Stan & Eisha

Olivia turns 11!

This year Olivia turned 11! She has had a very big year and has been a true inspiration to me and become a great friend as I pick her up from late nights at Les Mis, we get to girl talk and all in all she is such a good girl with a really great heart!

Birthday breakfast!

Stan and Olivia during Olivia's disco party- Olivia loves to dance and this year she invited over 50 kids to her b-day party-I eventually had to put a limit!

Simon, Maddy (Olivias BFF) & Nathaniel

David

Ben, Charlie & Cooper

Isaiah and friends getting ready for the cake!

Blowing out the candles!-

Olivia was worried the pet shop (figurine in the middle of the cake) would melt

Olivia's first slow dance...with her daddy :)

Happy birthday Olivia we love you so much!

Music update!

Olivia had a really busy July- Dec. It basically boiled down to Les Mis (4 nights/ week for kids- adults do 8 shows a week, so she had an easy schedule), invitations to sing at various functions about once/ fortnight, and then her usual singing competitions.

Below are some pictures from her competitions. First, 'Fast Track basically it starts with prelims, goes to semi's then finals. Each round is spaced apart by 6 weeks and you have to preform 2 songs each time. There are 4 judges and they pick two kids to go through each time. The Finals are in Feb 2015, Winner gets 10K towards recording time at a studio. Adult winners are in the running to be signed by a recording studio. So we will let you know how she goes during the finals!

Another competition Olivia participated in are the Eisteddfods. Each town will hold one a year. Last year Olivia traveled around to different towns competing in various events. She went from not placing to honorable mentions to third place and then second place. She never got a first place so this year she was determined to get at least ONE first place. In addition, she would only get one chance at first place because we didn't have time to travel to different towns this year with Les Mis etc... We took a day and drove up to Bendigo.

We love the Bendigo eisteddfods because they have a huge turn out, the audience is really involved and they are a little bit more lenient when it comes to accompaniments. In some towns you are required to have a pianist, Bendigo will let you have a pianist or a backtracking, which opens up the types of songs you can sing.

This year Olivia took home 3 first places medals: Musical Theater- she sang Quiet by Matilda the musical, Ballad- she sang clown by Emeli Sande & Contemporary- River deep Mountain High by Tina Turner. She was pretty happy!

She also was lucky to be invited to sing for a cancer fundraiser with fellow voice contestants Jack Lyall and Belinda Jo. Each kid sang one song and then they did a group number, "One" by U2- glee version. 10K was fund raised for the cause, it was a great night!

Olivia also sang for her school soiree (no good pictures from this one), its a musical event where kids from the school get to showcase their instruments. She sang for her Churches Stake carnival party, which had an awesome turn out

And then she got to sing a duet (I am Australian) with Opera singer Paul Bianco and a children's choir from her school at the Palace theater- It was extra special because she had just been given Australian citizenship.

Miss Mary had her first a piano recital! She has been taking from a lady down the street and I can honestly say I wish she had been my piano teacher when I was a kid- she is so good!

and a few months later Olivia and Mary played a duet together for Mary's second recital. We were pretty excited to see the girls playing together!

Melbourne Zoo

With the weather turning from winter into spring, we have taken advantage of the warmer days and gotten out of the house- today we went to the zoo!

Olivia and a giant pelican!

Then our favorite- the butterfly exhibit!

I think Mary got the most butterflies!

Giraffes!

Family time!!

Mary turns 9

My gorgeous Mary is now 9 year old! She is one of my favourites!

Mary loves cooking and basketball. So we decided to have a cooking party!

All of her best friends came over, we decorated aprons (the crayon didn't really show up on black :( and then we divided into teams and had each group make something to eat afterwards!