Deciding not to draw things out, a little boy, “Ryan”, was brought into the world kicking and screaming after only 6 or so hours of labour. A well built young lad, he tipped the scales at 4kg (8 pounds, 13 ounces) and seems to have already continued the height tradition of his parents, appearing at a tall’ish (or should that be long’ish) 54cms or 21 1/4 inches.

The jury is still out whether or not he’s going to proudly continue the other family tradition – that of sporting a thick mane of ginger hair. Time will tell I guess.

In the meantime, both Mum and baby are well and smiling. And why wouldn’t you smile – he’s perfect, it was a short birth and my sister looks a million bucks already. And… if he grows up anything like his big sister, he’s going to become more gorgeous as each month passes.

Ok, enough ridiculously proud dribble from me. Congratulations guys! I’m stoked to be be the “World’s Greatest Uncle” for the second time!

PS. Make sure Ryan gets his “Quatchi” from Uncle Rob!

At 7:43am this morning my sister Cobie and her husband Shaun welcomed into the world a cute little 7lb 15oz girl who they have chosen to name “Cara”. When I headed up to the hospital this afternoon to say hello to my new niece, bub was sleeping soundly in good health while her Mum was in remarkably great spirits with little to no pain.

Conveniently, today is also Mum and Dad’s wedding anniversary so we’ve now got double the reason to mark off 6th October on future calendars.

Congratulations Cobie and Shaun and welcome to the world little Cara!

For those of you who don’t know, my Mum and Dad are currently swanning around the interior of BC and Alberta visiting spots like Jasper, Banff and Lake Louise. Apparently they have been having the time of their lives, have had fantastic weather and obviously, given the shot below, are seeing some amazing sights. The picture below is fantastic and I’m so very proud of my Dad for taking it!

They are passing back through Vancouver this Tuesday, so I will hopefully be able to get some more shots to share with you all. I’m pretty sure they appreciate now why I love this country and it’s people so much!

Everything started off well with a quick pressie session where Nan and Pop got their hands on all sorts of cool stuff like a selection of DVD’s, Bundy Rum Fudge, some wine, books to read and other cool stuff that older people get! LOL

It was during lunch that everything started going a little screwy. It was while everyone was hoeing into their prawn cocktail entrees that I started hearing a noise behind me. At first glance I didn’t notice anything unusual, but then I heard the sound again and noticed this time that there was water leaking from the ceiling through the smoke alarm in the hallway outside the bedrooms. Evidently the ducted air conditioning was leaking water through the ceiling rather than running off through the allocated run off pipe. It was impossible to get anyone out to take a look at the system on Xmas Eve arvo, but something had to be done so Dad and I scooted up into the roof which at that time of day was around 50+ degrees celcius and had a look at what was going on.

To cut a long story short, the dodgey original installation of the main air conditioning unit in the ceiling meant that the entire thing had broken away from its brace and was sitting on an angle. This meant that any condensation that had been forming couldn’t drain away and instead channeled into the reserve catch tray which was also on a bad angle and therefore spilled out onto the ceiling gyprock and then dribbled down through the ceiling. Between Dad and I, we managed to re-position the unit, secure it and each lose about 2 litres of sweat in the process! Was a good work out… but kinda killed the whole ambiance as by the time we got it all fixed and showered, it was getting pretty late and the rest of dinner was a bit rushed.

Anyway, the rest of the time since then has been nice and relaxing. I’ve caught up with a whole bunch of friends and I’m loving the time off!