Sunday.  26th.  Had all the leftover meat, gravy, apple sauce and peas from the club Christmas in July night last night. Yeah it was barely enough for the two of us. MacGyver and early night.

Monday.  Awake from 2:43 for like an hour and a half. There were half a dozen big bangs at one point, and another big one a while later. This morning Tony found the shell casings for the fireworks. Bits and pieces day. Had some of the frozen meals we got off Ben and Sarah for dinner, MacGyver then photo stuff.

Tuesday.  

All the frozen yoghurts I got off Ben and Sarah.

Yoghurts

Day of way too much BS. Making me want to rage retire. Cooked Ben and Sarah's leg of lamb for dinner.  If we'd been better organised we could have had it when they were over last week.

Happy birthday Dad.  Missed you and your carving skills tonight...
Lamb roast

MacGyver and some photo stuff. Feeling like it's all too hard.

Wednesday.  Awake from 3:43 for ages. Nothing day, didn't achieve anything much. Bought some new undies and sox hurrah. Tried to get some photos of the moon. Clouds were being annoying. Stu cooked a pretty spectacular shepherd's pie for dinner (that took him like an hour and a half to make whoops).

Shepherds pie

Then MacGyver, read a few news feeds and it's 20:15. Sigh. Then post a moon photo and it's nearly 20:30. Epic sigh.

Thursday.  Spent a bunch of time cleaning out some workgroup DBs.  Good drinks, a bunch of other people came.  Mills&Grills for dinner.  This time we got Southern Chicken - tomato base, chicken, sweet corn, bacon & southern style sauce and mozzarella.  That was quite nice.  And potata.

Mills and Grills southern chicken and potata pizzas

Friday.  Slept like crap.  More workgroup DB cleaning.  Kievs for dinner and Black Mirror.

Kievs and gems

Then continued the Arnie marathon with EB with Terminator 2.  I still prefer it over the original.  Couldn't find my DVD to start with - somehow it had gotten mixed up in the S section!

Saturday.  Somewhat crap sleep.  In the morning got some house stuff done and a few things ticked off the todo list.  Then headed into town to go to Ted's.  Except the big one is shut on Saturdays WTF???

Ted's closed on Saturdays

So went to the little one but it didn't have the range of bags the big one does.

Then headed over to the National Botanical Gardens.  We spent three hours there taking lots of photos birds, and had a late lunch there as well.

Flower at the botanical gardens

Mist at the botanical gardens

Stu at the botanical gardens

Birds nest ferns at the botanical gardens

Fern at the botanical gardens

Flowers at the botanical gardens

Flowers at the botanical gardens

Flowers at the botanical gardens

Stu with his iced coffee at the botanical gardens

We both got Korean Fried Chicken Burgers ($22.90) - crispy chicken, kimchi slaw, gochujang mayonnaise, milk bun, fries.. which were quite nice and very filling.

Korean Fried Chicken Burgers at Pollen

Dropped into the chemist and the pet store(s) on the way home (it's getting harder and harder to get fluoro bulbs, another reason to downsize/get rid of the fish...).  We were out for nearly five hours - most of the day - whoops.  I didn't feel like eating any dinner.  In the end I had a piece of cheese and a scoop of ice cream.  We watched Conclave which was surprisingly interesting.

Sunday.  Okish sleep.  House/hobby/photo stuff and some food shopping.  Stu got a rather yummy truffle toastie from Le Cheeserie ($21).

Truffle toastie from Le Cheeserie

5.7.26

One Sunday afternoon we parked off Diddams Close and wandered around the peninsula.

Dusky moorhen
Dusky moorhen

Some sort of paradalote...

Pardalote

Pardalote

White-plumed honeyeaters
White-plumed honeyeaters

Fairy wren
Fairy wren

Stu's photo of a New Holland honeyeater
New Holland honeyeater

This was the first time I'd seen a spinebill.  We saw it in the trees, and then it flew over and landed right near us so I got to get a few quick snaps that turned out really well!
Spinebill

Brown-headed honeyeater
Brown-headed honeyeater

Cormorants..

