What We Did When the Big Girls Went Away

Imogen and Charlotte were going away to the 'Reasons for Hope' weekend and they would be away for a few days, so that meant Sophie and I were in charge.

When we had waved goodbye to the big girls, we made some eggy bread to eat. Mum said we could rent a movie, so Sophie and I did the dishes as fast as possible.  After looking at a few movies we chose The Croods. Sophie and I made some popcorn then settled down to watch.

The movie is about cavemen and was really good. Have you watched The Croods? I think one of my favourite characters out of the movie was Belt.

Belt

The next day Sophie made porridge for breakfast. We ate it slowly before doing the dishes and all the jobs.

"Girls, would you like to go out for lunch?" Mum asked. She'd promised we could do something special together while Imogen and Charlotte were away. "But we have to do some shopping first."

We smiled from ear to ear.

First thing we had to get from the shops was a present for Nanna. When we had found her something and bought a few other things we went to get lunch.

We entered a cafe and sat down. A lady came up to us. "Would you like a drink?"

"Just water please," Mum said.

The lady walked off but it wasn't long before she came back with glasses of water.

Another lady appeared with some menus and we began choosing.

There was so many things on the list like quiches and salad. Finally we had all chosen. I wanted a egg and bacon quiche. Sophie wanted a chunky steak pie. Dad had salad and Mum had quiche like me.

I stared at the huge plate of salad, chips and quiche that was placed in front of me. How was I ever going to manage to eat all that? All around me people chomped and munched. I tried some salad. Yum. I tried some quiche. Yum.

Sometime later Mum was staring at my plate. "What's wrong?" I asked.

"You're nearly finished," she said.

"Yeah?"

"I didn't think you could eat all of it," Mum said.

"I was hungry," I said.

When we had finished eating, Mum told us to choose ourselves a cake. Sophie chose a slice of apple pie and I chose a custard tart.

When we had eaten the cakes we went to the supermarket and did some grocery shopping.

In the evening we watched The Croods again.

On Sunday Imogen and Charlotte came home.

I enjoyed doing things with Mum and Dad but I am glad the big girls are home again.

A Three Times More Pretty Picture of Who?

A little while ago it was my birthday. My eldest sister Felicity rang to tell me she was sending me a present and it has arrived.

"Gemma-Rose," Mum said.

I hopped off the piano stool and peeked over Mum's shoulder at the computer screen on her lap.

There grinning at me was a very beautiful girl. Felicity had emailed me a very stylized and three times more pretty picture of who? ME.

"Do you want read the email?" Mum asked.

"Of course ," I said, taking the computer off her.

Felicity wrote that she had a professional artist draw the picture for me.

My smile stretched from ear to ear. It is always special when Felicity remembers our birthdays.

"You could write  a blog post about your wonderful sister," Mum suggested.

I think about it. Yes I could do that.

Thank you Felicity. It is a very nice picture.
   

Australia Day Birthday

It is Australia Day and it's also my birthday.

Dad is reading at the 7.30 am Mass and Imogen is singing at the later one so we will have to split up and go to two different churches.

Sophie climbs out of her bed. She is going to go to the early Mass. "Happy Birthday," she grins and gives me a hug.

Mum enters the room. "Sophie it is time to get up. Oh you got yourself up." She turns to go.

"MUM!" Sophie cries.

"What? Oh, Happy Birthday Gemma-Rose!"

Maybe Mum thought I was still asleep.

Suddenly there is the sound of a rocket taking off. It is really Callum starting his car. He has to pick his girlfriend up before Mass.

I jump out of bed and head for the dining room.

"Good morning," Duncan says appearing round the corner in his suit.

"Duncan," I say, "it is my birthday!"

"OH, Happy Birthday," Duncan says.

I sigh. Maybe everybody is still waking up. But I'm not. No way. I am full of energy.

Sophie appears beside me fully dressed. We bound into the dining room.

