Christmas Holidays - Flooring

After spending Christmas at my parents with my sister (unfortunately I have no photos of that) where my parents did much of the work - cooking, cleaning and looking after small child! - we drove across NSW to Burrendong Dam, where my in-laws have just bought a cabin.

Having just bought a cabin, the family have decided to extend it so that in total it will be about 4 times it's original size. The rest of the family spent the week around Christmas building the frame and putting most of the roof on. When we arrived, it looked like this:

We (by which I mean John, his father and brother) spend the next few days finishing laying the joists, laying the floor and then decking. I was designated as cook, scullery maid, housekeeper, painter (did I mention we had to seal the floor) and chief toddler entertainer!

Alex spent large portions of time locked with me in the cabin (due to welding), or stuck in the portacot outside (once the first section was done and it was no longer a hurdles competition to leave the building!). When he was allowed out, he thought he had better lend a hand.

We finished the building work late on New Years Eve (as in around 11pm) after drilling in 2600 screws in the deck and ~400 in the floor.

The finished product on New Years Day:

There is still some minor work to go - just little things like, walls, balustrades, ramps... etc, but is more accessible than it was (and more usable) so hopefully the rest of the family can enjoy it while they do some more of the building work!

Happy New Year

Hello and Welcome back everyone from their holidays.

We have taken a real (and virtual) holiday for the last three weeks. We had a good rest, both mentally and physically and were amazed at how much our little boy grew up in that short space of time. I hope that everyone else enjoyed their end of year break as well.

Yesterday was our first day back at work, so we are now back in some sort of routine, which means that I have the time and some inclination to blog. I'll probably spend the next week catching up on all the blog posts I have in my head and then go back to my semi-sporadic type blogging!

Christmas Gifts

I made these small gifts for some of my work colleagues. They are short-bread stars and paneforte wrapped in cellophane with a Christmas covered ribbon.

As these are difficult to wrap and I am not good at that I bought some asian food boxes and wrapped a metallic pipe-cleaner around to make it look like a bow. I just added a "Merry Christmas" tag as well. [I made similar boxes for the ladies in my day-time bible study but I filled them with tea and chocolates]

I think that they look pretty good for minimal effort - that is definitely my kind of craft.

What we do on Our Weekends away, Part III

Perform in (watch) Scottish Pipe Bands!

In October, there was a Scottish style Tattoo in Condobolin run by their local pipe and drums band. John is old friends with one of the organisers, and as he had some pipe band experience (drum major - not an instrument but he claims it still requires skill!) he was asked to go along.

So we drove the 4 hours to Condobolin, he got all dressed up in his kilt and paraphenalia and the bands marched up and down the street and then up and down a square for the tattoo. Unlike some of the other bands that were present, Condo band is ... non-proffessional ... so they hadn't had a great deal of practice so John just did drum major flourishes (ie throwing the mace in the air) for the Condo section rather than fancy scottish tunes or fancy marching.

We stayed the night at our friend's place and then turned around and drove the 4 hours home!

It was a fun weekend - Alex was beautifully behaved at the tattoo, and the dancing and the piping were fairly good. [The best pipe band in the Southern Hemisphere was there] If you click on the link above then you may even like to see if you can spot us in the photos that were in the local paper!

Sick boy

Earlier this week Alex and I were both sick (separately of course to spread out the pain!) which is partly why I have been silent on the blog front. We had a very long trip back from Sydney on Sunday. Fortunately we stopped at my parents - who fed both the big and little boy (;-)) while I slept, and also bought me some anti-emetic medication.

A few days later Alex woke up screaming in the middle of the night and we had to shower him and change the sheets and then have him sleep with us for the rest of the night. The next day he was still sleepy and cuddly. Here is my sick little cuddlebug - he'd gotten over the worst of it but was still at the miserable 'why is Mummy only feeding me crackers?' stage.

Christmas Cards

I have been busy recently assembling our Christmas cards for the year. They are not at all fancy - I made a potato stamp for the star and printed the verse from Isaiah with the computer. (Inside I printed the family newsletter) I just used paper and cardboard that I already had at home. Now all I have to do is write in them and send them out.

Flashback Friday

This weekend is our 11th anniversary - not our wedding anniversary, but the anniversary of when we first 'got together'. And how are we celebrating - by being in different cities of course!

This photo was taken about a month later - when I had gone on holidays water-skiing with John's family. I look at this and see how much younger (and skinnier) we both were, and yet it does not feel all that long ago.