Talia and Melissa Are 23 Years Old!

25th April, 2026, Taxi, returning to Istanbul Airport

I am actually writing this in a taxi going to the airport at Istanbul to collect lost luggage … but that’s another story. Let me back track to where I was up to last time..,

We got back home from Denmark around 3pm on the Saturday, having stopped to pick up fairy lights and wine for the kids 23rd birthday party. Once we got home it was flat out getting set up. Even at 23 the kids don’t still quite get how much prep is needed - Talia was off at the hairdressers when we arrived and it was challenging to get Melissa focused…

Anyway the party went very well! Had some good chats with the various friends -I think there was about 40 people at its peak. And unlike last year it didn’t end with me holding Talia’s hair whilst she vomited in the toilet!!! Talia and Melissa both seemed very happy and no one fell in either the pool or the fire so that was a bonus.

Some of Talia's friends insisted on a photo with me

Talia and a few of her mates (I dont seem to have a photo of Melissa as she was in her bedroom at the time but will add one later)

Party underway

Didi playing Jenga

Enjoying the fire

Next day, Sunday, was mother daughter walk. Then I worked in the studio on my new glass tree of life and decided to make one as a gift for Anne from Pilates, who just found out she has breast cancer again so is having a double mastectomy (this would have been yesterday in fact).

The week was quite full on with Did for dinner on Monday, a meal with Elena on Wednesday, then after work drinks followed by a meal for Anne with Pilates folks on Friday, followed by Bookclub on Saturday at Liz and Phil's house. I gave Anne a small tree of life, but I stuffed it up with my last firing (put too much gold on it) so gave it to her but asked her to tell me how she would like me to fix it....

Talia and Didi

Family dinner

Bookclub girls, except for Nas who hadnt arrived at this point. We keep turning up to bookclub wearing similar coloured clothes! (with no collusion)

Kids heading out (the new guy with Talia is Jeremy from Melbourne)

Night out with Pilates folk - excellent meal at Prego

This was the small tree of life'' for Anne before the final firing (which I added gold, but too much)

And then this past week the main highlight was seeing Bob! Now known as Jemma Freese, she is Guy and Cathy's daughter from Sheffield and she was the kids'' nanny for several months about 13 years ago. Jemma is now an amazing musician and she was playing in Fremantle with a touring UK band called Maximo Park. So Talia, Melissa and I went down to see here. We were all tired - Melissa had come from an 8 hour shift, I was trying to pack and do last minute things, and Talia had just had a week with her new boyfriend visiting....

But it was great! First the music was excellent even though it’s not really my type of music. Second and more important it was fantastic to see Jemma. We went back-stage after the show, and chatted with her probably for about 40 minutes. She hasn’t changed, and is still quite hilarious. We reminisced about the therapy role plays she used to do with the kids. Apparently one of them would pretend to be God and call up and say ‘I’m sorry but your son Jesus has died’ !!!