Jo's birthday weekend extravaganza

And what a weekend it's been. Honestly, we haven't had a spare moment - mainly because all I've done is eat. We just got back from dinner at South, this great, tiny place in Neutral Bay that's owned by this American guy, so their menu is mainly traditional Southern American food, like a lot of the stuff we had in New Orleans last year and loved! We had crab cakes and hot dogs to start with, then Jambalaya and bucktown prawns to follow, and there i am up above enjoying my cherry cobbler for dessert - heaven.

On Thursday night, we went to Moretti's for dinner with Mum, Dad, Andrew, Ashley and Zio. It was a fun night with great food, most importantly topped off by great NUTELLA PIZZA, yum. Delicious.





On Friday night we had our traditional bowling night, with Daniel, Romina, Leah and Chris. It was fun except - you know how you're supposed to get better at bowling as the game wears on? Like you usually start slow, kind of clunky, the ball veering to the left and then eventually into the gutter just before it reaches the pins...but then slowly you pick up, you know? In this case, it went backwards. We all started strong (except me, as i am a terrible bowler), but then got much, much worse. In fact in the second game, Daniel - who, I'm sorry to say, is usually a worse bowler than me, and that's really and truly saying something about his bowling skills - was the dark horse of the evening and ended up beating us all!




Some pics of our evening:

Leah taking her shot




Jo with his special t.shirt - 'Joe's Disco Bowling'



Jo and Daniel, having a rockin' good time

The ladies

Trying to stop those pesky paparazzi from harassing us. I mean enough already guys.

On Saturday we headed out to Dee Why to celebrate all the important June birthdays - Jo, Turnsey, David and Maria. We had a huge, delicious lunch at Stella Blu, right across from the beach. Lightly bread-crumbed calamari, little arancini, linguini marinara...yum. After lunch we strolled the boardwalk with Jack, who was very excited to be on his trike - which he loves. Though he admitted to me later that watching the other big kids go by on their skateboards and scooters made him feel slightly inadequate.

That night we dined with friends at James Squire on King St Wharf - my chicken, mushroom and pine nut tart was SO good, yum. And so was the bocconcini and tomato salad. It was great to catch up with an old friend of ours Kirsty, who we hadn't see in a while. The boys headed off to the pub afterwards, but we decided to take a walk down to the rocks and had a hot chocolate at the Guylian Cafe - the BEST hot chocolate, seriously. Go there now.

Here are some pics from Saturday:

The beach in winter, one of my favourite things!

Jack - super cool in his super cool vest

Jo and I

June birthday babies - David, Maria, Turnsey and Jo. Love that face Turns - you look like a stunned mullet.

Jack on his trike

Last night when i came home i watched some of my favourite TV family - Jon and Kate plus 8. Who doesn't love those guys? And a great doco on the photographer Annie Leibovitz, who's portrait work is just amazing i think. Oh and i started a new book! Love in the time of Cholera, by Gabriel Garcia Marquez.

And today? Well admittedly today we did not much. I watched that movie Now and Then - wowsers, nostalgia anyone? Took me right back to my childhood, Yvonne and I loved that movie when it came out, and the song Sugar Sugar by the Archies is still one we love belting out. Then headed to South for dinner, as i mentioned at the top. In fact, that has bought us full circle, which is marvellous, cause Conan O'Brien is on so i have to go.