This is a month by month picture round-up of highlights of my year 2013.
Hope you also had an interesting year and may 2014 bring you all you wish!
If you follow the highlighted links you will be able to read more about those events.
JANUARY
Australia Day, celebrated on 26th of January was celebrated with friends.
We still have no plans for this year's celebrations ...
FEBRUARY
Our en-suite bathroom was finally finished after a few months of working on it on and off over the weekends.
Thanks to my dear husband and son who did the tiling, and a plumber knowledgeable friend who helped with some of the piping before the basin could be installed.
The difference is amazing, as we had a 1970's house complete with all the colourful and un-matching tiles, wallpaper, floors, counters, toilets....Very groovy!!
A big difference from the blue toilet and counter top (seen here on the bottom corner) and blue patterned tiles in the shower, to a modern cream and white bathroom with storage and enclosed shower.
My daughter and her partner arrived from France, a day after my birthday and a few days before her birthday. We celebrated both our special dates by having a lovely party in our backyard with our friends.
Just before departing on our very long road trip to the North of our state of Western Australia, we managed to squeeze in a visit to Cottesloe beach to see the weird and beautiful works of art at the "Sculpture by the Sea" exhibition.
You can follow our day to day along the following 7 posts and see some wonderful West Australian sights.
part 1 - http://sami-colourfulworld.blogspot.com.au/2013/03/a-long-way-to-top-perth-to-coral-bay.html
part 2 - http://sami-colourfulworld.blogspot.com.au/2013/03/perth-to-coral-bay-part-2.html
part 3 - http://sami-colourfulworld.blogspot.com.au/2013/03/perth-to-coral-bay-part-3.html
part 4 - http://sami-colourfulworld.blogspot.com.au/2013/04/perth-to-coral-bay-part-4.html
part 5 - http://sami-colourfulworld.blogspot.com.au/2013/04/perth-to-coral-bay-part-5.html
part 6 - http://sami-colourfulworld.blogspot.com.au/2013/04/coral-bay-to-perth-homebound.html
part 7 - http://sami-colourfulworld.blogspot.com.au/2013/04/coral-bay-to-perth-homebound-2.html
For me the highlight was seeing the dolphins come to feed at the beach at Monkey Mia.
We spent 9 days relaxing, swimming in clear waters, fishing, looking at the coral reef and enjoying beautiful sunsets. I took just over 800 photos on this trip, my family says I must have a Japanese ancestor somewhere!
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APRIL
I joined the "Postcrossing" group swapping postcards with snippets of info about Perth.
Strangely enough, the first address Postcrossing gave me was Braunschweig, the German town where we lived for almost 6 years in the 80's. I'm glad there are still so many people who enjoy putting a pen to paper instead of just typing away at the computer keyboard, and it's also a lovely way to get to know the world.
MAY
I visited the city of Adelaide, and then my husband and I took a ferry to the millionaire fishing town of Port Lincoln, where we spent a few days getting to know the area.
Both cities are in the State of South Australia.
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| The river Torrens in the city centre |
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An old building in the seaside suburb of Glenelg., by the sea side.
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JUNE
For the first time I attended the WA Day or Foundation Day celebrations in the city on 3rd of June. The centre was full of people having fun around the most diverse activities.
On the 22nd June, my son got married in Sydney to his lovely bride and we spent 3 days there and once again visited the usual tourist sights.
This was our third time in Sydney since we have been in Australia.
Part 1 - http://sami-colourfulworld.blogspot.com.au/2013/06/sydney-weekend-day-1.html
Part 2 - http://sami-colourfulworld.blogspot.com.au/2013/07/sydney-weekend-day-2-wedding.html
Part 3 - http://sami-colourfulworld.blogspot.com.au/2013/07/sydney-day-3.html
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| Sara & Michael cut the cake |
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| Darling Harbour, Sydney |
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| A wet day greeted our visit to the Opera House |
For the first time we enjoyed an Australian Christmas in July dinner.
It makes sense when Christmas falls in the heat of Summer in Australia, and people want to get the feeling of celebrating Christmas in the middle of winter.
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AUGUST
A couple of renovating projects that I embarked on during the month of August and September were the renovation of my son's bedroom, now a guest room, which started with me painting the end wall with stripes.
As you can see from the before and after photos, the room looks brighter and modern now.
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| Before - gray walls and black furniture |
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| After - Gray, white and turquoise |
This chest of drawers that I bought on Gumtree also had a make-over, with a splash of colour in each drawer, mimicking the striped walls, from white, turquoise to dark gray.
Another project was the "framing" of the bathroom mirror in our main bathroom, changing it from a just plain mirror to a more contemporary mirror.
