helping grow the shoe tree

The kids and I have hung several pairs of shoes each on the shoe tree over the years.

anzac 2019

This legend stood Vigil along with his fellow navy cadets from 2.30am to 4.30am ANZAC eve at the Port Lincoln War Memorial. They then formed guard during the Dawn Service at 5.45am for a 6.15am start. We followed the cadets to the RSL along with the other cadet families for the gunfire breakfast. TS Flinders cadets then formed up to lead the morning march back to the Memorial for the second service.

As a cadet Mum I'm pretty darn proud of all of our Navy Cadets, but I'm especially proud of my cadet.

To support Sean we stayed in Lincoln at the Blue Seas Motel which is right next to the War Memorial. By the time Annie and I got there after netball training it was late so we only managed a couple of hours sleep before we were all up to support the cadets with their vigil.

As we've never attended a Vigil it was a totally new experience for us. Why were the cadets circling the monument? What the reason for the guards in the first place? What's the historical significance of the ceremony?
I googled the reason for the Youth Vigil.

The ANZAC Eve Youth Vigil Ceremony is a youth inspired activity that has become the first ceremony of remembrance of ANZAC Day.

With differing backgrounds and interests, young Australians representing a variety of service and community groups, conduct a formal ‘Holding Ground’ Ceremony (a night-long, guard of honor around the historic War Memorial on North Terrace) from 6.00 pm to 6.00 am between ANZAC Eve and ANZAC Morning.  In doing so, they have created their own ANZAC Day tradition. Just prior to dawn the youth guards step down and the Dawn Service follows.

The Anzac Eve Youth Vigil stems from the military tradition of ‘holding ground’ whereby a reconnaissance patrol would find and hold strategic position in preparation for the arrival of their army. This would often involve an all-night vigil, keeping awake on watch, alert that the area of battle is secured against threat.

It was a pleasantly calm night for the vigil (thank goodness) so it was great to see the kids do what they do. I had organised with McDonalds to pick up a bunch of hot chocolates for the kids to have while they were rotated off for their break. That was very welcomed by the kids.

By the time we finished duty after the morning service we were all pretty shattered and both Annie and Sean slept the way home. And we slept the afternoon away.

sean braces

so this happened on the 12th of April.

Thank you to the staff that were more than happy for me to have the camera ther.

By that night his teeth were pretty sore and troubling him. Yogurts and soup was all that Sean could tolerate. 

The next morning was supposed to be his first official colts game now that he his colts age. But he was in all sorts of bother with his teeth. They were just driving him to distraction. The coach was notified and Sean didn't play. Just as well, as he copped a ball to the jaw in the changerooms during warmup and that was not wonderful.  He ran the waterbottles so he was still involved.

It was a week later before he could just about bite a thinly sliced carrot and brocolli was still not happening.  Toast is back which he's pretty happy about. Apples are cut to bite size pieces.

L'Anse

School holidays are here. Yeeehaaaaa. We reeeelaaaaax a lot. No alarm clocks. No school buses. No lunchboxes. And the best bit is having Annie home from collage. My home is complete.

I've been wanting to get to L'Anse Tumby Cafe on a Saturday morning for their pancakes for a while.  They are very very popular and L'anse is super busy.

I've been told the trick to ensure that we are in time for pancakes as they sell out so quickly.  When you book your table, book your pancake order too. They produce only a certain number of serves each Saturday, and this ensure your serve is held for you.   And after today I can certainly vouch for both reserving the table and your order. We met a friend who happened to be there too and they weren't able to have their desired pancakes as the cafe had already reached their quota. But we did receive ours.

Today's creation was Matcha Pancakes. And they were scrumdililumcious.

today you are 6

Just gotta love when a paper, washi tape and embellie matches the clothing exactly. 

shoe tree

Scraplift from Janna Wener found on Pinterest.

those summer feels

inspired by Stefanie on the Studio Calico blog.  I just had to do a his and hers and I had the perfect surfing pics for it.  

one happy day for each falling leaf you catch

I knew that leaf punch would come handy some day

happiness is enjoying the little things in life

dancing leaves

This one is inspired by the orange leaves I had in my stash. Good ol Prima. I've been binging on Game of Thrones for the last little while in the lead up to the launch of season 8 so this one has been sitting on my desk for a bit longer than it should have been.

that's my boy

See that faint X on his hand. That was from the first day of the month and if you have it on your hand you can't get done for 'pinch and a punch, first day of the month'. Obviously it took awhile to wash off, but I used that faint symbol as a jump off point for the backing paper and some of the embellies.

summer dayz

Large photo layouts. What's not to love?

star student

Using a recent Paige Evans cutfile made this one so easy. No journaling required.