A happy 2014!
2013 was a marvellous year for our family with many adventures and achievements! Here’s a few snapshots of our family’s year below.
Madeleine’s love of textiles begin under the direction of her grandmother several years ago and she enjoyed making many garments throughout 2013. With the encouragement of her textiles teacher Maddie entered several garments into The Canberra Show, winning the champion award for the ‘Recycled Dress‘, which was made using recycled rice bags. Maddie then set about designing and making her school formal dress over several months. This garment will be entered into the Canberra Show in 2014.
In April 2013 we celebrated my mother’s 75th Birthday by climbing the arch of the Sydney Harbour Bridge with Madeleine, my mother and 2 of my sisters. My mother has no desire to slow down and still enjoys grabbing life by the horns and holding back the years for as long as she can!
As usual our children look forward to their Birthdays each year; in 2013 they enjoyed celebrating with cake, friends and onesies!
Our children continued to participate in weekly Netball matches and Swimming lessons throughout the year with both Madeleine and Hannah playing Netball and Campbell and Hannah participating in weekly squad swim lessons.
Madeleine announced on her blog that after a selection process beginning in February 2013 that she was successfully chosen as a Rotary Youth Exchange Student in July 2013 and will be departing for Germany in January 2014 for 12 months. When she was presented with her blazer I took the opportunity to wear my 25-year-old blazer during the presentation ceremony. Note the change to the colour of the Australian blazers from blue to green. Our family will be closely watching Madeleine’s Rotary Youth Exchange journey in Germany through her regular blog posts. As a result of Madeleine’s selection I recently reminisced about my own exchange journey here.
Madeleine was very privileged to travel abroad twice during 2013 with a school music tour to Rotorua, New Zealand in July 2013 and school cultural trip to India in September / October 2013.
We were privileged to enjoy watching our offspring continue to grow into adventurous, happy and healthy children in 2013!
Thoughts on the Matter 
I must have missed this post in my Reader. Glad I checked in. What a fun family letter. Netball must be basketball. What are the birthday onsies? Is that a family tradition or a cultural thing? And a “textiles teacher?” Here in America we have 4-H, where you can learn to sew and enter your projects into county fairs. I’m wondering if Maddie is involved in something similar to our 4-H.
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Hi Randee,
Apologies for the belated response. I’ve been preoccupied with the departure of my daughter on her Rotary Youth Exchange last week.
Glad you enjoyed the post. I enjoyed creating it. Netball has its origins in early versions of Basketball, although, the ball is never bounced; the player must not move whilst they hold the ball in their hands and must pass it to a team member within 3 seconds; it is primarily regarded as a women’s sport; and it is generally only played in [British] Commonwealth countries. Onesies are simply one piece jumpsuits or costumes worn by children (and some adults); some children’s versions are designed to look like animals. My son was wearing a Giraffe jumpsuit and my daughter was wearing a Unicorn jumpsuit. They are neither a family tradition or cultural to Australia in particular. They simply asked for Onesies for their Birthdays. Yes, from your description, it sounds like the American ‘4-H’ teacher is the equivalent of the Australian Textile and Design teacher. Your ‘county fairs’ are referred to as ‘shows’ here in Australia.
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Thank you for all the explanations. It’s funny, when my kids were babies they wore onsies, and I always thought how great it would be if adults could run around in onsies. They seem so comfortable.
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