Lyrebird.

There is a nice cafe down at Bobbin Head, we had breakfast down there again the other day and coming back up the hill a Lyrebird strutted across the road right in front of us, they are pretty rare and this is only the second time I've seen one in it's natural habitat... so it was a real thrill. The National Parks and Wildlife have been concentrating on ridding the park of ferral animals like foxes and cats... so we are getting a lot more Bandicoots in our garden and the Lyrebirds seem to be thriving as well.
I didn't take this photo I just found it on the net.

Three Cheers for Briony.

Briony receiving her Roger Shaw Memorial Prize for Excellence in Legal Research... Three Cheers for Briony we are all very proud of you Bri-face!!
Joon, Briony and Professor Rob Watt.

Words of Wisdom from Jackson Harry....

1. On Fridays I mind Charlie while Jackson has his swimming lesson, last Friday he came back carrying a plastic bag and I could see he was excited... I said, “So you did a bit of shopping did you Jack?" "Yes" he said in his little excited voice, "We've got Broccoli... we’re going to have Broccoli and Tofu for dinner tonight!”

2. Daddy had just finished feeding Charlie, burped Charlie, changed Charlie’s nappy but Charlie was still unhappy... Tim said as aside to Jackson... “I don’t know what is wrong with Charlie, Jack, I’ve done everything but he’s still crying” Jack hesitated with his game and said... “He needs more milk Daddy” and he did too.

3. Jackson loves to spend a little time on my computer when he’s here for the day... he can’t read but he knows how to open Safari, go to Bookmarks and find one of his favourite sites like Sesame Street, The Wiggles or Tractor Tom another one of his favourites is one on Transport... the other day he came in to the kitchen saying... “Pennie it’s scary, the ‘puter is scary...” I came in to see he’d found a site that had short movies on it and he’d found one of the Steam Train, 3801, in full steam but it went into a tunnel and vanished LOL

4. Just to assure you that this little Angel of a boy isn’t 100% perfect here’s one more....

Jack “What are you doing David?”
David “I’m bottling my beer.”
Jack “I don’t like beer, do you like beer Pennie?”
Pennie “No I don’t like beer.”
Jack “Mmm I don’t like beer either”
Pennie “I like milk, do you like milk Jack?”
Jack “Yes I like milk, I like milk on my porridge.”
Pennie “What else do you like on your porridge Jack?” knowing that he loves honey drizzled in a big ‘J’ for Jack.
Jack “I like Poo poo on my porridge.” then bursts into fits of giggles! We try not to laugh but we can’t help it... how can one eh??

Last night we Skyped!!

Both of our lovely boys are in London with the two very special Em's and the very beautiful Abigail Rose, we Skyped for nearly one hour last night our time and it almost felt as though we were there in London with them all again... well... Almost!!
Isn't she beautiful!! And Gwillo as well... isn't he lovely... you can actually see Emma in the background, that's because their departure from Sydney Airport is on my Desktop... Tom and Abi are hidden in this shot.
Oh dear a runny nose... Emily to the rescue.
Here's almost all of them... Tom, Gwil, Emily and Abigail... Emma was upstairs!
But here's Emma now.

Happy Birthday Rosie...

Today is my Mum's birthday, she is 83!! Wonderful isn't it eh?? Dad will be 90 later this year and they're both well and busy so it's always a delight to go visit them. Happy Birthday Rosie... here is a photo of my Mum taken more than 60 years ago, way before I was born :-)

Gwilym and Emily... Update...

Gwilym and Emily have found a place they want to go back to... even live they say... it's not a place I would have thought of but they've been raving about Ljubljana, in Slovenia so here are a couple of their photos.
Old Tins for sale in the Street Markets.
The Opera House
They tell me this sand pit is a beach on the River... give me a good Aussie beach anyday I say!!
Celebrating the Socceroos win against Japan with Canadians.
Looks pretty good doesn't it.
Gwilym and Emily will be staying in London with Tomos, Emma and Abigail Rose for 5 days, they leave for the South of France on Tuesday the 21st, then to Castellane to work for our friend Marie-Therese... what a wonderful trip they are having.

