March is nearly over!

Hi all! I've never known life to be quite as intense as it is at the moment ... and it doesn't look like easing much for a while yet! I dare say you're all finding it busy too. This week's camp has been only 47, and they wanted roast beef and vegies, and icecream with toppings, both nights - made it easy for us! They go out this afternoon, and next week's starts Monday, with about 50, all vegetarians! Yesterday's little drama involved mice - and led to us cleaning out the whole pantry, sweeping and washing shelves, putting almost everything in plastic tubs with good firm lids, and setting more traps! When I went in at 7am today we'd caught 5, and in the 3 hours I was there we caught another 6 .... while we were there!! Cheeky blighters! There are soem things we can't put in tubs, so they're stacked up on the top tier of our stainless steel work table in the kitchen, and we hope the meeces can't climb stainless steel!

On Monday we had a Board meeting at 4pm, to plan the National Secretariat we're hosting at Nunyara in May, then went to dinner with the 10 folk, at which someone mentioned the Northern Lights! 2 carloads of us went in and wandered around - they're quite incredible, aren't they?! I was amazed at the number of people milling around, in little old Adelaide at 9 o'clock on a Monday night!
Tuesday I took Helen to Adelaide, for her next counselling appt, and we did a big shop at Cash and Carry. Got back in time to organise dinner for the Camp! Yesterday i worked 6.30am to 8.30pm, with an hour off for a haircut mid afternoon! Was another long day!

We're about packed up to go to Adelaide .... again! It will be good to see Peter again! He rang lunch time and we had a good chat! He reckons we ought to just buy a laptop and present it to Grandad as a fait accompli! Sounds good to me! We then need someone to make sure everything gets transferred from his old one, and also to help him organise Broadband ..... well, we'll keep plugging away at it! Poor old Dad! Peter's trying to convince him to spend our inheritance on making sure he can comfortably stay in his unit as long as possible - he's been talking "hostel"!! We hope he'll see a physio, get some exercises, and be more comfortable! .... and I think that's the obvious thing to do and am totally in favour of it!!

Tomorrow Dad and I will go and visit Granny, and take her some photos from Alicia's wedding - I realised last visit that she doesn't have one photo of Elwyn there! She will tomorrow! Hopefully they can also sort out Grampa's headstone .... Granny's mentioned it the last couple of visits and Dad's had replies from Elwyn and Bill .... I'm keeping out of it!
Dad's got Synod tomorrow night and all day Saturday, and we'll come back in time for me to help Helen serve lasagne, salad, garlic bread, and fruit salad and icecream to 30 footballers! Sunday morning they want a cooked breakfast, so Helen adn I may be a bit late for church ... not too, I hope! Then our next Camp comes in Monday .... never a dull moment! And next weekend is our church Camp! Aaaaah well ..... we don't get bored!
Hope you're all doing well, enjoying this cooler weather, and not too busy!
Love you all! Mum xxxxxxxxxx

The Hunter and The Bruised!

Whyalla update:

Last (last) Saturday Stuart went out fishing at 4am with the other Assistant Principal. And the hunter not only caught a fish, but he cleaned it and then cooked it for his family for tea.

Also, last Sunday night I lead worship and was playing tambourine for one song. This is what my leg looked liked after the service!!!

I hope that you are all well. Big hugs and kisses to you all.

My First Kindy Morning

Hi all, Jacob had a great morning on Monday at his "New School". We even caught the bus back home, all 3 stops which is a long way for a 3 1/2 year old (he did have to walk almost the same distance from Kindy to the Bus stop then the Bus stop to home and it was 30 degrees).

He didn't want his photo taken before he left though :-( and soon asked for his bag to be taken off his back.

The new year begins - officially

Hello all. Thought it was time I put something here. Calvin's first full week of kindy seems to have gone better than I expected and he is starting to make friends which is nice. He is quite proud of his new kindy top (as you can see).
The other photos are just cute. Calvin decided today that his friends Sheepy and Monkey should dress up with him and capture bad guys.