 "Look," I shout. Blue tacked to the wall is a birthday banner. It has HAPPY BIRTHDAY written in light blue words and standing in front of the them are Elsa, Anna, Kristoff and Olaf from the movie Frozen.

"Do you think Charlotte drew it?" I ask Sophie. She nods. We both know that Charlotte is the only one talented enough to draw them.

Charlotte appears in her pyjamas. "Happy Birthday," she mumbles.

"Thank you for the banner!" I give Charlotte a big hug.

A few minutes later Duncan, Sophie and Dad leave for Mass.

Charlotte hands me a crumpet. I sit down and eat. When I am done I jump up and run towards my bedroom. In a few minutes I reappear dressed.

Usually the birthday girl or boy gets a day off jobs. But today there are not enough people. It doesn't matter. Having the day off jobs isn't the best part of a birthday.

After I have cleaned the the cat litters and straightened the cushions in the family room, Mum offers to do my hair. Finally I am all ready for Mass.

Imogen puts her L plates on the car before driving down our street and onto the road. She is driving Charlotte, Mum and me to Mass.

After Mass we drive back home and open the front door. Everybody is waiting inside for presents. I make some hot chocolate and we are ready. Duncan grabs the film camera and everybody takes a seat.

"One, two, three," Mum says and everybody starts to sing Happy Birthday.

I grin.

Sophie gives me an envelope. "Happy Birthday!"

"An envelope! Just what I always wanted," I joke. Inside is a piece of paper. "The Land of Stories: The Enchantress Returns," I read. "Thank you Mum." It is a Kindle book and a sequel to one of my favourite library books.

Charlotte trots up next and passes me a package. I give her a big squeeze and probably give her a broken back. I tear off the paper and shake out a running shirt. My eyes grow wide. "I was wanting one of those!"

Charlotte gives me another present. It is some sketching pencils.

Duncan gives me a Rapunzel wig.

Imogen gives me some coloured inking pens.

Callum hands me a movie called Horton Hears a Who based off a book by Dr. Seuss.

Lots more presents get given to me. I especially like my Lego house Mum gives me and my owl necklace from Casey.

When presents are done Sophie and me sit down on the ground and we begin to build the Lego house.

"Gemma-Rose," Mum calls from her room.

I stand up and run toward her. "Yes Mum?"

"Do you want to go to that animal place we went to on your birthday two years ago?" Mum asks.

I nod.

"Get your shoes on everyone," Mum shouts.

Ten minutes later we have our shoes on and food packed. We pile into the car and we are off.

A while later the Dad parks the car and we hop out. The food gets carted over to the sheltered eating area. Dad hands me a cold sausage in a wrap with pasta salad. It sure tastes nice.

When we have finished putting away the extra sausages we go to look at the kangaroos and emus. There are two emus and loads of kangaroos and wallabies. After we have walked around the enclosure a few times we head back to the car.

In the evening Imogen cooks pizza and we eat in front of the movie Horton hears a Who.

Felicity rings to wish me Happy Birthday then we have cake.

I have had a wonderful day.

Feasting on Father's Day

Yesterday it was Father's Day.

We all hopped out of bed, ate breakfast and got ready to go to Mass like we do every Sunday. But on the way back home from Mass we did something we don't normally do.

Dad parked the van outside the supermarket and then he and Mum walked into the shop to buy something special for lunch. They came back a few minutes later. Dad started the van and we drove home.

"Everybody out," Dad bellowed from the front of the van. We all piled out of the van, trotted down the driveway and into the house. Imogen started to unpack the lunch and I smiled as I saw a container of potato salad, a packet of cheese, a bag of rolls, followed by some peppercorn ham and pesto ham. We all tucked into a good lunch.

 "Gemma-Rose, go to my bedroom. In my cupboard are some presents," Mum whispered to me after lunch. I dashed off to Mum's bedroom and soon came back out with a big bag of presents.

