Skye stayed over and they were all really good, chatting quietly till midnight and then going to sleep with no problems.

Happy 12th Birthday Sarah

Birthday girl with all her presents. I think one of her favourites is the coupon book, she has on her lap. It is an all year round gift with redeemable coupons for things like 'no chores, an extra hour to stay up late; being called Princess for a day etc. etc.' It is going to be a fun present.


Talking to Daddy who is in the USA.

Rebecca's 21st party

Elizabeth and Scott; Rebecca and of course Jan and Chris.

Elizabeth's boss Chris made the perfect Charlie Chaplin and Rebecca looked beautiful.

Almost everyone was in Black and White, so Elizabeth looked fantastic in her green dress. Scott made the perfect Riverboat gambler.

A great evening was Elizabeth's comment

Happy Birthday Elizabeth

Happy Birthday Elizabeth.

Yesterday Elizabeth, Mum and I went to the Chermside shopping centre (the other side of Brisbane). Everyone raves about it and we were certainly impressed. We started with a yummy breakfast and then enjoyed the shops. Looking in all the fun ones without feeling pressured by husbands of little children to hurry up and leave.

This was Elizabeth's gift from Ivan and I, a ring with all the semi-precious stones. It suits her delicate hand so well and she loved it - hmmm what a pity, as I was quite happy to have it if she didn't like it.

Finally, a birthday cake especially for you.

A plain double sponge cake with blackberry jam filling, vanilla icing and sprinkles. What the 20 year old ordered!

Congratulations on your birthday darling.

A lot of hard work.

As part of my Birthday present, Ivan gave me a year's membership at our local gym. I am now 46 years of age and have been gaining a kg every year or so and really need to think about my health.

So today after 60 squats and 40 sit-ups, 20 mins on the treadmill and 4 mins on the rowing machine, I am on my way to losing 5kg and getting back a fanastic figure. My goal is to fit into my leather pants again.

Look out for some photos, if I can get out of bed tomorrow.

A birthday gift from a friend

My lovely friend Michelle sent me this beautiful wind-chime of a little frog "to remind me to nurture myself and connect with the Faery Magick"
I thought the perfect spot would be outside my bedroom window so as I sit writing and working on my laptop, I could look out and see it and hear the tinkle of the chimes.


Ivan willingly put it up for me, so that I could enjoy it.

Thank you Michelle for making my birthday special once more.