A beautiful southern Christmas Day

Christmas Day dawned bright and sunny and beautiful. We sat in the yard and chatted and relaxed over coffee and Christmas cake at morning tea time. I stayed there for a while and read for a bit. We didn't have to be anywhere until mid afternoon.

Mid afternoon we headed over to number one son's home and congregated with the rest of the family. There were 18 of us in total as my brother and his partner from Aussie had arrived unexpectedly.

As usual there were parcels under the tree

and we had fun opening them :)

And then it was time to head outside

to seek the shade and maybe catch a breeze.

Under the house for some

and under the umbrella in the back yard for others.

Sunblock and sunhats were the order of the day.

A couple of the men got the barbie going, the girls had already done their bit with the salads, desserts and nibbles.

Enough food to feed the clan and then some left over.

Well maybe not the meat but some of the salads and sweets.

Later it was time to head around to the front garden

out of the sun and heat, to chat and eat desserts.

And that is a snapshot of our Christmas Day.

Diana

joining Deb at Breathing in Grace

for Friday foto friends

Merry Christmas to one and all

A funny sort of week & an apology

It's been a funny sort of a week in more ways than one,

but it is over so we can now get on with Christmas 'stuff'.

Some days it's been bucketing down like this...

and on those days I did stuff like this on the computer...

And then I would think that really I should have gone and dusted the bedroom, or wherever, but it was too late :) Dusting is my second most hated household chore.

Grand daughter came and decorated the tree last weekend and I showed you a picture of the work in progress - here is the finished tree. "You need more tinsel, Granma" she said, and I do so will probably get some at the post Christmas sales.

I don't know about you but I love getting Christmas cards

and I am a bit disappointed that people don't send them

any more. It's not quite the same receiving an electronic

 one - you can't prop it on your mantelpiece and enjoy

 it quite the same. Above is a picture of this years cards.

I managed to bake another cake that turned out pretty good,

even if I do say so myself. It is gluten free as my daughter has become gluten intolerant at the ripe old age of 50!

I'm hoping it will taste okay.

************

An apology

I've been having trouble with putting comments on posts

so my apologies if I have made multiple comments :( 

 I think I have the problem sorted now, I hope so.

joining Deb and friends today for

Friday foto friends

Am I ready for Christmas? No.

Christmas is almost here as you know.
Am I ready? No. Does it matter? Not really.
I think it will probably be the end of the week before
I get any more shopping done. That's just the way
it's panning out this year. But on Christmas Day
the whole family will gather at number one son's
 home and we will celebrate together,
just as we have every year.
And that's what matters :)

Newly married grand daughter, Monica, came over

and decorated our tree. She did a great job too :)

 

And after putting my nativity up and looking at it for

several days I have just realized that Joseph is AWOL!

I've made a cake too, disaster. I've cut it up and

 will use it for pudding with hot custard over it.

And so 'til next time

 E noho ra, goodbye

Diana

Oh this spring weather...

This is what it looked like a couple of days ago even though the forecast had been for rain, hail and snow to low levels.

Well it did arrive and although we didn't get snow here the temps have dropped dramatically and it feels like winter again. This is how it looked a couple of minutes ago from one of my front windows.

A lake is forming in the yard.

And the storage bin began to float...

.

...so my GKB had to go out and rescue it.

It doesn't look like a lot of water but it is!

A pot of soup is cooking on the stove - winter comfort food :)

If only I could I'd send this rain to California.

***********

Well things got worse after I had written this. Flooding, shops, businesses and some homes sandbagged. Some people were told to prepare to evacuate, roads have been cut off and trees down as well as slips. And our power was out for a couple of hours. Apart from that all we have had is a leaking window. Thankfully we had our roof fixed back in February otherwise I think it would have been a different story. It was quite a weather bomb with more to come apparently.

Cowboy boots, lace and pearls...

The weather had been dreadful leading up to the wedding. Even on the day we were all nervously watching the skies. The aunties and Granma joked about buying bright pink, sparkly gumboots and wearing them, instead of our nice high heeled wedding shoes. But it stayed fine and was quite a nice mild day and we were able to hold the service outside under the trees in the garden at the venue.

Me and sis ready to leave.

We had thrown umbrellas in the boot of the car.

The cake made by the bride's big brother.

There was a bit of drama with the cake as it was so

 hot where he was making the decorations that they

wouldn't set so he ended up bringing it down

uniced and icing it on the morning of the wedding.

We ended up with fresh flowers on it as a substitute

to the artificial ones he had hoped to make.

It looked beautiful.

Siblings, Monica, Andrew and Caitlin.

Caitlin was one of the bridesmaids.

Monica made her bouquet along with those

of the bridesmaids and the rustic table centerpieces,

which I never got a photo of.

The radiant bride and handsome groom

with their groomsman.

She wore cowboy boots under her dress :)

That was one of the borrowed things.

The other was a string of pearls.

