Meet the newest (and youngest) member of our family

Claudia Bronwen Cox was born on Tuesday 26th February at 10.50 am. She is the cutest little girl and we already love her to bits. She looks a bit like Sophie. You can see Sophie giving her sister a kiss. Also Rachel and Andrew celebrate their first wedding anniversary today - how nice!The year has flown. Meg and Steve are painting their house in Camperdown and it's looking great!

2008

I am about to start up for 2008. Happy New Year to everyone who reads this! 2008 will be a challenging year for us - more so than 2007. I will be overseeing the Playgroup at Rockdale as Liz Allon who was a wonderful volunteer there has moved on to new things. Also, we plan to begin a new congregation at the church - with the help of a new family in the ministry team. John and Caroline Lee and their two boys are moving in to the house today!



CMS Summer School was good but exhausting as usual. We have a few funny clips of Sophie that I will try to upload. Only about 6 weeks and Meg will be home from Tanzania and then a few weeks later, Anna is due to have a little sister (probably) for Sophie. What a start to the year!

Home again!

Hello everyone! we are now back in Australia after a wonderful Long Service Leave all over the place. We found it very difficult to access a computer in the last 4 weeks of our leave. Most people travelling in the USA have a laptop and everything is wired for that - trains, planes, cafes, hotels etc. We used our mobiles to text to the family and left it at that. Next time we will take a laptop! We especially loved New York - except for a burst of a flu type thing for me. I saw a doctor for 5 minutes and was presented with a huge bill! It makes you appreciate our health services in Australia. We enjoyed the Museum of Natural History immensely - it has a whole floor of dinosaur exhibits! I especially loved the Houston International Quilt fair. I attended 2 classes (one with Judith Baker Montano who is a silk ribbon embroidery teacher and another with a Japanese Sashiko teacher), and two lectures/ demonstrations. There were hundreds of booths selling everything you might need for all manner of handwork and other crafts. The booths I loved the best were - Plum Creek Collectibles and A Quilter's Dream. Plum Creek Collectibles sells great Advent Calender patterns. Check out their website at www.plumcreekcollectibles.com

The emphasis in the quilt show now is moving away from the traditional quilt exclusively - now art quilts with painting, embellishments etc. are in the Show. I think that there is always room for new types of quilting and sewing. The quilt that won was an art quilt and it was magnificent! There were many booths selling computer programmes and quilting machines too.

We went to a number of interesting churches and in Houston we even went to church with George Bush Snr. (as well as many security men!) at St. Mark's Episcopal Church. We loved being part of the congregation at Redeemer Church in New York hearing Tim Keller in the flesh, and the Baptist Church on Capitol Hill in Washington was great - Phillip Jensen was preaching there that Sunday! I thought of Megan Engel driving into Washington a few years ago (very brave).

Another great part of our time away was spent with Anna, Matt and Sophie in Hong Kong and then 9 days in Honolulu with Rachel and Andrew. While we were away, Meg and Steve bought a house in Camperdown.

Quilt ladies work

Missing everyone at Wollongong

Hello everyone who reads this! I hope there are a few of you in Wollongong. I am missing you all a lot lately. We seem so busy! I may be on jury duty next week. Ian and I are getting ready to go to Adelaide the week after next for his brother's 50th birthday and engagement. Then on the last Saturday in September, Ian and I (and Anna, Matt and Sophie)set out on our first port of call for 6 weeks of long service leave. We seem to have been planning this trip for years - and yet I can't believe that we are actually going to go on it! On the way home, we are meeting Rachel and Andrew in Honolulu. I'll put our itinerary in a bit later. I must get a date with Lydia and Co., for my normal Christmas lunch in Wollongong soon or the dates will all disappear. I have recently joined Facebook. Anyone can - go to http://www.facebook.com/ and you will end up seeing pictures of people you haven't seen for years!! As you can see, Sophie has gone form sitting to walking. She absolutely refused to crawl!

4th August brunch at O'Connors

Our brunch last Saturday was a great success. The food was memorable and the company wonderful. We must do it again!

20 July 2007

Today Barb and I finished her quilt! Virginia Wise of The Shire Quiltery did an amazing job quilting both Barbara's quilt, and Rachel & Andrew's wedding quilt. Her work is always superb. I also include a few photos of Josiah and Micah's Bible cushions. They did a wonderful job with their drawings and Barb and I did the embroidery. I love their choice of Bible verses.