35 and rising 35 and falling.

Well with a regular barrage of how many days until we go home and how many days until Christmas and how many days until the end of term and how many swimming, drama, cricket,piano lessons have I got left..... we decided a countdown claendar was needed. Anybody blog checking regularly or the slightest bit concerned about us coming home will realise that this countdown calendar is now already one week old.

Not convinced by the bedtime pose I also got Alex into the "before and after" shot with him in his uniform, back on the balcony 10 months after proudly wearing his uniform for the first time.

All it appears to prove is that I was a better photographer 10 months ago but look more closely and the boy on the left is certainly higher up the verandah railings. If he is lucky he may not be as stumpy as his Dad.

35 and rising? This statement comes one of the most curious bits of weather I have ever seen. We got it on video quite well but as far as photos are concerned all I can do is another crap comparism. Here was the view from our house at 4:30 pm last week. It was in the middle of a storm. Crap dark photo! so what?

Well here was the same view and another storm this week. so what was going on?

Well 35 degrees was the temperature a couple of days earlier. It was now up to 38 and Australia was starting to burn. The worst bushfires were in the Blue Mountains 4 hours Southwest from us. On this day the wind picked up and the storms were brewing and for about an hour we felt like we had space travelled to Venus (quick Science lesson? "The atmosphere of venus is very hot and thick.You wouldn't survive a visit to the surface of the planet you could not breathe the air"). Ash was falling as well as rain and our clothes smelt like we'd stood next to a bonfire. Jess and Alex were convinced we were about to be burned alive and found it hard to comprehend that the fires and smoke causing this phenomenom were at least two hours away. Once it all passed away we were left with the most curious looking sunset. After the hail a few weeks earlier we are certainly getting a meteorological send off