Small Hallows Eve

Dear Mum,

Had quite a good day at work today, I feel pretty settled now and have just been added to the on-call schedule, my first go is in a couple of weeks. A little nerve wracking but I might just actually go to work really early and finish really early. It’ll mean I can go with Deanne to pick the boy up and accompany them to Gymnastics classes.

We had potato scallops and chips for tea, which were very nice. Joshua was very talkative tonight and was coming out with lots of those long, rambling sentences where it takes him five minutes to get to the point. Daddy’s boy!

There was a Halloween disco on at Joshua’s school tonight, but with Josh’s seemingly innate fear of dressing up in public we thought it would be best not to try and force him to go. I feel a bit bad though, because a lot of his friends have pictures on Facebook and it looks like a good percentage of his class went. But I suspect if we’d have tried to dress him up for it he would have freaked out. 😦 Maybe next year!?

We’re doing a bit of shopping tomorrow, possibly buying an outdoor table for the verandah, and possibly going to visit Olive who hasn’t been well this last week. She seems to be better now though.

The picture is of our no longer agoraphobic cat, who has taken to laying in the sun during the early evening. Funnily enough we found a few bits of lizards strewn around in the same area just last week!

Love

Dan

Snugs, In The Sun

Streets

Dear Mum,

Just off to bed but thought I’d say hi, and I got to go to the Kewdale office which also houses Streets, who make Ice Creams!

I took the picture for Joshua but thought I’d stick it here, so I remember to show him it when he’s back from Nana’s tomorrow.

Love

Dan

Ice Cream

Party(s) Time

Dear Mum,
Sorry I’ve been quiet, as you can imagine I’m still recovering from working five days a week!
Our weekend was really good, on Saturday we did some bits of shopping, washing and tidying. Sunday was spent at the zoo, hence the picture of the tree kangaroo!
Joshua is still loving doing dinosaurs at school, the second picture is him wearing the dinosaur hat he made.
Yesterday an email was sent out for my work Xmas party. It’s an evening do at Adventure World, a water park with roller coasters, etc. near our old house at Bibra Lake. Joshua is VERY excited! …and he doesn’t even know yet that a new dinosaur themed bit is meant to be opening a couple of days before the party.
Deanne’s birthday weekend is also looking a bit on the hectic side. There is a film night, hosted by Joshy’s school on the Friday night. Either Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2, The Lego Movie or Rio 2. All of which meet with Joshua’s exacting standards. On the Saturday we’re having a family get together at a café near the river. Then Sunday is the Tyco (where Rick works) Xmas party, which we’ve also been invited to.
Last night I went to our local pub to meet up with one of the guys from my writing group. He and I are being handed the reins by the outgoing chairperson/boss man. We chatted for a couple of hours, had a couple of pints, and came up with a whole bunch of ideas for how to proceed.
Gotta go now, nearly bed time.
Love
Dan

Pudding

Dear Mum,
Another tiring week done! Work’s already seeming a bit more of a normal everyday thing, although the early mornings are taking their toll.
I got home at just after five, Dee and Josh had popped to the shop. Deanne also got her back scanned and has a big envelope with x-rays and cross sections of her spine. She’ll need to take them to the physio’ to see if there are any underlying problems.
I made a cheesy pasta bake with a breadcrumb and parmesan topping for tea. We were all still hungry afterwards, so Deanne suggested we go out for an ice cream to Baskin Robbins. They were very nice, mine was mainly caramel flavoured, Deanne had rum and chocolate and Josh had a rainbow sherbet one. Very tasty.
Some shopping tomorrow I think, then possibly a trip to the zoo on Sunday.
Love
Dan

