Yesterday

My birthday was simple yet sweet
Waffles for breakfast, eaten outside overlooking my garden
Ice cream cones on the beach
Toes kicking and splashing in the water
Watching the sun go down
Take away pasta from my favourite place in Moonta

Really, i couldnt ask for more in a day

Early birthday visitors

Oma, Lil and Mum came to visit me today, the day before my birthday as i have the day off work

We took a whole heap of photos with my camera on self timer. This is my absolute favourite photo ever i think its safe to say! I think we were all laughing at me, i was still adjusting to get everyone in the photo after id pressed the button so i had to dive to get in the pic!

We all had such a nice morning together

Here is my yummy chocolate spotty cake that Oma made for me

mum looking beautiful as always:)

Oma crocheting a scarf, me knitting a cardi

I'm always so happy to have family visit for my birthday to make my day so special!

Melbourne

Thursday morning we went to Melbourne with Benny's parents, uncle and two of their good friend.

The reason for the journey was to take Benny's dad to the footy as a suprise for his 50th.

We had a busy busy 3 days, making the most of our short trip.

We stayed at a really pretty hotel, went on many fun tram trips, went st.Kilda beach, Victoria markets, the casino, the MCG (melbourne cricket grounds) for a tour (which didn't bore me as much as i thought it might) and i surprised myself by really getting into the footy game and thoroughly enjoying it even though crows lost.
Melbourne was beautiful, and had so many things to see and do, we all wished we could have stayed much longer, it was so much fun. Benny's parents, uncle and their friends kept us laughing all weekend long, they are so funny when they get together.

pics-Benny waiting to get on the plane, Autumn leaves on the way to our tram stop,waiting to catch a tram, our airoplane, autum tree, river water, Benny walking, Benny's uncle+his dad+Benny

photo booth pics, us at saint Kilda beach

me with my handsome

cow up a tree, our lot on the tram, lilydale sign (lily and dale have you guys seen this?!!! for those that don't know my family, i have a cousin lily whose boyfriend is dale), graffiti

st Kilda beach, palms, st Kilda painted in graffiti, guys lookin at the beach

super cute old tram (that we went on, i loved it sooo much!)

thankyou oma and opa

oma and opa, thankyou from me and benny for our christmas gift voucher

it came at the perfect time as id been making lots of smoothies but our old blender had been gradully leaking from the bottom, more and more.

this one is fantastic, it crushes ice which is what benny really wanted so that he could make frapes. the kids i look after love me making 'snow' (crushed ice ) for them too

its been getting a good work out already. the night we got it in kadina we made dad a frape and a mango smoothie, he was in heaven!

heres a picture of my mango smoothie that i made the other day at home, just to make dad super jelous (dad is quite a smootie addict!)

mmmmmm!

birthdays and new gals

weve been having fun birthdaying around here. bennys was last wednesday, i got him a dartboard and made him a computer chair cushion and ice cream cake.
levins 40th was saturday night, there were so many soups to choose from (i LOVE soup!) and it was so nice to spend the night outdoors lit by fires and lanterns! Mums birthday was today, we had pancakes for brekkie and oma and opa came to visit. for all three birthdays i took just two photos at levins. note to self, must take more photos!



lil and dale keeping warm.

yesterday we went and visited mums neighbour loretta to buy some chickens. there were no red hens (orange) but some beautiful brown ones

first i chose hawkie (called hawkie because she reminds me of a hawk) and fell in love

then i chose a white girl for bennys cousin and a light brown one for us. i gave them a bath and suddenly had two white ones:)

i already have two white chooks so i swapped her and came home with hilda. shes got a bent up beak but she eats fine and we love her. there settling in beautifully, hilda seems like shes been part of their gang forever, hawkies a little shy and prefers to keep to herself but she seems happy with her new home. loretta also has some beautiful ducks which benny realy loved, hes thinking of building a cage so he can get some which would be realy great

happy actual bday to me (tuesday)

heres pictures of my actual birthday. i had a great day full of visitors.

i was lucky to have anneke come the night before so that she could be here to say happy birthday to me the second i woke up!

