Christmas at Dad's

On the 27th of December, the day after Sarra's birthday, we headed off to my Dad's to spend the day celebrating Christmas with him.

Dad has such a big spacious bit of land around his house and the kids have so much fun riding around it and doing fun stuff. I love it because it gets them outside and away from playstations and computers.

Hallie loves riding the motorbike and has learned how to use the gears and kickstart it by herself.

I love the backdrop of my Dad's water wheel in this pic and the dam in front. Sometimes we get to use Dad's neighbours paddling boats in the dam but the water was way too algaey and dirty this year.

Instead Dad suggested we go down to the creek which runs through his property and because it was so hot, the water was very refreshing.

It was a bit slippery and we all had a few laughs when Ollie slipped over on the rocks.

My Dad retired this week. He started his own landscaping business after having been a truck driver for many years and deciding that he wanted to be his own boss. His last trucking job had him alternating between working 4pm -4am or 4am to 4pm so the hours were really sucky. Dad sold his business, Yorktown Landscape Supplies at the end of December and already he is full of ideas of what he wants to do next. I asked him how he felt being retired after working for most of his life since he first got a job at age 15 years.

He explained it like this, "the feeling is like giving your mother-in-law the keys to your Lamborghini and she drives it over a cliff." Happy that she went over the cliff but sad that the car went too. He did clarify that by saying he liked my Nanna very much when he was married to Mum. I thought it was such a funny analogy.

Looking out across at my Dad's old landscaping business that he started from scratch, 21 years ago, after working in the transport industry for 23 years.

Whatever my Dad decides to do in his retirement, it will be something innovative and clever. He isn't one to sit around twiddling his thumbs but likes to think outside the square and put his ideas into action. I'm very proud of the leap into the unknown my Dad made into starting his own business all those years ago and stepping outside his comfort zone. His motivation and tenacity is something I admire greatly.