Australia Day

What a lovely 24 hours :) We enjoyed a Scots evening followed by a dinkum Aussie morning.
Yesterday we went to Chateau Mary Mary for a Burns Supper on Burns Night. We ate (modified) haggis, tatties and neeps in the grand style and with the grand company we have become accustomed to.

Tony delivers the Selkirk Grace, closely observed by one of the lassies.

3 lassies toast the haggis.

Mary busts out a poem. Gangsta.

Today is Australia Day, the anniversary of the arrival of the first fleet in 1788 and the proclamation at that time of British sovreignty. It is also known as Invasion Day, and with good reason. I am quite uncomfortable with flag-waving jingoism and January 26th has long been my least favourite Australian public holiday. But...I am a joiner and a proud Australian and there is much to be celebrated and enjoyed about Australia and Australians, so that's the spirit in which I have enjoyed today :)

Free pool entry and a free bbq brekkie. Love free stuff.

Pilbara regiment. They drive...landrovers!

Our favourite ambo, Mr S.M., gets some well deserved recognition for his voluntary work. Good job Steve!

Esther and her posse watch the raft races. Her friend J's mum and I have discussed entering next year in a raft kept afloat by the inflated bladders of many empty casks of goon.

 

The giant inflatable got an outing. Esther made it to the end all by herself 5 times! Here is her first successful crossing in glorious 2D (imagine it's a flick book or scroll quickly!):

 

 

 

 

Finished! Yay Esther!

Cheese :)

Little Aussie poser.

Freya has a synchronised swimming lesson with the multi-talented Dr S.Giles.

Sarah shows us how it should be done:

Impressive, no?

Inspecting bloody great big tadpoles rescued from a puddle

  Happy Australia Day to everyone xxxx

p.s. The grown ups got a go on the inflatable too, Esther wasn't the only Jonker to make it safely to the end!

White Elephant

Several months ago I posted about the urban renewal afoot in TP. You can read about what is supposed to happen here. The grand plan, however, seems to have been shelved or is so far behind in its application that, I suspect, the local authority is hoping residents will have forgotten what was supposed to happen and be delighted with a new pavement. At this season's first rain, a sheet of water poured from the canopies covering the footpath outside the retail strip, prevented shoppers from getting into the shops and flooded all the businesses. As far as I know this hasn't been remedied and the last time I was in the post office they still had sandbags at the ready.
On the bright side, gentrification has brought me my first 'celebrity' siting in TP.
I am, just quietly, a bit obsessed with celebrities; my blog-roll is deliberately missing my most-visited sites and blogs because they are concerned with celebrities and I don't want you to know how shallow I am. Yet while the presence of the Channel 7 sports presenter at Scott and Kate's recent wedding guaranteed them a spot in The West Australian's (newspaper) society pages, it just didn't do it for me. Only A-list floats my boat. Geoffrey Rush walking along Adelaide Terrace was a coup for me: genuine A-list, (that's A for Australian of the Year). But the big names are few and far between in WA so we'll take what we can in TP.
Anyhoo, the siting was...da, da, daaahhhh... Josh Byrne....you know?! The ABC's Gardening Australia presenter in WA!! Having lunch at The Nameless Cafe no less. My sources (Mary Mary) tell me that he is submitting a tender for the landscaping of the new TP town centre. So while the revitalisation may be a folly, its landscaping will, perhaps, be innovative and sustainable.

Wanted: landscaper

"Mum, why are you taking pictures of the sandbags?"

Spot the (deliberate?) mistake

School Holidays

The girls have had vac-swim this week and last which has given their holidays a bit of structure. In an entirely flukey bit of coincidence, both their lessons are at the same time which gives me a beautiful 40 minutes of uninterrupted swim time. I have been doing 1km of unco breaststroke every morning.
Here is Freya demonstrating 'butterfly', with top camera-work by her mother (demonstrating that she still doesn't know how to properly work the Nikon).

The Wet has come to TP. Post-Heidi we have had beautiful hot and sunny mornings and afternoons where phenomenal electrical storms fill the creeks in minutes. F and E love playing out in the rain and I love that they are a couple of Pilbara ferals, but today I called them in because the lightening was literally too close to home!

The wet weather has prompted comfort cooking.

Tea cake with 7x the amount of cinnamon sugar suggested in the recipe. Another Kitchen-Aid production.

Anniversary

One year ago to the day we rolled into Tompers.
As with many of the big moves I've made in my life I look back and feel rather nauseous at the enormity of what I was doing; however, anticipation and adventure seem to have been powerful anti-emetics and I don't recall any queasiness on January 15 2011.
We have all settled in and made friends and I am happy.

Our status quo will be jolted next month when Ade returns to Perth to have his right knee replaced. His knees are old before their time after a motor bike accident in his youth and consequent arthritis. The knee replacement is large surgery but the plan (at the moment) is that me and the girls stay in TP while he is away, since the op coincides with the first day of the school year. I am very uneasy at this prospect but Ade doesn't understand why, he is (typically) indifferent about my presence during his hospitalisation and immediate rehabilitative phase. I should like to encourage our Perth friends to pay him a visit post-operatively but I fear he will be (typically) indifferent! However, if you know Ade and understand that his lack of enthusiasm about anything without wheels does not mean that he is not very touched and grateful for your effort and concern...please go and see him and give him a hug from L, F and E!

P.S. Heidi was a fizzer!

Big rain coming

Apparently cyclone Heidi has crossed the Pilbara coast and has been downgraded from a category 2 to a category 1 system. But, according to the map I'm posting from the bureau of meteorology, Heidi is still heading our way and likely to arrive tonight...
She is unlikely to be terribly destructive once she reaches Tompers, but I have taken advice from some long-termers and stocked up on batteries and tinned food. Power cuts and flooded roads are likely to be our biggest inconveniences. Flooding means that trucks can't get through to TP and so there'll be panic buying in Coles today (did my shop yesterday-phew). Power cuts are a regular Summer inconvenience here and so we're not worried about that- plus we're hardened tenters and can eat for a week on a camp stove.
Fingers are crossed that we don't need to RFDS anybody out while the weather's bad. A young fella with suspected appendicitis had a trip to and from the airport this week and then an extra 12 hour stay at TP hospital because the weather prevented the flying doctors from landing.
So, watch this space...

These photos don't really show just how ominous the sky looks!

 

A Night in Trixie Hollow (flashback!)

For those who like to begin a new year with a bit of a performance...

Ladies headwear will be applauded

On January 1st 2012, Scott married Kate.
It was a sumptuous affair attended by a bunch of doctors, a Channel 7 Perth-onality, some very talented musicians and me and Ade.

2 hotties photographed with a special camera which makes them look as though they're standing in front of a fairground mirror!

The Quarry Amphitheatre at City Beach, it was an amazing venue. That's the oyster bar at the bottom on the right.

The steps were potentially lethal; twice I nearly broke an ankle and the bride almost didn't make it to her first champagne!

Kate: stunning and tiny.

Lounge and bar. Veuve Clicquot all night long, anyone?

The groom with my best-man

Kim and Jess were great company

Awesome party!

Scott was dead pleased we'd made the trip down just for his wedding and so were we; it was a great day, a lovely way to start the new year.
I hope that 2012 is a wonderful year for all our friends and family xxxx

Now We are Six

When I was One,
I had just begun.
When I was Two,
I was nearly new.
When I was Three
I was hardly me.
When I was Four,
I was not much more.
When I was Five,
I was just alive.
But now I am Six,
I'm as clever as clever,
So I think I'll be six now for ever and ever.


Happy Birthday Esther xxxxx