Palm Beach - Near Cairns

In September we took off for a week at Palm Beach. It was a week spent with Anthony, Jenny and little Luke whilst Lauren and Tim joined us for about 4 days. A terrific family holiday.



Luke, who has several months of swimming lessons had a great time in the pool. No fear and as per the photo seemed to think there were no reasons for all the safety warnings.

Luke, and his dad, Pa and Uncle Tim spent a lot of time playing with the ball. Mum joined in to play "jumping into the pool for dad to catch me" which Luke thought was great.

We celebrated Lauren's birthday whilst in Palm Beach. Lots of walks down the beach and then celebrated father's Day at one of the local restaurants. Great time - particularly as everyone lives in different states and we don't get together very often. It was also great to spend some time with Luke where he could really get to know us all a bit.

Hamilton Island

By February, the Project we are working on was up and running. All bids reviewed, all contracts in place and work started. It had been a busy and full-out period since Ian had joined me in Brisbane and we decided we needed a couple of days off to rest and relax. It was also our 35th wedding anniversary which did deserve something more than just a dinner out with a glass of wine. so Ian had booked a surprise trip to Hamilton Island. this island is off the Queensland cost and part o the Whitsunday group.

We had a wonderful suite on the top floor of the Reef Hotel.

Great rooms , great views from two lovely balconies. the island had terrific restaurants and we both ate far too much. It was rather fun getting around as the island traffic system was based on golf carts - which Ian tried very hard to "hoon" around in.

Being there also gave us the idea of having a full family get together at somewhere similar later in the year.

Ian's still in Italy and Luke is getting bigger

It is now several months past Ian's initial expected arrival date in Queensland.......and we are still not sure exactly when we will see him arrive on these sunny shores. However, he has been over a couple of times - Once to catch up with Luke, and the rest of the family over Easter and a couple of weeks later when his father became ill. Dad has since recovered and Ian is back in Italy with the never ending project.


Baby Luke in the meantime has continued to grow and is looking cuter every day (I am no longer allowed to call him pretty as Anthony has infomed me that boys are NOT pretty). However, I still think he is pretty.

According to his parents as he is growing he is becoming a lot more fun, with lots of smiles and gurgles. The family is on a "round the country trip" at the moment as their house renovations have commenced. This means that they will come up visit Nana this month allowing me lots more opportunities for cuddles and photos etc. Things are certainly easier than the "old days" with the ability to rent car seats and other baby bits without having to go out and buy everything from scratch - Isn't the internet wonderful.

Ian in the meantime has been doing a bit of travel around Italy over the last few weeks. Knowing that his time there is coming to an end triggers the desire to go and see all those places we had planned to go. A downside of the expat lifestyle is that the intention to "do" the tourist thing often gets overridden by the need to meet work requirements. Projects tend to be very demanding with 12 plus hours per day including weekend work - which limits the time available to actually get out and see the country you are in. Usually this means that just before we are demobilized it is a mad panic to try and see the primary things on our "to do" list. That said, I think we have more or less decided that once we retire we will need to go back and see all the places we had on our lists and have missed.