With her proud grandad :)

The dress was beautiful as you can see.

Dancing with her proud Dad.

Mum with her partner.

On the dance floor.

A great day was had by all. and all too soon it was over.

Sooner for us older ones than for the younger ones,

oh well we still enjoyed ourselves, but I was glad

to get those heels off when I got home :)

Maybe I should've worn pink, sparkly gumboots!

There was a photo of my little mother and Monica's other grandmother on display. Both had died in the past twelve months and this was a nice way to include them in the celebrations.

Diana

joining Debby for

Friday foto friends

A bridal shower

We had a bridal shower last weekend, at my eldest daughter's home, but before I share some photos with you

here is a little bit of whimsey :)

Can you see the face?

***********

Now to the shower.

My granddaughter Monica is going to be wed this weekend and so it was time to celebrate with just the girls. Pink was the colour theme and the instructions we had were that we should wear something pink :) but as you can see some people never got the message, oh well.

We were greeted at the door by the beautiful bride to be in her pink and white outfit. She and I both love pink. Somehow we ended up with nearly all the food being pink or white as well which meant quite a lot of it was very sweet:)

Once everyone had chatted for a while it was time to play silly games and have some fun. There was a mix of people, workmates, friends and family and the games were a great way to break the ice. Daughter in law was in charge.

Daughter with cake on her face after one of the games - don't ask - but it was fun and I think I won a prize in this one - always a bonus.

Time to open the parcels and I'm not sure why the face pulling but maybe she thought a pink teddy bear was a bit strange at a bridal shower :) She did get some lovely gifts though. Anyway, we all had a fun afternoon and as long as Monica enjoyed it that is all that matters in the end.

************

Middle sis arrives from Aussie late tonight and another grand daughter flew in yesterday. Monica's big brother is bringing the cake down from Christchurch on Friday, he's made and iced it, so none of us have any idea what it's like - well maybe Monica does :) So we're really looking forward to a wonderful celebration with everyone at the weekend.

I'll see you again once it's all over.

Diana

joining in with Debby over at

Friday foto friends

Beautiful colour

My GKB has been sussing out more features on his camera and below is the beautiful, colourful results of some of his sussing. 

And I had to show you this photo of Mischief (used to be known as Fluffybum as a kitten), our neighbour's cat. He is sitting under a bush at the bottom of our yard. Look at those eyes:)

Joining Debbie and friends for

Friday foto friends

An afternoon at Airlie Beach

At the risk of boring you I'm going to share

a little more about our holiday in Australia.

I left you in our last post at Colour me Crazy,

a colourful little shop in Proserpine.

From there we travelled on to Airlie Beach,

a holiday resort a bit further north.
I have two sisters in Mackay and it was
my middle sister we were travelling with today.
The first thing we did after parking
the car was find a nice café for a bite of lunch.
It was as delicious as it looks :)
Even if it was pudding, yum.

After lunch we went for a stroll through town,

mostly looking for souvenirs to bring home for the family.

Sis found herself a nice little dress for the summer.

And we took a photo with one of the locals

who looked just a little bewildered :)

We wandered along the esplanade and admired the cruise ship which was anchored offshore. Then we headed down to the lagoon, Sis and I had thought we might go for a swim...

 

...but we changed our mind when we saw all the beautiful young people lying around, we didn't want to scare them, that was our excuse anyway :) I had gone out and bought swimming togs especially too, they're still waiting to be christened. Oh dear, vanity, vanity.

We'd been there quite a while and I didn't think my GKB was looking too good. He was dehydrated and so we found a spot in the shade and sat and drank lots of water, then thought we should get him home where he could go and lie down. He said he thought the damage had been done in the car on the way up, he was sitting on the sunny side of the car with his window up!

And this is one from a mob of emu's we saw on the way home.
They were scavenging on the edge of a cane field where
the cane had already been cut.

We went out to a sugar cane factory another day

but I'll save that for later sometime.

Diana

Colour Me Crazy

I promised you a look inside Colour Me Crazy.

Well here it is :)

Once upon a time it was a house but now

all the rooms have been converted into

showrooms for all manner of goods.

In fact it was so bright and vibrant

that when I first walked in I was quite

overwhelmed. Sensory overload for my

poor, tired brain :) I immediately turned right

into a side room which was filled with plants

and stayed in there a couple of minutes

and eased myself into the experience.

Beautiful, vibrant colours everywhere, even the toilet!

Gorgeous stuff, clothing, jewellery, home goods,

cushions, throws, wall hangings.

You name it, they had it. I enjoyed it

but wouldn't want to do the dusting or the stocktake :)

No, we didn't buy anything but in hindsight

I wish I had. I think at the time I was just too

 tired to shop. We only stayed a short while

as we were heading for Airlie beach and still

 had a short drive ahead.

I hope you enjoyed the visit to this colourful little shop.

Diana

Joining Debbie for

Friday foto friends