I chose a present from the bag and walked over to Dad. "Happy Father's Day," I said giving him a kind of square and squidgy parcel, and a big kiss.

Dad opened the present and a smile crept onto his face. "A pair of shorts. Thank you."

Sophie gave him the next present. "Socks! Groovy socks," cried Dad in delight.

"Here you go, Dad," said Charlotte, handing him another present.

"Ooh...arr...Um I can't get into this one," Dad admitted as everybody watched him struggling to get it open.

"Maybe I put just a little too much sticky tape on that," pondered Charlotte.

"Nuts! Yummy hot spicy nuts," exclaimed Dad when he finally got the present open.

"Another pair of shorts! Thank you Imogen," said Dad, taking the paper off another present.

One by one the presents got opened and oohs and arrs kept going round the room.

Mum handed Dad the keys to the car. "Go look in the boot of my car," she said with a mischievous grin.

Dad, Imogen and I headed out to the car. Dad opened the boot and inside was a huge cardboard box. He looked at the side of the box. "Ocean," he read,"You're giving me an ocean?"

"No, no," said Imogen as we plodded back into the house.

"Is it supposed to make all those click clacking sounds?" Dad asked.

"Yes," Mum reassured him.

Dad pulled out of the box lots of black pieces of plastic, then some black square plastic frames and four white plastic boxes.

"It all looks like giant Lego," said Charlotte.

"Does it have any instructions?" Mum asked.

"No. There's only lots of plastic," said Dad.

"I think this part goes here and this one here," Imogen said, helping Dad put up a rather tall tower.

"What is it?" Dad asked.

"Not telling," said Mum.

"Done," said Dad, standing back to view the masterpiece. "It's a cabinet with four drawers, isn't it?"

"Yes. It's for all your stuff that's lying on the table in the other room," said Mum.

After a relaxing afternoon we had dinner and ice cream. We did the dishes and then settled down to watch Oliver Twist. When we had finished that, Mum said, "Callum sent me a text message telling everybody not go to bed."

"Not go to bed?" I asked.

"Yes. We've all got to stay up till he gets home from work."

"Imogen, while we were at the supermarket I bought some crumpets. Do you want to cook some?" Dad asked.

Imogen walked into the kitchen and soon we could hear the kettle boiling and the toaster being placed on the kitchen bench.

We ate crumpets and talked until we heard the front door open and Callum walked into the family-room.

"Good. You are all still up," he said and with that, he walked into the kitchen.

Callum came back a few minutes later with a platter of salmon, olives, a orange dip, cheese and crackers. Everybody scrambled to the table and started filling plates high with cheese and crackers.

"I am full," said Dad as he polished off the last of his crackers.

"So am I," said Mum.

"But it was good," I said, getting up from the sofa.

"We better be getting to bed," said Sophie.

I toddled out of the room.

"Good night," said Mum as she bent down to give me a cuddle.

"See you in the morning ," I said drowsily.

Mum closed the door softly and padded off down the hall.

Everybody enjoyed Father's Day and the feast that came with it. But I was glad it was all over and I could go to sleep.          
   

An Interesting Taste

"Gemma-Rose, I brought home some bananas from the shop so you can cook a new recipe I found," Mum said, handing me a piece of paper with a recipe written on it.

I read the recipe, then read it again. But how ever much I read the recipe it still clearly stated that I was supposed to put peanut butter and bananas in the same batch of biscuits, which I thought was strange. Would it taste weird?

"Er, Mum," I said uncertainly, "are you sure that I am supposed to put peanut butter and bananas into the same biscuits?"

Mum nodded, undaunted by the fact.

 As Mum and the recipe had quite clearly decided that I was going to make this batch of biscuits with that strange combination, I plodded off to the kitchen to start cooking.

