A day at Manly

Today was Louise's Christmas Dive day.

So up early and off to Manly. Weather was looking good (28degrees, little cloud).

Louise had two good shore dives with SydneyDive, whilst we went for a walk down the Corso at Manly, and off to the beach (then because the sun was getting far to hot for sensitive skin), back to the Corso for lunch.

Where the smell came from

Well, we discovered where the smell was coming from - raw sewage was bubbling up from an drain access point near the bottom of the garden - given the way it "bubbled" up suggested a blockage (I put the lid on, and weighted it down with 20Litres of liquid chlorine!)

So, off to the list of tradies, and our recently obtained plumber (who is actually a drain specialist).

Yes, it was blocked, and yes it is likely to block again - tree roots have penetrated the pipe. What isn't clear is if the blocking point is on our pipe or Sydney Water's part - that is going to take another visit and a camera.

Joy.

Off to the sales now.

Boxing Day gardening

Louise spent most of today filling up the neighbour's WheelyBin with bits of the garden.

We were going to go into the pool at the end of the day, but the kids had a late sleep and by the time they were up, it was a bit late, and nearly dinner time!

We did discover an interesting smell though...

Christmas Day

Back at home now after Christmas lunch/dinner with friends, at friends.


Amelia and Callum were generous enough to wait until 7am before getting up (later than normal!), which was nice. Then time to open a couple of presents that Santa brought (oh look, Santa ate the jelly and dranks the beer that we left for 'him').

Callum isn't sure about the whole opening thing - Amelia has no doubts.

Then some breakie and more opening gifts. Then bathtime, and time to make the salad and start packing for going to lunch.

Lunch was good, with prawns, ham, bbq'd swordfish, salads, pinapple desert and christmas pud and custard. The weather was cold though - only about 20 degrees.

Both the kids were sparko by the time we got home (I drove) - Louise wasn't far behind :-)

Amelia's birthday, and a social event in the evening

Today was Amelia's 3rd birthday, and our first social event since moving to Latona Street - it was the yearly xmas street bbq (at the house on the corner - not in the street!).

Everyone bought a plate and it was interesting to meet our neighbours and introduce ourselves.

A busy week

Well, that was a busy week - lots of stuff at work with one possible new customer, and then a last minute trip to Melbourne yesterday, followed by a days worth of presentations today at Parramatta.

then off to the roofbar in the CBD for the staff xmas party.

(train home, and a 35 minute walk [mostly down hill] from Pymble Station)

OOO - Hail

That was interesting/scary! Hail storm whilst we were out in the car - stones about 2cm across. Although not as big as they got in some suburbs!

WildLife

Interestingly, Pymble seems to have much more wildlife than St ives did. At night we can hear the bugs chirping, some sort of lizard growling (every night!), and the mossies have shreded me every time I go to put rubish out once it is dark.

And then there are the spiders.

I've nearly walking to a particularly nasty looking one (only about 10cm across) that had built a web during the evening, between the car, the house, and the bins. He was sitting a little above my head height...

And then there was the little huntsman on the car. (little meaning only about 20cm across at the widest part)

We were driving (ok, Louise, was driving) to the shopping centre to do some xmas shopping (eg get pics of the kids with Santa) - suddenly Louise squealls! She's seen a big spider on the rear window, and doesn't know if it is inside or outside the car!!

We park at the shopping centre - Amelia tells us the spider is hiding on her door. Why? I look in the side mirror on myside - there is a large spider sitting on the the door frame above amelia (outside!) - legs hanging on the window. Louise gets out the drivers side. So do I!

It runs around the car - over the windscreen and more.

Doesn't stop it getting flicked off the wingmirror by the bit of plastic I've found though.

Not that I don't like spiders...

been busy - still moving in

sorry for the lack of posts - as you might expect we are still unpacking boxes, and trying to find where stuff is hidden away

Settlement day - 2

12.30 - not heard anything.

12.45 - call the solicitor - ohn yes - settled fine at 11.30.

Then why didn't you call us!!!!


packing the car with some stuff now - expecting a call from the agent re the keys!

settlement day

11.30am - should be getting a call shortly...