SEPTEMBER
Kings Park celebrated 50 years of flower power with yet another amazing display of Spring wildflowers.
For the first time yarn-bombing was introduced and it was a success!
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The "Florettes" walking around the park, delighted young and old.
Holden, the Australian car maker celebrated 100 years as well, and some stunning and unusual flower displays were made with two very old cars.
PS - Sadly, General Motors has decided to close down the Holden car plant in South Australia in 2017.
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OCTOBER
The 46th Telethon was held in Perth, and raised just over an astonishing $20,700 ,000. Yes, you are reading right - Twenty million, seven hundred thousand dollars!!! It's the best fundraiser worldwide!
NOVEMBER
For the second year Perth participated in the "Open House" event, celebrating design, architecture, interiors, etc and showcasing the most important public and some private buildings in Perth.
My favourite was the very modern Central Park building, the tallest building with the best views over Perth. Follow the links to read about my visits on 4th of November.
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| The Swan Bells tower and the new "Elizabeth Quay" project under way by the river Swan |
Part 1 - http://sami-colourfulworld.blogspot.com.au/2013/11/open-house-perth-2013-council-house.html
Part 2 - http://sami-colourfulworld.blogspot.com.au/2013/11/open-house-perth-2-spacecubed-and.html
Part 3 - http://sami-colourfulworld.blogspot.com.au/2013/11/open-house-perth-3-qv1-building.html
Part 4 - http://sami-colourfulworld.blogspot.com.au/2013/11/open-house-perth-4-central-park-building.html
Part 5 - http://sami-colourfulworld.blogspot.com.au/2013/11/open-house-perth-5-bishops-gardens.html
Also in November I met up with two bloggers, one from Perth, the other from Braunschweig, Germany.
I took Iris and her husband to visit Penguin Island. It was a short visit, but enough to enjoy seeing these cute little creatures that inhabit the Southern coast of Australia and New Zealand.
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| Penguin Island
Towards the end of November I flew again to Adelaide, to celebrate our wedding anniversary on 30th. The city was decked out for Christmas of course.
November was certainly a busy month!
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| Rundle Plaza in Adelaide - a pedestrian mall |
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| We had our wedding anniversary dinner at a restaurant in the Glenelg Marina
DECEMBER
For the second time I watched the Perth Christmas Pageant that takes place the first Saturday of the month.
 
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| My husband and I and our son and wife |
It's now time to get back to normal and stop over-eating on so much junk. I can hardly look at food today!
Have a happy 2014, with health, peace and happiness!
I look forward to having your company again this year.
You had a full and busy year Sami with some very important events ie your son's wedding. You did quite a bit of travelling and heaps of DIY projects.. You might find it hard to top all that this year :) All the very best for 2014, hopefully at some point we can catch up for another cuppa !
ReplyDeleteYes Grace, I'm always busy with something. We will certainly catch up one of these days, when life gets back to the normal pace.
ReplyDeleteNão posso deixar de salientar e elogiar a sua capacidade e criatividade nos projectos de remodelação...:-) É que está tudo tão mais leve e bonito...e acho que vou copiar a ideia da cómoda. Fab!
ReplyDeleteFeliz Ano Novo, Sami e que 2014 lhe traga muitas, muitas alegrias!
Beijinhos! :-)
Gostei da revisão anual! Acho que vou "roubar" a ideia para o meu blog. Pareceu-me um bom ano, mas espero que 2014 seja ainda melhor! Feliz Ano Novo!!!
ReplyDeleteWhat a wonderful 2013 you had!
ReplyDeleteSandra - Obrigada pelo elogio sobre a decoracao do quarto. Adoro a comoda, ficou bem engracada.
ReplyDeleteSara - Tambem vi esta ideia ha 2 anos atras noutro blog e achei o maximo rever os bons tempos passados durante o ano.
Mara - Foi um bom ano, nao me posso queixar!
Boa ideia esta. Mais uma vez, votos de um óptimo 2014.
ReplyDeleteObrigada Jose, igualmente para si.
ReplyDeleteVery nice review - heaps to catch up on!
ReplyDeleteSandsation in Berlin, sadly they stopped the project, but that´s kinda what I expected when I heard about your "Sculpture by the Sea" exhibition.:-)
The coincidences with Braunschweig are really too funny! I still haven´t made it to the post-office...
A black suit for a wedding day for the groom? Over here...
Well, but they make a beautiful couple! :-)
So sad we were too late in Kings Park, would´ve loved to see those cars...
And thanks again, Sami, for inviting us to Penguin Island!
Grace is right, try to top 2013 ;-)
All the best for 2014!
Thanks Iris - aren't those cars in Kings Park so cute? I wouldn't mind one in my garden!
ReplyDelete