Three Things

I've been absent for the last few days because, well, life cropped up :P Nothing like actually having things to do, people to meet and parties to play at to get in the way of dedicated blogging.

First exciting thing to happen in the last few days was that my husband graduated from being a firefighter recruit into a fully fledged, has-the-uniform-and-badge-to-prove-it firefighter. This was the culmination of over three years of applications, interviews and recruitment processes, as well as the past 16 weeks of firefighting training. It's been tough emotionally, physically and mentally for Justin and it's also been tough on us as a family unit. So it was wonderful to celebrate the start of his new career. We did so with a graduation ceremony at the Royal Melbourne Showgrounds (he looked very tasty in the uniform by the way!) and a posh rooftop party in the city afterwards with all the blokes from his training course and their partners (where I drank far too much and had a ball). Justin had his first offical day at work today and will work four days on, four days off for the rest of his career. Fairly mindblowing and something we'll all be getting used to over the next few weeks. (The piccie above is pretty crappy. My sister took better ones and I'll upload one here when I get copies) (Oh and Justin is the one in the middle in the back row! Looking very serious!).

Second exciting thing to happen was that I escaped to the beach for the night with a group of great girlfriends. We met at work a few years back and have stuck together ever since, celebrating birthdays and taking overnight trips. Two of the girls in the group are among my best ever mates and everyone in the 'gang' is good value. It was lovely to leave my husband and baby behind and head off to the beach for girly chats, bubbles and shopping. Must admit though that it was even better coming home as, whilst I was away and walking along the gorgeous Jan Juc beach, all I could think about was how exciting it will be to take Cate to the beach this summer. I'm looking forward to some special day trips with Justin and Cate as we explore summer as a little family (albeit, a little family on an extremely tight budget right now...at least day-tripping to the beach is relatively cheap!).

Third exciting thing to happen was that it finally hit me that's it's Christmas THIS WEEK! Four more sleeps until Christmas Eve, one of my favourite times of year. This year, for the first time ever, Justin and I will be staying in our home town and going to mass as a little family. After mass we'll hightail it to my parents place, 25 minutes away for a Christmas Eve feast, family chatter and laughs and some bubbles of course. And Christmas morning - Cate's first year of understanding presents! Incredibly excited to watch her getting excited about paper and ripping (even if the gifts won't mean much just yet).

Good times, good times.