Mischievious Pups, Dancing and the Brisbane City Hall

Pip and Hamish have been getting up to high jinx and mischief. A couple of weeks ago they decided to destroy a Pepsi box that still had 15 cans in it. There were cans and cardboard all over the deck and even next to the pool. They even sampled two of the cans which had puncture marks but luckily the Pepsi drained away to the verandah below!

This week the pups caught a mouse/little rat with my help in flushing him out. We have been having a little trouble with them getting into the pantry and trying to eat the dog food. Pip has a great nose for the rats/mice and so she alerted me to the one downstairs, that ran under the water heater which I flushed out with the hose and she caught. Pip wanted to show it off and Hamish being the piggy he is, just wanted to eat it!

Penny is deep into dance concert rehearsal and I have been helping out with the sewing this year. I had to make 16 head pieces which involved hand sewing on the orange fabric, sewing on the silver sequin band and then hot gluing on the feathers (which went everywhere) and sewing on the hair combs underneath. Time consuming but easy to do in front of the TV at night. I am still vacuuming up little bits of feathers!

A couple of weeks ago I took Wednesday off work and attended the grade 4 excursion to City Hall. It is a magnificent building which was renovated 3 yrs ago. The kids were there to learn about what the councillors do and so our local councillor Nicole Johnston took us on an excellent tour and we visited places that the general public don't see. She provided sushi, watermelon and lamingtons for lunch which we ate in the councillors tea room. We also had a tour of the museum upstairs which had some great exhibitions on and went to the beautiful concert hall. Penny was one of seven, lucky enough to be chosen to go up in an old-fashion lift to the clock tower. We fully plan to return for another visit in the holidays.

Have a good weekend and try to keep cool!
Love, Rach xx

Gardening and Birthdays

Nic and I have planted a veggie patch underneath the laundry window. We put it together by ourselves and researched how to make a good soil mix. After letting it sit for a couple of weeks, we planted seedlings of parsley, chives, spring onions, tomato, basil, coriander and more recently beans and thyme from seed. Everything is roaring along with the help of consistent falls of rain. Nic is very good at covering (and uncovering) it every night with netting so that the possums don't feast on our plants. We are really enjoying watching the growth and had some chives with sour cream on our jacket potatoes last night.

Craig has also filled the garden with mushroom compost which was deemed waste at work as it became too hot in a truck. It seems to be working fine in our garden though with the plants flowering and looking healthier as well as mushrooms popping up everywhere. This mushroom is huge (diameter=14cm).

We have also put in some sandstone garden edging out the front to contain the cane mulch (from puppy frolics) and made a new garden along the inside of the front wall which is waiting for me to fill with plants.
Penny celebrated her birthday in October with a sleep over with 4 of her friends. It was lots of fun with the girls swimming, playing a few games, eating pizza and an ice cream cake topped off with a DVD. She wanted mostly clothes and items to decorate her room rather than toys - a sign she is growing up!

Here are some photos of Nic enjoying his birthday night out at his favourite Italian restaurant in Graceville in April. Mum and Dad joined us and the meal was bellissimo!

Be back soon with the next installment.
Love, Rach xx

Poor Neglected Blog

Sadly, again I have neglected the blog. Thank you Robyn for the message on my previous post which has spurred me on even if you did leave it a few months ago!
It's too hard to go back and fill in March-August so I will just fill you in for the last few months.
In the holidays, Craig and Nic and some other boys/men went camping and kayaking at Eurimbula National Park (6hrs nth of Brisbane) for 4 days. They certainly roughed it with no shower (which wasn't a disappointment to Nic) and a long drop toilet! They had a great time and caught many fish.
Penny and I stayed home because we obviously weren't invited on a BOYS trip and also because
Miss P had dancing eisteddfods to attend. She danced in a trio and this was the debut of a dance they have been practicing all year. The costumes were beautiful and they did very well - 2nd (missed 1st by one point) and very highly commended.

Nic and Penny also attended a tennis clinic for a few days and Penny was very pleased to top her group and win a trophy. Nic did very well in school tennis and received the Coach's Award. He was undefeated in singles.

We also went to a couple of movies in the holidays - Pan in 3D (N and P's favourite) and Oddball (my favourite). Both were very enjoyable and I'm sure we'll watch them again when they come out on DVD.
In October, we had a visit from Trudie, Alex and Lachlan for Alex to attend the Gregory Terrace Boys School Semi Formal (Yr 11) with an old kindy friend. Nic and Penny so much look forward to their cousins coming to stay and there are plenty of giggles and fun. Alex looked stunning after an afternoon of primping and preening. We also went kayaking at Wivenhoe Dam and us girls went to the musical, Strictly Ballroom - both very enjoyable.

Doesn't she look stunning?
Well that's enough for now. This post was much longer but I have split it up so stay tuned for the next post very soon.
Happy Friday. I think it's champagne o'clock.
Love,
Rachxxx