Happy New Year - Roll on 2017

Happy New Year!

 Part of the NYE fireworks display at Coolangatta

 
I can't believe we're nearly at the end of the first week of 2017 already!

 Boxing Day with May Family rellies

 
Both Steve's and my workplaces close down for the week between Christmas and New Year, so we had a nice quiet week off, using that time to go and see a couple of movies (including Rogue One), have a Boxing Day catch up with some of the rellies, hang out with friends, re-waterproof the canvas and put new mattresses into the Jayco, and organise Cheyenne's school books and stationery for the year. Not long now until school starts again. We just have to get her some new track shoes and pay the usual assortment of fees and she'll be ready to go.

May I just say that I have so much love for my new Brother P-Touch label maker?  I have no idea how I managed to live without it for so long!

This Saturday we head off for a week away at Boyds Bay caravan park at Tweed Heads, with some of Steve's family.  The Jayco is mostly ready to go (we leave it packed with the camping gear) - we just have to do our food shopping (tonight) and pack our clothes in.

Looking forward to our little holiday (yes, I know I only just had a week off, but a stay-cation just doesn't feel the same as a proper holiday) and can only hope the weather plays nice for us.

2013 Already? Happy New Year!

Well, didn't 2012 flash past rather quickly!   It seems like only a month or so ago that I was writing a "Happy New Year 2012" post, but in fact it's been twelve months.

I'll admit it now - I was VERY SLACK last year, postwise.  I think I managed to post twice. Twice?  I really will try to make more of an effort this year.  Not that it's a New Years Resolution. I don't make them.  I'm not anti-resolution or anything. I just think that if you want to turn over a new leaf, you can do it whenever you want. You don't need to wait until New Year.

So...  what has happened since my last post in August?   Let's see.  Cheyenne turned 9 in September, I turned 39 and Steve turned 41 in October, and Cheyenne finished grade 3 with an encouraging (although not fabulous) report card.  We bought Cheyenne an early Christmas present of a Honda CR50 dirt bike, which she is getting more confident at riding. My boss closed her office for the whole of December, so I've had a month off work.  Nice, except that no work equals no pay for casuals. Oh well.  I finally bought myself a new Christmas tree, managed to get my Christmas cards done on time, and did a little bit of Christmas baking (including Baileys balls - YUM!).  We had a nice quiet family Christmas lunch at my mum's followed by a bbq dinner at Steve's mum and dad's. As usual, Cheyenne received far too many presents.

We've just had a relaxing week away camping with friends at Borumba Deer Park.  Although we do enjoy it there, we have vowed to try somewhere different this year.  I sense some Googling research in my future, lol.

Steve returned to work today after two weeks off, and I go back to work on Wednesday, so I guess with three weeks to go, it's time to start covering school books and getting ready for the new school year.

I wonder if 2013 will seem to fly by as quickly as 2012 did.

School's Out For Summer...

Well, the school year is over. Prep is done and dusted, and we're into the first week of Hell... er..., sorry... the Christmas Holidays!

Six weeks of "I'm hungry, Mummy! Mum, can I have an iceblock? Can I have some fairy bread? Can I have a Nutella? An apple, a sandwich..?" It's only Tuesday, and already she's devoured almost an entire box of Tiny Teddy biscuits (which were bought as a treat), is about a third of the way through a 12 pack of individual Nutella snacks and has consumed more Zooper Dooper ice blocks than should be deemed necessary, considering the overcast (and therefore cooler) weather. Clearly I will need to buy another truckload of apples, and reintroduce her to stone fruits, now that they're in season.

This, from a child who has spent the better part of her life eating like a bird. I also know for a fact that she survived quite well every day at school on the two standard breaks, morning tea and lunch. So where has this sudden need to continuously graze come from? Maybe it's a growth spurt, but I hope it doesn't last. She's eating us out of house and home... and she isn't even a teenager!

