Oh dear. More than three weeks into the new year and nary a photo yet blogged of 2015. Tsk, tsk! Summer holiday mode, family time and other things going on have taken me away from my camera and computer of late - which is ok of course, the break does me good!
This summer is not quite the one we expected and I don't have many photos to show for it thus far (well, many for me, haha!), but many memories are being stored away regardless - treasured, in fact. We are thankful for these warm, often rainy, quiet days of togetherness.
Here are some snaps from the last three-ish weeks...
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| Preparing for round #1,372 on the Slip'N''Slide. These kids beg for the Slip'N''Slide all year round, even on the coldest Canberra winter days (bless). It's nice to be able to say Yes at last :) |
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| Too cute. Mark's parents have very kindly stored Mark's beloved teen-years basketball card collection for many many years. Then hauled it across the country in their cross-country move. Now safe back in his hands, he enjoyed the blast from the past while he sorted, culling the collection of several thousand cards down to just a select few. The kids are enjoying picking out some and the rest... who knows?! Needless to say, we won't be retiring early on the value of this collection but it's pretty adorable to see the fond memories it holds :) |
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| Raindrops are falling on my head... |
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| You know that moment when you just have to take a post-fruit-binge breather?? |
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| Right back to it... |
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| My little snuggle bug. He wanders, being brave and adventurous until he circles back around and collapses on top of me with an 'Ahhhhhh'. Settling in for a snuggle and some connection. I am always happy to be his pillow and his resting place xx |
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| 'Cuggggle!!' |
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| Strutting off to the pool again like he owns the place |
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| Mark wanted the kids to have 'special holiday cereal' but as I am avoiding store-bought cereals these days, I decided to try and make my own 'treat' (but actually pretty healthy!) cereal. I mixed raw cacao, a little maple syrup and coconut oil, then stirred it into puffed rice. Baked it in the oven to dry it out and... tadaaaa - healthy 'chocolate puffs'. The kids approved :) (I got the idea from PWK) |
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| We wake up to a sign that says 'Merry Morning', with all our names listed and a bowl of muesli (with milk added!) and serviettes too. Just Lily the Fairy at work once again! |
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| Nothing like a little basket of freshly picked herbs to go with dinner! |
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| Loving having my girl home on holidays. She spends her days whipping up things like this. No stopping her creative force! |
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| Our cherry tomatoes have grown like wildfire.... so much rain, now we just need the sunshine to ripen more up! |
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| Nature's snack machine. The kids burrow in every day, hunting for handful more red ones. Few actually make it into the house but I have hopes to make some semi-dried tomatoes when they do! |
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| A morning's work. The wisteria vines were snaking all over the patio, so I handed the kids a pair of secetares each and they had a happy morning clipping away! They had a ball. The next morning they pruned half the backyard, haha! |
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| One afternoon the kids announced they were serving us dinner at the coffee table in the loungeroom. Tickets were made with our names on it, the table was set, flowers were placed and we were informed that they themselves would be eating alone in the kitchen (very Downton?) and would serve us ANYTHING we wanted. We were strongly encouraged to want ice cream cones with sprinkles ;) Eli dressed himself in a misbuttoned vest and it was all very proper. The buckets were for handing out our tickets and giving out flowers. These kids are a scream, bless these little munchkins of mine! |
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| More holiday hijinks. They set up a stall consisting mostly of stuff pilfered around the house as well as apples from the tree, flower creations and other items and announced they were having a sale. Eli walked around very business like with a piece of paper to mark Sold/Not Sold for each item. Lily attempted to sell us items for $2-$5 each!!! But I bargained her down to 10 cents each to aquire my own pegs. Sheesh ;) |
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| So proud to have a School Girl Lottie 'She goes to school like me!' |
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A school holiday outing, quality time with my girl. I took her to the National Museum to
see a wonderful Australian Horse history exhibition called 'Spirited'. It was so sweet to wander around
together, chatting about everything we saw. She was most keen to see the horse hearts and kidneys!
(iphone) |
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| A little Jillaroo (iphone) |
And that wraps up our #highlightsreel. Will try to get back to posting weekly-ish from here on in!!!
What's on your highlights reel this week? Feel free to share in the comments :)
And what a highlights reel it is too - it sounds like you've been having amazing fun over the summer, and I just love the sound of the dinner party - I remember doing something like that for my parents at a smilier age (we gave them pink jelly!) and it was so much fun :)
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