Dec 20 - Fun in the Sun

Dark Mint Lindor Ball

  "Do give books for Christmas. They’re never
  fattening, seldom sinful, and permanently personal."
  - Lenore Hershey







  The day started out without a particular plan.  Gub and the Cambridge Rower wanted to do some errands so we opted to do them first, and then go and see Bertie and our nephew.  In part due to the number of cars that would be required and in part due to not being thrilled about errands, Mr Smart opted to head home and leave us to our sisterly catching up, and we headed off towards Forest Hill.
  As we set out, Gub said.  "Can we go to Ramsay Street?"  Ramsay Street is of course the fictional setting of the ever popular Australia soap opera Neighbours, but growing up in the area, Gub and I knew exactly where it was.  It was a stop along the route so we turned in, drove up and back down the court and pulled up and parked.  The Cambridge Rower walked in stunned silence to the top of the court.  Suddenly grinning, he stated excitedly "I'm in Ramsay Street!!"

No. 28 Ramsay Street, Home of Karl Kennedy

  There was no denying why he was really there (until now he'd been pretending he was only coming for the sake of his mother) and it was fun to see him enjoy himself.  The ever present security guard, protecting the interests and privacy of the real residents of Pin Oak Court, smiled good-naturedly at yet another mad English tourist enjoying themself.  He said it was fine to take photos but not of the residents themselves should they happen to come out of their houses.  Fair enough too.  The stop didn't take us long and I drove us quickly to Forest Hill Chase via the TV studio where the interior scenes are shot.  An 'unofficial' Neighbours tour completed in record time.
  At the shopping centre we visited the bank, had some sushi, went to JB Hi Fi, bought some clothes, organised a ring re-sizing, bought our Christmas ham and then headed off to Bertie's place.  It was just general running around stuff but in two short hours we managed to accomplish quite a lot of little errands!
  When we got Bertie's there were cuddles all round from our nephew and he was very excited to be able to show Gub his new game on Bertie's phone.  Turns out he has worked out how to download apps.  Oh dearie me!  His favourite one currently is Cupcake Maker where he can, surprise surprise 'make' and decorate his own cupcakes.  After a few rounds of this I reminded him that Aunty Gub had never seen his trampoline.
  My nephew loves his trampoline, but never more than when he can take a friend on it.  Gub went first, and showed him a new trick, how to bounce on your bum seated and stand back up again.  He was delighted when he got the hang of that.  "Do you want a turn?" Gub laughed out to the Cambridge Rower.  "Hell yes!" he cried, flinging his shoes off.  We all had a turn, even Aunty Jess who is now under the trampoline's weight limit!

Trampolining is much more exhausting than I remember!

   After the bouncy fun of the trampoline, Bertie had the idea that we should all go to the beach for fish and chips.  It was at this point more than any other that I wished Mr Smart was still with us, he'd have enjoyed that.  People got changed and we headed off, two adults and a child seat squished into the back of my tiny Mazda 2.  We grabbed fish and chips first then headed down to Seaford Pier.
  We sat on a bench and ate lunch first then when we were all too full to continue, the seagull baiting began.  Bertie often comes to this beach in her lunch break and has a group of them well trained.  With chip held aloft she walked backwards onto the sand, they followed her, hovering on the breeze, floating just above our heads somewhat ominously, open cups were covered lest seagull poop fall from on high.  Bertie tossed the chip up into the air and it was caught and an airborne scramble commenced.  Next our nephew took a small handful of chips.  Apparently seagulls are not new to this either and they all began to land around him.  He tossed the chips and then ran at ball of seagulls, scattering them noisily. 

  We soon ran out of seagull fodder and bucket and spade were fetched out and our nephew set to, attempting a sandcastle construction.  His efforts were somewhat hampered by sand that was first too dry, then further down the beach, too full of shell pieces.  He found a lovely small shell and handed it to me for Mr Smart and I chose one for him too.
  Gub and the Cambridge Rower, being completely mad for sunshine having just come from an English winter, headed out into the too-cold-for-normal-Aussies sea.  They headed out almost as far as the end of the pier and it was fun to watch them happily splashing about.  My nephew was becoming increasingly frustrated with the lack of success his sandcastles were having so I asked him if he'd like to walk to the end of the pier.  He said we would and off we went, hand in hand.

  Gub and the Cambridge Rower had come in towards shore a bit by the time we started walking so we met them halfway down the pier.  Our nephew was very excited at waving down to them and knocked his head on the fence rail at least twice while we waved and took photos.  We continued on to the end where two young men were jumping off the end of the pier against signage listing this as an explicit no no.  So determined were they to jump that they had taken all the way to the end, a small exercise trampoline.  My nephew was very excited and we rushed back to tell Bertie.
  "We walked out there" he said, "and saw a trampoline!"  Bertie raised an eyebrow in disbelief and I had to nod and laugh confirming that he was not simply being imaginative.  We had our dessert, a shared chunk of cheesecake, and played some more in the sand.  My nephew enlisted me to get a bucket of water and bring it back up to the dry sand and I managed to get a wet pant leg for my troubles despite having rolled my jeans up to my knees!  Bertie and he used the water to make wet sand and Bertie started making an elaborate dribble sandcastle on top of the Cambridge Rower's right foot.
  We continued on peacefully enjoying the sunshine and the cool bay breeze but with the sun beginning to droop and time marching on, we gathered up our things, rinsed and dried our feet and headed back to Bertie's.  We dropped her and our nephew off then headed back to my place via the supermarket and grog shop.  I needed ingredients to make a  salad for tomorrow's Christmas lunch at work and Gub needed various odds and sods that weren't packed due to space limitations and alcohol for our Saturday Christmas feast!

  Today's food was:

• Breakfast was Carmen's Classic Fruit Muesli with Jalna Greek Vanilla Yoghurt, flaked almonds and two dice dried peach halves.
• Lunch was from Sushi Sushi, Gub's choice, and I had a brown rice salmon hand roll, a crispy chicken hand roll, a tempura prawn handroll and an unagi (eel) sushi.
• Dinner was fish and chips.  A piece of battered flake, a battered frankfurt, a potato cake, a dim sim and some chips with tartare sauce and tomato sauce, and a couple of cups of Coke Zero.
• Dessert was a quarter Tangy Lemon Cheesecake from The Cheesecake Shop (sincere apologies Mr Smart) shared between four adults and one kidlet.
• Today's advent calendar Lindor Ball was mint flavoured dark chocolate.

  Between getting home and Gub and the Cambridge Rower leaving to visit Gub's best friend, I got started processing photos for the blog and nearly forgot to make the salad for tomorrow!  Luckily I remembered before it got too late.  It's a fabulously easy salad, a recipe given to me by The Seamstress, but it takes a bit of time to cut up all the broccoli into little bite sized pieces.  I musn't forget it in the morning!
 Jess