After all the excitement of last week, this week has been relatively quiet – Isobel is being now being doted on by her grandparents and great-grandparents in Tamworth after spending a week in Melbourne. Mum managed to find several old toys from my childhood for Isobel to play with. They didn’t believe me when I said Isobel likes chewing on things, until she picked up one of my old teddy bears and proceeded to try and pull an arm off with her teeth! Teddy was quickly swapped out for a rusk, and everyone was a little happier.

I was able to call up a couple of friends to say hello, as we won’t be able to call in and visit this trip – Wendy’s birthday was on Monday, and I wish we’d been able to swing through Canberra to see her. Turns out she was off to Sydney for a work trip anyway, so I don’t think we’d have managed to cross paths. Troy’s wife Deb is also due with their third child any day now, and even though we’ll be passing through Newcastle on our way back from Andy’s folks I don’t know if we’ll have time to stop in. As much as I love our life in Seattle and our circle of friends there, it’s not the same as being near the close friends you’ve known for years and have shared so much with.

The travel goal for this week was to get to Sydney to visit my grandmother, as Isobel is her first great-grandchild. My uncle Bruce had originally planned to surprise her, but after the party on Saturday he thought it would be better to let her know in advance. Ellie has been printing photos from our blog for Granny’s ‘brag book’, so she’s been able to keep pace with Isobel’s growth and changing appearance. We called in to visit after Bruce collected us from the airport, and Isobel turned on the charm – she happily sat on Granny’s lap and played with the buttons on her shirt, and her necklace. We took a few photos for Granny’s album, and then Granny produced a couple of my old thankyou letters from over twenty years ago. Even more amazing was a page of my first crochet samplers from about the same time, posted off to show Granny my skills after Granny had taught me how to crochet during one of her visits to Melbourne. The tension in most of the pieces was uneven, but it was thread crochet and some of the circular ones were pretty damn good if I do say so myself – not bad for an eleven year old!!

Bruce then drove me home so Isobel could have a snooze, and went back to get Granny for dinner. Lea and Ellie arrive home soon after, and Alix wasn’t far behind. The rain continued to fall steadily as it had done most of the day, and the swimming pool in the backyard where I’d practiced for my air force swim test so many years ago was overflowing – almost like those flashy ‘infinity pools’ in the resort photos, but with less palm trees and sunshine. Isobel had great fun exploring another new house, and Alix brought down some huge plush toys for her to climb over – one toy bear was probably the same size as the Pooh Bear Andy bought for Isobel last year, which we really should drag out for an updated photo soon.

Isobel had pride of place at the top of the table for dinner – Chinese food from the favourite family takeaway. She managed a few prawn crackers, and the expressions on her face were hilarious – crunchy, then bubbly on her tongue! Gerber doesn’t make anything like that back at home. She posed happily for some more group photos and a couple of special ones for Granny’s brag book, before heading to bed.

Lea woke me a little earlier than expected, after hearing news about several traffic problems from all the rain – snow not far from Tamworth where we were headed, plus the Hunter was threatening to flood sometime during the day. I couldn’t contact Andy on his mobile before his flight from Adelaide, so we headed to the airport with a couple of alternative plans just in case. Andy called his Dad to see whether the reports were any different there, and everything seemed OK – we decided to push on, and made plans to stay in Newcastle if the roads became impassable.

The trip out of Sydney was fairly painless thanks to our navigator device, and beeped every couple of kays for speed cameras … rather useful little thing! The rain kept falling, and we saw lots of standing water on the sides of the roads as we drove past – the lawn bowling greens in Branxton looked like wading pools, and we had a small diversion in Singleton for about a foot of water over the road. By the time we reached Tamworth at around 5pm, the highway through Singleton had been cut – we were lucky we’d decided to leave when we did, or we’d have been stuck on the other side.

Isobel now has yet another house to explore, and has poor Buddy the Silky Terrier running scared – Isobel wasn’t sure what to think of him to start with, but soon discovered he was lots of fun to chase after! She now squeals with delight every time she sees him, and puts on a little dash of speed to try and catch him while crawling around on the carpet. But no, we’re not thinking of getting a puppy any time soon – it’s too difficult while we’re away.

We spend a few more days here in Tamworth (waiting for the floodwaters to recede?) and then head our separate ways on Thursday - I have to return to Melbourne with Isobel to catch our return flight on Friday, and Andy heads back to Sydney for his return flight on Saturday. It would have been wonderful to be able to get the same flight as Andy, but such is the fickleness of dirt-cheap air travel ... you often get a limited choice of options. Hopefully Isobel will travel as well on the way back.