Let's see ... what's been happening ...

Dad arrived safely on December 19th! He said his flight was good and the train arrived exactly on time even though it left the city late. It's so good to see him again and the boys are rapt that he is here.

Mark said I have been a bit of a nervous wreck for the last couple of days where my Dad is concerned. I have been a bit on edge for a while but I think it is because I want things to go really well while he is here. We're keeping things as low key as possible as far as Church is concerned. I don't wish to upset Dad and have him want to leave. We are still continuing to do some of our daily activities. Dad will need to get used to us blessing the food and such. I told Dad that it's good for the boys to do these things. We did tell Dad when he asked what Church we go to. So he at least knows now that we are Latter Day Saints. He seemed to think that its the same loopy church one of my cousin's belongs to but I told him that it was a Pentecostal something or other and NOT the same Church at all! If we ease things in slowly Dad should be able to accept things. He will see that we haven't changed all that much but what has changed is for the better!
Dad has even been asking questions about our Church. I guess he sees us as not having changed too much now and that we are still the same people we always were.

The big fella has been such a little imp of late. He has been doing ALL sorts of naughty things and thinking it's okay to keep going on with them. He has no respect sometimes for Poppa and is often hurting him even if it is unintentional! I've explained to him that Poppa isn't such a youngster any more and he is more easily hurt than he used to be (physically that is). Dad is constantly having to use his walking stick here, which kind of surprised me. I didn't think he was that bad until I saw him walking.

Mark's Dad and Step Mum came over for a late lunch on Christmas Eve. It was strange to do our Christmas celebrations early. At least the meal side of things anyway. We also decided to start a new tradition for the family. You see Angus no longer believes in Father Christmas. He was told last year by the big fella that he wasn't real and I only found out about a month or two ago that they both no longer believed. It did make things a lot easier though in some ways.

So tonight we let everyone open one present from 'Santa'. I was going to let the boys open a small present but it seemed that the little dude needed some BIG cheering up. His budgie, Aragorn, passed away this evening and he was totally devastated. He cried like a baby because his bird was gone. So we are now down to the cockatiel and the cats. I can't work out what was wrong with the bird he was fine earlier and even jumped on my finger today to hop on his perch. It hurts so much to see the little dude so upset. Back to the presents. I let them open a 'big' present. Well not a big one in size but a big one nonetheless .. A new PSP2. The boys were so excited and so happy that they were laughing so much that they had tears in their eyes too! So I let them open one more present which was this PSP2 game that "A" was so desperate to have (Jak X). He was so excited jumping up and down like his pants were on fire, giggling and squealing with joy! It so makes up for his bird dying. It's what Christmas is all about!! Making the kids happy and sharing some quality time together.
For Christmas day the boys still had stacks of presents that they didn't know about (it's nice to be sneaky that way). The weather wasn't too pleasant here but that's okay I could live with that. It was only 13C instead of the usual mid 20's and they forecasted rain for us and snow for the alpine region. they were actually right it rained on and off ALL day! The alpine region desperately need the rain/snow. The fires that had been raging for three weeks were finally under control and the majority of them were out.
Wasn't that a wonderful Christmas miracle to have snow in Australia on Christmas day?!?! It snowed on Boxing Day too!!

I took Dad for a drive the other day to show him where "B" goes to High School. I think he was surprised at the distance it is from home but he did comment on how pretty the views are on the way up to the school. We also stopped at the reservoir near us. He thought it was very pretty. They have a lovely barbecue facility there. Maybe one day before school goes back I might take the boys up there.

We also called into a gardening-hardware store on the way home. I wanted to get some of Dad's gardening ideas for my vegetable patch! We bought a new chilli plant and some leeks. It isn't the right time of year to be planting so many vegies but I thought that with the cooler weather we've had that it wouldn't hurt!