Looking back over the year

2006 has been a busy year for us and we've not been very good about keeping everyone up to date – Steve has started his Masters in Business Administration (MBA) and a new job; Bridie has been working hard in her job with new responsibilities.

In between we have included some traveling. For our 5th wedding anniversary, we hightailed it to Las Vegas and renewed our wedding vows with Elvis officiating at the Chapel of Love. We also took a helicopter ride over the Grand Canyon and the Hoover Dam – it was truly amazing to see how big the Canyon really is.

In May we celebrated a belated birthday for Bridie in Florence. She has truly fallen in love with the place. We saw Michealangelo’s David – and it is as amazing as everyone says; we also saw Boticelli’s Venus De Milo and many other great artworks. We even managed to hop a train and have dinner in Pisa where we walked around the Leaning Tower.

We caught up with our friend Helen and spent Bastille Day weekend in Paris where we saw more military might parading down the Champes Elysees than we thought France had.

In August we spent nearly the entire month travelling, starting off with a week driving around bonny Scotland. It might have been wet, but it was absolutely beautiful. We think we will go back, one week wasn’t enough.

We also went to Germany to celebrate the 50th wedding anniversary of Steve’s Aunt and Uncle and who should we meet there but his Mum and Dad who had flown over for the special occasion.

It was a very wedding focused year come to think about it – we also flew to Ireland and our old stomping ground of Galway to watch a friend get married and take part in that famous Irish tradition – the hooley (basically celebrating the wedding over a WHOLE weekend!)

England enjoyed another warm summer and we finally invested in a proper little barbecue – which saw a lot of action. Can’t wait for summer to come back.

We were supposed to head off to Stratford in September to see Patrick Stewart at a Royal Shakespeare Company production of The Tempest when a rather nasty little kidney stone gave Bridie her first personal experience of England’s National Health Service up close. Bridie was a week in hospital, and now back at work and recovering. Everything is alright now – but it was an interesting time. We have now booked to see the play in its London season in March.

We are still enjoying living in London – the variety of theatre, art and easy access to the Continent means life is always busy.

This year, we are spending Christmas Day with friends and then heading off to Copenhagen for New Year’s Eve.

In the New Year Steve will be heading off to Argentina to do some work for his MBA for a couple of weeks and Bridie will be winging her way home to spend some time with her Mum and Dad in their new home in Queensland. She intends to go down to Melbourne for a couple of days to catch up with friends and family.

We are both looking after each other and we hope you are all healthy and happy.

We hope you all have a cool Yule and a funky New Year!

With love from

Bridie and Steve

xxx