I grabbed the bunch of bananas, a packet of oats, the peanut butter and with much reluctance, put the chocolate on the kitchen bench without so much as taking a tiny nibble. Then I set to work chopping, measuring, mashing and stirring. A few minutes later a batch of unusual looking biscuits where thrown into the oven and I, feeling quite proud of  myself  and the biscuits despite the contents, started to clean up the kitchen.

 "Mum, have they cooked for long enough?" I asked, peering through Mum's bedroom door.

"Not yet," answered Mum who had her eyes stuck to the screen of her computer, so clearly she wasn't paying much attention to me.

A few minutes later I was back. "Mum, should I take the biscuits out yet?" I asked anxiously.

"You should leave them in for a couple more minutes yet."

I poked my head round the door again. "Mum, are you certain they aren't burning?"

"Yes, I am quite certain. Go sit down for a few minutes and stop worrying," Mum said determinedly.

I slunk out of Mum's bedroom and sat down at the table with a good book.

"Gemma-Rose, they can come out now," called Mum.

I jerked my head out of my book and sprinted for the kitchen, questions bubbling up in my head.

"What if they were burnt?"

"If they were, would I have to make more?"`

"Would I get in trouble for burning them?"

"No I wouldn't get in trouble because I had asked Mum to tell me when they were done, hadn't I?"

I opened the oven door, and  inside were some biscuits that weren't burnt at all. "What was I worrying about?" I asked myself.

"Mum, the biscuits still look squishy," I said, as I raced into Mum's bedroom.

"That is probably just the banana," Mum reassured.

The next day Mum asked, "Can I have one of your wonderful biscuits?"

I opened the lid of the container and placed one of the biscuits onto a plate. "Here you go, Mum," I said placing the plate on the table. Then I found myself a biscuit and sat down to eat.

"Interesting taste," Mum commented.

I bit into my own biscuit and had  to agree it was an interesting flavour.

"Sophie, what do you think of my biscuits?" I asked.

"Interesting," Sophie answered.

I thought about the peanut butter and bananas I had put in them, and decided that even with those odd ingredients, they had turned out well.

If you want to brave the peanut butter and banana combination......

3 ripe bananas
1 cup of quick oats
Half a cup of chopped up dark chocolate
1 heaped dessertspoon of peanut butter

Mash up the three bananas in a bowl and add the oats.

Chop up the dark chocolate and put it in the bowl.

Take a dessertspoon and heap it with peanut butter, then plop it into the bowl.

Mix all together and then make small balls and place them on a tray lined with baking paper.

Cook for 15 minutes at 180 degrees C

Editing Photos

I have been editing some flowers on Picmonkey and Befunky. It is a lot of fun.

"Gemma-Rose, what are you doing?" Mum asked, peering over my shoulder. "Editing a photo I downloaded," I answered.

"That is pretty," Mum smiled. "Do you like editing photos?"

"Yes, it is fun to play with different effects," I smiled back.

     
"What kind of photos have you been editing?" Mum asked.

"Flowers and leaves, maybe a fish," I said staring at the screen of my computer. I was only half listening to what Mum was saying.

"Crop it, put some sparkles on it, maybe I should try putting some shadows on," I mumbled happily away to myself.

"She really is enjoying herself," Mum said to Charlotte.

I love editing photos. Do you like editing photos?

   

Zumba Girls

Mum decided to learn Zumba so naturally all us girls decided to learn it too.

Charlotte and Imogen move the table to the side of the room. Mum puts the disk into the DVD player. "This is going to be fun," Mum encourages. I pull a big silly smile. A lady appears on the screen and starts shouting at us.

"Get your heart rate up there. The higher you get it, the more calories you burn. Come on, wiggle those hips. Walk like a crab," she shouts.

I take three steps to the right and then three steps to the left and end up on Charlotte's toes. I pant away. I never thought Zumba would be this hard.A few sore toes later we stop.

"I think that's plenty of Zumba for one day," smiles Mum.

"You have learnt Zumba, but before you start partying, I would like to introduce you to the creator of Zumba," shouts the lady.
 
