Pictorial fragments from the past week

Hosted by Mrs4444.

This week's Friday Fragments has, very conveniently, been put off till Saturday which means I didn't have to be incredibly rude and spend part of Christmas Day hiding away behind the laptop in order to participate. Of course just because I didn't have to have net time yesterday doesn't mean I stayed completely away.... I'm so addicted. Head on over to Half-Past Kissin' Time for more fragments from the festive season.

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Our camping trip to Fingal Bay last weekend kicked off to a great start with us stuck in a traffic jam on the freeway, we took 2.5 hours to travel about 5km. I was able to get online from my phone and find out that the reason for the jam was a caravan accident, that there was a rescue helicopter on the road and that all lanes were closed. So we resigned ourselves to being late and were very grateful for cool weather, fully charged Nintendo DS's and that it wasn't us who'd managed to flip their huge caravan and have the roof of their 4WD removed (not sure if that was due to the accident or the rescuing). We arrived with just enough time up our sleeves to get the tent all set up before the light faded.

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The next morning Tom was ready to head to the beach at 7am but, as it was still quite overcast and cool and we had shopping that needed doing, we made him wait for a while. By the time we got to the beach there was not a cloud in the sky and we were all well and truly ready to get wet. The water was crystal clear and FREEZING but that didn't stop anyone - not even me, but there are no pictures to prove that ;-)

This was about as big as the waves got.

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On Christmas Eve we went to Adam's brother's place for lunch. I made a Greek salad and a pear, blue cheese and walnut salad, and we took some prawns along as our contributions to the meal and we sat around eating and talking while the kids played in the swimming pool. It's possible Caitlin may have been in there just a little too long.

Wrinkly fingers!

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Christmas lunch was at my Mum's place and we were very happy that my 99 year old Grandma was able to join us. It was quite an effort for her to be there but she was glad to be there and, as I told her, it's such a wonderful thing for the kids to know their Great Grandma and be able to share special occasions with her. As we sat around the table after the meal Caitlin ran off and grabbed her new sketchbook and Derwent pencils and drew a portrait of Great Grandma which she then gave to her to take home. I think it was a bit of a hit.

Caitlin with Great Grandma

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Caitlin scored big on the art front for Christmas, as well at the set of 72 Derwent watercolour pencils, she got a desk easel with paints, brushes, a palate and a couple of canvases, they seem to have gone down well.

Caitlin painting a dragon

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One of Tom's presents was a drawing kit with a book on how to draw mythological creatures, this has been a huge success with Adam and Caitlin getting in on the act as well. This one is a collaborative effort between Tom and Daddy.

Dragon by Tom (with some help from Dad)

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Today we have eschewed all the traditional Boxing day pursuits of movie going, sales shopping, cricket or Sydney to Hobart yacht race watching and have spent the day lazing around doing nothing much. Adam did get a bit energetic for a while though and whipped up a loaf of Ginger Beer Bread using the Spiced Ginger Loaf recipe from our bread machine's instruction book and using Lord Nelson Old Admiral beer in place of water. It was pretty damn good.

Bread, cheese, ham and pickles. Perfect.