Baby shower

In April my mother and sister threw a baby shower for me. Here are my Mum Lorraine and sister-in-law Jen with the decorations Mum put up - the signs read "Let's celebrate Baby Drew". 

We had a lovely supper. I had to take care of a doll for the evening, as practice. Thankfully the doll did not cry or need its nappy changed.

One game involved tasting a variety of baby food options and trying to guess what was in them. Everyone who played decided that bought baby food was revolting! The only kind of nice one was berry and apple. Homemade baby food, here we come!

My sister Janelle served punch in a unique bowl!

Of course, there was "one of those games" that involved guessing my tummy size. Guests broke off the number of toilet paper squares they thought would measure baby and me. 

I was allowed to leave my baby in the care of others, and often made use of their willing arms. Yvonne is expecting, so she needs some practice :).

I am thankful for the friends who attended, for those who brought food, for the effort put into organising the shower, the presents, and especially for the special prayer time we had. 

Dave's graduation

We had a wonderful time at Dave's graduation from Monash University early in April.

Getting a PhD means you get a special hat.

The Drews . . . Dave, Sherrin and baby.

I felt blessed to be able to share this special time with Dave, as I was only a week away from the stage of pregnancy when airlines don't like to let you onto planes! 

At the end of the evening, Dave was relieved to take off his hot and somewhat amusing garb.

While in Melbourne we were blessed to receive hospitality from friends. We also felt privileged that a friend and one of my aunts chose to attend the ceremony with us. Graduation ceremonies are not the most riveting of events, so we figured it must have been something of a sacrifice! It was great to be able to share the celebration with them. One of Dave's PhD supervisors also attended.

Engagement Anniversary

Dave and I had a great time celebrating our engagement anniversary on March 9. It is now two years since that happy day when we decided to get married. We are happier than ever that God led us to make that choice! We went to the historic town of Richmond to eat lunch and search for a wedding present for friends. 

Dave took these pictures on self-timer . . . 

All the family

My brother and his family are down from Brisbane, so it was fun to have a picnic (in Mum and Dad's yard!) with all of my siblings and their kids. All but one of the children feature in this photo . . .




Well, this is the last post from me until the last week in February. In the meantime I'll be busy trying to complete craft projects before baby comes, keeping house, using the produce of our garden and my parents' garden, keeping up with my "read the Bible in 90 days" plan, and more! I'm grateful to God for purposeful days.

Mummy Shower

Do any of you read Above Rubies? My Mum has received it for many years and the inspiring articles and teaching have impacted my life in many ways. It is the kind of magazine that makes you believe that it is possible to create a God honouring home and family life, and turns you toward relationship with God as the source of hope and help in life's difficulties. Even people I know who don't agree with a word of the magazine's perspective on birth control (which could be briefly described as God family planning) read and enjoy it.

One article described the idea of giving baby showers to Mums who were having their 3rd, 4th, 5th . . . or 10th child! The idea was that we should have special God honouring rituals that celebrate life and encourage Mums. We shouldn't stop celebrating with number one or two! So when friend of mine became pregnant with her 4th child, I asked if she'd like a "Mummy Shower". She already had everything necessary for baby, so the idea was that guests would bring something to bless her. Here I am with our lovely sunflowers before the Mummy Shower . . .


We gave the Mum-of-honour a foot bath and painted her nails.


I also made a book of pretty pictures and inspiring quotes. In the invitations guests were invited to contribute a word of encouragement to this book. At the Mummy Shower we also had a prayer time . . . and of course there was food to eat and punch to drink. Have any of you ever done anything similar? If so, do you have ideas for other activities?

December pictures

We had a wonderful month celebrating Christmas! Dave loves to decorate the tree.


My sister gave us a bassinett some time ago, and it is set up in our room looking pretty . . .


On Christmas Eve, we had "Nine Lessons and Carols" at our home. This is a worship service with carols and Bible readings and prayers. Christina was to give birth to Eve the next week (who, by the way, is a most beautiful baby).


On Christmas day we harvested some veggies to take to our family Christmas lunch.


Our sister-in-law obligingly took photos of us in my parents garden.

I hope you also had a fantastic Christmas and December.

Birthday cakes and baby bumps

On Saturday it was the twins' 2nd birthday. It was fun to decorate cakes for the little ones. One of my nephews was being serious type. He looked at his engine cake without a smile . . .



and made some unsuccessful attempts to blow out the candles.

This one, on the other hand, grinned as we sang happy birthday and successfully extinguished both candles! Right after, he decided it was time to eat the lion's ear.


I can't tell you what a joy it is to be in the kitchen again making yummy things for people to enjoy. One of the main ways I show love to people is to feed them, and it was hard when I could hardly prepare any food due to all-day-sickness. For a few weeks there, even opening the fridge door could send me rushing to the toilet bowl. Something went wrong with my nose! Reading recipes, something I usually enjoy, became nausea inducing. I'm happy to say that all is back to normal now, and I'm loving my birthday present . . .


This wonderful book contains just about everything you could hope to know about food and cooking! What a blessing it is to be able to look up a particular food that we have in the garden, or that comes to mind, and find ideas for how to prepare it. It does not have any pictures, but that does not worry me.

Since it is the last week of the month, and I've promised baby bump updates, here is a picture taken two days ago at 16 weeks and 5 days of pregnancy.


That may not look like a bump to you, but my tummy sure looks different to us!

Mr and Mrs Drew

On the weekend we were privileged to have the opportunity to attend Dave's brother Christopher's wedding in Brisbane, Australia.



