Birthday Upate #3 (final - thank god!)

My birthday weekend circus finished this morning with a dream featuring Gordon Ramsey and a great deal of vaccuuming. Just as things were getting frisky I awoke to Marianna calling out for a bottle at 3:45 am.

Yesterday we enjoyed a lovely lunch at the Italian cafe at the Watefront where dad lives. The Waterfront is a development of apartments at Homebush Bay where dad has lived for the last year and a half. There is something about this place. Whenever we drive into the complex I have an irrisitable urge to look at real estate. There is a part of me that desperately wants to live there. Perhaps it's the village atmosphere (it's real, not just the advertising blurb), perhaps it's the peacefulness, the beautifully maintained gardens, parks, swimming pools and paths. Even though it is a large complex there never seems to be many people around and those who are walk quitely or enjoy a meal or a coffee at the great cafe. Logically I know I would be unhappy should we swap our spacious house for a much smaller apartment and, worse still, apartment neighbours who I am quite sure would drive me nuts. I think this adventure may need to wait until the kids move out and we're an old couple without the need for so much space.

Then we picked up Jason's great-aunt and her daughter and son-in-law and I dropped them all off (plus Will) at North Sydney so they could walk over the Sydney Harbour Bridge for it's 75th birthday. Jay's great-aunt Ethel walked over the bridge when it opened at the age of 6, so it was very special for her to do the walk so many years later. They had a wonderful time. I drove around via the Anzac Bridge and met them at Darling Harbour. I love that area of Sydney, I just do. I love the friendly buzz, the people walking around, eating, drinking, just having fun. As I pushed Marianna around in her stroller I felt so very happy to be living in Sydney. I just can't imagine a better place to be. When the walkers joined me we found the newly opened Lindt Cafe and enjoyed the world's best chocolate milk shakes and waffles. It was a wonderful way to end a wonderful weekend. Too much of a good thing but then that's what birthday weekends are all about.

PS. I finally did get the 2nd part of my birthday present from Big Jay, Jules and mum: a fabulous gift voucher for a FIVE HOUR day spa package at the gorgeous Gillian Adams Day Spa. It's a beautiful Art Deco building I've been driving past for years and now I'm going to go and check it out and have a wonderful day of pampering. It's a hard life, but someone has to do it!