Aside from that, Merry & Frodo and I went on a special park day with some home school friends, both old and new :) and had a blast.  Merry was incredibly water logged by the time we were done!  Frodo was rather shy & reserved most of the day, but given the crap treatment he's recieved from kids at school, me & the other mums were very understanding of his reticence!  We've signed on for classes starting in February with them though, so hopefully he relaxes and enjoys it :)
 The first week of holidays we went to the Ipswich Nature Centre, which is an animal park :D   The boys love it, but Merry was quite young last time we went so he really got into it this time!  The first critters we saw were some rather LARGE Goana's... they were about as long as Frodo is tall ( and he's nearing 1.5metres!).  I would have taken photos.. but Mr. Goana was feeling VERY friendly to Mrs. Goana (who didn't seem interested lol) and yeah.. that just doesn't make for blog friendly photography! Next up were the wallaby's and they were much more photogenic :)
 But when Sam stopped, the Emu stopped and stared him straight in the face!  I was pretty glad for that nice tall fence between them.

 And some cool scaly critters! This is a blue tongued lizard (left) and a frill necked lizard (right).  There were also Wombats, which I couldn't get a good pic of due to glare off the glass of their posh air conditioned sleeping dens.... and Bilby's, which are housed in a semi darkened enclosure since they are nocturnal critters.  

 Which catches us up to yesterday, Christmas Eve :)  The grandparents came out as always, for our traditional seafood feast, which was delish.  Frodo was Very pleased with himself as he got to decorate the Pavlova.
 After the boys went to bed, and the grandparents wandered off home, the stockings were .. well, not hung lol but filled at least ;)  We don't do a massive gift fest like so many do these days but the boys were thrilled with their loot.
 A couple of much anticipated wii games were received so there was a little bit of this :)
 And a lot of this (hangin out on the patio)-
 To play with this!  A totally cool little pirate ship water play table.  We don't have a big yard so no pool, and our trampoline is bundled up in the garage.. but this and a slip n slide we can accomodate!   Frodo has had a 2nd bout of tonsillitis, poor kid... and a bad reaction to some penicillin (not allergy, just puky!) he's finally on the road to recovery.
Which is a good thing because the one thing we really did splash out on (pun intended lol) was locals passes to the big 3 amusement parks until June 30, 2012... and we're making the first trip in a few days.  I was a tad worried but I think he'll be through with the first antibiotics and good to go have some fun!

Until then, I'll be spending my time relaxing on the veranda reading my fave book, The Mists of Avalon, on my new Kindle!  Merry Christmas to me :D  And a super wonderful holiday season to you and yours, whatever holiday your family celebrates at this time of year!