2002

Is it my imagination or does life get more hectic as the years pass? Maybe our bodies just get less able to cope with it all! Certainly the children appear to have unending amounts of energy- makes me tired just watching them. On that cheery note let me say G'day from the ‘Downunder Watsons’, and a very merry Christmas to you all.

Last Christmas we went camping close to Canberra for a few days. As we drove to the camping site on Christmas Eve we passed a small bush fire which the fire brigade and rangers were fighting, but when we returned 3 days later, hundreds of acres of forest around Canberra were smoking ruins. We were fortunate that our camping area (in Corin Forest) had not been threatened as we had no means of communication! We had fun and games with interesting toys, and lots of good food and drink while we were there.

 Sadly it's looking as though the fire fighters may be busy again this Christmas, as the fires have started already and we are in the midst of a severe drought which isn't helping.

We have had a busy year working studying and playing. It started with our second visit to 'Delicate Nobby'; the wonderful basic beachside camping area near Kempsey in New South Wales. No shops, no pubs, no electricity, just toilets, firewood and a water supply - brilliant! Lots of time to read books, play in the surf, build sandcastles on a perfect squeaky beach, cook damper and drink the odd glass of wine in gorgeous weather with no mosquitoes. We're going back again this New Year and Mike's sister Sally, is going to meet up and spend a week with us there which will be excellent. We're also taking our neighbour's children Hannah (11) and Sam (6) with us, so all the kids will have a ball.

Abi celebrated her 5th birthday in January with a Teddy Bear party in the park which was very successful. We made a Teddy Bear shaped Piňata (a painted hollow thing made of papier maché and filled with sweets which you hang up and the kids hit it with a stick until it breaks and they then run about madly to collect the sweets). It was a bit traumatic to watch the little dears gaining so much pleasure out of beating a teddy bear to a pulp, cheering as it was dismembered etc. I don't think we'll do that again! Our second birthday mistake was with Sam's 7th birthday party in March- a camping sleepover for 8 children in the garden - and that was a REALLY big mistake. We got very cranky at 1am when they were still running riot, and at 3am several of them burst into the Fossils' room searching for 'party bags'. They are going to have Discos for their next birthdays- much less trouble.

As I mentioned, the Fossils came out in February. It was lovely to see them and especially good to see Jean almost recovered from the nasty car accident she was in last year. They stayed with us, then went to New Zealand and then came back to us again in March. They spent their time with us building water rockets and trimming (or should I say massacring) hedges for us! Whilst Dick was here, he announced out of the blue that he would like to start flying again.  After a stunned silence, we went and tried some and different types of aircraft, and Dad decided that he would like to fly and aircraft caught a Lightwing, a small aircraft of just under half a tonne with a tailwheel.  We spent a week at the Oaks aerodrome and flew about 12 hours in four days, the only excitement being that when a piece of exhaust pipe fell off an aircraft once.  We had an absolutely great time, as this was the first extended quality time that Dad and I have had together for many years.  It was a bit like riding a bike for Dad, even though he has not stand much flying for the best part of half a century.  He was quite justifiably very pleased with himself when we had finished.  Next time, we must be a little bit more organised and actually playing sometime to do this again!

Both children have been at school full time this year, Abi has now settled in and has made friends, it took a little while but she seems much more confident now. She is reading very well and loves books, and is obviously very artistic. Mike bought a very nice Yamaha organ from Revolve (our local rubbish tip recycling depot!) and Abi adores playing on it and is able to play a few tunes- She desperately wants to have piano lessons so we will try to organise that next year. She has also been bringing us the occasional surprise breakfast in bed which is very sweet but somewhat daunting- we awake to Abi bearing a big grin and carrying a tray upon which is her latest 'experiment' these usually involve an 'interesting' use of food combinations such as Picalilli on toast (she couldn't find the marmalade); black olives, strawberries and passionfruit on dry bread; and Hommos and marmalade on bread (she couldn't find the margarine!) We have grown to dread the prospect of breakfast in bed and Abi is getting a cookbook for Christmas!

Sam continues to do well and has definitely got his father's maths abilities (as opposed to his mother's, thank goodness!) He is an avid reader, and collects rocks, insects, and various junk which usually gets left in his pockets and goes through the washing machine- so he has lots of clean rocks and dead insects! He remains an unstoppable chatterbox (why use 1 word when 10 will do), and is often in such a rush to say things that he's incomprehensible- so we're working on slowing him down a bit!

His morning speciality is making us a cup of tea which really is very nice (so this is why we had children!) We have finally managed to persuade him to make it upstairs rather than down however as we had kittens finding him carrying a full tray with 2 cups, a milk jug and a pot of boiling tea up the stairs, with Abi coming up behind him holding his pyjama bottoms up because the elastic had gone, and they had dropped to his ankles halfway upstairs ……

Both children performed in the school talent quest recently doing a clown act which was hastily thrown together but well received. Certainly the children in the audience enjoyed a humorous break from all the very clever, but not particularly entertaining piano playing.

I have been at Uni all year having swapped from 'Nutrition' to a nursing degree in order to speed up the time it will take to get my final qualification. I have now graduated from this degree and am going back to do an Applied Science graduate diploma in Public Health Nutrition next year- which I'm really looking forward to. Hopefully after that  I should be back in the workforce in my chosen field.

