Ashes in the bag

Today was day 2 of the Melbourne Ashes test and the Aussies are looking dead & buried barring some kind of miracle. The Boxing Day test is a major Melbourne event and 86,000 turned up yesterday to witness one of the best English sporting performances ever - finishing Australia off for only 98 runs and then going on to notch up 157-0 themselves...... The Barmy Army had a whale of a day. Myself, Anthony, Trevor & Debbie watched in amazment as the day unfolded .... then I got offered a ticket in a corporate box for today.  Fantastic couple of days ! See the pictures here.

Santa here at last !

Well, the boys have been besides themselves waiting for Christmas this year and its finally arrived..... once again, Santa has been good with a vast array of toys delivered. Ethan got a new bike, Aidan his playmobile dragons and both got remote control helicopters (which Daddy is enjoying the most!). Anthony has been over to help with the various lego monster build sessions not to mention a few goes of the helicopters himself and Trevor and Deb popped in as they're in Melbourne for the start of the 4th Ashes test tomorrow.   A few of the pics from today are here.  Wishing you all a very Merry Christmas !!!

A new Hawkins arrival !

Just two days short of Christmas (and ending up being named Noel).... baby William Macmillan Hawkins arrived on the scene safely to Sarah and Neil. Another boy joins the ranks of the Hawkins offspring !   Congratulations, Neil & Sarah - a perfect Christmas pressie and certainly a unique one.  All the best from the gang down under and we hope to see little Billy soon !

Santa Baby

For the first time in living memory getting to see Santa was actually quite easy this year.  Getting to David Jones (department store) wasn't too bad and the queue was small. The boys were both mega keen to see the old man so easily rattled of their list for him (obviously that took quite some time to reel of the list of 'demands' !!).  As you can see,no fears this time around. Probably the last year before the non-believers get to Ethan :-(

Pool Time

Well as you can see, December has started to warm up nicely and the pool is in regular use by the boys. It looks like the UK is enjoying similar tropical weather for the build up to Christmas ;-).  Hope that's going well for those in Blighty !   The Ashes has started well for England and long may it continue - makes for great fun in the neighbourhood and at work ;-)
Pics of the day in the pool are here.