Tuesday 17 June 2014

Catch up post

Hi, remember me and this blog?

No of course not I haven't seen you in ages!

When was the last time you posted? About 6 months ago!

Oh really? No way! It definitely has not been that long!

Perhaps you should close the blog if you are going to be so slack with your posts?

Hmmm.......

Nah!

Perhaps I should just do a catch up so it doesn't look like I have dropped off the face of the earth.

I'll try that instead.......


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While I have been slack on the blog front life has been humming away with so many things to keep me away from the blog. I will try to condense 6 months into this blog post and then hopefully start posting a bit more often than I have been.
 
We spent the first 4 months of the year swimming and doing swimming carnivals. Amazingly my boys went well in their school carnivals and then their regionals. The Diocesan carnival followed and amazingly F made it through to Catholic State (Polding) with his relay team. He was so excited to make it to Sydney for State. And we had never got that far before, so to say we were all excited was a bit of an understatement!
 
 
So exciting!
 
The Sydney Aquatic Centre at Olympic Park is so huge! The boys kept eyeing off the waterpark over the other side all day. After the race they got to relax and have a play.
 
 
Waiting is nerve wracking.
 
And they won!!!!!
 
Well, won a bronze medal anyway! It was absolutely the most nerve wracking experience watching the race. So close and so much cheering. F swam his fastest time ever that day.
 
Bronze medallists
 
 
Parents were allowed to go downstairs to take pics of the winners on the podium. Then we signed forms and paid levy's to go on to the next level. PSSA (NSW State swimming). We spent a couple of days in Sydney doing other jobs. We never stopped going to Sydney in term 1. We went down for swimming, Scholarship exams and interviews for H. We did a trip to Bathurst for soccer trials. We slipped in a few trips to see family in Orange on our way home from Sydney. We were never at home that term and I kept our suitcase out and kept washing and repacking it any day we were home! That along with the swimming training made it a pretty busy time.

 
 
End of the day.
 
 
 
The cattleyards
 
 
While plenty of excitement was going on for us, home was looking pretty dry all the same. We were fairly worried that we may be in for more drought, but luckily we got some crucial rain and we have sown our crops. Thank god for that!
 
Easter hunt
 
 
 
 

Nervous wait again.
 
 
Back to Sydney for more swimming, this time in the PSSA carnival. It was an extremely tight competition and came 8th in their heat. 22nd overall out of 40 school teams, which is pretty good as our boys don't get to swim year round like some schools. We don't have a heated pool so only swim October to April. We have great coaches and the boys did their best.
 
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This little one is old enough to start playing Rugby in the under sixes. So we have been travelling most weekends for that too.



 
The Rodeo came to town. And it was a glorious winters day for it. Beautiful sunshine and bucking broncs.



 
 
 The boys also made it to the Diocesan Spelling Bee. They came first in their school for their age groups so another trip away to do that too. They went really well in all the rounds and made it to the "unseen" words which is the words they did not practice off the given list. They had to figure out how to spell them off the top of their heads which was rather tricky. Hard to tell their placing, but F came in the last 20 kids out of 65. 

 H made it all the way to the final 5 kids out of 65. He was so very close to winning or coming second. He is kicking himself now as he had the unseen word correctly but though it seemed too short and added an R to the end of it. They went well though and it was a great experience to have. All that practicing spelling in the car all the trips to Sydney pays off!


So there you go, 6 months in condensed highlight form.

Not counting all the mundane stuff no one wants to hear about...