This Week

Some random thoughts from the last week.

White chocolate and macadamia muffins

White chocolate and raspberry muffins :-)

Holding other gals babies.

A warm fire.

Homemade spring rolls.

Talking with my Mum and Dad on the phone.

A horrendously sore neck.

Rain.

Growing sprouts.

Homemade bread.

A chat with a very old school friend.

Washing, washing, washing.

Coriander...love it!


A VERY BAD SHOPPING TROLLEY.


Eggs from friends.


Time with my family.


Oh yes, and school!



Ken preached at the church this morning. I am very proud of him as I know he really dislikes public speaking! He did great.


He spoke on 1 Peter 4:10



Serve one another with the particular gifts God has given each of you, as faithful dispensers of the magnificently varied grace of God.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JENNA

Happy 18th Birthday Jenna!!

Thoughts of Jenna growing up..................

Her beautiful curly hair! (which we couldn't control)

Her chumpy cheeks everyone would pinch

Her "bath" look (only selected few have seen this)

Honiaria

Honest and loyal

And now???? Hairdresser extraordinaire! A wonderful friend! A woman of God!

I hope you had an awesome day, and know that we all LOVE you very much!

20 Years Ago

HAPPY BELATED BIRTHDAY TOM!

Last Wednesday was twenty years since I gave birth to my only son.

I was only 24, and already had two daughters.

His temperature was low, so the nurses put him in a humidicrib to warm him up.

When he was younger he loved cricket, ball games, reading, computers, and playing outside.

Now he's older, he loves playing the guitar, computers, and spending time with his lovely girlfriend Katie.

Happy Birthday Tom!

We all love you.

This is a little late due to the fact that getting good photos of Tom is very hard. Oh there's plenty I could have used, but I would be in trouble! Sorry Katie about "stealing" this photo. :-)

Bad Mumma

I know, I've been so bad at blogging.

So much has happened since Kylie arrived home last month. I really enjoyed having her here. We didn't do alot. Except hang out here at home, cook together (she's good), laugh lots, hug lots, and generally just thank God for my beautiful daughter and the adventure she had over the last 16 months.

She has left now to move 1000kms away to start Uni and another adventure in sunny QLD. And I miss you Kylie. Now my Mum and Dad get to spend time with her instead. I know they'll be loving that.

During the time since my last blog we've had MANY visitors. Some here for dinner, some for the night, some for the week, some for two weeks.
You know what that means......washing sheets and cooking. It's all been good, but busy, and now I just need a breather.
During the last three weeks, we had school holidays. Two of those weeks we had our friend's three daughters here to stay, while their parents travelled in Europe.

So, there was a 10yr old, two 13 yr olds, two 15 yr olds, a 17 yr old, a 21 yr old. And all girls!!!!
I took five of them to Bourke for a couple of days just to give us all a break. It worked well.

School started for us yesterday, it went well. The girls are motivated, and I'm proud of them! We are still working on our first part of World History until the end of the year. At the end of last term we made a trip to Orange which is about 1 1/2 hrs away to a Bell Shakespeare production. We had been reading through "Twelth Night" with another homeschool family in preparation for the performance. I didn't understand it! I don't recall doing Shakespeare at school and I didn't understand what we were reading. The girls did though. They are smarter than me! After seeing the perfomance (which was very funny) and reading the "Lamb's book of Shakespeare", I finally got it! I love that I'm still learning, and I really believe that homeschooling has everything to do with that.

Today I went to the dentist. It's been six years! I needed two fillings and got one today. My face and tongue are numb and it's dinner time. Not sure how that's going to go. My pocket is numb too!

I visited Tom when we were in Bourke. He nearly fell off a roof at work a couple of weeks ago, but hit his lag rather badly and ended up with a haematoma. He was off work when I was there so I was able to spend some time with him, which is always nice. He's my favourite son! :-)

Well that will do for now.

Will try to do better at blogging. I do have family photos, but Kylie has already posted them I think. Better go serve up dinner!

Home at last

Yes, at last after 16 months away, Kylie is home from her wonderful adventure overseas

The day she arrived, she was meant to fly in at around 9.30am

We were there (well those of us that weren't working) at the airport very excited.

Until, the plane arrived and we watched through the window, the passengers disembarking one by one.

"There she is" became, "no, that's not her" as the plane emptied and we were slowly disapointed . She obviously wasn't on the plane we expected.

Then we saw this sign.......

And realised that her plane wouldn't be in for another couple of hours, and since we live only about a 7 minute drive from the airport, we went home.

I checked online throughout the day and saw that the plane continued to be delayed and then at last it left Sydney, for the hour flight out to Dubbo.

We watched again as the plane emptied and saw someone get out holding one of these.......

Kylie had just come from China, so, seeing the chinese hat, we (ran) walked quickly down to where the passengers enter the airport.

