Back to School Pics

So, the kids are back at school, my house is tidy and stays that way and there is no fruit in the fridge. Caitie is faced with the challenge of pulling her grades up, Aiden starts a new phase of schooling, entering Middle School and Conor has a fantastic teacher helping him this year, Mr Gregory, who sent Aiden postcards from around the world.

And with no further ado, here they are in all their glory! Aidens shirt is SO white it has created a halo around him. Lets see how long that lasts!

And this year we are stooping to bribery to encourage good marks. $20 for every A, $10 for every B. My kids have hit the point of wanting to purchase their own stuff so they will be working hard, I hope, to achieve it.

Cindy

Schools Back...

Its been a long summer with the kids having to go to Vacation care two days a week due to my work commitments. They pretended they hated it but didn't think it was too bad, our provider is a family friend who loves my kids.

Today was the last day before school goes back so the kids and I spent the day making yummy treats for their lunch boxes. I had all three cook as I believe both boys and girls need to learn how to care for themselves. Below are the results.

Caitie made chocolate choc chip biscuits which we sandwiched together with nutella. These were truly yummy and with thick chunky bits of chocolate.

I bought the coolest muffin tin which Aiden and I used to make banana cake. It worked really well and I think square muffins will fit better in their lunch boxes.

Conor and I made the savoury portion of the treats; corn and tomato quiches. The amazing thing was that we don't actually own an oven. Ours blew up a while ago but we make do by cooking on our barbeque. So, yes, we made biscuits, banana cake and quiche in our hooded barbeque!

Tomorrow is a big day for all the kids with new classes, new friends and new challenges ahead of them. Fingers are crossed for a prosperous new year.

3 Towns, 1 City, 2 Days!

We were invited up to a friends place at Toowoomba. Toowoomba is a beautiful inland city, just gorgeous at the top of the Ranges. A two hour trip and it feels like you are in another world. No sooner had we arrived than we were off to Crows Nest to visit the Antique center.

Meet Jimmy Crow! Jimmy Crow lived in a Gunyah (aboriginal house) which was made in a hollowed Fig Tree. He used to wait for the ox trains to come through and would update the cattlemen on the goings on in the area. The area became known as Jimmy Crow's Nest which was later shortened to Crows Nest.

This is, I believe, a reproduction of the original Gunyah but the kids thought it was pretty cool.Its almost the middle of Summer here and there has been a huge amount of rainfall which has kept the gardens beautiful and green. These lavender were at the entrance to the town "common" for lack of a better word. It was gorgeous circle of lush grass with a concrete path the whole way around which the local boys were having a great time skating on. Then there are sandstone beds and arches of wisteria all topped off with a small fountain in the middle. The most amazing thing was that UNDER the grass was a 360 000 litre tank which earnt the town an environmental award and $1 000 000 in funding!

We then decided to enjoy yet another drive to the sleepy town of Esk. The drive was exhilirating with dense forest, wild lantana (which is a pest but smells soooo good) and the flowering Pattersons Curse.

We arrived at Esk and this is the view of the towering cliffs that surround the town. It is just beautiful to see, you can easily look at the lichen on the cliff face.

Every small town out west has monument to servicemen who have lost their lives for their country and Esk is no exception.

I jokingly told Tony that this was his new stud cat! Freaky looking find at the Antique store.

As we left the weather began to close in with towering thunderheads filling the sky. The clouds were beautiful but only the smallest amount of rain fell.

****

Day two and we got a phone call to say that we were able to go out to our friends farm, which is what we were looking forward to. Mile after mile of cotton, corn and sorghum, all in brilliant health, as far as the eye could see.

This is our friends sorghum. Still a month or so off harvest but the heads have flowered and are about to set seed. When it sets the seed heads become deep red with the resulting seed. Its an awesome sight, especially as the sun sets.

My kids had a run in the cotton fields. Its only baby cotton at the moment but will be allowed to grow until its hip height. Then it will get sprayed to arrest the growth and to encourage it to send out more shoots for more flower heads which will become cotton. There was cotton all over the ground from last harvest and Caitie was especially amazed as, being a city kid, she had no idea where her clothing came from.

The farm cat, Biggy. She is pretending to be dead and doing a very good job of it I must say! As you can tell by her trimline figure there are heaps of mice and rats for her to feast on. More importantly there are a heck of a lot of King Brown snakes out there which are the most fearsome of the Aussie snakes as they have no problem in chasing down anyone that hassles them!

Lunch at Pittsworth was lovely. A loaf of bread, some shaved ham, silverside, cheese and some choccie chip muffins, all washed down with orange juice.

Aiden being a goober and trying to be cool...it didn't work.

Conor being a dag. Pull out a camera and he starts to pull faces.

Again, we are in the middle of summer and the town common in Pittsworth had the most beautiful roses that smelt absolutely divine!

Caitie posing.

Conor posing. They don't get this from me.

The town map showing places of interest. Might consider another trip out to visit some of the weirs and river crossings.

And finally, my lot decided to hide out in these spruces. I daren't tell them that they are usually full of paper wasps. Made a good photo though!

And from there we headed home. The trip was long but worth it. We came home after two days and felt like we had been away a week. It was short break that we needed. Oh and we restocked the shop at Esk.

Cin

PUTT PUTT!

School holidays can be a trying time, especially when there are five of us to please. I took the initiative today and sent us on a fun filled morning where we played 18 holes of Putt Putt Golf! Scary looking bunch aren't we?

Caitie is very competitive but was super excited when she got two hole-in-ones!

Conor will always be the baby of the family so often gets a chance or two but he too got a hole-in-ine which was no mean feat on this course!

Aiden is our comedic child and enjoyed himself immensely! And got a hole-in-one...are you seeing a theme???I actually love to play Putt Putt so it is NOT surprising that I got a hole-in-one!

My darling husband did NOT get a hole-in-one so it is fair to say that the Putt Putt gene comes from my side of the family! All in all we had a lovely morning topped off with a lunch at Macca's.

More adventures are on our way, we are heading up to Toowoomba on the weekend.

Cin

Christmas Fun

I had been eyeing off these gingerbread men at Aldi. I finally decided to buy them and the kids and I had a great afternoon designing. To make it a little more challenging, each of the kids and myself were given someone else to design for and we had to make the gingerbread look like them.

This is my effort, it is for Conor. These aren't your ordinary cookie men either they are around a foot long!

Caitie concentrating on getting the icing in the right spot.

Aiden loved using as much icing as possible.

And Conor of course just had fun!

This is for me, created by Caitie.

Conor did a great job of Aiden.

Aiden used a lot of icing for Caitie.

And our verdict was a two thumbs up!

Family Pics

Its been awhile, I know. The above photo is how I found Aiden the other night. He is still hilarious. Comes out wearing boxer shorts the other night telling me he's cold. So he was going to put on some socks! uuuhuh!

Just thought I would share some of the pics I took for my parents Christmas present.

C