Happy Birthday Tomo :-)

Today is Tom's 33rd Birthday, with all the threes flying around the family at the moment I know he's in for one lucky year... so Happy Birthday Tomo!
I was looking for a recent photo to put on this Blog but haven't taken any since they went back to London (obviously) so I dug out my all time favourite photo of our Tom... taken just after he'd been promoted to Medalist in the St Andrews Cathedral Choir in 1987 aged 13 1/2... I can hear his groan when he sees it up here but he's in Cornwall at the moment and won't see it till he gets back to London, so I have some breathing space :-)

Pies...

I have a pie maker and a brand new Pressure Cooker... recently I cooked up two kilos of beef to make a really delicious Beef Bourguignon... we ate some hot and the rest of it I made into pies and froze. I took a couple up to Mum and Dad for their dinner and received a very appreciative email from Mum and a hand written note from Dad... Dad's was written on orange paper in black texta and in capitals...

P.J. THE PIES WERE GREAT! THANK-YOU! -o- I BET YOU MAKE GREAT APPLE PIES TOO! R.

How cheeky is that??

I also gave a couple of pies to our Solicitor (Briony's Boss) and below is part of his reply!! I know it sounds a bit far fetched and sounds as though he is willing to go to extraordinary lengths for some more Pies but I have it on good authority from both Briony and David that this story is absolutely true!! What do you think??


Pennie, I have bad news.

Like yesterday, I put the pie on a saucer (appropriate size) in the
microwave and set the timer for three minutes at high heat (equivalent
to gas-mark 6 for 15 minutes in old money).

I started up my computer and returned to the microwave and found the
timer was still on 3 minutes - it hadn't moved. I changed the timer to
2 minutes and set off to turn the other computers and photocopier on.
Within a minute the office was full of smoke. It took me a little while
to discover the smoke was coming out of the microwave. I turned it off
and opened the door. Your poor little pie was a black crisp. I briefly
thought of Auschwitz.

Meanwhile the smoke detectors had done their job and the fire alarm was
ringing. The alarm is connected directly to the fire brigade. Next
thing sirens are sounding and the fire brigade arrives with half a dozen
officers with breathing apparatus.

I could only agree with the fireman who said "That's a awful lot of
smoke for such a small pie".

I don't hold you entirely to blame for destroying my microwave and
blackening the benchtop. There may have been other factors -
atmospheric conditions, electrical or mechanical malfunction.

Tracey and Val have just set off to buy a replacement (microwave, not
pie). It will need to be thoroughly tested before cooking normal things
such as my corn, Skye's soup, Briony's noodles etc. The best test would
be beef and stout pies or, as you generously suggest, chicken, wine and
tarragon.


In anticipation

Peter

Charlie is 6 weeks old...

Here's our beautiful Charlie Ripley... now 6 weeks old!

Jack takes a couple of photos...

Jack has just learned how to work my camera... here's a photo of Mummy.
And a photo of little brother Charlie.

Jackson Harry has a haircut!

Nerys cut Jackson's hair one night after his bath and while his hair was wet, he sits quietly for her in front of the Television while she cuts away and he's getting better and better at sitting still for longer so she cut a decent amount of hair off this time. Jackson didn't notice how short his hair was till he woke in the morning and caught a glimpse of himself... he did a double take and said in surprise... 'I've lost all my hair!' he looks so different doesn't he and he likes his look but wasn't all that keen to have his photo taken.




Caught him... and his photo smile.

8-6-68

On the 8th day of the 6th month in 1968 we were married at Artington House Register Office in Guildford, Surrey. Actually as I write this its not even 7am over there... so in fact we've spent the day celebrating too early!! We'll have to do it again tomorrow I reckon.
Artington House, 8th of June 1968 (38 years ago) David bought his suit from Moss Bros and I made my dress, it was stolen with some other clothes and stuff when we were in Rome.
Nerys and Tim were also married at Artington House in 1995
David and Pennie at the same spot in 2005
Breakfast down at Bobbin Head. It's been a perfectly beautiful day here in Sydney, everything is shining after it's good soaking rain this week and the sun's been shining on us all day. It was also a perfectly beautiful day 38 years ago... if my memory is correct!
A walk around Manly Beach... we always say you can't go anywhere without bumping into someone from North Turramurra... here are old friends, Peter and Anne who left the area more than 10 years ago.
Lunch on the roof of the Steyne Hotel... what a view... then home for a quiet evening and homemade Pumpkin Soup.

