A chilly winter's day in Melbourne today ....18 degrees!!!

Afternoon Tea at the Windsor Hotel!

On Saturday afternoon Natalie and myself headed into the City to enjoy our Mother's day present - afternoon tea at the Windsor Hotel! It's a bit like going to the Ritz, so we dressed up and arrived at 1p.m for our 2 hours of pure heaven! We were presented with a glass of pink champagne each, then had scones, mini quiches and pies and cucumber sandwiches (without crusts of course!). After that, we helped ourselves to an enormous array of desserts and were glad that we had been for our 30 mile bike ride in the morning!

In the evening, Chris and I had been invited to a "Christmas in July" dinner party, so more eating!! This is quite a popular tradition amongst the Brits over here. The Christmas tree was up, Cliff Richard was playing and we had a full turkey dinner - alas, no Christmas pud :( Amazing how it did actually feel like Christmas and we had a great time.

After my efforts of the half marathon I am now suffering with a possible 2 stress fractures to my 4th and 5th meta-tarsels and tendonitus, so I am not allowed to run or play tennis. Bit annoying since I followed my training plan exactly and my wishes to do another half next month and possibly the Melbourne Marathon in October are now going out the window :(

My foot is all strapped up and I am having ultra-sound on it which seems to help.

I am allowed to cycle though, so Chris and I headed off this morning to St. Kilda , Chris on his new bike. Unfortunately, he is now much faster than me again so think I will have to up-grade my bike again (ha ha or just cycle with Natalie!)

Sam has had his first info through about the tennis and he has to be in the city for 8.30 a.m for his first two training sessions! That went down really well, especially as it is the first 2 days of the holidays!! I'm sure it will be worth it!!

My First Half Marathon!

Got home from skiing on Friday 4.15 p.m and Saturday was Jack's 17th Birthday! We went to Mainstreet (our favourite haunt in Mordi) for brunch (eating out for breakfast is very big here), then he went out with his friends in the evening.

This morning, I ran my first half Marathon. The race was starting at 7a.m in the city, so we had to get up at 5a.m but I had actually had quite a good nights sleep so it wasn't too bad. Managed to eat some breakfast, then Chris, Natalie and myself headed out at 5.30a.m. Having parked in the PwC car park , the meeting point was Federation Square (in the dark!). I was quite relaxed which surprised me. The course took in all the sights of Melbourne and I wanted to run it in under 2 hours. I came in at 1.59 hrs so was really pleased and quite emotional. Chris and Natalie were fantastic supporters and kept popping up all around the course shouting and waving - it was great!

When I originally decided to do the half (about 10 weeks ago), I was just doing it for me as my new goal. Then last week, Natalie's father was diagnosed with Bowel cancer, so I decided at the last minute to run to raise money for The Cancer and Bowel Cancer Research Trust. Most of you I sent an email to with a link to my fundraising page, but here it is again because not many of you have used it! Just put into google "runmelbourne.everydayhero.com.au/morgsinoz". It's very easy to donate and it's a secure website . You can put your own amount in or tick one of the boxes and it doesn't matter that it's in dollars, your credit card can handle it!

My Dad was dubious of using it but he managed!!! Well done! And a very big THANK YOU to those of you who have already donated, it is very much appreciated.

The rest of the afternoon has been spent ferrying Boys to footie matches, so now we are going to collapse in a heap!

Skiing.....in Australia!

Hi everyone from snowy Hotham, north east Victoria.....Australia!!! It seems so strange to be skiing in July and in Australia....but we are.

It is great to be able to drive to Hotham without having to worry about flights and transfers. Hotham is north east of Melbourne and about a 5 hour drive. We decided to stay overnight at Bright on Saturday night to break the journey a little bit - leaving about a 1.5 hour Sunday morning drive so we could then ski in the afternoon.

Setting out from Bright Sunday morning the weather was cold and cloudy....but no snow yet. After about an hour we started heading up steep and windy mountain roads, climbing higher and higher. Caroline had decided to sit in the back as she isn't too good with heights.....and roads that have a steep drop over the edge!

After 30 mins on the mountain roads we came to a checkpoint where you had to have chains fitted to the car wheels. We had borrowed some off our friends so we paid the chap a few dollars to fit them for us. Straight after this the snow got thicker and deeper and the roads more icy. Our fully laden car (5 people, 3 suitcases, food for a week and ski gear) was coping well so far....and then the blizzard hit. The car in front came to a stand still and the driver got out to tell me he was turning round....visibility was down to 10 metres and the snow was going sideways. I knew we weren't far away and felt I would rather carry on up hill than to turn around and head down hill....so we bravely carried on. 15 mins more careful driving later we arrived in the resort....phew.....now it was about 11:30am.

We headed straight for the ski hire shop (no messing), got our skis sorted and after a quick hot chocolate were heading for the slopes! We managed a couple of hours skiing which felt great to get back into it! After that we checked into our chalet which is lovely. It is 2 storey and very new....all close to the slopes and fully equipped...even wireless internet :-)

So the last couple of days we have got up fairly late and venture onto the slopes about 10ish. We head back to the chalet for some lunch and a break before hitting the slopes again in the afternoon.

The boys skiing has come along really well and they are all confident skiers now. Jack and Sam basically bomb it to the bottom as fast as possible whilst Will takes it more leisurely with Caroline and I. Chris holds the record for the most falls so far with Jack a close second (clearly the others aren't pushing to the limit like we are....). Chris is realising just how unfit he is now as his legs turn to tree trunks by about 3pm....and a beer beckons :-)

Tomorrow night there are fireworks so we will go and watch them I expect!

Below is a little video clip of Jack in action and if you want to see more photos then look at our usual Flickr site here.

Jack the ref....

Hi everyone.

Just a quick post to let you know that I have added some photos of Jack that I took yesterday. He was refereeing a mens game in Melbourne....was quite a difficult game actually with 7 yellow cards being dished out.

Jack is doing really well and enjoying it very much, including the money of course. Last week he became the youngest ever referee in Victoria to take charge of a Victorian Premier League (VPL) U21 game. We are really proud of him!

Visit our usual Flickr site by clicking here to see more photos.