Maybe I'll just have to sidetrack her with holiday activities. There's plenty of things she wants to do. The problem is getting her to understand that she has 6 weeks to do them in. We do not have to do every activity TODAY. We can swim in our pool any time we like. The park and duckpond is only 5 minutes away - she can even ride her bike there on the nice wide bike path. (Maybe we'll even get those training wheels off if she practices hard enough!) We can visit friends, have sleepovers at Grandma's and Nanny and Poppy's, do crafts, go to the movies... we just don't need to do it all right now, this instant.

Perhaps she's right though. All too soon it will be the end of the holidays and we'll be covering books, ready for Grade 1. Maybe we should be trying to cram in as much as we can.

Cheyenne's "Prep Graduation" photo.

(They didn't actually have a Graduation ceremony, this was just a posed shot included on the Powerpoint slideshow that each child received on a CD at the end of Prep. Kind of like a report card with photos. Excuse the grainy quality of the image - we didn't get access to the originals. I just copied it "as is" from the slideshow.)

Deck The Halls...

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas... well, with less than two weeks to go, it's kind of hard to avoid all things Christmas-y. Shopping is a nightmare. Christmas lights are on up and down the street. The usual round of Christmas parties has begun.

First we had the break up party at Playgroup. Found an easy recipe for Christmas tree biscuits. Luckily, I had a tree shaped cutter stashed away in the back of the cupboard. Cheyenne helped to decorate them with mini M & Ms. I thought they looked very cute - bright and festive - and all the kids loved them.

We'd had our Christmas lights on the front of the house fairly early, but been a bit slack putting up our tree. I must confess that two rope light shapes (which hang in the front windows of my craft room) are there permanently, all year round... out of necessity because they are in an awkward spot, not because I'm too lazy to take them down, honest! I'd had to buy a new set of icicle lights for the front verandah because the set from two years ago only just limped through last year's display. When I hauled the tree and decorations out from the storage area under the stairs, I discovered a brand new 8 function rope light, still in the shrink wrap! I'd post a photo of our lights, but can't find my itty bitty tripod and anyway, our current compact digital (a Pentax) takes the most appalling night shots - even whilst in night mode! I would have thought that a Pentax would be better quality, but I guess, at $185, you get what you pay for!

Cheyenne was keen to get the tree up, so we had a bit of "family time" decorating it. There are still a lot of decorations that didn't make it onto the tree this year, but really, you can go a bit overboard if you aren't careful, and the tree will do, as it is, without the extras.

Steve's boss decided to go barefoot bowling for their Christmas party. I don't mind lawn bowls really, and barefoot bowls seems to be becoming quite popular these days. All but Steve and one other bloke live on the south side, so it was held at Carina Bowls Club. The food was a bit average. The boss's wife was livid about ordering enough nibbly food to feed 20 people, paying $300 for it and only getting three lousy trays - one of cold meats/antipasto/crackers and dip, and two of various hot savouries of the mini spring roll, curry puff, spicy meatball, unidentifiable mini quiche variety. She ended up ordering 6 large pizzas from Pizza Hut because everyone was still hungry. Nevertheless, the bowling itself was ok, despite the fact that a storm hit and we ended up playing in the rain. At least it cooled us all down.

Cheyenne's kindy is finished for the year and they held the Christmas party for the children and their families on Thursday night. It was a bring-a-plate affair and the children sang songs and had a visit from Santa. Cheyenne STILL has a problem with Santa's beard, so I got this photo under protest, with Cheyenne clinging to Steve the whole time. It is the first real Santa photo I've managed to get of her in five years, so I'm happy with it.

So with less than two weeks to go I still have so much to do... finish making my Christmas cards, and finish my Christmas shopping (still heaps more to go) not to mention wrap everything and get it under the tree in time, attend a bbq and a Christmas drinks evening and anything else last minute that I'm bound to have forgotten to do. Hopefully I get it all done and can kick back and relax.