By the time I managed to get around to picking up my camera the cool change had begun to come through so both bunnies had roused themselves from their cool and comfy spots and were getting into some late afternoon nibbling, grooming and, in Toffee’s case, more snoozing.

Must you point that thing at me? I just woke up and hey, how about some privacy?!

Caramel cuddles

Toffee and Caramel in the hutch

Bunny bum!

Face grooming action shot!

Caramel getting at the itchy bits

*eyes camera suspiciously*

*high speed nose twitching*

Toffee snoozing

The fact that we’ve just gone and left it there is either a measure of how much calmer the kids are around spiders now than they used to be, or it’s indicative of just how can’t be arsed exhausted Adam and I* are. Or a bit of both. Anyway, it’s probably doing a stellar job reducing the other insect populations in the house so I guess it can stay there for a while yet.

Huntsman spider

Huntsman spider

I am reminded yet again that although I want a fancy camera for taking photos of critters, my phone camera does a pretty good job.

*Though apparently I can be arsed dragging a chair down the hall and climbing up on it to take photos.

Geoffrey Rush (Lady Bracknell), Christie Whelan (Gwendolen) and Patrick Brammall (Algernon)

And it was, most fabulous, and fun. My only regret was that I’d only got tickets for Adam and myself, I really should have got ones for the kids as well, especially as Caitlin has been doing Earnest with the Drama Ensemble at school.

We brought the kids with us on the trip, and dragged my dad along as well to do kid-wrangling while we were at the play, so it turned into a mini family holiday. We flew down in the morning of the 28th, checked into the hotel, walked to the cinemas where we left Dad and the kids, grabbed a quick lunch and hopped in a taxi to the play where we met up with Ariane, Crash, Toni and Andrew. By this time it was clear that my “bit of a cold” was in fact a “hideous horrible lurgi” and I was doomed to be enjoying the rest of the trip through a haze of headach-y, snotty, cough-ridden blerghness. I sucked cough lollies all the way through the play desperate not to be that person in the audience who ruined it for everyone. I succeeded in suppressing the cough, but at the cost of a very queasy tummy.

After the play we went back to our respective hotels for a bit of a rest before meeting up again for dinner, Dad and the kids having returned there some time earlier. It’s not all that restful with 6 people in one small room though (we weren’t all sharing for sleeping purposes, but Adam’s and my room defaulted to the general meeting place).

Dinner that night was at Nobu and it really was rather amazing, both Tom and David joined the adults in the degustation menu, which our waiter devised for us, and tried all sorts of things I would never have bothered offering them usually, Caitlin ate her own body weight in edamame, teriyaki chicken and rice, and we all ate and drank to the point of asploding, barely managing to tuck the last little bits of dessert away before staggering out the door at the end of the meal. Unfortunately the whole thing was incredibly slow, we sat down at 6:30pm and didn’t leave till after 10:30pm which meant we had very tired children the next day – not to mention the rest of us!

The next day began with breakfast at a cafe then a walk over the river and into the city for a spot of shopping. On the way we discovered the Giant Theremin.

Little brothers are so embarrassing

Tom playing the Giant Theremin

Tom playing the Giant Theremin

It's the sort of thing that needs explaining

In Minotaur Caitlin bumped into her music teacher – clearly the man has good taste in shopping destinations. We bought a nice swag of comics including a whole heap of Scott Pilgrim and the first volume of Neil Gaiman’s Sandman – Preludes and Nocturnes.

I had been exchanging texts with Ariane and Toni all morning and it became clear that we were not going to manage to coordinate with them until evening so we went in search of lunch and some not too taxing activity to fill the afternoon with.

Lunch was achieved on the banks of the Yarra, I had a rather delicious spaghetti with scampi, mussels, prawns, calamari and chili in a cream sauce and the not too taxing activity turned out to be a ferry ride down the river and back complete with commentary that varied between quite interesting and slightly scathing about the large sums of money involved in some of the scenery.

The boys reading comics on the ferry

Pedestrian bridge over the Yarra

Melbourne aquarium

On the Yarra

While on the boat I came across an announcement from Amanda Palmer that she and Neil Gaiman would be doing one of Amanda’s infamous ninja gigs (impromptu, short notice, free performance) at Melbourne City Library at 4:30pm. Neil would be doing some reading, she would be singing, and it was less than 10 minutes walk away from where we were staying. At first I thought I would just take Caitlin with me and leave the boys to their own devices, but in the end we all went leaving only my dad behind to rest, Ariane also joined us and we met up with Leish, Immy and Jules at the library. Both Neil and Amanda were brilliant and I was able to get my brand new Sandman book signed by Neil.

Neil Gaiman and Amanda Palmer

Neil Gaiman reading

By now it was dinner time and time to meet up with Crash, Toni and Andrew again so off we went (Leish, Immy and Jules as well) to Little Bourke Street and the Peking Duck restaurant, where, it may astonish you to know, we had Peking Duck, lots of it. Once tummies were full I left the rest of the mob to it and took the kids back to the hotel – taxi this time, none of us being in a fit state to walk anywhere else. Twitter and Facebook tracked the others to the Gin Palace where they seemed to be having quite a lot of fun, but I was too exhausted and sick to care that I was missing out. I have been promised a next time, I intend to hold them to that!

