The girls were here for a sleepover at the weekend. They seemed to enjoy a change of routine and the way the rules are not quite as tight over here. Like …… getting the paints out whenever you feel like it, eating chocolate Easter eggs when it's not even Easter, going to bed way later than usual...…..
Sunday dawned clear and COLD, a real Canberra Autumn morning - probably our first COLD morning for the year (but no not like London COLD!). A great morning for some park play.
The girls love our Hassett Park. Ella can't resist creating beautiful poses - with perfect control!
I love the way her pose echoes the Y shaped frames in the front courtyard of the newly built Koben Apartment building in the background.
Josh and Jody joined us mid morning for coffee at our fave local Intra.
Giving them a chance to sample Intra's kimchi (and provolone cheese) jaffles. They now understand our passion for them!
I took these pics with my brand new camera - the Fujifilm X-T3 with its 18-135 f3.5-5.6 zoom lens. It's gonna take me WEEKS to work out the way to use it in a smart way. It's a lot more hi tech than my 6 year old and fairly battle scarred little Fujifilm X20!
The young ones have been back from their road trip to Adelaide for a week or so and we've had a couple of chilled out days with the girls here at Campbell. They are both very serene, happy and calm at this stage of the summer holidays and spend hours here painting and drawing, making and eating food and playing in our Hassett Park.
It's so nice to have plenty of time for everything. When Ella was here today she told us the plotlines of all seven of the Harry Potter books she's read over the last year or two. It took her well over an hour in the telling as she swung from trees and assorted park equipment. She loves the books and has remembered every character and all the minute and obscure plot developments in all seven books.
Ella reckons she's lost some of her gym fitness after a 3 week break - but she looks very fit and strong to us!
And Abi's catching up …..
We moved into Saint Germain a year ago on the 3rd June 2017. It means we've lived here long enough to see the progress of all the seasons through our north facing glass walls looking towards Mt Ainslie. This past Autumn would rate as our favourite season so far …..
I took this pic from our window at the beginning of April when the first dusting of Autumn colours on the parkland trees started to emerge.
3 weeks later it looked like this …….
A month ago it looked like this - Autumn colour at its absolute exhilarating peak.
A week ago sunrise was looking like this ……. winter has arrived!
We had friends over this week and used it as an excuse to celebrate Wayne's birthday. Judy made one of her spectacular cakes for him ……...
Reminding us that a year ago Judy made us another spectacular cake to celebrate our move into the apartment ….. Hopefully this can become an annual tradition Judy ??
We've made more progress over the past 6 months making our apartment "home". David has just about completed this beautiful and unique timber storage unit in the living room, which we are really thrilled with ……
And we have made a bit more progress with the winter garden, after spending a year experimenting with the kinds of plants that will tolerate our regular absences OS and in Sydney, and the "glasshouse" conditions (succulents and semi-tropicals are good).
It's a great place to sit in the sun on a Winter's day admiring the views and the birdlife enjoying those parkland trees ……..
We've had the Coogee flat rented for a month now and we're just starting to ease into a more Canberra based life after an intense month of packing cleaning sorting and unpacking (again). We've never regretted any aspect of this move to apartment life despite minor regrets mostly to do with not having our own garden any more. Lucky there is such a beautiful natural environment surrounding us to fulfill our attachment to plants and earth.
We've had a couple of days with Ella and Abi this holiday, beautiful sunny, warm Autumn days in Canberra, perfect for enjoying life here in inner Canberra......
Last week we walked into Civic with the girls, picking up bucket loads of acorns along the way from the grand old oak trees lining the streets of Reid. Our goal was the annual ride the girls enjoy on the old Carousel in Petrie Plaza. Abi loves this merry-go-round!
We did a bit of shopping after at Ella and Abi's favourite beauty bar (Lush!).
Today we stayed around the apartment.... ages and ages doing crafty things - and eventually a bit of free form face painting....
Then ages and ages in our beautiful Hassett Park, playing soccer, talking to the resident dogs of the neighbourhood and climbing trees.
Ella even gave Rob's bike a workout in the basement carpark. She is getting so tall now it's no longer too much of a stretch for her to work the pedals on his big bike. She is a bit of a speed freak!
With Granny Bobbie (GG) here it was a great excuse for the Sydney LZACS to visit Canberra, to see her and catch up with their Canberra cousins.
There aren't too many opportunities for taking a pic of this side of the family all together - this was my best effort (but minus A and S unfortunately!)
We enjoyed lunch together on Saturday, at Saint Germain (in Campbell, not Paris) and our Hassett Park proved to be a great venue for some fun and games after.
I think baby Leo has won his cousin's heart or maybe it's the other way around?
For some reason the kids called this their Steve Urkel dance (have they even watched that old sitcom Family Matters???)
We were all up early on Sunday morning - for breakfast together at the QT Hotel at New Acton - which was perfectly placed for a walk to the lake after (on a breezy cool Canberra morning).
Baby Leo wins hearts wherever he goes!
I like this pic below - but pity about the WC backdrop!
It's a huge effort for a busy family with 3 young ones to get away for a weekend - so glad the LZACS made it!!
Sunday dawned clear and COLD, a real Canberra Autumn morning - probably our first COLD morning for the year (but no not like London COLD!). A great morning for some park play.
The girls love our Hassett Park. Ella can't resist creating beautiful poses - with perfect control!
I love the way her pose echoes the Y shaped frames in the front courtyard of the newly built Koben Apartment building in the background.
Josh and Jody joined us mid morning for coffee at our fave local Intra.
Giving them a chance to sample Intra's kimchi (and provolone cheese) jaffles. They now understand our passion for them!
I took these pics with my brand new camera - the Fujifilm X-T3 with its 18-135 f3.5-5.6 zoom lens. It's gonna take me WEEKS to work out the way to use it in a smart way. It's a lot more hi tech than my 6 year old and fairly battle scarred little Fujifilm X20!