Natalie seems to have settled back into school well. She has spelling homework as well as her normal reading homework now, but has got back into the routine quickly. She will start ballet again next week and I'm very pleased that she has gone up a class so we won't have to rush from school any more.

Stuart ... I probably can't really speak on his behalf, but I think that things are going pretty well and he hasn't encountered any dramas yet.

I have managed to fill up my Calvin free mornings, but hope to get into some sort of routine in the next few weeks. A shoulder injury is putting doubts on my plans to study video editing in more depth. Extended time on the computer leaves me rather immobile in in right shoulder and rather painful. But we will be investigating some ways around that.

Hope that you are all well and having a good start to the year.

Love and Hugs, -Debbie



(PS I just found this very cute Rooster in the back yard, which I thought I should share, not to mention the flash of Pink who zoomed past me)

Washing

Here is a picture of our car. So what you might say....well last night I washed it :-)

First time in almost a year...opps.

so this is 2008?!

I hope it slows down a bit!
By the way, happy birthday Calvin, I do hope you had a great day! We loved having you stay with us last week, and it was beaut having all the family visit on Saturday! That's one of the (many!) things we like about living here!
Having had various combinations of family and friends to stay, basically from Christmas eve until last Sunday, this week has been busy with work! We had a YMCA camp in from Mon until today, with 3 meals a day on site, for 72! I worked 8, 8, 12, 12 and 4 1/2 hours, and am a bit weary! But my, won't it be good on pay day?! Next YMCA camp comes in on Mon, same format, same leaders, different kids, and only 66 this time! But we've learned from this week, and are much more organised this time. We'll vary the menu a bit, and have worked out a HUGE shopping list that we plan to do first thing Mon morning, so hopefully we don't have to make so many emergency dashes to the shop! Helen and I have great fun together, altho it wasn't much fun when she cut her finger on the electric slicer and had to have 4 stitches in it Wednesday lunch time! It hasn't handicapped her too much - she can still give orders! (and sometimes I take them!)
Tomorrow I'm off to town for an all day Board meeting - 9-5! Dad's around at the church tonight for a Thai dinner, but I decided I needed some catch-up time, hence this entry - and the emails I fwded you all this afternoon! My Inbox is much more manageable now! I'm glad Grandad's gonna give Broadband a try - I've got some really big ones to send him!
Hope you're all doing OK - not working too hard, and all well, and all that!
Love you all!
Mum

Happy Happy Birthday Calvin

Decorating Trees

It is the season...while most people were decorating there Christmas trees with decorations and lights, it was time for me to do some serious recycling with those unwanted CD's.

For most of the time it was very effective (more than the pie dishes). Apricot season is over now for us and we have 5 litres stewed in the freezer plus 4 from last year!

More School results!

Michael's end of school year report is in, the envelope was opened by an anxious mum. Inside...

At most subjects Michael is working dilligently at year 3 level, and showing strong signs. In English Michael is working ahead of class level requirements, and in German Michael is showing strong understanding and exceeding requirements for his year level :)

School reports at his level are allocated in A,B,C,D,E (A for excellence, C for year level requirements, E for further assistance) for how their work slots in with their year level expectancy and 1,2,3,4,5 (1 for highly mastered, 3 year level requirement, 5 more further assistance) for understanding. Michael achieved mainly C's and 2/3's with the exception of English where he achieved a B/2 and German where he achieved a B/1. He was also presented with a strong character reference by his teacher and principal alike.

Now its on to year 4, where he has a 4/5 class with his first male teacher, Mr Richmond.

Uni Results are in

Second semester was always going to be tough and a little busy with Uni, Church and Family life. I'm please to say though that for my 4th year Education topic, Teaching Indigenous Australian Students, I got a Credit. Also got a Credit + for my essay (thanks for the proof read Stu).