Three people entered wearing the hat and not one of them was her!

There were a few happy tears......

I had a special dinner planned. Kylie's favourite with lasagna and pavalova!

I can't show you the lasagna picture, I might cry.

As I pulled it from the oven, it fell from my hand upside down and made a huge mess all over the oven door. Thanks to Ken, we salvaged enough for dinner, but the sight wasn't pretty. Thanks honey, for cleaning up the mess.

But the pav was great!

Welcome home Kylie, we missed you!

The last month....or so

I have a hopeless memory and should never leave blogging this long. I just can't remember what I've done.

We have done this a couple of times due to the cool weather and Ken enjoying his chainsaw. :-)

Some highlights, were a trip that was decided one afternoon and Jordan, Emy and I left next morning to go and visit my parents for a week and go to my little brothers 40th birthday party. It was really lovely to spend time with Mum and Dad and my brother also. He has four beautiful girls around my girls ages, and so my two spent time with their cousins.

My brother tandem jumped out of a plane, for his birthday present from a friend, and landed safely. I'm glad about that, as we were all watching.

I think the landing was painful!

I love being able to take a week off school when we want to, and just take up where we left off when we get back. I did take work away, but it wasn't a happening thing! We did listen to a book that Kaity downloaded off the net for me called "Our Island Story".

It was written in 1902 and is the story of England's History. It's written in such a lovely story format and was great listening whilst driving. Younger kids would enjoy it aswell!(probably more)

We got to spend time with my Mum and Dad......

We've had visitors stay last weekend for four days. These friends have lived in the last two towns we have lived in and after spending time out with family, have taken a job here in Dubbo. We are pretty happy about this as we enjoy spending time together and now that makes three towns!

I've been quilting a little. I started working on a baby quilt for my friend's baby she was fostering, but then the baby left and I stopped working on it. Will have to get back to that, for another baby. I moved onto a table runner that I've been working on for probably a year and have come near the end now. Quilting in winter happens easier for me. I'm sharing the read a loud time with the girls in the afternoons, so that I can sew, while they read books to me!

I know there's lots more that's happened but, it's gone for now.

On a very happy note, it's now two days till Kylie comes home. We are all pretty happy about this, and are looking forward to seeing her. Hurry up Kylie. In fact next week, when Tom is here for Tafe, all my chickens will be here. One. Happy. Mumma. I think Pappa too!

Cannot forget a family photo.

Emy-Lou turns 15!

Happy Birthday Emily!

Yes today , our beautiful Emily turns 15. She has been such a joy to our family.

Some brief thoughts about her last 15 years........

I used to find her in the bathroom,(when she was about 1) after she had pulled EVERYTHING out of the cupboard.

Biscuits cooling on the kitchen bench, when she was big enough to reach,disapeared!

Big, Noddy glasses. Tears welling up behing them, so we felt sorry for her.

Her "Thank you" after we disciplined her.

Her loving cuddles.

Spending time talking together.

Her beautiful smile :-)

I hope you have a great day Emy, we love you very much.

Coolah Tops National Park

Ken and I disappeared alone on Sunday for the day to a beautiful national park which we wanted to check out for a possible camping spot.

It was very beautiful

with a lookout

wildlife

signs of wildlife

beautiful parrots

creeks

bushcamping

awesome views

I love being out in God's creation

we will be back!

.

Highlights

A few highlights from the last couple of weeks.

Yes at last, both Kaity and Jenna now have their "P"s. Kaity was so kind, and baked Jenna a "P" cake.

Yes, Kaity in the kitchen IS dangerous :-)

That means that I do not have an "L" driver in the family! Not for the next year anyway.

That means independence for them, and staying at home for us.

Actually two comments from others were that once you have to stop getting 120hrs of driving with the kids and they drive themselves, you no longer get as much "talk" time together.

The other was that the time you spent driving with them, becomes praying time instead.

Tom is driving Emily and Jordan back from Bourke as I write, and yes I woke up to praying this morning for them.

A highlight of the last week was a beautiful dinner that Jenna made for Ken and I for no reason except I guess she loves us! She did an excellent job.

We had nibblies......avocardo, cheese, sundried tomatoes and crackers. We ate this so quick, there was no time for photos.

An entree of homemade creamy potatoe and onion soup.

The main meal was chicken with creamy mushroom sauce, rice and grilled vegetables.

Did you notice the special "touches"? Roses on the wine glasses, parsley on the soup, serviettes were tied around our water glasses, candles and the special little rice mounds. Cute!

Dessert (which I could hardly fit in) was chocolate fondue with strawberries and oranges.

She did an excellent job. Everything was homemade, and their was no drama, it just kept flowing from the kitchen and we felt very spoilt.



Why would you go out????


Thank you Jenna, you did an excellent job. Well done!