we had a great time eating ham and cheese bagels for breakfast (no were not turning into bagel eating yuppies, the bagels were reduced to 70c for a bag of 10! i cant pass up that kinda bargain lol)

oma and opa came for a bit, then lil and dale, then sarah and kylie and then bennys parents and my mum for a barbie tea



whats that im holding you ask? only the greatest icecream cake ever made by the wonderful anneke especially for me! it had honey icecream, toffe ice cream with crunchie, maltesers, curly wurly, chomp mixed in, ice magic and a funky candle. mmmm, theres enough left for me and benny to enjoy all week and benny has been brainstorming what to put in an ice cream cake for his birthday

here we are eating it. mmmmmmmmmmm

21

heres some pictures of my family party. it was ''tea party'' theme and a lot of fun!
i made teapot shaped biscuits, tea cups out of marshmallows with half life saver handles, biscuit saucers. very cute

mum and anneke suprised me with a photo board of my life so far, a great suprise

i got some great presents, including a beautiful wooden outdoor table (which i absolutely LOVE!)

heres some of the pretty food

happy birthday AJ!!! (bit late but better late than never)

Aj has just been the best sister ever. i dont know what i could have done without her being my best friend throughout life. weve always been so different in many ways (shes always been the neat one, trying to get me to look nice, look after my clothes etc, she loves modern things, i love rustic) but where its important were so alike. we share the same views and morals and care about people. we both went through the same things growing up, learnt the same life lessons. when she went to queensland i saw her grow, change and learn and come away a more grown up confident version of herself (and i had a ball going to visit her and kane!) its been so nice seing her grow into an adult over the past few years, spreading her wings and living away from home (a bit too far away from me mind you!)

AJ, miss u like crazy, Happy Birthday '21st' for the 26th! have fun looking after Mia pup xoxoxoxo

heres a recap of our awesome night out!

having fun on our hotel balcony with aj, lil, sam, sarah

we hired a stretch hummer with tv screens and a mini bar packed full of goodies and drove around the city in ultimate luxuary!

kylie and kara met us at the cassino for a bit of a gamble (no i did not gamble my hard earned dosh, ive told you my thoughts on cassinos already!) kane enjoyed himself,

i love this picture! the camera buggerd up (ok, so perhaps it was the drunk photographers!) so we have many wierd red photos but this one i really like how it turned out. Then we got a little sleep, and went hangovers and all to ajs suprise family party!!!!!heres the birthday girl cutting the cake (with dad tine and sue in the background, we were very happy to have some mountgambians join us!)good ol family snap shot

and it wouldnt be a family party without "grandpa hugs" from sam and ben! i dont know the origin of grandpa hugs but i have learned to love their cripplin goodness! (they are a very tight hug in which the 'hugger' tries their best to squeese the life out of you) heres ben being the giver of one of the offending grandpa hugs, me being the reciever, sam and lil, and in the background, one of the streamers that 'makes' a party at Jo's place. they have been going up for birthdays for as long as i can remember, i love them and the memories they hold

happy birthday to me!!

i had a great birthday, dad was down which was a great suprise! mum made bacon and eggs for brekkie and dad squeezed fresh orange juice, mmm yum.


i got this tea pot from anneke, i have plans for a tea pot colection to run the whole way across the top of our high kitchen cupboards (aprox 3meters) i so far have 3 lol still quite a way to go

also super dooper happy elmo pyjamas from dad. i got lots of other nice presents too including money and chocolate,( both always nice:) fat quatres from levin, and some beautiful pictures from julian and louis

heres our visitors for the day, from left dad, me, levin, oma and opa. we had pies and pasties for lunch and i enjoyed wearing shorts and thongs which it hasnt been warm enough for in ages
and louis and julian (who were to excited about the playground to stick around for previous photo:)

heres opa, oma and mum


we walked down to the shops so i could spend my birthday money (i got awesome fabrics which you will soon see in the form of quilts and other things) ive almost finished a quilt top out of it already, i plan to be on the sewing machine the second the kids go home this arvo

me and dad had a go on the boys scooters. we couldnt get nearly as fast as the boys but we tried hard and had lots of fun!
benny came ova later that night to say happy birthday in person. we couldnt manage to get a non blurry photo but we did mansge to have fun!