Crumpled Home

(RJ has to introduce himself and a hobby at school today, he has decided to bring in his collection of ‘dead things’)

RJ: (pointing to dead bobtail lizard in tightly sealed plastic container) I still remember how bad he stinks. Yuck!

Dad: Really? You opened him up to take a sniff?

RJ: No! Not me… It was my teacher.

Dad: Why did she open it?

RJ: (grinning) I tricked her. I told her he wasn’t smelly at all.

Dad: I hope she learned her lesson!

(early morning, before anyone else is awake)

RJ: Can I tell you something?

Mom: Mmhmmm.

RJ: You know those bones? Those human bones? In the cave?

Mom: Uh huh.

RJ: They remind me of Lady Gaga.

Mom: (awake now) Really? Why?

RJ: She sleeps with dead people.

We took a quick trip up to Gingin over the weekend and discovered that some of the trees had fruit on them. We also drove around the farm, stopping at the big pit for an explore. On the way back, we scouted for bones in the fields and discovered a complete fox skeleton, with teeth and everything else intact!

Foxxy made the rounds at the kids’ schools for show-and-tell, and was a big hit!

LR is fully loaded up with mandarines from the citrus trees.

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Despite the hot weather, we made it up to Gingin for the grape harvest, but Grammy, Poppa, Kath and Brad had already picked all the grapes and crushed them the day before we got there! We made the most of it anyway, picking a lot of figs and table grapes that were ready to eat. Mum cooked up some fig jam and we had a big sewing ‘sesh’ during the heat of the day, before going for an explore out in the paddock.

Our incredibly brave**, heroic** and good-looking** dad rescued us from this marauding beast** that had been ransacking the countryside and was intent on destroying the farm.

We found this guy having a drink from the dog's water bowl. He's a bobtail lizard which are pretty common around here.

**Hyperbole employed as official privilege of the author

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It’s September and the wildflowers have gone crazy. We took a quick trip up to Gingin to wish Grammy a happy birthday and spent an afternoon with Poppa helping him with his electronics and designing our own robots.

RJ and LR work on a birthday present for Grammy.

LR admires a huge bunch of daisies.

The almond and other fruit trees in the garden are all flowering.

The field is filled with a carpet of yellow flowers.

LR performs her amazing disappearing stick trick.

Please put down the camera. We want to do something fun.

It's either from a dragon... or a cow.

LR solders a resistor for Poppa.

RJ clips some leads for Poppa.

LR shows off her latest masterpiece - now hanging prominently in her room.

Dad and RJ worked together on cutting, gluing and colouring his robot.

RJ made himself a pair of "mad scientist glasses" -- out of some plastic packaging.

LR and RJ keep each other company during the scary bits of a movie.