Little Emme Temple

Look who is sporting curly hair for school...
No, its not a perm or her natural curls. Just the result of sleeping all night in rollers. But oh how cute!

Red Dust

An environmental phenomenon occurred while we were sleeping last night. I had come home in a thunderstorm, but not expecting wild weather at all. Unfortunately, wild only begins to describe what was happening.
Due to the fact I had a semi-late night out, I was trying my best to sleep til 7am. The kids are usually pretty good about minding their own business till then or if I am lucky they start on getting ready for school. Well, not this morning. Around 6.30 Andrew came in to tell me the sky was pink. I told him it was the sunrise and not to bother me again until after 7. A few minutes later Emme came in and said the sky was red. Again I pleaded 'sunrise'. Rolled over and dozed till 7.
Then when I stumbled out of bed and opened the curtains, I immediately saw they weren't kidding. Instead of the normal morning fog we often get over the bay behind the house, we were engulfed in a red/orange haze. Flipped on the news to hear that Sydney is in the midst of one of the worst dust storms ever in history. Think Wizard of Oz meets the Grapes of Wrath. Or something like that. No tumbleweeds, but I wouldn't have been surprised to see things flying by in the sky.

View from our deck to the right

View from our deck to the left

View from our deck straight over the pool

View from our driveway looking at house

The dust was so fine that it just filled the air. You could feel it in your lungs, your skin, your eyes, everything. ICK! It kept the dusting up until a huge westerly blew in around 2 and cleared up the sky. But you can imagine what 80-100km/h winds would do to dust that had settled on the ground!
Everything was coated with a fine powdery rust colored dust. The ping pong table, the ground, the plants, the cars. It is just awful. Found out quite a few kids were kept home from school to keep them out of the dust. Being the mean mom I am (not that the kids requested to stay home anyway), I took them to school. Was pleasantly surprised to find ALL the doors shut to the classrooms, so that they were trying to keep the most dust out that they could. Kids survived the day and now they can 'live to tell the tale!'

Aladdin Jr. at NPS

Last night Emmalee made her debut as a cloud in the Northbridge Public School's production of Aladdin Jr. She and her classmates from 3P danced to A Whole New World as clouds while Aladdin and Jasmine sang.
Starting her theatrical debut as a cloud -- must be taking after her meteorological uncle... weather and all you know...

Emmalee's 1st Communion

Today Emmalee completed the final sacrament of initiation into the Catholic Church here at St. Philip Neri in Northbridge. She made her 1st communion with her classmates at 11am. She looked radiant, you could really see the Holy Spirit glowing from within her.

Taronga Zoo Trip

Andrew's class took a trip to Taronga Zoo to further their studies of the African Animals. We got to see baby elephant Luk Chai, who came out to greet zoo visitors for the first time the Sunday before we arrived.
I was lucky (?) enough to be one of the parents who accompanied the class on their excursion, so I got to see the kids as they enjoyed the animals and the beautiful 70 degree spring day.

Father's Day 2009

This year I decided to to a proper Father's Day for the dad in our family. Instead of the normal breakfast in bed (which totally disappointed the kids), we went for coffee Saturday morning and I informed Jim that he was going on an adventure. One he (and the kids who have BIG mouths ) didn't know about.
I had packed the car the night before (luckily without his knowledge -- boys can be so non-noticing) with all the gear we needed for an overnight stay in a beach town.
Drove up the coast to Ettalong Beach and spent Saturday night in a Mantra hotel with a beautiful heated (just not heated enough for my princess taste) pool. Would say dad and the kids had a wonderful weekend.