Cormorant

Cormorant

Purple swamphen
Purple swamphen

Fairy wren changing plumage for spring
Scraggly fairy wren

7.7.26

First actual test of the new lens.

Red wattlebird
Red wattlebird

Grey butcherbird
Grey butcherbird

Red wattlebird
Red wattlebird

Magpie

Magpie

Magpie

Magpie

Can you see the eastern rosella?  I took this photo on my phone while Stu had a play with my camera and lens.  

Eastern rosella

What about now?  (cropped)

Eastern rosella

And these are the (cropped) photos Stu got

Eastern rosella

Eastern rosella

Oh and this whistler of some description from 4 July

Whistler

18.7.26

A brief afternoon trip to the Watson Green Space.  Second test of the new lens.

Watson pond

Crested pigeon
Crested pigeon

Wood duck
Wood duck

Young king parrot
King parrot

Young grey butcherbird
Young grey butcherbird

This happened so quickly I didn't have a chance to get a decent photo.  The depth of field was so shallow though that the miner was out of focus even though they are really close together.
Noisy miner and butcherbird

1.8.26

Yeah I'm actually blogging the same day I took the photos....

We wandered around the rainforest walks to begin with.

This female bowerbird was pigging out on berries
Female bowerbird

These little white-browed scrubwrens were all over the place.  But they don't stay still.

White-browed scrubwren

White-browed scrubwren

White-browed scrubwren

White-browed scrubwren

Spinebill
Spinebill

Then we headed out into more open area.

I was excited to see these cinnamon-flanked silvereyes.. apparently they fly over from Tasmania for the winter!Cinnamon-flanked silvereye

Cinnamon-flanked silvereye

Stu heard some gang gang cockatoos, and then we saw them fly into a tree in the distance.  I was amazed I was able to get this shot at all!
Gang gang cockatoo

Stu spotted this male satin bowerbird (the only male we saw)

Satin bowerboard

Satin bowerboard

A pair of crimson rosellas were poking around this tree looking for a suitable nesting site.

Crimson rosella

Crimson rosella

There were heaps of female satin bowerbirds around

Female satin bowerbird

Female satin bowerbird

Female satin bowerbird

Female satin bowerbird

Red wattlebird
Red wattlebird

New England honeyeater

New England honeyeater

New England honeyeater

There were more spinebills as well

Spinebill

Spinebill

King parrot

A new bird for me - yellow-faced honeyeater

Yellow-faced honeyeater

Yellow-faced honeyeater

19.7.26

Galah nesting
Galah nesting

Buff rumped thornbill
Buff rumped thornbill

Brownheaded honeyeater
Brownheaded honeyeater

White winged chough
White winged chough

White winged chough

White winged chough

By this point we hadn't really seen anything too exciting.  Then I noticed this little scarlet robin like right next to the path..!!

Scarlet robin (male)
Scarlet robin (male)

His girlfriend was there too

Scarlet robin (female)

Scarlet robin (female)

Scarlet robin (female)

Scarlet robins are super cooperative for photography.  They sit still on a branch and spy insects from there before swooping down.  

Scarlet robin (male)

Scarlet robin (male)

Great egret fly-by
Great egret

We were heading back to the car when we thought we heard a stone bush curlew so we headed off to the north to where we heard it.  Never saw or heard it again though.

White-throated treecreeper
White-throated treecreeper

Brown thornbill
Brown thornbill

Brown thornbill

Thornbill of some sort
Thornbill

Wood duck (female)
Wood duck

Eastern rosella
Eastern rosella

A few people asked me on the weekend how many times I'd done Christmas in July.  I couldn't actually remember, but guessed between 10-15.

Last night I went back through the blog to find out.  Turns out I've officially done it 11 times including this year, having to skip 2020 because of stoopid covid.  I did Christmas that year though so it kinda counts as 12 :)

2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020 (non-event); 2020 (Christmas)
2021
2022
2023
2024
2025
2026