Christmas 2009

I Know....only 2 months late, but hey! You can't rush these things!!

Christmas was a great time for us. My eldest brother and his beautiful girls Kaiya & Olivia came over for a fun packed week leading up to Christmas! They arrived on the Tuesday and came to stay at our place. Tuesday night we went and visited the Christmas lights around our streets.
Wednesday we took all 6 grandchildren to Dream World for the day....exhuasting! But they had so much fun and it is rare that they all get to be together at one time, so we had a great day.
Thursday I went back to work! And the kid spent the day swimming in Chey's Poppies pool...poor wee things were melting in our heat! And Friday was Christmas day!

Christmas was at our place this year! So great to have our own home to be able to host Christmas.

Then the troops headed up to Mum & Colin's caravan in Redcliff for the night where they beached and went to the movies before heading home to NZ to see their beautiful mummy who was waiting for them to come home. Thanks Aunty Sarah for sharing your gorgeous girls with us!

Here are a few happy snaps from Dave and the girls time here....




We loved having the girls here and were so sad to say goodbye! You never really know how long before we get to see them again....although with my Grandmother turning 80 this year, the Australian family will be flying home to NZ in June - so at least this time we know we will see them soon!

Christmas Lights with Poppy

Like most people, Christmas is my favorite time of year, but it also brings with it some sadness. Shirley, Cheyenne's grandmother (Jamie's Mum) died on the 19th December 2002 (7 years ago). Shirley had just celebrated her 50th birthday on the 9th December - 10 days later she was dead. Not that it was a surprise, she had been diagnosed with Cancer earlier that year and sadly it was a long tough year as we watched her literally fade away to a shadow. Death was a respite but still an extremely sad time for us all.
John (Shirley's husband & Chey's Poppy) misses her deeply and I know this is always a tough time of year for him, so we do our best to spend time with him and keep him busy and show him lots of love! Which isn't hard, because we do love him heaps!


So, Sunday night we ventured over to Poppies house (just Chey & I) and after a lovely dinner cooked by Poppy, we got into the car and made our way to two chruches which had the most impressive lights & Christmas displays.

It was a lovely night, I really enjoy this time together as we talk about the old days and remember Cheyenne as a baby - specially since she was a Christmas baby (almost). Which by the way, i will post photo's of her birthday soon - i haven't forgotten to blog that one!!

Here are a few happy snaps of our night....
Chey holding one of the baby chicks at the animal display at the Baptist church - were ever animals are...you will find my girl!

Chey insisted on taking a photo of Poppy & I

My girl

I hate to say it, but Poppy certainly has a favorite!! They have such a great relationship!

Last Friday we had our internal Christmas party. I feel blessed to work with such great people, we always have alot of fun when we are together and Friday night was no exception. As we are a small office of 5 people, we decided to invite two of our Vendor friends Evan & Brenton pictured below with Carrie & I.

Office photo; Carrie, Ollie, Me, Daniel & Dean

Miss Scarlett turns 1!! I can't believe she is 1 already! We had a nice afternoon down at Cotton Tree - not that we were there long, poor Chey had been sick and so we had to leave shortly after the party started.

She is such a beautiful baby! Always smiling and definately runs rings around her big sisters.

Ollie & I

Carrie & I

Recently one of our Vendors arranged an afternoon of Paint Ball. I have always wanted to play and so jumped at the chance when they sent the email inviting us. It was an extremely hot day and with all the 'special' gear you have to dress up in, made for a slightly uncomforable afternoon. Never the less, we had fun and although i was feeling very nervous as they gave us the run down on the do's and don'ts of the game I still managed to throw myself into the game.

We did walk away with some crazy bruises, mine fortunately were on my arms and upper thigh's, Carrie's however were all over both arms and down her side - for two weeks she looked as though she had been beated up badly! The crazy stares were funny and didn't go unnoticed. A couple of times we could see people checking her out with a look of concern, however once they noticed i had similar bruises on my arms, they concluded she wasn't a case of domestic abuse!

