Christmas festivities

We've done a couple of nice pre-Christmas events with Sharon, Carson, Sam and Matty lately. We had a picnic and saw the carols by candlelight at Peppermint Grove on Sunday, and on Tuesday went to the live nativity play at St John's church in the centre of Fremantle. They actually had a petting zoo inside the church, which kept all the kids enthralled. They had a real donkey carrying "Mary" down the aisle, and the finale was allowing the kids to file past a very very young baby swaddled in the "stable" on the alter. Being raised in a religion free zone meant that Harrison had no idea of being quiet in the church, so when the hymns started he was up doing his best dance moves in front of everyone. Then he discovered he could see his shadow on the stable walls which were along the front of the alter, so he danced AND sang Wiggles songs AND did shadow puppets whenever the music started. Outside the church there were free camel rides for the kids, which Harrison also loved. We went to Little Creatures for dinner, then to Cottesloe for icecream on the beach. There was a low wooden platform (kind of a park bench / picnic table thing) which Harrison decided was a stage, so it was back to dancing and singing and watching his shadow on the grass. He is completely besotted by Sam (Sharon and Carson's 5 year old angel). She is just wonderful with him and very protective and big-sisterly.

Post - script - here's a pic of Harrison about to open his "real working" accordian from Marg and Neil on Christmas morning. Wags the Dog lies discarded to the side... 8 months of wishing for Santa to bring him a Wags, and 2 hours into the festivities he finds something better.... tsk tsk.

Esperance

We had a week in Esperance early in December. It was a long drive (about 7 hours each way), but we broke it up at Wave Rock on the way down and Hopetoun on the way back. Esperance is a really lovely place - the beaches and bays are magnificent. Even at the start of school holidays we had beautiful turquoise bays all to ourselves. Harrison loved the sea. We found a gorgeous restaurant - Taylor Street Tearooms which catered for coeliacs, had fabulous water views and great service and food as well. We camped at Cape Le Grand NP and at Hopetoun, and Harrison loved it. It's hard work camping with a 2 year old, he needs to be supervised every minute, and is into everything, wanting to climb trees, wander into the bush, play in the dirt... He made friends with a couple of kids (Darcey,8 and Hannah, 6) who were about 15 months into a trip around Australia with their parents. They arrived at Cape Le Grand the same day as us, and the 3 kids spent hours playing chasey and splashing in the sea and building sand castles. Darcey was particularly good with Harrison. He made up stories for him and held his hand walking around camp. They will be coming through Perth in a few months time, so hopefully we'll catch up again.

First day of holidays

It's the first day of my very long summer break (until 29th January), but I've spent a large part of the morning on the phone sorting out a few small crises at work. Also did some Christmas shopping this morning - sent a series of presents over to Brisbane. I bought them all at Myer and they box them up and post them direct to the recipients.

Harrison had another visit to Santa. Still not keen on sitting on his knee, but happy to chat and wave from the safety of my arms. We had lunch at the shops and sat next to a lovely retired couple - the man had a close cropped white beard. Harrison kept leaning over to tell him conspiratorily "I saw a man with a white beard on his chin, and a Christmas hat on his head with a jingle bell on the end. He was a very nice man and he was very big. Who do you think he was? Santa Claus!".

Speaking of lunch, I asked the Coffee Club to do a plate of ham cheese and tomato for Harrison without any bread, and they were happy to (and what's even better, Harrison was happy to eat the lot). Maybe this gluten free thing won't be too hard after all. I also successfully made mum's ginger nut recipe with gluten free flour and sent some mini gingerbread men to daycare with Harrison, and took the rest to work with some rum balls. Mel gave me a rum ball recipe based on sponge cake, so I can make a cornflour sponge and do gluten free rum balls as well. Same theory for trifle... I'll make my own stuffing for the turkey breast roll instead of buying it pre-done, and we really shouldn't be able to tell much difference with our Christmas fare.

Rudd

We have a new Labor leader as of this morning. Kevin Rudd is the MP for our old seat in Brisbane. I always thought he was pretty impressive, so hopefully it bodes well for a change of government at the next election. A Mandarin speaking PM would be fantastic, and also one who knows how to communicate with the electorate and with the media.

Sam's the Man

Yesterday Simon and Harrison went to the Wiggles concert together. The news all morning was the impending announcement of Greg's departure as the Yellow Wiggle (warning - this links to a large video file). Showing how resiliant (or fickle) kids are, Harrison watched the video announcement before the show and by the end of the concert was perfectly happy with Sam Moran as the new Wiggle. He's starting saying "I'm Sam and you're Anthony" already. He was a bit concerned about Greg's illness. He hoped that the nurses gave Greg jelly beans when he had his blood tests, and that Anthony took him for an icecream afterwards.

This morning Terena and I left the boys at creche while we did aqua-aerobics, and according to the carers Harrison spent the whole time showing them his Wiggles dances and singing Wiggles songs (and also telling every mum that came in that his mum was just having a swim and she'd be back soon).

Mel and Tim are having a daylight saving party on Sunday (when we tick over to DST in Perth). Should be fun. We are shifting another cubic metre of mulch again on Saturday, so by Sunday Simon at least will need some R & R. Let's hope his beer elbow hasn't seized up after a day of shoveling.