ANZAC day weekend

We're now on the other side of the Anzac day long weekend. Every year we have a public holiday to commemorate those that have served for Australia. Since being united with his old Army unit several years ago, Dad has become an active participant in the Vietnam Veterans association and as such had decided this year to march in the Anzac Day Parade.

Dad was very excited. He's a proud veteran & Anzac Day is good opportunity for all the boys to get back together for a chat and a beer after the parade.

Although the weather has been a bit dodgy lately, we all made the trip into the city to cheer on Dad. The parade goes on for hours. I don't think there are any WWI veterans left, but there are still a few WWII diggers around, with plenty of other wars fought between then & now. Although the parade started at 9am, Dad didn't march past until after 12pm. As such, we had to find ways to amuse the kids. With Isaac, this means drip feeding him treats in between chasing him up & down the footpath.














Eventually Dad's Battalion marched past. We all waved our flags, cheered and then high-tailed it to Pitt St for lunch and a spot of shopping. It's not a great photo, but he is tucked in there on the side.


By the way, Happy 14th Birthday Shauna for last week & Martin for the 5th this week.

Pictures for Granny

This is just a really quick post - just thought we'd put a few cute pictures of Maeghan up for her Granny. Now that the weather has cooled down a bit, she's finally been able to wear the cute little green dress that she was given at Christmas.

Runny Noses & Family Celebrations

Well it's been hectic the last week or two. Though on the mend now, Maeghan has been dosed with a cold, getting tummy aches from the expanding diet and to top that off - teething as well. Amongst all of these complaints, we've had various family social activities to attend. The first of those was the wedding of my cousin Daniel.


Being a Chinese wedding the ceremony started earlier in the day to allow time for all of the rituals that needed to occur throughout the day. Thankfully we didn't have to attend all of them, but it did involve several outfits for the day. Here is Maeghan dressed for the morning, her cheeks are all rosy from the teething & her nose is all red from the cold.

My Grandmother loves the opportunity to cuddle with the great-grandkids.
This photo was taken at the reception. Maeghan was only awake for the first hour or so, but it was long enough to show her off in her cute little Chinese dress that was given to her at her Christening.

The second big family event was the annual celebration of Chinese Easter at Rookwood cemetry. It's Chinese tradition where the whole family pays their respects to our ancestors. All the graves are cleaned up and decorated with flowers & food. We all sit around folding up gold paper into little bullion shaped bundles, which then get burnt to provide our relatives with their yearly allowance. These days, they also get cardboard mobile phones, shoes & a new suit or two. We all take turns to 'chin chin' and pour wine as a drink offering. Here is Dad is taking Maeghan through the routine. Afterwards, we have a great feast of roast duck, suckling pig and dumplings. It's really a great day. I'd love to think that in years to come, my decendants would celebrate my life in the same way.

Sydney Royal Easter Show

Every year at Easter, Sydney plays host to the Sydney Royal Easter show. It started years ago as a way of bringing the country to the city. They run all sorts of "Best in Show" competitions ranging from cows, pigs, fruit cakes etc... They also have loads of rides, concerts, exhibitions and show bags. It's a massive event.

This year we took the kids in for the day. I also went on a separate day with Podger where we were competing in the Agility Dog trials.





The nursery farm is always packed with kids and not just the animal kind (he he he), so we started there first. Elissa enjoyed chasing after anything fluffy & wanted to know if was okay to touch it. I'm pretty sure that most of the animals in there had to go through some sort of temperament test to check it's tolerance at being poked, prodded, pulled & yanked from the thousands of toddlers over the two week period. I have no idea what Isaac was up to... Susanne had her hands full chasing after him. Maeghan was happy on my Mum's lap. With a little cup of food, all the animals were happy to do the drive through option with Mum & Maeghan sitting on the hay bale.

After a painful 1/2 hour sitting through the Dora the Explorer show (I'm sure that we're not the only ones in the world exposed to this rubbish) we then attempted to bribe the kids with a bag of fairy floss while we had a look through the arts & craft pavilion. I think we managed about 30 minutes before they got bored.

I think one of my favourite displays every year is the District Exhibits, showcasing the farming efforts of the different regions around NSW. My explanation to Elissa, as a way of getting her excited about what we were about to see was that we would see giant pictures made out of fruit & vegies. Well, it's more impressive in real life. Anyway, this was my favourite display this year.

It's hard to describe how major this show is every year, though as a kid, I remember as being much bigger than is probably is. We managed to get through the day and hopefully, won't need to take the kids back for another few years.

Then it was Podgers turn. The dog agility trials were being run a few days later so with Maeghan spending the day at Nanny & Poppy's house, myself & Podger made the trek back into the show to exhibit our 'skills'. It certainly wasn't best run we've ever had, but it was a great day. Unfortunately for us, the show dogs had been in that ring all week so there was loads of food & other interesting doggy smells going around. I think there were people in the crowd that actually laughed at us when Podger stopped for a sniff. Well, if you can't win, you might as well get a few laughs along the way.