T-4 days and counting

We complete/settle on Thursday - not long now. Removal company are coming on Friday. We clean the rental place on Saturday.

We bought some pool fencing on eBay today - just need to get someone to fit it.

In the meantime - some video of Callum:

more house cleaning

Thanks to louise for more house cleaning today

at house today

Spent the day at the house today, cleaning (or rather Louise was Cleaning, I was doing a bit of cleaning, and a lot of chasing children....)

Callum's 1st Birthday

Friday (16th) was Callum's first birthday. Obviously I wasn't there, but Louise had a little informal party with other mum's and their kids.

We had a present opening yesterday once I'd got back.

Photos later.

Back at home in Sydney

Back in Sydney now - it rained every day in Penang - probably because it is the rainy season!

Hotel was ok - meals were good.

in penang, malaysia

Made it to the hotel - it is now 2.46am Sydney time, 12.46am local time - off to bed I think.

away on business next week

Off to Malaysia on Saturday.

went to see the house

We got temporary access to the house today, to check things like space for beds, where plugs are (not many - very interesting fuse box!) and to see if the utilities work (eg cooker, hob, hot water etc - they all work).

Sat in the sun room and marvelled at the view (considering we are in a suburb, there isn't much to see of the adjoining houses!)

We've exchanged contracts on a house

Well - that was stressful.

Last week (Monday 24th September) we put in an offer on a house in Pymble, and it was verbally accepted on Friday 28th.

All we had to do then is exchange contracts to ensure the property was ours - in the meantime, the agent would continue to progress putting the property on the market (we got to see it pre-marketing).

Then estate agent calls, and wants the contract sent staight away not overnight in the post, as a neighbour was about to put in an offer (apparently we later find out, they had put an offer in a few months ago, but this time went direct to the solicitor).

A bit later Louise gets a phone call from the agent. The neighbours offer exceeds ours. The amount was a figure we had previously discussed and we quickly made decision to match their offer. Now it was case of whom could exchange first.

We got the agent to collect our contract from solicitor, but find out that the other contract is there too, just after ours. The estate agent was waiting upon the vendors solicitor to tell him which contract to exchange with. But the solicitor was in a meeting and was keeping us all waiting

Eventually the agent rings back and...............................

it's ours.

Long Weekend

Well, back at work after the long weekend

• Saturday saw us at one of Callum's playgroup friend's for her 1st birthday.
• Sunday saw us all at Bicentennial Park for a group birthday
• Monday (Labour Day in NSW) saw us back at Bicentennial Park for another 1st Birthday via Callum's playgroup.

all partied out now.

Possibly some house news by the end of the week...

Welcome to the zoo...

Its spring, the water dragon's and their baby are are back, as are some other guests...

It's snowing again....

Forgot to mention - Amelia was very quiet sunday morning. This is what we discovered when we checked in on her...

Slack - again

OK - I'm sorry - no posts so far in August - very slack.

bits of 'news':

• Callum has a second tooth - one at the top, and one at the bottom
• Callum is starting to stand (leaning on things like the sofa, my legs etc)
• Amelia is still having tantrums
• The weather is getting warmer
• We are still looking at land/houses

All very exciting. Honest!

First Tooth

Finally, it looks like Callum's first tooth has broken through. We can't see it, but Louise can certainly feel it :-)

wet weather back in the old country

Looks like we missed some serious rain back at the old place...

http://www.newburytoday.co.uk/Images/Entities/NewsArticles/Gallery/turnpikeroad1-2l0hnei844ld717.jpg

(Turnpike being the bit further up from Kiln Road).

back in melbourne - where there has been snow

It's Wednesday, and I'm back in Melbourne Central - overnight it snowed on the outskirts of Melbourne - it has been cold.

Yesterday (tuesday) saw the coldest day in Sydney for 21 years - and god it was cold!

South of the city

Well, we finally did it - we managed to go further south that the airport in Sydney!
Driving down from Sydney to Helensburgh, lunch at Thirroul and then on to Bulli, we drove over the 'famous' SeaCliff Bridge

Stop Thief

Quick - there's a hooded thug stealing my car!!

