Swan River, 8am

This morning was forecast to be heavy rain so it was a lovely surprise to see a stunning morning on the Swan River for the official opening to the Rowing season at Blossom's school.

The girls have been rowing together for a month now and this morning, after a tough session of time trials, they rowed in to an audience of proud parents.

If only all mornings were like this on the river!

Sydney, 7.55am

View of South Head and North Head from Tania Park, Balgowlah Heights.

Taken while we stood in the 7 degree early morning chill waiting for Blossom's soccer match to start. They lost 4-0.

Yesterday Padawan Learner's team won 13-0; with PL scoring 3 of the goals (which brings his life-time goal scoring record to 4). In typical Under-8s style our team turned up without the kit bag, couldn't supply a ref and had no whistle - so the coach from the other team offered to ref, used his own ball, shouted STOP instead of using a whistle and timed the game on his mobile phone...

How did this happen?

You know how we always joke about being a taxi-driver to our kids? Yeah, me too. But until this year I was a serial taxi-driver - I sometimes took the kids to more than one activity in a day but just one activity at a time.

This year I've become a parallel taxi driver. And how. Here is yesterday afternoon's soccer practise debacle.

(For the more visually inclined please refer to professionally drawn diagram above. Blue box is my house, green circles are the soccer grounds.)


1615: pile kids into car (in soccer uniform)
1630: drop Child A off at Soccer Club A and Field A (15 minute drive)
1700: drop Child B off at Soccer Club B and Field B (20 minute drive)
1730: pick up Child A from Field A (20 minute drive)
1800: return to collect Child B from Field B (20 minute drive). Child not ready until 1845. Supposed to be ready at 1830 hours.
1900: drop by local Thai takeaway because am exhausted by driving, glad that I had a full tank of petrol as there was a queue of at least 15 cars at local petrol station (now I know why...)

How I managed this extremely poor timetabling I don't know but I'm horrified that we are only two weeks into the season.

Baseball Gala Day

Today was the last day of Baseball for the season. The kids played their last games, had team photos and got their trophies.

Kids now get a trophy for every sport they play, every year. Just for turning up. Does anyone else find this over the top? I'm all for a certificate and a pat on the back. Or even just a pat on the back.

Anyway, enough bah humbug, the kids love their trophies and they had a great day.

Now the soccer season starts...