"It is beyond me how the ladies get their hips all the way round like that," pants Charlotte.

I can move my hips but I keep stepping on Charlotte's toes.    

We keep going back and doing this strange sport. Why? I have no idea. We have no coordination.  
           
Finally it gets warm enough to run outside and we give up Zumba. Zumba is fun but we prefer running.

Yummy Cakes

We always celebrate a special day with a yummy cake.

                                           
                                             My eighth birthday cake    

                                                           Happy Anniversary cake

                                       
                                                              Epiphany Crown Cake                         

                             
                                                            My 9th Birthday cake

                      
                                                Charlotte's First Holy Communion cake  
                                                           

                                                   Easter Egg Nest Cake

 
                                                           Pentecost Cake

                                                        Imogen's 18th Birthday Cake

                                                             Fathers Day Cake

                                                       Sophie's Confirmation Cake  


Tomorrow we will be having another cake. It is Mummy's birthday!

When We Went to the Moscow Circus

We went to the Moscow Circus a few years ago. It was very exciting. They had a huge tent. They were very good.

One of  my favourite acts was the trapese artist. Don't you think it would be grand to hang up side down on a trapese? I also liked the juggling. You would have to be very talented not to drop anything.

Circuses go on for a long time but they are very interesting. I wonder what it would be like to be in a circus with everybody in the crowd cheering. I think I would be scared and fall off the trapese or drop balls and sticks on my head. No, I think I will stick to watching the circus and let everybody else do the work.

I like the circus. I hope to go again soon. We might even go next week to celebrate Mum's birthday, because the circus is back in town!          

Uninvited Fleas

"Imogen, could you please give those cats a bath? I got bitten last night by a flea," says Mum.

Imogen sighs and turns to look for the first terror (bathing cats is hard work) .

"She is probably in the settee," calls out Charlotte.  

Imogen grabs the first cat and hauls her out of the settee.

I try to clog up my ears and read my book at the same time but it is impossible with those cats yowling and hissing all the time.

Imogen throws Poppy out of the laundry after her bath.  (Poppy is the worst cat in the bath.)

"I bathed the cats, Mum," says a VERY wet Imogen.


"Poppy tried to climb the wall," says mostly dry Charlotte, who has been helping.

"Thank you. Do you think it would be possible to look through the cats' fur?" says Mum.

Charlotte marches into the family room armed with a comb and a cup of hot water.

One after the other the fleas got plucked  out of the cats' fur and into the hot water.

A few months later, Imogen makes a terrible discovery while hugging Sammy.

"Mum, I found a flea on Sammy."

Mum takes Sophie and me to the shops.

"We will see if we can find some flea shampoo and some flea collars."

We come home some time later with a yellow collar, a blue collar, a red collar and a bottle of flea shampoo.

Imogen starts putting the yellow flea collar on Jenny.

"That shade of yellow looks like the worming paste they get on their paws," I say.

"What if she chews through her collar like she did with the one Imogen got her for Christmas?" says Sophie.          

"I doubt it tastes that nice," says Charlotte.

A few days later Imogen is out.

"Charlotte could you please go through the cats with a comb and see if there are any fleas?" asks Mum

Charlotte nods and picks up Poppy who is lying sprawled out on the floor in the sun.

Again in the family room, with a comb and a cup of water, Charlotte, Sophie and I sit down on the settee.

Charlotte holds the struggling animal who doesn't like anybody that close to its tummy while Sophie combs through the fur.

I have a cup of water all ready for the fleas but no fleas come.

We trudge off to Mum's bedroom.

"We couldn't find any," says Charlotte.

"Not a single one," concludes Sophie.

But Mum keeps getting bitten. There are fleas hiding somewhere.

Mum suddenly has a great idea.

Mum jumps into the car and we go off to buy flea bombs.

We come back home with eight flea bombs.

"What are we going to do with the cats?" asks Charlotte. The instructions say the house must be empty when the bombs go off. The house has to be empty for two hours.

