The daily grind!

The first few weeks in February have found us getting use to going to school and trying to enjoy beautiful evenings and weekends. We were invited to a dinner party at Jane (whom David works with) and Stuart Bollom's house. They wanted to give us a real Aussie experience and so the menu included lamb and to our surprise........Kangaroo! It was a fantastic evening.

Kangaroo on a bed of spinach and wrapped in proscuitto

McKenna has been taking tennis lessons every Saturday. She is really improving and more importantly loves it! There is a playground beside the courts and trees that the girls like to climb.

view of the Gib from the tennis courts

We spent an afternoon at the Bowral Swimming Pool. It was 24 degrees outside, too cold for the locals and the pool was empty but we enjoyed ourselves.

We went back to Fitzroy Falls and hiked a bit farther along the trails then the last time. We found another little waterfall and an amazing view of the  escarpment.

We are blessed with sunsets like this weekly. What is missing is the deafening sound of the crickets and the birds roosting for the evening.

Next blog....pictures of our Saturday trip to Sydney!

Kangaroo Valley

Last weekend it was in the mid 30's and so a colleague of David's invited us to Kangaroo Valley to swim in the local river.We swam in the shade of an old one way bridge. The water was warm and very refreshing, even Blakely went in to cool down!

McKenna also lost a tooth this week. She was working hard on wiggling one of her top teeth and was able to pull it out herself! She was very excited to find out that the tooth fairy does exist in Australia and that she leaves Australian money (a whole $3).

And of course, no blog entry would be complete without a super cute picture of the baby! I had her weighed last week and she now weighs 12 pounds 5 ounces.

Should have another entry soon, going to a dinner party serving "Aussie Tapas" tonight.

Hope all are well!!

The Start of School!

We went to Wollongong on Saturday to get one more "beach day" in before David and McKenna started school. After a few wrong turns we finally stumbled upon City Beach and a lighthouse, a great little park by the beach and some fantastic fish and chips. We spent the afternoon looking in the tidal pools, climbing on rocks, and finished off with the park and fish and chips takeaway!

waiting for the spray to come again!

Monday was the first day of school and McKenna's 7th birthday. She started the morning opening up her presents. This was the first of several batches of presents throughout the day!  We have been very blessed to have made some great friends over here and several people brought presents over for McKenna. They all realized how hard it must be for her to be away from Canadian friends and family on her special day. It really made her feel loved and cared for and I'm sure she will remember her Aussie birthday!

Then is was "Quick, get dressed!" and off to school. She is required to wear a school uniform to school. She looks very cute in it and I have to admit that I love it...no more arguments about what she is going to wear to school! Her new teacher is Mrs. Sharpe and I think that after a bit of initial anxiety, McKenna settled in and enjoyed her day.

It was David's first day also...his students were very excited to find out they got the new Canadian teacher! The classrooms all open up to the oudoors with covered sidewalks just outside the room for the students to keep their backpacks. He starts every morning with 15 minutes of fitness (even at 8:45 in the morning the temperature was in the 30's for the first 3 days of school).

The new gymnasium.

sports uniform

Last night we had a pet spider come to visit...thankfully he was on the outside of the patio glass! He is not quite as big as your hand stretched out, unfortunately no one would get close enough so that you could have some perspective when looking at him.

This is his underbelly.

That is it for now...you are all in our thoughts and we miss you all!