Dad

I have a wonderful Dad! He is very funny and is always making us laugh.

"Dad would you like to play a board game with Gemma-Rose and me?" I ask as I enter his room.

"Sure." Dad stops what he is doing and comes with me and Gemma-Rose to play whatever board game it is we want to play. I don't know many dads who would do that.

"Will you make toad in the hole please, Dad?" I am begging for one of my favourite dinners.

"We had that last week and the week before," Dad says.

"We have sausages in the freezer," I beg. Next thing I know Dad is making toad in the hole for dinner. He is wonderful.

It comes to dinner time and we all sit down to eat. The toad in the hole is wonderful, but we soon find out that Dad has made a dessert too. It is a dessert he used to eat as a boy, spotted dick. It is the first time I have tried it, but it is wonderful.

On the weekends when Gemma-Rose and I are going to watch a movie we always invite Dad along and more often than not he joins us as we watch one of our favourite movies.

"Dad will you come for a run with us tomorrow morning as you're not working?" I beg.

Next morning Dad is out there on the tracks outdoing us. He is a lot of fun.

"Dad can you make a trifle, please?" we beg, and so Dad makes a really big trifle with the thickest custard ever. Yum!

"Can I come shopping with you please, Dad?" I ask as Dad is heading out the door to do the shopping.

"Sure, go get your shoes," I rush off and soon I am pushing the trolley around the supermarket helping Dad with the shopping.

When we go swimming Dad often hops in the pool with us and plays games. It is not quite so fair when he cheats, but none of us mind. He is too much fun!

I love my Dad! I bet he is the best dad in the world!

Cameras

A very old camera

"You know you are very lucky to have a camera," Mum said to me last night. "When I was a girl we had film cameras, and you only had twenty four shots per film, and then you had to wait until you had enough money for another one, and you would have to save up even more money to have your photos developed."

I think about what Mum said. I am really lucky to have a camera of my own. It is a much better camera that the ones Mum must have had.

"Nowadays you can just plug your camera into the computer and import all your pictures and then take some more," Mum said.

In the old days you couldn't take many photos before your film was full and you had to buy a new one. How lucky I am to be able to take as many photos as I like without having to worry about running out of film on my camera. And I can use my photos as many times as I like.

I think of how I took all those photos of Gemma-Rose's Pollys. There were more than twenty four photos. I would have used up all my film at once. I think of all the bad photos I took. If I had been using a film camera I would have wasted heaps of photos. Cameras are much better nowadays.

I think of how I like to take my camera out on picnics and take photos. If I owned one of those big cameras that people used in the old days which you have to shove your head under a blanket, than I would never have been able to take it out on a picnic. I am so glad my camera is small enough to fit in my pocket.

Cameras have a lot of settings: cake, people, animal, nature, etc. When Mum was little she only had one setting. I am so lucky to be living when I do and have all the things I have. I will have a lot of photos to remember my life by when I get old! Mum is right, I am very fortunate.

Beach

I love the beach. It is so much fun to play in the sand and splash in the water. Do you like the beach?

One of my favourite things to do at the beach is to make a sand castle. I like piling sand up and then digging around the castle to make a moat. Imogen makes the best sand castles ever. Someday I am going to be as good as she is at it though.

We don't get to go to the beach very often. We live a long way away, but that just makes going to the beach more special. Can you imagine going to the beach everyday? It would not be very special after a bit.

Each time we go to the beach we come home again with huge buckets of shells. They are always so pretty. I love shells. Shell hunting is a lot of fun. Shells also look good on sand castles.

I love having picnics on the beach. Ham rolls with potato salad seasoned with sand, yum. Well not the sand bit, but it adds a bit of extra flavour. What do you think?

I like to take photos at the beach, but I don't get very many. I am still trying to get a good one though. Can you take good photos at the beach?

All in all the beach is a very fun place, but I think that I would not like to go everyday, it would not be so special and fun.

Albatrosses

Would you like to be an albatross? I think it would not be a bad life. Just think of sailing over the seas on big wings.

Albatrosses are such agile birds in the air. That is what makes them some of my favourites, but they are so ungainly when landing. I can hardly believe that a bird can be so graceful and yet so clumsy.

I love albatrosses' big beaks. It makes them look powerful and strong. If I had to have a beak I would choose one like the albatrosses'. Which would be yours?

Until I watched a movie with albatrosses in it I hardly thought about them fishing and having to feed their young. I just took it for granted that they ate. Now I am awed at how skilled they must be and I wonder how much practise it would take to be a good fisher. I wonder if I could learn to fish like an albatross and fly. What do you think?

Albatrosses have lovely feathers. I often wonder how they keep their feathers so white. It must take them forever to clean them. I wonder if they often get tired of it and wish they had other coloured feathers which dirt does not show up on so much. What do you think? Or maybe they don't get their feathers dirty because they are flying all the time?

