Piper's Birthday Party

It was Piper's birthday on the 31st of December (Piper is my cousin Luke's daughter) and she had a party at my Aunty Julie's house. We took Harrison, Sienna and Mia along and had a nice time catching up with the Tempany's. Not sure what kind of face Sienna is pulling here!

 They played this game of sucking M&M's through long staws and putting them in cups. 

 Sienna couldn't figure out why she was getting no suction! 

 Mia was the best at it...all that practice on her trombone must be paying off! 

 Harry loved Aunty Julie's meringues

 Luke's son Fletcher - Harry had fun playing with him again 

 Tim's son Jonah 

Piper and her cute Hello Kitty cake 

Visiting Grandma Lois

We went back to Mornington one morning for Piper's birthday party and to visit Grandma Lois. She has been pretty sick (especially since Papa died) but has rallied over the last few weeks. I don't think she recognised me but understood who I was and that my children were her great-grandchildren. She was excited to hear about Harrison's baptism and to hear about everyone in Perth. I showed her some photos of the family on my phone. Even though its very hard to see Grandma like that, when she used to be such a vibrant, intelligent person, I'm glad we were able to see her and talk to her and especially that my children were able to see her again. 

Alissa's Little Accident

On Monday night, a couple of days before we were due to leave Melbourne, Alissa tripped outside at Grammie and Papa's house and split her chin open. Clinton and I looked at it and saw how deep it was and took her straight to an after hours emergency clinic. A GP there wanted to put stitches in but Alissa freaked out and wouldn't let anyone touch her. Even with Clinton and I trying to hold her down she was moving too much. The GP suggested taking her to a hospital so we took her to Knox Private (knowing it would be more expensive but much quicker - it was getting late). Grammie and Papa looked after Sienna and Harrison which made it all a lot easier! We said a prayer in the car that Alissa was calm down and allow these doctors to treat her. 

Knox Private ended up being a good choice, we were looked after pretty much straight away. Alissa liked the nurses and the doctor and was smiling at everyone. They cleverly bandaged her chin with a numbing agent and gave her an icy pole. She watched a movie on my phone while we waited for her chin to numb. We think she bit her tongue or cheek too so the icy pole probably helped with that as well. 

 The doctor decided to glue her chin together rather than stitch it and Alissa was not going to let that happen without a fight! One of the nurses was fantastic and she got us to lay her on a bed then they wrapped her in a sheet like a straight jacket. It still took Clinton, me and two nurses to hold her still while the doctor glued her chin. She kept saying, "all done now" over and over! The doctor then taped it together and put a pressure bandage on it - we only had to leave the pressure bandage on for a few hours...she looked like she'd suffered major head trauma by the time we left! She ended up waving at all the nurses and the doctor and saying "bye bye" even after all her crying and fussing. We didn't get home until 10.30pm and Grammie and Papa had a good giggle at the mega bandaging!

Melbourne Aquarium

We had a great day at Melbourne Aquarium, Grammie and Papa kindly looked after Alissa (one of many times they babysat for us), and Mia came with us too! We took a few photos to kill time while waiting in line to get into the aquarium...

Those eyes...

The kids liked seeing the trams, we especially liked this cool one painted with aboriginal art

Sorry about the bad quality photos inside the aquarium, I didn't bring a flash

The kids punched a card at different zones around the aquarium 

Giant fish photo bombing in the background

Sienna and Mia got slap bands as a souvenir 

We walked across the bridge from the aquarium to Crown Casino to get some lunch 

Too bright to look at the camera!!

The kids had pasta at the crown food court and Clinton and I had Chinese food

We bought Alissa a hat at the aquarium...