Break ins

There have been a number of car break ins in our street this week! Fortunately the thieves are not actually breaking in but just getting into unlocked cars and stealing what they can find (including guns!)

My neighbour caught both thieves at 4am because he has a motion sensor that sets off a silent alarm.

Check out the news article here.

It's getting scary around here. Our house is even shown in the newsclip!

Hark! 2012

It's a mad creative wonderland around here at the moment in preparation for hosting our first ever Christmas party.  

We've called it Hark! 2012 because our lighting show is themed around the Christmas carol Hark the Herald Angels Sing. It's an outdoor party to view our musical & lights extravaganza and then enjoy some hot chocolate and treats in the backyard.

Andrew is still creating more light effects and new lighting shows.

I am creating signs, coffee cups and popcorn boxes as well as baking. (Thanks to Trader Joes opening (!?!!?!?) I have lots of other treats too)

As of today we have 78 people signed up to attend  and about half of these are kids! Check back later for more updates.

Christmas Tree 2012

We picked up our tree from Hugh McRae park again this year.  Felicity kept running around in the maze of trees and laughing when we couldn't find her. [Do you like the Christmas tree shirt i made her? Lucy wouldn't wear hers]

We had fun decorating the tree with Lucy taking charge of things and doing a good job! Both Felicity and Henry loved climbing the ladder even when Dad wasn't looking.

Bike riding

Over the summer we bought Lucy and Henry new bicycles because they had outgrown their old ones.  

Lucy, whilst she has a rather large bike, is still riding with training wheels and just doesn't have any balance.  

Henry has great balance and was not good at peddling.  So he has been sitting in the burley with Felicity instead of riding his super cool neon orange Tony Hawk bike.  But a week or two ago he gave it a go and went on a really long bike ride to Anchors Bend and back. 

Go Henry!

Thanksgiving 2012

This year we attended Thanksgiving at Nathan & Elisabetta's home.  We had the traditional turkey, sweet potato mash, and green bean casserole but the Italian twist came with the dessert - panna cotta. A couple of the little ones were crying for no real reason but once they had a panna cotta or two everyone was happy again!

Felicity had a thanksgiving play at preschool the day before where she dressed up as a grey squirrel but she didn't shake her bushy tail! Henry had fun visiting his old preschool.


And just for my records here is where we've enjoyed thanksgiving in years past.

Thanksgiving feasts:
2012 Cook family (Boiling Spring Lakes)
2011 Holmes family (Hampstead)
2010 Tilly family (Rocky Point)
2009 Marlene's (Carolina Beach)
2008 Martin family (next door neighbours)
2007 Westra family (Hampstead)
2006 Monetta family (Wilmington)

County Fair

Every couple of years we think it would be good to go to the county fair at ILM airport.  Then we go and wonder why we bothered! However the kids did have a fun time on the rides.  

Henry loved the monster trucks, Lucy loved the jungle gym (she went on 6 continuous times) and Felicity loved the fun slide (she kept running from the end back to the entrance and screaming until she was let in again by the attendant!)

We visited the animal tent which was judged smelly by Lucy and then Henry declared he didn't like horses.  But he did like the mega sized tractors.

We ate some bad ice cream and then came home!

Lucy's half birthday

Lucy's cake was several days in the making.  She chose a White Gold Passion Genoise from Rose's Heavenly Cakes book.  It included the genoise cake, passionfruit syrup, passionfruit curd and deluxe white chocolate buttercream icing (which firstly required a custard to be made). 

It tasted as good as it sounds and that passionfruit curd was truly delightful.  [We cracked open one of the tins of passionfruit we bought in Australia as part of this celebration. Please Australian friends send more tins!]

Of course we decorated the house with pink and purple crepe paper streamers per Lucy's request.