Alison Slattery Photography: Farah, Faiyaz and Fiona Khan

Finally, they have some photos together. For months I have been wanting to do a family shoot with my girlfriend and her siblings, because they seriously have no family photos. They were more than willing to sit there in the cold, tired and hungry while I tried to get some shots on our deck. At one stage Fiona decided to draw a moustache on Farah and Faiyaz, she did a pretty good job. Afterwards we took a walk along on our street and through the ruelles.

That evening we headed to Au Pied Du Cochon for dinner, which was amazing and filling as always. We had codfish fritters, crab and cucumber salad and guniea hen liver mousse for starters. For mains we had Duck in a can, fries cooked in duck fat and a squash purée. Pecan pie, cheesecake and crème brulée came for desserts even though we were full.

To work off all of this, we headed on a outing to the Botanical Gardens. Every September they have a spectacular showing of Chinese Lanterns. There are about 700 to 1000 lanterns in the gardens and they are based on a theme typically related to Chinese history and culture. It gets pretty crowded in there as dusk begins to settle in. The smell of Jasmine tea and the crowds munching on moon pies is never far. I find the best time for photos is around 8.30pm after the crowds leave, which doesn't give you much time to shoot as it closes at 9pm. With Bonsais over a 100 yrs old, the garden is pretty impressive. We walked around until our guts unloaded the feast we had and then headed on home. I had so much fun on this day and hope we can all do it again someday soon.