"I don't know," says Mum.

The next day we put the cat question to Callum.

"Why don't you put them in one of my cars?" suggests Callum, after a lot of thinking.

"They will boil in the car for two hours."

Finally Mum has another one of her fantastic and strange ideas. "Why don't we take them down to the park."

To the park? We all look doubtful.

"People take dogs down to the park so why don't we take our cats?" says Mum

 We all grin at the thought of us taking the cats for a walk.

Sophie, Charlotte and I hop into the van while Mum and Imogen get ready to set the flea bombs off. We have the cats in their carriers. Mum and Imogen come running out of the house.

"I set off all the flea bombs," says Imogen proudly.

Imogen and Charlotte are in the middle of the van with our cats Poppy and Jenny, while Sophie has to look after Sammy in the back.

Mum starts the van. I listen from the front of the van as the cats start meowing and yowling.

We finally reach the park. Sammy and Jenny stop yowling. They are fascinated by the ducks but Poppy doesn't like it at all. She starts trying to dig her way out of the pet carrier.

Lots of men with big dogs walk by and ladies with puppies. Two ladies stop to have a look at our cats.

"What have you here?" says two ladies.

"What an adorable cat you own," they say pointing to Poppy.

Mum reads part of a book to Sophie and me, while we are at the park. After a while Mum closes the book and I pick up my drawing.

"We can start heading home now," says Mum eventually.

We all get up and Imogen goes to find the cats' bowls which she fills with water, so she can give the cats a drink before their ride home.

Mum pulls in at the driveway. She goes into the house with Imogen and opens the door and all the windows. Imogen then returns to the van.

"Mum is airing the house. She told us to get ice-creams."

We walk up to the village shop and buy big ice-creams.

When we get home, Charlotte opens the front door and a terrible smell wafts up to our noses. Flea bombs smell awful.

I am glad it is all over. The fleas are gone and the house now smells okay.


  

Swimming

I have swimming lessons. I go to the swimming pool every Saturday. It is a chlorine pool.

Mum got me a wonderful pink wet suit because the water there is very cold. I also have a rash shirt, a pink swimsuit and pink goggles. I like pink.

I go and play for five or ten minutes before my lesson. Then I have a half an hour swim lesson. I love my swim lessons. They are lots of fun and I soon warm up. I can do tumble turns, I can dive with a big splash and I am learning breast stroke.  I think I am lucky to get swim lessons.

After my lesson, I play till Charlotte has finished swimming laps. Then we go and get changed into our clothes.

I was glad that Mum got me swim lessons when Dad, Charlotte and I capsized the canoe, while we were on holiday.  We all fell into the freezing cold water. It was deep. I went down to the bottom of the lake. Then Charlotte grabbed me.  We got back into the canoe and Dad towed us to shore.                                                                                                                                                                                                   

Kangaroos

There is a lot of kangaroos in Australia.

When Charlotte was little, Mum and Dad lived on a 100 acre block and when they went walking in the bushy bits they could see lots of kangaroos.

At Penrose Park (monastery) we see heaps of kangaroos just dotted around the place.

We have seen kangaroos on our street as well. When we were saying morning prayers one day, Mum said, "Look there is a kangaroo."

I rushed to the window and there was a kangaroo happily hopping down the road.

We also saw a kangaroo when we were going running.We were walking up to the bush track in the early morning.

"Look, it's a kangaroo," said Imogen.

It sat there in the bush looking at us, then it hurried away as if it was late for something.

Dad hit a kangaroo late one night. I think the kangaroo did more damage to the car then the car did to it. Imogen was afraid that the kangaroo would go through the windscreen and it would sit in her lap. Dad managed to get the car home. Luckily for me I was not in the car but I did get to see the car afterwards. It had kangaroo fur on it. Both the kangaroo and the car ended up dying.

I like kangaroos and their big legs.