My 2nd elective on Environment, Economy and Culture I got another Credit and last no surprises I got a High Distinction for Information Communication Technology part 2 (following on from 1st Semester).

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Natalie the Ballerina

Last night Natalie had her first ballet concert. She was one of Cinderella's mice and probably spent a grand total of 8 minutes on the stage! I was not allowed to film or take photos in the theatre, but I did take these photos in the dressing room before the show.
Grandma and Grandpa Cozens were over and also enjoyed the show, which included ballet (Disney Princesses) , jazz (Dusty Springfield - lots of glitter), modern (High School Musical), contemporary, hiphop, tap (my favourite bit, after Natalie, - they did Happy feet!). Not bad for a little dance school in Whyalla. I cried at all the little tiny people :P lol.
Natalie has a second show this afternoon (in 90mins actually) then we can think about being on holidays :)

Love and hugs (and hope you find the remote Al!)
-Debbie

Remote Life

Bedroom TV Remote lost....if found please return (Sam!)

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Christmas in Adelaide

Hey there,

If you get the opportunity, make sure you go and see the Christmas Tree in Victoria Square in the city. It is really quite spectacular! We went last night, and there were bubbles in the fountain, funky lights in the trees and the most massive tree I have seen! There were kids running around and laughing and having a ball.

Excuse the clarity of these shots, but they were taken with Rob's mobile as we left the camera at home, but you get the jist of how cool it is.

Natalie's Christmas Play

Hi all. Hope you are all well.

Natalie has a new vlog up in which she talks about being a cat in the Community Christmas Carol play on Sunday night. You can see her vlog here.

Also I have put the entire play (5ish minutes) up on Stuart's account and you can see that here. Not the best play ever seen, but the cat is cute and funny. ;)

All the best and enjoy.

Natalie GOT FEATURED!

Oh my goodness!!! The last thing I expected to see this morning when I started up Youtube was Natalie looking back at me from under the words FEATURED!

Check it out here.

I feel a little nervous about it. I'm not really sure why they chose that particular episode from all of hers, but I have been keeping an eye on the comments and her new subscribers all day, screening for scary people. Let me know if you come across anything dodgy.

Ok, now that I've got the paranoia out of the way, back to being excited! John sent me a message:
And congrats to Natalie. She honestly is, at the age of six, one of the best vloggers on youtube. (Also, Calvin is pretty amazing. His impression of me is the cutest event of my life maybe.) -John

Gosh I didn't think any of this would be happening 6 months ago!!!

Hope that you are all well, love and hugs -Debbie

Slight Color Change

Thought the blog need a face lift...well slightly anyway

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Guess who we saw last night!

After 15 years, Noiseworks finally returned to Adelaide and they rocked our world. Fantastic show! Still havent slept yet, poor Rob s at work! LOL Michael stayed with my parents as it was an over 18's gig. When we arrived at the soundcheck - Jon asked where Michael was and was disappointed that he wasnt there! After the show we chatted to Stuart Fraser for around half an hour, and he was more than disappointed that Michael wasnt there! He gave us his pick to nuture his interest in guitar and made us promise that we would bring him next time :) This morning when Michael came home to get ready for school he was very impressed :)

Guess what WE saw on the way home the other night!

Driving down Edward St after I'd picked up Jacob on monday night, I had to stop for what i thought was a dog slowly crossing the road (luckily there were no cars behind us, and luckily i didn't hit it!). It looked a bit funny for a dog, and I realised it was a Koala! How cool! It crossed the road in front of us then climbed up the tree. We pulled over and took some pics and hopefully you can see it!

Monty Python Lego

What more can I say - this is just brilliant!

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A couple of snaps from today. Michael is with Father Christmas at the Reynella Neighbourhood Pageant, Michael and Rob are at the Reynella Neighbourhood Fair. The Ocean shot is at Pt Noarlunga which looked stunning today. And Michael and I are at Pt Noarlunga on top of the bluff.