Crumpled Home

(over breakfast)

Mum: (to Lorian) RJ and I need to go buy a birthday present for your friend.

LR: How about something from the horse shop?

Mum: Good idea!

RJ: How about something from the Indonesian Shop? They have lots of things and even horse stuff. It is expensive.

Mum: What do they have there?

RJ: Toy horses… and ones you can paint… You can even get food there! Like bagels, giant pretzels, juice… and almond dessert!

(For the record, we have never been to or even heard of an Indonesian shop, but it does sound pretty cool!)

Great grandpa Maury went in for surgery on Tuesday. He’s had a second angioplasty and a surprising number of stents put in. Not bad for his first heart related problems (at 97!)

Grandpa Maury is still looking great! Grandpa Maury tells us about his surgeon during lunch, on his 97th birthday.

Everything went fine, but they are keeping him under observation to make sure there are no complications. Mum had the kids draw pictures and went to visit him yesterday. He loved them!

And of course, the pictures that they drew:

LR's drawing depicts a scene of devastation around an erupting volcano, complete with ash clouds masking the sun, portending environmental disaster... and a kraken attacked a ship.

RJ tackles a classic theme... A kraken brutally attacks a pirate ship; its quivering maw and writhing mass of tentacles preparing to unleash a storm of destruction..

Easter and the Autumn break rolled around once more, so we took off down south to unwind and relax a little. We brought our friends M, J, J, and I along with us and we all had a great time. Big events this time around were several extreme rock climbing sessions, decorating eggs, the Easter morning hunt, a hike through the Karri forest and the required horse riding.

We made it to the top!

Continue reading

We took a bit of a break last week and head off to the Southwest. It was very relaxing and the weather was just fantastic. The days were filled with horse riding, beach trips, exploring and even a couple of fishing trips.

Grammy and Poppa were there with the Melbourne cousins for the first couple of days, but couldn’t stay the whole time.

Grammy, LR, RJ and Daddy checked out Ngilgi cave. This huge room is called the amphitheatre and has great accoustics (especially for people who appreciate yelling children).

Continue reading

Mum went off to camp to visit LR for the evening. RJ and I had a big afternoon playing secret agents, jumping on the trampoline, mucking about at the beach and having getting dinner at a restaurant.
Towards the end of the meal, RJ grabbed the drinks menu, opened it and started reading.

RJ: Hmmm… Look at that…

… That’s interesting.

… Wow. I didn’t know that!

Dad: RJ. What are you reading???

RJ: This magazine. They left it here for us.

Dad: What is it about?

RJ: All sorts of things. There is a story about a party that they had.

Dad: What kind of party?

RJ: Just a birthday party. It’s not very interesting.

Dad: Is there an interesting story in there?

RJ: Yes. It’s about dragons.

Dad: Cool. What does it say?

RJ: Dragons have enormous teeth and a big tail. Some of them live in the ocean. They have very sharp teeth and they eat meat… but not people meat.

Dad: What kind of meat do they eat?

RJ: Oh you know, sheep, cows and horses and stuff.

Dad: Anything else about dragons in there?

RJ: They have a picture of a knight who had to kill a dragon. It was very dangerous, but he had a sword and shield with him.

Dad: Why did he have to kill the dragon?

RJ: The king told him to. It was eating all the sheep and making the people mad. (goes back to reading the menu)

Dad: … Anything else in there?

RJ: No. That’s the end.

RJ can tell you a thing or two about dragons.

Mum and the kids spent a few days down south. Dad caught up with them over the weekend. We had all sorts of animal visitors to the house: a couple of bandicoots, parrots, cockatoos, galahs, king skinks and even a blue-tongue lizard! LR started each day with riding lessons while RJ spent the mornings exploring.

LR had several riding lessons.

She's getting very good. On the last day we were there, she led everyone back to the stable!

LR gives Seeaney a thank-you carrot.

RJ spent some the time herding snails with a stick. He gets to ride next year!

It's not a rat! A young bandicoot stopped by for a snack.

Mum and LR spotted some fossils while on a walk.

You just can't leave the house without finding them.

RJ: (singing) Old MacDonald had a farm. Eee eye eee eye oh!

And on that farm he had a cow. Eee eye eee eye oh!

With a moo-moo here, and a moo-moo there. Here a moo, there a moo everywhere a moo-moo.

Old MacDonald had a farm, Eee eye eee eye oh!

RJ: And after that he ate the pig and the sheep and the duck too!

Run fellas! Old Mac-D is on the way!