eleven is our lucky number !!

Postscript :  I wrote this post two years ago but never published it.  I think I just never got around to adding the photos and then forgot about it.  So it was a nice surprise to actually stumble across it today in my drafts folder, quite by accident.  It was even more special  to find it today as today is our 13th wedding anniversary.  And I wrote this draft two years ago on our 11th wedding anniversary. 

My husband was born on the 11/11/66 - all multiples of 11.

On the 11/11/99 he turned 33 - again multiples of 11.

Eleven days after his 33rd birthday we got married - the date was the 22/11/99. We got married, just the two of us, on Hamilton Island. It was a perfect day. No fuss, just simple, we didn't need anyone else.

The wedding date was not planned to be a multiple of 11, it just turned out that way and I don't think we noticed for quite some time that 11 kept appearing in all our special dates.

So you would think that after all the multiples of eleven that on our eleventh wedding anniversary we would do something super special to celebrate ??? No.

It's another ordinary work day for him today and I have jobs piling up left right and centre.

But last night he cooked the four of us a lovely dinner and made a super special trifle to mark the occasion.

The simple things in life are often the best.

The children each picked their favourite coloured jelly. He made chocolate custard. And he dug out the left overs from the freezer of the kids recent birthday cakes. He chose a nice big bowl and assembled the most colourful trifle complete with cream and cherries and toasted almonds on top. Then he put sparklers on top and lit them - it was really special.

Thank you to my dear husband, for eleven years of love, laughter and friendship. But most of all for our two beautiful children.

And just to add to the number eleven thing, when we did IVF to conceive our babies, the doctor retrieved 11 eggs. I remember waking up from the anaesthetic and checking the back of my hand (the nurse told me before going in to theatre that she would write the number of eggs retrieved on the back of my hand so I would know straight away). I could not believe my eyes when I saw our lucky number eleven. And then when I was finally positively pregnant, I was told my estimated date of delivery was, can you guess, 22nd November.

As it turned out they were delivered early on the 5th of November - but I wasn't going to argue about that as I couldn't wait a minute longer to meet them both.

Our miracles - Lucy and Oliver

 

 

 

 

 

 

Happy Anniversary to my beautiful husband  x x

 

 

Old Photo brings much joy

1965 Ballarat

I had a couple of emails yesterday from a very old family friend which kinda got me feeling homesick for my family, as they all live far away. I decided to have a look at some old family photos and I came across this beautiful photo of my parents. It was taken in 1965 in Ballarat Victoria. Dad had driven mum from Kerang across to Ballarat to buy her wedding dress for their wedding in August 1965. They were running across a street in the rain and a local newspaper journalist snapped this happy picture. My Dad was very trendy dressed in his stovepipe pants and Beatle boots - with his Beatles hairstyle that he cut for himself. He was not a hairdresser but all his mates in town used to line up and he would cut their hair for them in the style made popular by none other than THE BEATLES. Mums looks so beautiful with her hair immaculate and that beautiful smile and look of youth (she was just 18). Her shoes are to die for and I would love to have that basket she was carrying and the coat she is wearing. Mum always dressed beautifully and as a little girl I remember her and Dad would often go out to a dinner dance. She would look beautiful wearing one of her beautiful long halter neck dresses and big wedge platform shoes with green velvet butterflies on them. I so wanted to grow up and dress just like her. Mum and Dad have just recently celebrated their 45th wedding anniversary. Last year my dad was diagnosed with an aggressive glioblastoma (brain tumour). He is doing well having endured surgery, radiation and chemotherapy. He is in remission and for this we are very greatful. I too am in remission from ovarian cancer, it will be five years soon which is a big milestone. Ovarian cancer is silent, it invades your body quietly without obvious symptoms, and before you realise it, it is too late. I am one of the lucky ones who, with an early diagnosis, undoubtedly has been saved from an early demise. It is very hard to watch a loved one go through the trauma of cancer and in particular the treatments that are so harrowing. But my Dad and I are survivors of cancer at this moment in time and this is an unspoken bond that we now share. Only we know how we feel and how cancer has affected our lives forever. But there is still joy in each and every day and so many more things I want to do before it is my time to leave this life.