House in Oz!

There is great excitement in our house because we received some photos of the house we will be living in when we arrive in Ballarat. The school recently purchased the property as it lies right on the boundary of the school cricket ovals and it is therefore really convenient for whoever lives there to get to work! It is going to be for the Head of Boarding to live in at some stage in the future but for the first 15 months that we are in Ballarat it will be 'home' for us! See what you think!!!

Front view of the house from the road

Woodburning stove for those cold winter days!!!

I think this is the famiy room...

View from the family room into the kitchen....

The back garden which leads onto the school ovals....

Packing Up!

Removal company came today to pack up our stuff for shipping. I spent all of yesterday (from 9am-midnight) sorting the stuff that was going from the stuff that was staying so I was able to sit back and watch the men do their job today! It was odd though as we have always moved ourselves and done all the packing etc but today I just made cups of tea and walked around making sure I had put everything in the right pile!! Brian took Isaac (and Evie) to the fracture clinic to have Isaac's follow-up x-ray for his thumb so the kids were out the way the whole time the men were here. They probably would have enjoyed the whole thing but we had decided that it would be better if the men could just 'get on with it' rather than answering the childrens' 101 questions!

So it's all gone now and we won't see it again until we are living in Australia.... how weird is that? Bring on the inflatable beds......

Isaac's room

Evie's stuff


Off it goes.....

Evie is 7!

Today was Evie's 7th birthday, where has all that time gone?! She was SO excited because not only was it her birthday but she was also having her very first proper birthday party. I have managed, over the years, to just have family teas or visits to the park but this year she specifically asked for a party with a group of her home ed. friends. She made all her guests a party box filled with little gifts and put up lots of streamers around the house and garden. She spent quite a bit of time talking through the game list with Brian who was appointed games master and yesterday spent a lot of time icing and decorating her birthday cake. She is such an independent spirit that she didn't want me to decorate it but wanted to do it all by herself.... I baked the sponge cake but everything else was her work including the buttercream icing and the stripey cat for the top. She even insisted on lighting the candles herself when it came to cake time at the party!

The weather was great and we managed to have a picnic lunch outside and even got the water slide out for a while later in the afternoon. We made fizzy lifting drinks (see Roald Dahl's Revolting Recipes) and Brian did brilliantly with the games, keeping all the children occupied and entertained for ages (was probably all the sweets he used during the treasure hunt that did it!!)

Evie wanted the Playmobil Pony Farm as her birthday gift..... she was VERY excited to receive it!


The party boxes that Evie made for her guests!


Evie's cake......

Victorian School Day

Went to Blaise to take part in a Victorian school day (thanks Wendy for organising it!) and the kids had such a great time. They dressed as appropriately as their wardrobes would allow (for Isaac that was quite nearly impossible apart from a pair of cut off trousers!) but were provided with additional dress props (stiff collars for the boys and pinafores and mop caps for the girls). They spent an hour in a mock-up of a Victorian classroom being taught the three 'r's' under very strict rules by a lady who did a great job at pretending to be a Victorian teacher. The age range of the home ed children who attended was 5 years to 12 years and they all did brilliantly at remembering to put their hand up to answer questions and call the teacher 'ma'am' when addressing her. It was such a great way for the children to learn about what school would have been like in Victorian times and they really enjoyed the experience!

Evie writing on her slate

Sightseeing in London

Had a fantastic two days in London doing the real touristy sightseeing stuff before we head off Down Under. We left Bristol really early on Friday morning and arrived at the Travelodge in Battersea at 9.30am (not a pretty place it has to be said is Battersea but with such a good deal at the Travelodge for the night who can complain!!)

After leaving the car there we headed off on foot to the local train station and caught the overground train followed by the underground (a highlight for the kids!) to the Tower of London. Thanks to Tesco days out vouchers we didn't have to fork out any entrance fee for this fantastic place. We joined a Yeoman Warder on a tour of the tower and she took us to the most interesting and notorious parts of the Tower and included lots of interesting snippets of history (and lots of gorey stories!!! I fail to remember how many time the Yeoman talked about hanging, beheaded, murder, torture etc!!) I could have joined another and done it all over again with a different Yeoman because they all have their own way of presenting the stories and I forget things as soon as I hear them so it would have been interesting all over again! I am also astounded by the history we have so readily available all around us here and yet I don't always take the time to enjoy it. I have to say that this was my very first trip to the Tower even though I lived in London for 8 years in my younger days! The rest of the our visit to the Tower was a little more rapid and I didn't get to read as many of the information boards as I would normally like to but that comes with having two young ones with you who are always ready to rush on to the next thing!




We travelled on to the Imperial War Museum which was another place I have never been!We stayed until almost closing time and Isaac had great fun seeing if he could hold a submarine at the right depth and balance while Evie and Brian loved looking at the model of the front lines during the first world war. One of my favourite bits was finding an Anderson shelter set up in one of the exhibitions just like the one we had at the end of our garden (!) and looking round the inside of a 1940's house.











After a quick tea we travelled to Hamleys (the toy shop) to spend the last hour of our day browsing the six floors of toys! (definately my least favourite part of the day!!)

Saturday dawned and we set off again this time for our open top bus tour and river cruise, how touristy can you get! We spent an hour or so touring London on the top of an open top double decker in part sunshine, part torrential rainstorm, before joining the crowds for the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace.

We made our way to Westminster pier and took the river cruise to Greenwich to visit the National Maritime Museum and then we walked through the park to the top of the hill to stand on the meridian line with one foot in the east and one in the west! We did manage to catch the last boat back into London and got the last open top bus tour round the rest of the city before heading back to pick up the car and drive home. We didn't get home until nearly midnight and we were all completely pooped but it was so worth the aching feet and tiredness (and all the chocolate spread sandwiches....)

Buckingham Palace
Greenwich Meridian Line









Need to go and do a little scrapbook with them now!

Isaac's thumb....

Bless my little boy, he dislocated his thumb today playing football (he was in goal and the ball hit the top of his thumb and popped it right out of the socket!) We spent the afternoon in the ER of the children's hospital and after a good dose of paracetamol, ibuprofen, morphine and a generous helping of 'laughing gas' they were able to 'pop' it back in again. We got to keep copies of the x-rays which was interesting as his thumb really was a funny shape when he did it and we were able to show Evie the before and after 'shots'! He now has a cast on to immobilise his thumb and wrist and has to go back next week to the fracture clinic for a follow-up. One thing he was/is grateful for is that it was his right hand so he doesn't need to write for a couple of weeks!! I'm planning on encouraging him to become ambidextrous!

BCHedders Sports Day

It was our annual sports day today at BCHedders and it was great fun (as always)! It started off with a group photo (I almost had to pay Isaac real money to get him to sit for it and getting him to smile was another thing!!) I'm convinced it will be a photo to remember because we had little ones crawling off the mat and others who found the whole experience just a little traumatic.....! (that was me! LOL!!)

Claire did a fantastic job in running the sports and got them all warming up so she didn't have to treat any injuries later on in the afternoon! It was a mix of all those favourites races we all know and love from our childhood, ... the sack race, egg and spoon race, wheelbarrow race, three legged race..... it was great... thanks friend for organising it again this year, you're great! (and you run like the wind!)









I'm going to miss Tuesday afternoons ..... all those fantastic women who encourage, bless and share their good ideas and friendship with me.. thanks for sharing your lives over the past 2 years! And thanks for the photo CD, what a treasure!