Day off

I took the day off today, and Louise went with Callum to a craft fair, and I went with Amelia to the Sydney Aquarium.
I think she enjoyed herself - she definitely enjoyed seeing the 'Nemo Fish!!!'.
After, we (Amelia and myself) went to Subway for lunch. I didn't think she would eat all the sandwich!

Back in melbourne

Back in Melbourne again - now have 39,870 points with VirginBlue :-)

Friday 22nd

Happy Birthday to me...

first cold, now wet

Well, it is still cold; and now wet!

Sydney actually has a higher rainfall than London - it just all arrives in about 2 months compared to being grey and damp 10 months of year like in London.

land

Wednesday saw us bidding for some land (to build a house, before you ask). Unfortunately, we were outbid. The other remaining bidder was willing to pay more than we were.

On with the search

Cold - Part 2

It has been suggested that I'm being a bit of a wooss regarding the temperature here in sunny Sydney. In my defense, the house we are in probably has little in the way of insulation in the roof/walls and no central heating.

We have a gas fire in the main lounge, and electric powered 'oil heaters' in the bedrooms (plus electric blankets on the bed!).

At night the temperature in the unheated rooms drops to between 12 and 15 degrees at the moment. The nighttime outside temp is about 10 degrees.

Cold

Winter is here! It is 11 degrees outside, which is pretty cold. It's not much warmer in the house!!!

LHR T4, Singapore and duty free

I emailed a complaint to the Duty Free company at LHR T4. Yesterday I got a full refund on louise's moisturiser. So bit happier now.

Back in Sydney

(Obviously) I made it back - went to Arlanda airport and had to wait an hour for the check-in desk to open, then eventually onto the flight to LHR. Then at LHR get the bus from Terminal 1 to Terminal 4. London was grey and drizzly - just like normal.

At T4 i discovered that due to the changes in security and duty laws in Australia, I couldn't buy any duty free alcohol - no great problem, as I would be able to try at Singapore (where I would have a 3 hour turnaround between flights).

I did buy some moisturiser for Louise. This was going to prove a mistake.

Finally onto the flight from LHR to Singapore - 13 hours. At least there were some better films to watch on the tiny tv.

Got to Singapore, and left the plane (we couldn't leave the transit area, but Singapore Transit area is HUGE!). Bought some Absolute Pear - cheaper than it was being sold in Sweden where it is made!!

Went back to the gate for the plane - had to go through security check - where apon (after x-raying my hand luggage - we had to take everything out of the plane if we left it), they confiscated Louise's moisturiser - it was 125ml and thus fell foul of the 100ml limit per gel/liquid item rule that they bought in a week before. Very annoyed as I had asked as LHR if there would be any problems - "no"...

Have contacted the store at LHR for a refund. Watch this space.

Got back home at 6.30am on Saturday - left the Ericsson office in Kista at 12.30pm the previous Thursday!

Still got a cough. :-(

shame on me

I know - it is over a month since I last posted. So some updates:

Today - I'm sitting at a desk in Kista, Sweden, where I have been for the last couple of days. Yes, I flew in via LHR, but as I didn't have enough time to even walk through the terminal, I've not had time to say hello to anyone. Sorry. (And just as bad on the way back - unfortunately, this was all a little last minute, so no options for staying over in the UK and seeing any of you).

For the last week, most of us have been ill. Monday 30th April saw all of us go to the doctor - me with a temperature of 39.8 and a cough. Callum with no temperature, but a cough and lack of sleep. Amelia with a little temperature, a cough, and no appetite. Louise was ok (excluding the lack of sleep and having to look after us all). I've still got my cough, which was interesting on a 24 hour flight....

The house searching continues. As mentioned last post, we are also looking at the option of buying some land, and having something built for us. Both are expensive options. But we think we have an option we like.

Wednesday 25th April was ANZAC day - a public holiday. I think at least one of us was ill :-(

Easter was fun with Amelia searching out easter eggs. I sent pictures to most people. I've got some video as well which I'm trying to edit into something I can put on youtube or similar. But not really had the time yet.

houses

This weekend, and last we went to Homeworld, HomeQuest, and another display "village", to look at project homes - this is an alternative to buying a house; instead we would try to either buy empty land, or land that needs an older (smaller) house knocked down.