November saw me coordinating the cake stall for the school fete which raised $17,000 (the whole fete that is, not the cake stall!). The fete was held 3 days before my last exam, so that week was a fairly stressful period for me!  I have also been helping with school banking once a week, listening to kids read twice a week, helping in the school canteen occasionally and am a member of the executive P&C committee. So I am keeping busy!

Mike here: I have been a very busy at work; for most of the year I have been working on the biggest investigation we have ever done, looking at the problems at Ansett before it went bust.  The report is now finished and out on the streets, which is a big relief.  I have also been working on a fatal mid air collision that happened in the middle of the year, as well and is preparing, planning and exercising in case there is a major accident, so that the Bureau can respond properly.

We headed back to the UK in June / July and managed to see quite a few people, although sadly not everyone, with the limited time that we inevitably have. It was really nice to be in England in the summer as we have been back in winter the last few times. We certainly enjoyed this visit all the more for having better weather. We took the children into London to see some of the sights and also to see Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (the stage Show) which was fabulous. The Fossils had an enormous party mainly expertly coordinated by Clare and Pedro and friends. It rained for a week before, cleared for the day and we had bright sunshine and then rained again for another week after it - spooky! We were put in charge of children's entertainment on the day and Mike rigged up a selection of swings, rope bridges and sewage pipes to climb up. The children all had a great time and amazingly no one broke any limbs. Dick set up his infamous 'improved' water rocket which was also extremely diverting as it both entertained and drenched adults as much as children.

We then spent 5 days with Sally down at Rock in Cornwall reading books, flying kites and crabbing. Judith and the triplets also joined us there for a day. We headed back to Somerton next and more frantic social engagements including the Fete Champetre at Stourhead where we all dressed up as Royalty, ate marvellous food, listened to, and danced to music, admired everyone else's costumes and watched fantastic fireworks. Certainly a night to remember. Grandma and Grandad also celebrated their Golden Wedding Anniversary for which there was another party where we caught up with yet more people.

Exhausted from our “holiday' we headed back to Oz and straight back to work / school / study for a rest.

We have had a traumatic year with chickens. Our 2 older chooks, Jo and Issie both died but were at least old and had stopped laying. Our 3 younger ones, Charlotte, Amelia and Henrietta are all well but Amelia decided to become broody in the midst of winter and so we had to resort to putting ice cubes under her bottom to stop her from sitting! In the spring we allowed her to sit and after a suitable time slipped 2 chicks under her at night. Unfortunately she woke up and attacked me as I was introducing the chicks and one of them ran away and was found frozen to death, having squeezed through the fence to next door. She has successfully raised the other chick, Spot, who is now 13 weeks old and well. Because we wanted more than 1 chick we tried to hand raise 2 more but one got sick and died and the other was accidentally stepped on by Sam as it followed his feet, not having a mother to follow, poor thing.

Charlotte then became broody and we successfully introduced 2 chicks to her, sadly they also died at about a week old- we think that the drought may have increased disease levels in the wild birds which fly in and eat the chick food and drink from their water dish, passing on their viruses etc.

With the drought we are trying to reduce water use and I wanted to use our washing machine water to water the back garden. I mentioned the idea to Mike and he immediately set to work to make it happen.  I'll let him explain how:

We started first by trying to get the outflow water to drain the through a hose onto the back garden.  The problem was that the flow was so slow that the washing machine got bored and started on the next cycle before all the water had drained from the machine, and the washing remained soapy and dirty.  The first fix was to use another washing machine drain pump to boost the flow rate, but that still did not get enough water out of the machine in time.  The next cunning plan was to use only a short piece of hose, and to fill a large drum outside the back door.  I then bought an old industrial swimming pool pump from Revolve, and used that to create a truly ferocious flow rate, which is sufficient to drive of the Rotary lawn sprinkler.  A couple of electric kits for sensing water depth, and a large relay, and the system is now automatic-ish, spectacular, and would put Heath Robinson to shame.

In October we went along to the annual Tandem rally, this time in Port Stephens in New South Wales. It was good to catch up with the Tandem riders again as they're all slightly bonkers. Unfortunately the first day coincided with an unusually hot day for that time of year. Riding a bike in 38 degrees C is not fun at all and we were all somewhat affected by heat exhaustion, particularly Mike, who was riding harder to compensate for the fact that the rest of us were slowing down! The following day was back down to 24 degrees and much more pleasant.

Our Sunday Supper tradition continues, we now have 3 families involved on a regular basis. Catherine, Hannah and Sam Walker from across the road, and Sanae and Frederick Boukaert, and their children Koh (7) and Erica (4), who are friends who moved back to Canberra in June after 2 years in Jabiru in the Northern Territory. We usually decide on a theme such as vegetarian, Thai, Italian etc. and we all make different dishes and produce some wonderful meals. The children also cook- usually desserts- sometimes we end up with 3 desserts which is a bit hard going!

We're having Christmas at home this year, together with the Boukaerts but it won't be 'traditional', it's usually too hot to cook Turkey and all the trimmings, so we tend to have that at a 'Christmas in July' celebration and at real Christmas we'll have smoked salmon, mussels, salads, and other cold foods as well as luscious desserts. We do have a Christmas cake though, and we'll make mince pies as well.

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