RIP Romeo

Two days before Christmas my mum found our dog of 11 years beside her car. She thought at first he was sleeping, however, he had died in his sleep. I thank God he died in his sleep and we didn't have to make any decisions or take him to the vet. We knew he hadn't been well, but he had been on anti biotics and he seemed to be getting a little better. Well, he knew his time was up and he died peacefully at home. I'm so grateful for that! I'm also grateful none of the kids found him, that would have been devestating! We called Ali to come home because he is a big dog. He took the two older boys down to say good bye to Romy, to see that he was at peace and no longer in any pain. They were really sad and we had bought tickets on line to go to the movies. I decided we would still do that, to try and make them smile. Poor Kaleb still walks around saying 'woof woof'. I find that really sad, but Scott and Chrissie bought a new puppy 'Sparky' at the beginning of the month, so Í'm hoping he is looking for him. So RIP Romeo, you were a fantastic, loyal dog and we all loved you.

On a happier note, it's happy birthday to my little brother Scott today - so HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!! We had cake this morning and then I offered to mind their little boy so they could go out together. What a nice sis I am LOL

Only 2 more sleeps to the party of the year - our NEW YEARS EVE party - bring it on!!!!!

Brooke and Ethan in the pool with new toys on Christmas Day.

My Prince Kaleb and I

Superboy Harrison and I

My 4 gorgeous boys

Kaleb with Daddy.

We had a great Christmas Day. The kids were over the moon when they found out there were DS's under the Christmas Tree. Kaleb was happy with whatever he got and was happy to break the plastic toys very quickly. We had a lovely bacon and egg breakfast with my mum and dad and then we had our traditional hot Christmas lunch at around 2pm with mum, dad, Scott, Chrissie and Kaz (with their kids). We had turkey and ham, and roast veges, gravy - yum, yum, ,yum. Then for dessert we had Margaret's home made Christmas cake with custard, brandy butter or ice cream. YUMMO!! Between the 3 girls, we drank 8 (yes eight OMG) bottles of champers. Naughty indeeeeeedddd!!!!! We spent heaps of time in the pool and even managed to watch Mamma Mia (another gift I received :).

I hope everyone had a magical day aswell xx

December 27th

I was soooooo excited when I opened my present from my hubby and he had bought me a new lense for my SLR camera!! I was then shattered when we couldn't get it to work, the firmware wouldn't upload, so I took the camera and the lense back on Saturday and the man fixed it all up for me. We went down the beach in the afternoon to get some yabbies for fishing the next day, and these are the shots I took down there. I love, love, love my new lense, OMG the zoom is amazing and the crispness and quality of the pics are fantastic (for a novice photographer like me). I haven't edited any of these pics.

I was sitting about 50m away when I took this pic of this gorgeous specimen of a man heheheee

Ethan and Will pumping for yabbies

All the boys...

Tis the season to be jolly falalalalalalalala

Christmas morning, the tree was finally brimming with presents LOL The kids had been complaining that Nanna and Pop's tree had more pressies than ours. They were definately impressed on Christmas morning.

I was bored a couple of nights before Christmas as Ali was working at the Carols in Cotton Tree, so I made this LOVE album for my brother to give his new wife Chrissie on Christmas Day. She loved it (phew!)

This is a pic of our kids with Amelia's boys. Six boys together, it sure is BUSY LOL We had our Christmas get together a week or so before Christmas because they were heading to Adelaide for Christmas.

Heidi Swapp class

Here is a sneak peak of one of the calendar pages we did at Heidi Swapp on Saturday.

Heidi Swapp Create 08

So, the day had finally come. I was going to meet Heidi Swapp and 5 other girls I had met online at Scrapbook Shelf. I was really excited about this! Here is a sneak peak at one of the calendar pages we did. It was all so fast paced, but it was amazing and I learnt so many wonderful techniques, mainly inking and using Heidi's masks.
This is Heidi Swapp, an American scrapbooker who is such an inspiration and very, very talented! Plus she has 5 children - I don't know how she does it! Now, she isn't this tall, I have leant down so I was the same height as her LOL. Isn't she gorgeous! And she wasn't well - lots of coughing spasms. I hope she feels better for her Melbourne class on Tuesday.
Here I am with Heidi, Brendy and Tanya. It was so nice to meet these girls as well for the first time. Such a fun day!

Sunday the 30th November, 2008

We had our woodfire pizza oven installed late last week and we had some friends over on Sunday night to try it out. It was a bit of a competition between the boys and girls with toppings on the pizzas. Of course the girls' pizza's were the best LOL We had a bit of trouble getting this pizza into the oven, but hey, we got there eventually and it was totally delish!!

Al's new toy!!

We put our Christmas tree up. It was Kaleb's turn to put the star on the tree and of course he needed a little bit of help from dad. I love watching the kids' faces when they pull out the decorations for the tree and then they see the lights turn on - love Christmas!!

Scott and Christine's Wedding

So, the day has finally been and gone!! Yesterday my brother Scott married Christine in a cermony at our house with family and close friends. Anyone living in Qld will know that there was a severe storm here last night - we were very lucky, but as you can see in the beach photos - which by the way I haven't had time yet to edit, so these photos are all in their rawness. The sky looking towards Brisbane was amazing, the colours were so blue!! Anyway, we were lucky enough to have the ceremony, pics at the beach and then dinner. Then the rain started, no one got wet though, so that was a blessing, but we had to move inside our house for the cutting of the cake, the speeches and the bridal waltz.

It was a lovely wedding and although it rained, it was a beautiful occassion. Welcome Christine into our family, I know you love my brother very much and I wish you every happiness together! I really hope you like the photos - here are a few that were taken - my very good friend Yvette helped me out at the ceremony and then came to the beach aswell - mwah to you Yvette, you are a treasure. Thanks also to my friend Nicole who wore the wedding dress 10 years ago and didn't want it anymore, so kindly offered it to Christine. Thanks also to my friend Hannah who did our hair - you are a champion - broken foot and all :) Thanks also to Kaz who did a great job with the video camera, and a special thanks to my gorgeous husband who did a wonderful job as MC, host and Best Man, oh, and my baby boys who were all page boys - you all looked AMAZING and were soooooo well behaved.

Sorry the photos are in the wrong order, I just wanted to show you a few!!

Scott and Christine's Wedding

My DH Alistair and I

The Bridal party

My brother Scott's side of the family

Christine's side of the family

My family

Scott and Christine with their baby Joshua

After the signing of the registry

Arriving

The boys!!

My boys

Music Festival 2008

Amelia and I at the music festival listening to The Whitlams. Absolutely awesome weekend!!!
Ali and I taking a quick break...
Sunday afternoon in the park listening to The Whitlams and then Darryl Braithwaite.