I know I'm really home when...

I've spent the nicest of days today... the need to make a quilt for a dear friend has had me happily locked in my sewing room for most of the day sewing and listening to ABC radio... amongst the fascinating interviews, titbits, music and news, the afternoon presenter asked people to ring up with any obscure 'Brush with Fame'.

There were many funny callers but the one that stuck in my mind was the girl who rang up to say that 20 years ago she was playing 'spin the bottle' at a party in the Eastern Suburbs and she got to kiss the boyfriend of the baby sitter of Mel Gibson's children. Well if that didn't have me chuckling as I chain pieced my fabrics through my sewing machine... about half an hour later another woman rang. She was the wife of the boy that had played 'spin the bottle' 20 years ago when he was the boyfriend of the girl who baby sat Mel Gibson's children... she wasn't the baby sitter though... Just in case you were wondering.

Anyway... the reason I just put this on the Blog is because this is the sort of thing I missed while we were away... listening to my radio station, in my sewing room, chuckling while I blissfully make a quilt top!!

Rain Glorious RAIN!!

Do you know what's better than the sound of rain falling on the roof and our very very bone dry garden??

It's the sound of water pouring into all three of our water tanks.

Do you know what's better than the sound of water pouring into our water tanks?

It's the sound of water overflowing into the pool beside our largest water tank!

Hurray our garden is soaked at last... plus our water tanks are full!

We've had no real rain since we've been home these past 3 months so watching it pour down and soaking in to our garden is wonderful but to be a bit of a 'party pooper' none of this rain is falling in the Sydney Catchment Area so we are still on very strict water restrictions.

Jackson Harry asks...

Last week Jackson Harry was heard to ask his Mummy ‘Why doesn’t Charlie have his own quilt? Why hasn’t Pennie made him one?’

Well Pennie thought it would be OK if Charlie (now 5 weeks old) used the little quilt she made for Jackson that covers the capsule in the car, or borrow one of Jackson’s other 4 quilts until Charlie turned one and got his own big ‘I Spy’ quilt just like Jackson and Abigail did... but apparently not.

So Pennie feeling a little guilty, but a lot proud... that her 3 year old Grandson would not only think of such things, but ask... racked her brain for something quick to make that Jack would be impressed with and Charlie would eventually enjoy as well.

A couple of years ago I bought one of those panels that has a sort of map on it with roads and buildings, I bought it out a few times for Jack to play with but never got around to doing anything with it... ahhhha just perfect for Charlie Ripley.

I found backing fabric in my stash that was given to me by a friend who knew David liked transport vehicles... it has tickets, railway clocks, oil cans, conductors and so on... this was perfect for quick project. I found some scrap batting, layered the three together and machine quilted along the roads and around the buildings.

Jackson Harry came to play with David and me yesterday while his Mummy had a quiet day at home with Charlie, and his Daddy went back to his monthly Golf game... I told JH that Pennie was making a quilt for Charlie... he jumped up off his chair and asked to see it so I hung it back side first over the couch and listened to him going Ooooh, wow... look at that ticket, look at that clock then he became impatient and turned the quilt over... the Oooh’s and Aaaah’s and Wow’s became louder and continuous as he saw the roads, the airport, the police station, the school, the play area and the shops, particularly the bakery with the cupcake on the roof. ‘Charlie will like this quilt, it’s fantastic!’ he said... and my heart just melted.

I was up till 1pm last night finishing this panel quilt off so we could take it to Charlie today... David and I had been invited for a morning tea of Fairy Bread made by Jackson... Jack saw me carrying the quilt and couldn’t place it over a sleeping Charlie quickly enough as he pointed out, to the still sleeping Charlie, the Bakery, the Fire Station and so on.

What a dear little boy Jackson Harry is... and gee I’m glad I can make quilts!!
Charlie Ripley and Jackson Harry
Jackson trying to get Charlie to look at the camera.
Charlie just before he christened his first quilt with a little milk overflow!!
The Quilt.