A great afternoon - but don't be fooled, the paint balls HURT even some of the guys almost hit the deck after a couple of pelts!

A few happy snaps from 2009, in no particular order :)

Lis & I at Cathy Johnsen's 30th birthday bash in August

The lovely creativness of a bunch of 6 year olds at Annaliese's birthday in September

Scarlett ready to party at Annalieses birthday - gorgeous!

Cartia, Isabella, Annaliese (the birthday girl) and Cheyenne - great friends!!

Who can resist this face of sweetness

Just hanging around

The grey nomads, living it up on Dicky beach - first stop of many

The grandkids visiting Nanny & Grandad at Dicky beach. Ayla, Taylah & Chey

My lovely niece Kaiya turns 7 - November (Kaiya & her sister Olivia live in NZ with their mummy and my brother)

A well over due catch up with my lovely friends Cass & (new husband) Lance & Becky (not in this photo). My first job as a Beauty Therapist was in a Salon where i worked with Becky and Cass was a hair dresser. Who would have thought years down the track we are still great friends.
Jen with Gab & Becky

What are little boys, made of? Frogs & snails, and puppy dogs tails, thats what little boys are made of

On Monday 7th September @ 8.50 am my dear friend Jen gave birth to a beautiful baby boy, Cooper James. Such a beautiful baby boy. Jen & Tony have settled into parenthood with such ease and are making fantastic parents! We look forward to watching this precious life grow. Love you guys.

I think a certain someone has claimed this little boy as her own :) won't be long now and Chey will have her own half baby sister or brother - very exciting for her!!

30 years young....

I still can't believe I am actually this old...but alas...the day finally came and I celebrated my 30th birthday with my closest friends and family.

August was a busy time for us; moving into our very first home and organising a 30th party for 130 of my closest friends was not without its minor melt downs! If it wasn't for my fantastic friends, Jen (who spent hours party planning, designing invitations and cooking) Heid who made my fantastic skirt and Kate who (crazily) spent a week constructing the most AMAZING cake you have ever seen and Steve who manned their infamous photo booth, I certainly couldn't have pulled it all together!

below are some sneaky photos from the booth :) thanks Kate! This made the night so much more fun!!
The night was full of lots of laughs and crazy poses and a great time had by all. I am blessed to have so many wonderful friends and family who make my life all the more special. Thank you to all of you for making the last 30 years so special. MWAH

And the Winner is......

Before I turned 30 I gave myself one goal.....compete in a 10km race. I managed to do this twice over, competing in the Gold Coast half marathon (10km only obviously) in July and the Noosa half (10km only again) early August.

The photos above were taken at the Noosa run (not exactly flattering!) Mum, Chey my neice nephew and I headed up the coast the night before, staying at the Taylor hotel (said Taylors were on holiday in Adelaide). I was really looking forward to the cheer squad cheering me on as I ran into the finish line but unfortunately mum couldn't find her way around all the road detors and consequently missed my race...I found them at the finish line eagerly watching for my grand arrival poised ready to cheer as hard as they could....when I came up behind them after having crossed the finish line, sat down for 5 minutes, gathered my bag from the gear tent and eaten some watermelon! There were a few disappointed faces when they turned around to see me standing there.

SOLD

I never thought this day would come.....but it did and we have settled into our new home (well....almost settled). Monday 3rd August we got the keys from the real estate agent and the following day, it was all systems go.

We absolutely LOVE our new house and Chey has really settled into life back on the north side. I was really amazed me with how easily my girl fitted into her new school and has made some great friends already - she even managed to win "Kid of the Week" after being there only 3 days! Was very sweet. Her class has a voting system whereby the children can nominate other class mates for what ever reason and when Chey won, they sent home the votes she got. A couple of them read "Sian (Cheyenne is a bit hard to spell :)) is doing really well at getting other childrens names righ" & "Sian always puts her hand up at question time". So cute and so lovely for our first weeks experience at school.


I really enjoyed having a week off to walk my girl to and from school; its easy to forget how important the little things are when you get caught up doing life