Today Tom turned FIVE!

He has been waiting to turn 5 ever since he turned 4, so it has been a long, long wait.

It was good to share it with him in this room that has seen so many of our family gatherings:-)

Sadly it was very hot so my Mum was not able to leave her house to join us:-(

Funny little piece in the Presbyterian Ladies College news received today:

A “Little Gem”

“From the Council Minutes of November 1978: ‘Salinity testing of bore water. A report was presented on the level of salt in PLC bores…by Mr Brine.’ “

Also known as my Dad, and he passed away suddenly, soon after – May 1981.

I still miss him.

On Friday during my morning walk I revelled in the soundscape of a flock of black cockatoos calling, and of a flock of rainbow bee-eaters trilling as they caught insects during their pre-migration feed-up. The only time we hear and see rainbow bee-eaters gathering in flocks is this period in late summer when they gather in bushland to prepare for the their long flight north. Their babies have fledged and learned to fly, and they are now preparing them for flying the long distance towards Papua New Guinea.

Yesterday, when I was on our balcony with Tom and Thea, watching the various birds who make our tree-filled garden their home, we again heard rainbow-bee-eaters calling as they fed.

This morning, Rob armed himself with his camera to catch glimpses of them before they left as we walked in Bold Park, but the park was eerily quiet.

They had already left:-(

The next time we will hear them, and catch the brilliant flashes of bronze and green as they catch insects, will be in spring when they return once more to make babies in the nests that they dig in the sand.

This might look like an ordinary black house spider, but she has just been on an incredible journey!

Some weeks ago she fell down from the ceiling window where she had made her web, and I spied her wandering around the floor of our bathroom. She had fallen from the ceiling, down by the shower screen, onto the floor by the toilet. Then over some days she made her way across the floor to attempt to make a web under the left-hand side of the cupboard, incorporating the bathroom scales. Her web, so painstakingly constructed, was continuously broken when we opened the cupboard or moved the scales.

Then a miracle happened. This morning, when I got into the shower cubicle to have my shower, there she was on the rim of the ceiling window! Somehow she’d found her way right across the bathroom to the ceiling window where she’d been born!

By the time I’d finished my shower she had nestled into her spot and begun spinning a new web. Hopefully this time she’ll get it right and the web will be a safe home for her:-)