CELEBRATING ANZAC CENTENARY.

ANZAC Day may have well and truly passed, but I'm still relishing with pride being able to spend ANZAC Day with 46 other members of my family in Adelaide who watched our father, grandfather and great grandfather 'march' in the Adelaide ANZAC parade.

Since the event started, he has marched. And this is the first time I have seen him. It's been too long for me to go, and the whole event was so moving. My eldest two cousins pushed Grandad in his wheelchair, and they were so proud.

I was moved by more ways than one. Firstly because the parade when for over two and a half hours, and the soldiers kept coming. So many men and women who have fought in the wars past. So many empty banners with no-one marching behind them. So many soldiers who are fighting even today.

It seems we don't learn, and war is still very much part of the world which we live.

They fought for us, the families they didn't yet have. Today, they still fight for us.
 
I hope that like me, you will remember all those who fight for our freedom every day. Not just on ANZAC Day.

GIACOMO + KELLY | THE MOST PERFECT WEDDING.

At the end of March something wonderful happened; our eldest daughter decided to marry this amazing guy she knows.

The weather was perfect, the flowers divine, the vows hilarious, some tears (mostly the groom's), and plenty of laughs and smiles.

It was a day that passed far too quickly. It was over before we had a moment to absorb it all. But how we have remembered and reminisced!

Sometimes there are no words for how perfect something was. So here are the photos which captured a most wonderful day better than anything I can describe.



(Above casual snaps taken by me, below photographs taken by the amazing Jac + Heath.)
 

 There you have it. No words needed, right?
 

BETWEEN THE PARTIES.

There once was a time when I scoffed at families who had children born on the same day several years apart. Like my step-brothers. They're four years apart, born on the same day. I couldn't believe how people planned pregnancies like that. It just seemed bizarre beyond belief.

Since the mocking, I now know that this occurrence is not planned and much more common than I first thought. Because then I gave birth to two children - three years apart and both due on the same day. Luckily for me, one came two days early and so they don't actually share a birthday.

But it was this close.

It means that their birthdays are smack in the middle of the year, giving us reprieve between birthdays and Christmas. It means they have summer gifts and winter gifts, something always to look forward to (in six months' time), and they don't have to wait too long for their birthday after the hype of the Other Brother's.

Sooooo many advantages.

It also means that it's one big birthday week at our place every year. We usually combine the party, but the three year age gap at this age means that their differences are, well, different. So, two parties in a week it was.

But between the party madness, there was a quiet moment to celebrate and reflect. To give gifts, eat birthday cake and drink hot chocolate (Coke Zero for Dad).

This moment.