Two suitcases

Monday, 26 September 2011

Greek Islands.... finally!

The Greek Islands has always been high on my list of holiday destinations. After a couple of false starts, we finally went to Mykonos for a week in September. We deliberately avoided the hottest part of summer and had glorious temperatures of mid-high 20's which suit us perfectly.

Charlie loved the beach - playing with his sandpit toys and splashing in the water. We rented a townhouse/villa within easy walking distance of Ornos (the "family" beach) which had a pool which was good for a late afternoon dip. There was a great bakery nearby - perfect for picking up salad rolls to have on the beach, and several supermarkets to get whatever we needed.

by the pool

from our townhouse to the pool

Ornos beach... it has a few restaurants to pick from

Charlie loving the beach

We hired a car to drive into Mykonos and to check out some of the other beaches. Had a great meal in Mykonos which was good because the restaurants in Ornos were not that great. Overall, it felt like a real break and once again we realised how much we miss be close to the beach!

Monday, 29 August 2011

Charlie's 1st birthday

The 25th of August was Charlie's first birthday. The actual day was a Thursday and we had some low-key celebrations with Ruth and Colin on the day and then again with a few friends on Saturday (which was a bank holiday weekend).

Birthday gifts - paper is as good as the present!

"look mum, no hands!"
Red velvet birthday cupcakes

Birthday dinner

New Brio ride-on

New lounge chair

Sunday, 21 August 2011

London Zoo

We waited for Nana and Poppy to arrive before taking Charlie on his first trip to the zoo. We are very spoiled in Melbourne with great enclosures and lots of space for the animals and the visitors! London obviously has the limitation of space but it has two great enclosures - the penguins, where you can get a really good view of them swimming, and the monkeys where you walk into an open air enclosure and they are just swinging around your head. It was brilliant! I think I might have enjoyed it more than Charlie ;-)

two monkeys

two more monkeys

with Poppy

with Nana

Tuesday, 31 May 2011

Florence, May 2011

Family pic: the Arno looking toward Ponte Vecchio

The second May bank holiday weekend with Mama & Baba visiting was the perfect excuse for a "mini break" as the Poms like to say. Mama & Baba had been in the Czech Republic so we met them in Florence - coincidentally, they arrived from Rome via train at exactly the same time as we arrived via train from Pisa so we were able to bumble our way to the apartment together. We stayed in the centre of Florence - one street back from the Piazza della Signoria.

Friday morning we did a walking tour of the city. It's such a compact city but this tour was good for our orientation. We then spent the afternoon resting - it's hard work being a tourist. We saw all the main sights and went into the Duomo. Unfortunately, with Charlie it was a bit hard to walk up the dome so we decided we'd do it next time ;-)

Early Saturday morning, Baba went to get us pre-booked tickets to the Uffizzi. This was a great way to do it as the early queues are short and we could skip the ticket queues later in the morning after Charlie's nap.

We loved Florence and look forward to going back one day.

Early morning photo shoot with Ansel Adams... I mean, Dad...