My beautiful little baby cino covered pirate at Karmarama Cafe in the park across the road. She makes the most wonderful ARRRRRR pirate sounds as she runs around the place. Swords are next on our shopping list so we can have grand battles around the house and park!

Had a lovely afternoon at Jone's second birthday party in Little Venice yesterday. Sophia particularly liked the bubbles in the party bag :) Thanks Liz for a great time!

Exploring a map of the old city of London at Spitalfields markets with Brendan the bear (we've been fairly shite at naming Sophia's toys, usually resorting to such creative inventions as 'Bunny' for the rabbit, and 'Doggy' for the dog. Brendan is actually an Irish bear, and used to wear the Irish rugby kit. Until Sophia decided she liked him better au naturale!

Attempted to attend the Matsuri Japan festival at Spitalfields market yesterday, tempted by the lure of takoyaki (octopus dumplings) and okonomiyaki (japanese style egg dish) - the crowds were unfortunately heaving, the queues 60-70 people long, Sophs starting getting a bit freaked by all the people so we ended up exploring the outskirts of the festival and then wandering around the city a while. There were whimsical Japanese stories dotted around the area, which made us smile.

We're back! Been a long disorienting week, very surreal and dreamlike.

Stu and Sophia had a happy reunion, this pic was taken on the new camera in the park in the most beautiful dusk light. Still coming to grips with the new camera, very frustrating knowing how incompetent I still am on it, and what its capabilities are! Will get there.

Back to lectures in 2 week's time, 3 nights a week, going to be interesting trying to cover childcare, dissertation, stay on top of lectures, and a load of other life things going on. Well, good thing I'm always up for a challenge.

Found this weedy seadragon on the high tide line at Falcon beach. He's a bit whiffy but am drying him out and will try to bring him back to the UK with me! We saw the real live version at the aquarium today, just so beautiful.

I can't believe my little girl is wanting to ride bikes. Where has the time gone??

I can now have brief (often funny) conversations with Sophia who is speaking more and more each day. Today I came running out upon hearing one of the dogs barking to find Sophs standing looking slightly mortified, several feet from the older dog, having worked out how to unlock the back door to go outside. I asked her why the dog had barked, not really expecting any sensible response. Ah the honesty of the child - she replied with 'I sat on the dog'.

One of the wonderful things about being away from the daily routine is having the time to allow the tiniest bit of creativity to seep back into my world. I'm starting small - with a pipe cleaner crown! But Sophs and Lauren loved them :)

Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz in the lavender bush at the Mandurah house, where we spent a relaxing 5 days in the company of Su and Matt, then Mum, Dad and my niece Lauren. Dad took us out in the boat, and on the way back to shore we encountered a small pod of dolphins. Seeing them in the wild was just magic!