Christmas Greetings

Greetings all

May I take this opportunity to wish you and your family, a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, take care over the festive season.

We are settled into our new home and have begun reaping our crops, although it is raining today, maintenance is on the schedule for Bullet. One more week of school, one more week of work and I have 3 weeks off to properly clean the van out and go shopping to buy a few things to house paperwork and Tori's toys, etc. It's getting a bit messy as we don't have all we need yet for sorting out stuff like that. I have set up our keyboard in one of the rooms with a stand and a stool and a little cupboard for the books and music is slowly creeping back into our lives. Tori, when she is not on the computer, pops on the "learn to play piano for kids" CD and merrily practices away, that's a good thing. I have been looking for a piano for myself to replace the one we lost but I think I am going to have to settle for a digital piano (sounds like a real one) because the old style pianos are RATHER EXPENSIVE and we still have to get it to our place and regular tuning so the digital might be the go. Will look at that in the new year. Bullet wants to get another guitar so we will have to do something about that too !

I have successfully negotiated with my boss here to work shorter hours (9.00am to 3.30pm) and that will mean that a) we can get up later in the morning, b) I can take Tori to school and read with her in the morning and c) pick her up after school. So the money I lose is the money I gain in not having to pay for her to be looked after in the morning and OSHC after school. I hope to encourage her to take up an interest like gymnastics or dancing or netball or music lessons or whatever she wants to do as I will now be able to go along with her and watch her. I think she'd like that. She is moving into the Primary School next year as is looking forward to it. They had a graduation (moving from the Junior Primary to the Primary, getting a little bit Americanised I think !), and sang a couple of songs at the assembly.

I went to a School Jazz band presentation a couple of weeks ago and boy am I impressed with the standard of these kids. The junior class were brilliant for their age and the seniors, well, what can I say, they blew me away. There's not so much of a stigma attached to being a muso anymore, when I went to school (although not a music student) they were all considered nerds. With this extra time on my hands, I hope to go to piano lessons myself and also tune up the voice with a singing teacher. That might lead into a band of some description and then my life will be complete.

It's nice having Bullet home, but of adult conversation and a little less pressure on me being a "single mum". Although this daylight saving is driving me crazy as I judge everything by the sky and sometimes I find us having tea really late even thought it's still light. I like daylight saving but not as a working parent.

My Mum is coming over after Christmas and we will be hitting the sewing machine to make some curtains for the house. The main bedroom and the lounge room are the ones most in need of window dressings as the sun pops it's head in really early and not letting me sleep in. It's nice having lots of windows (and no neighbours), it keeps the place light and airy. Must do something about the immediate outside soon, possibly in these 3 weeks off as the dust is coming in. Luckily we have a lot of tiles and it's easy to clean. There are still a few things that the builders need to do, house the microwave (he made it to a "standard" but the microwave I have is deeper) and the dishwasher needs to be fitted properly (a base needs to be made) it's funny, I did give him the model numbers and he was going to get the dimensions off the net ?!?!?!?

Half of you have probably got to the end of this, half of you would have quit ages ago, but whatever the case, I hope that you are all well and enjoying life.

Take care and I miss each and every one of you.