Wallamble

Finally we got to see what caused all the noise overnight.
(Although these photos don’t really do it justice 😦 )

The back yard…

The driveway…

The front yards were full on downed lines and electicity poles on angles.

A nap …

Our champion tree guys, came and cleared out driveway so that we could get out 🙂
(a big thank you to Carew Tree Experts)

A quick walk down our street showed us how lucky we’d been…

Unfortunately strong winds and old beautiful trees are not compatible. Luckily Maplewood escaped the flood waters though.
After walking around our area, we were feeling pretty lucky 🙂 …and we hadn’t even seen the media reports of other areas 😦

By 7pm, it was already pretty windy as hurricane Sandy was NOT making a quiet entrance and so we decided to camp out together in the lounge room.

Dad was sad as the top of the tree where he likes to put Christmas lights had already broken off.
Mum had jumped when a massive branch landed in the back yard just meters away from where she was making coffee.
Eli and Lachie thought it was pretty cool as they got to stay up late and watch movies.
It didn’t matter that there wasn’t any power, as torches are more fun anyway…right?

With Hurricane Sandy due to strike on Monday our tree guy called past for a tidy up. He cut off a few of the dead branches in our trees, particularly in the tree our resident raccoon likes to hang out in. (hopefully this discourages him…apparently raccoons can be quite agressive. I wonder if there is anything else we can do to discourage him?)

But what to do with all these leaves???

Strangely after Hurricane Irene last year and now Sandy this year, the hurricane prep seems like it must just be an annual task. So much for these one-in-a-hundred year storms or have we just been unlucky?

These are taken by my BlackBerry and are from the Halloween party at Daycare. The kids had a ball!
(crappy photos sorry – but I wanted to remember the evening)

We took in some Vegemite sandwiches to share 🙂

Luckily they had this as with Hurricane Sandy coming on Monday night tick-or-treating is in doubt 😦
(go away Sandy – mum wants to go trick-or-treating!)

Helper Chefs are the best…if you can keep their fingers out and stop them from eating everything…but they make prep time for dinner parties so much more fun 🙂

Plus we must show off dad’s custard tarts. They were perfect and managed to dazzle our guests appropriately 🙂

Because we enjoyed it last year so much and we thought it would be a fun last thing to do with Aunty Di and Uncle Pete before they left, we thought we’d go pumpkin picking at Wightman’s Farm.

Donut time of course is always first…

The hay ride…

PYO (pick your own) pumpkins….

or was that bug catching?

A play (for little and big kids)…

A quick look around the home grown / baked fresh produce shop…

Then finally a go at the slingshot…
(we ALL got it in in case you were wondering…okay maybe not)

then home for lunch and pie (Happy birthday Aunty Di) before saying a sad farewell to our guests 😦

After their urban adventure, Aunty Di and Uncle Pete had limited time left in NJ/NY and so it was a good opportunity over the next few days to show them some of the country side.

First stop was ballet and karate…

Visited the Brotherhood Winery (America’s oldest winery) in the Hudson Valley NY…

As our planned lunch place was unexpectedly closed for a private party, so we just HAD to go for wings. Lachie made dad so proud when he announced “these chicken bones (wings) are really good after all!”

A drive through Harriman State Park (along with the rest of NY) past Bear Mountain.

Before heading out on an adults only dinner. It was great to spend the day with Aunty Di and Uncle Pete 🙂

P.S. In case you’ve been wondering why Eli looks a little *unusual* in each photo, we should probably explain that in the spirit of Halloween Eli has been posing for every photo as a Vampire – which has been faring for very attractive photos…