Early Days

Dear Mum,
I’ve been trying to get to work good and early the last couple of days, a 7:15 start and 3/4 of an hour lunch means I can set off for home at four and be home before five. It’s quite nice to spend a bit of time doing housework before tea, so I have less to do in the evenings.
Joshua is having a great time at school at the moment as the theme for this term is…Dinosaurs!!! Deanne got told yesterday that he was correcting the teacher’s pronunciation and telling them about the different prehistoric behemoths. I wish I could have been a fly on the wall for that.
The picture is of one of his pieces of schoolwork that he brought home today. His writing is coming on leaps and bounds, so much so that his teacher told him that she could see he’d been practicing at home.
I’m dropping the boy off at Julie’s in the morning then heading to work, so it’ll be a slightly later start tomorrow.
Nearly forgot, I’ve also been asked to help run my writers group, which is nice. Suspect I’ll mainly end up creating a website for it, but it’s quite nice that I’m considered worthy of being a part of the committee/quorum/argument.
I also attended a talk last night by the guy who is (amongst other things) the editor/writer for the literary supplement in the Weekend West, the Perth weekend newspaper, more or less. It was about writing and how to get into doing it as a job. It was very good and gave me some interesting ideas!
Love
Dan

The Park Of Kings

Dear Mum,

Deanne just commented that I look really tired, so I’ll keep this short!

We went to Kings Park today as a new (refurbished) part has opened with a playground. We went quite early, which is lucky as this afternoon it chucked it down as if the end was nigh. We also walked (cycled in Joshua’s case) to the café and had a drink and a cake.

The park had a sort of cage the kids could climb into, a maze of corrugated iron and, of course, some fantastic plants to see as we walked back and forth. I’ve included four pictures, two of Josh playing, one of a kangaroo paw we saw and then one of Josh this afternoon near tea time (after a nap).

Love

Dan

Josh, Crossing The Log Bridge

 

Josh In The Maze

 

A Kangaroo Paw

 

Tired Boy

What A Week

Dear Mum,
I should have gone to bed an hour ago but I’ve had a tough week, taking everything in at my new job and thought I’d finish watching the movie I started the other day, Timecrimes, a Spanish language, present-day, time travel thing…better than you might think!
I’ll try and Skype you over the weekend to tell you what’s been going on, but now I’m going to hit the sack. The pic’ is another one, taken on a different day, of the boy wearing the froggie head-light that Auntie Donna bought him.
Love
Dan

Day Two

Dear Mum,
At the end of my second day I’m quite tired! The first day mainly consisted of being shown around the warehouse and setting up my computer and account.
The guys I’m working with are both from Brazil, Fil and Gui. So I have a (nother) Type 1 boss and two Brazilian co-workers. Freaky!
Gotta go to bed but I’ll leave you with a picture from the weekend.
Love
Dan

Here We Go Again

Dear Mum,
I start my new job tomorrow so been a bit busy getting ready.
Visited Bob today, as we had to go in his direction to get some bedclothes. Last night Josh stayed at Julie’s because we went out to our friend Jodi’s 40th birthday party. All the best people turn 40 this year!!!
We also went to Garden City yesterday, there was a dinosaur thing on, as you can see.
With the new job I’m guessing we won’t speak until next weekend, but if I get a chance I’ll write about what’s going on.
Love
Dan

Gainfully (Briefly) Unemployed

Dear Mum,
Well I finished my first Australian job today. It was quite a good day as we did more Point of Sales machine memory upgrades, at another David Jones store. It was in Claremont Quarter mall, which is stuffed with posh, high end clothes stores. Deanne and I may have to take a trip to check it out, from a consumer standpoint, sometime.
Jason was out on a job when I actually left, so I just said goodbye and thanks to his kids and wife, left my stuff and came home.
I was meant to Skype my Nottingham mates this afternoon but completely forgot, we’ll hopefully reschedule for tomorrow.
Laid back night tonight as no Josh, he’s at Nana’s house. I’m doing Rich’s work tomorrow.
The picture was taken in the shop this morning, sorry it’s a bit blurry. I took it to show Dee the selection of bags.
Love
Dan