A week(end) with Oma

Wow... time sure goes by quickly when you are having fun!  This past week we've had Oma staying with us (school holidays) and the girls seem to have had a great time with her.

We didn't really get up to much during the week (other than eating), but we've made up for it over the weekend with a very busy couple of days, including way too much food, a movie (Oddball), a Spanish dinner (el Bulli), lots of shopping and yummy cafes, a round of putt putt, arts and craft and movies at home!

So without further delay, here's the best of the photos from the weekend...

First up, Keira's been attending swimming school each morning through the holidays to improve her swimming.  On Friday morning she had an assessment and moved up a grade  and was very pleased with herself.

Next up was a trip to the movies to see Oddball (while we let Oma and mummy visit Paddy's Market).  The girls shared a lychee tea afterwards...

On Saturday as the weather was better than forecast (at least in the morning) we went to putt putt at Dural.

Even Oma got into the golfing action.

Staring down the barrel...

The Barrel...

The girls like the motion shots... and what better motion than a flick of the hair...

Two queens of their castle...

Three...

Hmm... not quite sure!!!

After putt putt, and a visit to the Glenorie Bakery for some breakfast and cake and more cake... we headed out to Ikea to buy a shelving unit for the kids Lego, and then as we still had a couple of hours to spare before dinner, we went to Birkenhead Point.

And we took a moment to get out in the sunshine and enjoy the rainbow (which wasn't very photogenic it would seem)

Today we went out to Kingsford for lunch, after a morning of arts and craft at home... A final couple of photos at lunch before heading off to the airport to farewell Oma...

Bye for now Oma.... see you again at Christmas!!!

Happy 10th Anniversary

So 10 years ago, on a rainy spring day we started (well legally at least) a journey which has given us so many amazing memories...  Here are some stats in numbers:

10 years

3,652 days

14.5 years since first meeting

Over 100 flights

a combined 34 birthdays

17 countries in 4 continents

7 homes

2 kids

 To celebrate this milestone, we headed out to Balmoral for a nice family dinner...

Still looking as young as we did 10 years ago (or so we think at least)

 

 The girls loved being spoilt in the restaurant... Especially when it came to dessert.

Admittedly, we really loved the dessert too!!!

And one last shot... Keira showing us 'how to be a spy'.  Apparently its all about the eyebrow!

And, since I enjoyed doing this for the kids birthdays, some links of our celebrations over the years...starting of course with the big day, though we don't have posts for every year.

2005 - Our Wedding
2006 - Phuket, Thailand
2007 - Singapore (though we seem to have missed it due to our 2 week old stealing the limelight)
2008 - Singapore
2009 - Singapore (another year missed due to a young distraction)
2012 - Sydney (for this year we visited Nurrangingy to show the kids where we were married)
2013 - Sydney

Little Big Shots

This Saturday, we took a trip into Circular Quay to visit the Opera House, for the Little Big Shots film festival.  The festival screens videos made by young people and entered into a competition.  We saw 6 short films, and were lucky enough that one of the film makers ( a 12 year old boy) was in the audience and conducted a Q&A session at the end.

Here's the kids on the bus (which was a double decker no less).  Emika was at band camp this weekend so it was just these three trouble makers with the dad's on the bus.

A little park on the way down to the Rocks.  The kids didn't think it counted as a park as there was nothing to do (ie no playground).


Enjoying some of the original houses around the Rocks.

Under The Bridge.

And time for lunch... at the Lowenbrau.


It seems every weekend trip to the city we end up here...

Mostly for this... Amazing face painting... And the food and drinks don't hurt either.

Akira wasn't keen on face painting and instead had a fight with the chef it seems.

After lunch, a quick stroll down to the water before heading off to the Opera House.

Shadow puppets.

 

There they are!

Happy 8th Birthday Claire!

This weekend was all about celebrations!  Our wonderful girl Claire turned 8 on Saturday!

The day started (as birthday's should) with cuddles and presents in bed.  We then quickly got ready for Claire's 1st birthday party of the day, with her classmates at AMF bowling.

Happy Birthday Claire!

We then headed out to our 2nd birthday of the day, a dinner at Claire's (well our) favourite restaurant in Leichardt with Grandma & Granddad.

We also had the school disco on Friday... the theme was sports, and the girls made a real impression with their costumes... Keira managed to win three prices for the night (which was a great way to start a weekend of celebrations).

We followed all of that with father's day, and as it was a bit wet, it was a great day to stay at home and spend lots of time together...

And... lastly for memory sake, some quick links to Claire's previous birthday celebrations!

• 2007 - Birth day
• 2008 - 1st
• 2009 - 2nd
• 2010 - 3rd
• 2011 - 4th
• 2012 - 5th
• 2013 - 6th
• 2014 - 7th