Our last day saw us having a very rushed breakfast on the banks of the Yarra before piling back on to a ferry for a trip to Scienceworks, the science and technology museum, the kids had fun playing around with all the interactive exhibits and I was gratified to discover that I remembered all the flame test colours from my high school chemistry days during the Fire and Light show in the Lightning Room (Victoria University High Voltage Theatre).

Caitlin at Scienceworks

From there we took a taxi to the Little Creatures Dining Hall, meeting up with Darren, Sue and Immy for a late and lingering lunch. Yet more food was eaten, beer and cider was drunk and good company enjoyed.

Then we came home.

The end.

PS Many thanks to the wonderful Hazel who house sat for us both for this trip and the one before Christmas, it was lovely knowing the menagerie was in good hands and so much easier than having to farm them all out to various boarding places!

Lots of good things happened last year, I wish I’d blogged them all properly. We went to New Zealand for a wonderful holiday, Caitlin started high school, David grew a moustache, Tom took up bass guitar, Adam sailed on the Endeavour, we had lots of fabulous reenactment fun, games were played, songs were sung, good food was shared and there was lots of love in our house.

I could have done without the seemingly endless string of coughs and colds and ear infections I’ve had since February though, and I’m frustrated by plans not followed, things not done and expectations not met. It was nice to be reminded at my and Caitlin’s end of year singing concert that whatever I might think of myself I apparently at least provide entertainment for others.

Me getting a "Best Entertainer" award for singing

My first ever trophy

The looking forward bit:

I make no plans, promises or prognostications for 2012. I propose instead to work on the presumption that things will happen whether I will them or not and that the best preparation for that (aside from an inexcusable abuse of alliteration) is to be ready at all times to

Hold tight and pretend it's a plan

Bring it on 2012, and may we all enjoy the ride!

Bunnies!

I'm not talking to you

Exploring the large animal sitting in the enclosure

At the salad bar

Hand feeding a King Parrot

Closer shot of my hand and the gorgeous redhead

There was two of them but they didn't really want to share

And suddenly life doesn’t seem so bad after all.

Clara is less pleased, what with her “No it’s fine, you can’t make me go out into that wet stuff, I don’t need to pee EVER AGAIN” policy in regards to wet weather.

Her solution to a cold and rainy day goes something like this:

A. Curl up on lounge and sleep

Sleepy dog

B. Hear noise outside, make herculean effort of twisting head around to look out window

There's a cat out there

C. Repeat from A.

If only I could justify doing the same.

Caramel and Toffee (who may or may not be renamed eventually)

On Saturday afternoon we went to my brother’s place to meet the bunnies, they being the offspring of my nieces’ rabbit. They are soft and snuggly and all the wonderful things that bunnies ought to be. Caitlin’s bunnies. Yes. Not mine, not at all. Ahem.

On Sunday Adam and Caitlin went to Bunnings and bought a rabbit hutch and the materials to build a totally extravagant bunny run on the back deck outside Caitlin’s bedroom. Construction work has to wait until the patching up and repainting of the back deck that has been underway for the last few weeks is done, so I decreed that the hutch remain in its flat packed box until the space it will eventually occupy is ready for it. This did not make Caitlin happy. It did however inspire her to encourage* Adam to get on with the deck building and to help him by doing some of the drilling and screwing down of decking timbers.

Yesterday afternoon Caitlin begged me to let her open the box with the hutch in it to at least check it was all there and, yesterday having been a rather trying day, I responded by saying “Fine, do what you like. As long as it all stays in your bedroom and doesn’t become my problem.”

A little later I realised that the noise I had been hearing was an electric drill being used and speculated on Twitter and Facebook that Caitlin might be building the hutch by herself.

I was right.

Caitlin standing beside the completed hutch holding the drill with a sneaky grin on her face.

I confess to being rather chuffed that my 13 year old daughter was not in the least daunted by all the bits of hutch and the following of assembly instructions and the using of power tools involved in this exercise and I hereby decree that I am handing over my designated Ikea assembler baton to her. Next time we buy flat-packed furniture she’s in charge.

*where encourage = berate, beg and bully

When I told him I had just discovered that my phone’s software had crashed and that was why I was unknowingly offline he responded by saying “That’s ok, I have a wife like that too, forgets to turn her phone on, never checks her messages.”

I said that it was actually the first time my phone had done it to me and that his “joke” made me seriously want to reconsider buying an airconditioner from him.

“I was just messing around!”

Well, it’s not funny.

“My wife says if you’re not telling me off, she will when I get off the phone”

Dude, you seriously nearly lost a sale here.

“I’m sorry”

Thank you. Shall we continue?

And we went on to arrange for a visit to get a quote.

We finished the conversation with him apologising once more and me saying “That’s ok, consider it a learning experience – no more stupid wife jokes!”

I wonder what his wife did say to him after we hung up.

My next call was from my fruit and veg delivery people – they call and take my order over the phone around lunch every Monday – I said “Sorry, just discovered my phone’s software had crashed.” “Oh, how annoying!” she replied. Yes. That would be the correct answer.