UNfortnately, the local Council (Kur-ring-ai) is known to be fussy about what it will let you build; one builder who has about 20 different types of house, only offers 2 in our area, which will meet the council approvals...

Bridgewalk

(reposted, as the original seems to have gone?)
Well, today we did the bridgewalk - 75th Birthday of the Sydney harbour bridge.

Took us ages, as we stopped for photos, and to watch the airplanes go over every so often.
Afterwards, we continued to walk down to Darling Harbour to eat - we went to 'Nicks' - and won't be going back.

slack

Sorry - been very slack on the posts - lots of stuff happening - backdated some extra posts.

It's Friday

So back in Melbourne.

hmm - I so love flying...

it's thursday

So I must be in the Sydney CBD...

it's wednesday

So I must be in Brisbane...

eating out, in the city

To celebrate Lou's parents wedding aniversary, and her mum's birthday, we all went out for lunch at Summit - a revolving (no - not revolting!) restaurant 47 floors up, with pretty good views of the cbd. I'll put some pics up eventually.

car insurance

Apparently 9/10 SunCorp car insurance customers renew their insurance with SunCorp. We must be one of the 1/10 that don't like having the insurance premiums doubled...

1 year already

Wow - that went fast - we have now been in oz for 1 year - 365 days - 8760 hours - 525600 minutes - or 31536000 seconds!

BBQ Tiger Prawns

Sunday evening saw me bbq'ing a kilo of medium tiger prawns.

unfortunately, Sunday also saw me shelling them; no-one else wanted to do it, but everyone was happy to eat them :-)

the house we like

Well, we went to the auction this evening - house priced between 900k and 1M aud$.

You can imagine our surprise and dismay when it finally went for $1,385,000 - well above the '$1000 per square metre' guide in Sydney.

EDIT:
Apparently the reserve was $1m, despite the feedback from the agent '$900 to $1m - it might cross the $1m level'.

maybe we should look at this: http://www.smh.com.au/news/National/Real-estate-agent-fined-for-deceptive-conduct/2005/02/07/1107625069951.html

slack

Sigh - so I've missed updating the blog :-(

Thursday 25th Jan
Horarh - I'm in melbourne for the day; and it's hot! And I'm stuck in traffic waiting to get back to the airport. Oh - it's 11pm I've finally got home.

Friday 26th Jan
It's Australia Day - a public holiday and celebration of white man's Australia. :-)
Alas we were busy doing domestic stuff, so didn't really celebrate

Saturday 27th Jan
We've just got back from looking at more houses, and have found on we like! Watch this space

Wednesday 31st Jan
I took lunchtime off to go look at the house we are interested in again. We still like it, but there looks to be lots of interest, and it is going to be sold at auction

Saturday 3rd Feb
Today we went to two auctions to get a feeling of how they run. Unfortunately one was cancelled/postponed to a later date (we think they had no registered bidders). The second we watched; the house was 'passed in' as it didn't reach the reserve. there were two bidders, with the bidding opening at $950K, and reaching $1020K (the guide price was '$1M+' - very precise...)

Summer is here again

After looking at houses yesterday we cooled down in the pool for an hour - Amelia loves it (even though she can't swim or touch the bottom in the shallow end). Callum wasn't sure first time, so we let him watch from his bouncer.

Today, it is expected to 38degrees, so we might have to kick me dragon out of the pool early...

(hmm - air con looks like a useful option...)

redback

I forgot to say - we killed our first redback at the weekend - it was just sitting there on the pool fencing, looking very menecing (it was all of 4 mm wide at the body), and we were delighted when it jumped into the mortein spray, then rolled under my shoe...

NYE06

We ummed and ahhed about it, but in the end we bundled the kids into the car, drove to the nearest railstation and made our way into the city for NewYearsEve 2006. Given our late planning, we didn't have tickets for anywhere, and so decided to get to the grounds of the Opera House - where we should get a good view of the 9pm Family Fireworks.

And we did.

Amelia (and Callum) was very good considering she had to sit outside in a small area for nearly 6 hours.

We didn't think she would forgive us if we stayed another 3 hours for the main event (plus getting out of the city would have taken hours), so watched the midnight fireworks on the tv.

Pics follow:

More pictures here