Chicken Coop Complete

 Finally can cross this off the To Do List!!

Masquerade Disco

The Student Rep Council held a Masquerade Disco night. Ella went as part of the SRC while Katy and her friends boycotted the event...

Winter Walking

Beautiful July weather has been awesome for walking - sensational sunsets and crisp mornings....

Ooops

 A recent routine job of cleaning the car revealed a surprising and concerning issue....

As I was cleaning the front window on the outside I first noticed a chip mark but then soon discovered cracks radiating the entire length of the windscreen!! Interesting it was so low that the chip and cracks were not visible from the inside and we don't recall any incidents of stones hitting our windscreen.

A quick call to the insurance company was painless as I was informed that under our policy we were entitled to one windscreen replacement (without paying an excess) per year. I was shocked when booking in for the replacement to find out how expensive windscreen replacements are these day - $1400 - due to all the fancy sensors....

A few weeks later the windscreen was effortlessly replaced thanks to O'Briens!

Hope & Gypsy's New Abode

Finally a weekend without any kids sport or social commitments allowed us to dismantle, move and install the chicken house into the new coop. It required lots of work - a new leg plus various new sections of timber to patch up the holes. All under the watchful eye of Shirley!

By the end of the long day Hope and Gypsy were transferred to their new house. They had no hesitation to explore. Indi was quite intrigued with the new set up too!

Final painting touches required when weather and free time match up!

ACT School Cross Country Champs

Katy and her friends Mira and Lily competed in the ACT School Cross Country Champs. Held once again at the grass track at Stromlo on an overcast day. It was the same 4km loop and Katy run 17mins 57sec a few seconds faster than the previous competition. She placed 13th and together with 11th and 12th places they all recorded same time. The winner of the 14 year old girls ran a scorching time of 14.30 (over 1 min ahead of second place) and setting a course record in the process. 

 

KBIII Long Weekend

It was an early morning departure to ensure we would make the start window for the first day of the KBIII.   Day one was at Onley State Forest, a small map 2 hours north of Sydney. A creek dissected the map with steep ridges on either side. The valley floor was wet and thick.

Once the orienteering was over, we made our way to our accomodation at Redhead. The massive house easily fit three families plus a dog (not Indi). A quick unpack before we drove to the beach to test out the water and waves. It was rather chilly.

Day 2 was closer to Newcastle at Honeyeater Hideout. A mixture of private property and state forest. The assembly area was awesome on a propter owned by an orienteer. The forest was kinder and weather glorious.

 

Tthe afternoon was spent at Redhead beach swimming and whale watching!!

Final day of orienteering was a sprint course on the grounds of the University of Newcastle. We didn't stick around post run, keen to avoid the long weekend traffic heading back to Sydney. Unfortunately we didn't manage that and the M1 was rather slow all the way to Sydney. Overall a great weekend away.

  

  

House Update

 The new build next door now has most of a roof! Our skyline is slowly disappearing.

As for our plans well they are coming along very slowly....the landscape architect provided the following two options for incorporating the hot tub into the garden. After much discussion we have asked the designer to blend the two and are now waiting on the new concept plan.

Katy turs 14!

Birthday celebrations for Katy involved taking the family and Mira to try a new restaurant! Ramen O is a small Japanese restaurant specialising in Ramen. We waited for a few minutes before a table became available. The food was delicious. One of the drinks proved to be a talking point with a marble like ball in the neck! We couldn't work out the marbles purpose.

A few weeks later, Katy had a more traditional party - ten pin bowling with a group of friends followed by home made pizza.

The First!

I was happy to see our first ever apple on our two year old apple tree. That was short lived when I saw how mouldy it was! Better luck next year...