So all in all, life as an albatross would be very interesting, but as I think about it, I decide it would be a lot of hard work for nothing. I am glad I am a human. All my hard work will get me to Heaven.

Surprise China Dolls

About a week ago Callum came home with a surprise for Gemma-Rose and I. He told us to close our eyes as he entered. When we opened them again there were the most beautiful china dolls in front of us. I just stared. They were lovely. Then I got my voice back.

Charlotte

"Callum, thank you! Where did you get them all?"

Kendra

It turned out that Callum's girlfriend did not want them and had thought of me and Gemma-Rose. It was too good to believe.

Frances (the same name as the new Pope!)

Some of the dolls had name tags on, and those names were gorgeous.

Alexandra

I had only owned one china doll before, but now I have heaps, which I share with Gemma-Rose, of course.

Anne-Maree

We had to rearrange everything on top of our chest of drawers at once so we could fit them all on. We took off everything and then we dusted and put our china dolls up.

This one has no name

They looked beautiful standing up on our chest of drawers and we just had to tell everyone. We ran over to Callum and he came in to take a photo to send to his girlfriend to show her how much we like them.

This one also has no name

I look up at the chest of drawers and think how lucky I am.

This one is yet another with no name

Which china doll is your favourite? I can't decide which one is mine. I think it might be Charlotte or Kendra

Old Fashioned Photos of Me

I have not been on Befunky for a while. I decide it is time to have a play around. I pick a photo of myself out of the ones on my computer and get to work.

This is the original photo. It was taken only a few days ago.

I take the photo and apply the option called Old Photo1. I think this looks good but  wonder what the other old photo effects would look like. I do some experimenting.

I tried Old Photo 5 on my photo, and this is how it turned out. It is very different from Old Photo 1. I am looking forward to trying the next effects.

Old Photo 12 looks really nice on this photo. I might use it as my profile picture. 

Old Photo 13, like Old Photo 5 makes the photo a bit blurred. I don't think I would ever use this as my profile picture, no way!

Old Photo 17 looks like a B&W picture. It looks crisp.

Old Photo 18 is a bit green. It makes me look sea sick! OH NO!!

Now I look a bit blue-green! I must be cold. I hope I don't get frost bite! Old Photo 19 is not for me. I think that I will stick with Old Photo 12. I think that one is my favourite. Which photograph do you like best?

The Day I Didn't Want to Run

"Come on, it is time to go out running," Gemma-Rose calls up to me, from the bottom bunk. I groan and roll over in my bed. Maybe if I pretend to be asleep she will go away. No such luck. Gemma-Rose knows I am awake.

I drag myself out of my nice warm bed and over to my chest of drawers to get my running clothes. I am secretly hoping that it will rain like yesterday and we won't be able to go out. Again no luck.

I pull my shoes on to my feet and do up the laces. I am trying not to think of my nice warm bed or my head which is aching.

I pick up my water bottle and head out the door with everyone else. Mum is smiling round at all of us, trying to make us feel better about getting up early to run.

"Shall we run on the main fire trail or shall we run laps of the shorter bush track?" Mum asks. Everyone votes to run on the shorter track. The main fire trail has lots of hills and is much harder work.

We run into the bush and I am in the lead, but I am tired and soon Imogen and Gemma-Rose, who are running together, overtake me.

After three laps I am thinking I would like to stop, but determination keeps me running.

Mum overtakes me, but I tell myself that will never do and I run faster, so that I don't fall too far behind. To my surprise I overtake Mum.

After five laps I think about having a drink break, but I don't stop. I keep running. I pretend I am on the treadmill and I can't stop for drink breaks. It keeps me going for a couple more laps.

At seven laps I start telling myself that I will stop when I get to eight. I am sure I am going to stop once that lap is finished.

But when I finish my eighth lap, I decide to run one more. I am so tired that any walker could overtake me, but I make myself keep running with the thought of breakfast.

As I run out of the trees and over to the bench, where we leave our water bottles, I see everyone else has finished running. Mum is standing at the finish line with her iPod. I wonder what she is doing. It looks like she is filming me or taking photos. I pick up the speed in case she is filming.

I run past Mum and around the trees faster than I thought would be possible. I start to sprint and race the last bit back to the finish where the other girls are waiting. I smile to myself as I pick up my water bottle.

It turns out that everyone had stopped at eight laps, and only I went for the ninth. I am glad I made the extra effort to run the last lap.

We walk off home together. I am still puffing and panting, but happy. I am glad I came, even if I had a head ache and was tired. If I had stayed in bed I would not have been able to beat everyone and make that record. I would not have run 5.4 km!