Miss Kerry-Lee Du Plessis is about to become Mrs Drew! The Du Plessis family moved to Brisbane from South Africa in the 1990s. Kerry's uncle and grandfather performed the marriage service. The reception was held at Kerry's parents' home.


The new Mr and Mrs Drew!


Christopher and Kerry-Lee met when Christopher came to Australia for our wedding, and stopped over in Brisbane on the way to and from Hobart. We had not met any of the Du Plessis family prior to this weekend. They are a warm and close family, and welcomed us into the family with great kindness and hospitality.

Getting ready for summer!

Dave planted some strawberries plants in our strawberry planter a couple of weeks ago. Yum, yum.

An 18th Century Girl

People have told me that I'm a bit of an 18th century girl. One friend told me that the evidence for this includes the following:

I cook
I love children, and would like a lot of them
I think abortion is really, really bad
I make things

The fact that I started a hand patchwork course on Saturday should bolster my status as a person who belongs in another century. I was very excited about beginning the course, and collected a variety of blue and yellow fabrics.



So far, I have partially pieced two blocks. I've done all I can on them before the next lesson, and my fingers are itching to do more! I've enjoyed playing with what I've done so we can see what the blocks will look like when they're all sewn together.


I'm anticipating the next seven weeks of lessons, and the many patterns I will learn. Hand work is great for sitting and listening to Dave read, sitting and chatting, or picking up to do a little at a time.

Our trip: Day 6

On May 20th we went to Taronga Zoo in Sydney. I'd been looking forward to showing Dave one of my favourite places!

The trip over to the zoo on the ferry is beautiful, with lovely views of the harbour and Opera House.

We watched an amazing bird show, which involved a number of large birds swooping over our heads! Dave posed as a bird . . .


I posed as some type of rat with large ears . . .


As always, I was enthralled at the meerkat enclosure. I found out from the Lonely Planet guide to South Africa that there is a whole attraction/conservation centre devoted to meerkats there . . . hmmm, sounds like a must-see if we're in that area. Meerkats are the best!


I was far less thrilled with part of the orangutan display, which would lead visitors to believe that they are made in the image-of-an-orangutan rather than in the image of God.


As if all day at the zoo observing everything from lionesses to seals wasn't enough, we also went out that night!

Here we are in Sydney on our way to the Phantom of the Opera.

We went to the opera with the couple we stayed with, Phil and Brenda. It was an enthralling show. I was scared when that chandelier started coming towards us, and thought the themes were very dark, but appreciated the amazing set and performances.

Our trip: Day 5

On Day 5 of our trip, it was already time to leave Brisbane, Queensland, to go to Sydney in the state of New South Wales.

We spent the morning with my brother Darian who, amongst other things, trimmed his palm trees . . .


We also enjoyed chatting with Darian's wife Trudy and playing with their three wonderful kids . . .



On the way to the airport, we spent a couple of very enjoyable hours at the Mt. Coot-tha Botanical Gardens and ate lunch there. The gardens were beautiful, and the bonsai collection was especially impressive.


We arrived in Sydney in the afternoon and caught a couple of trains to my aunt (Mum's sister) and uncle's house, where we had dinner.

We stayed the night with friends of Dave's, who would soon become "our" friends! That is one of may excellent things about marriage . . . friends multiply!

Our trip: days three and four

In my last post about our Brisbane/Sydney trip, I forgot one very important detail about Day 3.In the evening we visited with friends of Dave's who've moved over from South Africa, which was a great blessing.

On Day 4, May 18th, we went to church with my brother and his family. It was great to fellowship in Brisbane.


We also went out for lunch with the family, spent a relaxing afternoon at home, ate pizza for dinner, and had a good chat with my brother and sister-in-law in the evening.

Our trip: Days 1 to 3

I really enjoyed reading the Girotti's day-by-day recount of their recent trip, especially their visit on day three to Biltmore estates, so I'm going to do a similar series of posts about my trip with Dave to Brisbane and Sydney from 15 - 21 March. I don't have photos for each day though.

Day 1:

We arrived in Brisbane in the afternoon and enjoyed time with my brother, his wife, and their three children. We explored their new house for the first time.

Day 2:

We went shopping, went for a walk, read stories, and played with the children, amongst other things.


Day three: We had a lovely time in Brisbane city. We explored Southbank and the Botanical Gardens across the river.

Dave had never visited Queensland before. The climate in Brisbane reminded him of Durban in South Africa, where he spent several happy years (and even walked around at night safely, amazingly enough) until he came to Australia in 2005. Even the smells in Brisbane brought back memories.

Two little old men on the porch

Fun in the sun

Last weekend Dave and I had our family over for lunch (my Mum & Dad, brother and sister-in-law, sister and brother-in-law and their 3).

It was an extremely hot day, and we had lots of fun in the garden with the hose. Dave and I took pity on the plants, but before we knew it the hose was being turned on people as well! Thankfully Dave and my little nephew love water!



We're not sure if our squash plant is going to recover from the heat though . . . its fruit are all shrivelled!


One twin is a water lover and headed straight for the hose, but the other little one stayed well away!!

For the benefit of international readers

Knowing how much people overseas enjoy seeing our native animals, I decided to post some pictures!

Miss Tamrin Tasmanian Devil


Master Walter the Wombat


Wendy the Wallaby and her baby Bruce


Mrs. Kristianne Kookaburra


My brother and nephew with Mr. Klaus Koala