Day 3

Sunday -

We all slept until 8am. I had to wake the kids so that we could get ready for church. Day one and two after a long flight are hard. Your body is so confused it is almost funny. The best thing to do is push through and go about as if you had never crossed so many time zones. I have to remind myself on these days that the kids attitudes should be almost completely overlooked, unless they are doing physical harm.

Church went well. Gids was loud as usually and went off to the nursery and then fell asleep in grandma's arms. Oh, I am at my parents for the first two weeks.

Visiting Southside RP church was weird. The building has been redone and there are lots of new people. That is good, I just felt like a visitor in my home church.

That afternoon we went to Southeastway Park. The kids needed to run. I love the smell of fallen leaves.

Kids in bed by 8 and I was in bed by 10.

Day 2

First flight - Melbourne to Sydney 1.5 hrs.

had to catch a bus from the domestic to international

Only one bus was working so it took a long time. We had to race walk to catch our next flight.

Second flight - Sydney to LAX 14 hrs.
Kids slept for about 6-7 hours. Out of the whole flight I was able to watch 45 min. of a movie. The kids did great, prayers were answered.

Once in LA, Brandon's uncle picked us up and took us to the LA Fisher household. We ate, had baths, slept, ate again, went to the park, talked, and had a great time.

Third flight - LA to Las Vegas 1 hr.
Short enough that know one freaked out.

Saw the Vegas strip, very sad and ugly. Of course the Vegas airport was littered with slot machines. Gideon was very restless. We were all tired and hungry. Gideon cried the last 45 min. waiting to board the plane. Everyone was giving me looks. I told a few of them that we were traveling from Australia and they lightened up a bit.

Fourth flight - Las Vegas to Indy 3 hrs.
A hard flight. We were over flying. The kids slept for the first two hours. The last hour seemed to last three times the true length. Gideon was not happy. The playdough given to me by a friend in Melbourne saved us. Thank you!

Got to Indy at 11pm safe and sound. Got to bed at 1am.

Day 1

I am trying to catch up and keep a record of all we do. Here we go.

Our calendar




So we went to the beach before we left on Friday. It was very nice and relaxing pre-flight activity. Came home from the beach took showers, gave the kids lunch, gave the kids a sleep, headed to the airport.

At the airport we met up with our traveling companions. There were three of them to LAX and then only one all the way through to Indy. I could not have done it alone.

Ok, that wasn't true

The last post was about our last trip to the beach. I was wrong.

We went today and will probably go again tomorrow or Thursday.

It has been in the 30s (low 90s) all this week, perfect weather.

The ocean is beginning to warm up and the winds have died down.

Going to the beach helps keep the house clean until we go.

I have to say it is going to be hard going into a US winter while it is so lovely here. I just hope the snow comes early.

I am about packed. Actually I have had the clothes packed for a while but they were needing to be weeded out. I know I packed too much the first time. We forget how warm the houses are in the States. I packed a bunch of jumpers and then realized that we will be too hot inside to wear them. Brandon said he is going to pack shorts and t-shirts. I told him that was a little extreme. Well, maybe not the t-shirt part.

Last beach trip before we leave for the States

We found some cool things.

Fossils
Dead seal pup
and rock pools

see here


We leave in 5.5 days. Our bedroom is a complete disaster at the moment. Clothes everywhere.

At this moment in time I wish I could be Merlin from the movie Sword in the Stone. I would tap my wand and make everything dance into one suitcase that I could easily carry.

surprise!, rally driving-best date ever, good times

note: the best part is at the bottom, so don't stop halfway through

This year Brandon turns 30. So to celebrate this monumental event I decided to throw a surprise birthday party for him...two months early.

Here is the invite if you want to view it.

It didn't end up being a surprise for Brandon, here is why...

1. He saw a work mate's e-mail and noticed an evite from me.
2. He read our internet history the one day I forgot to delete the evite url from the history. Saw the evite url and the game was up. At this time he didn't know the date.
3. Friday when he got home from work, Adele spilled the beans.

Before Brandon could say anything after getting home from work on Friday...
Adele: "No, won't say anything!"
Brandon: "huh?"
Adele: "It's a surprise"
Brandon: smiles and winks at me
Me: smirk at him
Jolene: "the only thing we can talk about is that we had a bath"

Right so he knew at this point.

On the way over we decided that Brandon should try to sneak in and come up behind everyone and surprise them. Someone needed to be surprised after all this work, right?

So I dropped him at the corner and then waited a few minutes before I drove up to the house. Brandon meanwhile sneaked through the laundry door and into the living room where everyone was quietly waiting. He walked up behind everyone and quietly asked "is he here yet?" I think everyone was very confused for a few seconds, Brandon and I enjoy being devious every now and again :-)

Party details -

Venue - Alastair and Marg McEwen's house. Our house was going to be way to small for the 36 people.

Food - Wine and cheese tasting, homemade meat pies, sushi, dim sims, and other finger food. Oh, and of course cake...see below.





What we did -

Ate food
All about Brandon quiz
Pass the Parcel
Speech from Josh
Speech from Brandon
Ate, ate, ate, ate, ate
Voting on the best wine and the best cheese

Music -

A great selection from our iTunes library, see below




I know, this post is getting long but keep reading the best is yet to come!

The game pass the parcel is something we do not do in the States. So I decided that since Brandon has missed out for 30 years that we would play it that night. A parcel is made by wrapping a bunch of "gifts" (some were gags) in different layers of paper. The last gift was for the birthday boy. The funny thing is, we had agreed not to get each other anything for our birthdays this year. Well, Brandon bought me an iPhone and I bought him the surprise inside the parcel.

The surprise was a voucher to go rally driving in Werribee. We did the rally driving yesterday (Sat). Brandon got to choose two cars (evo and STI) to drive 12 laps in. An instructor sat in the passenger seat (where the navigator sits during a rally race) and gave him tips on how to improve his time. After all that the instructor takes you on a hot lap around the entire course. Brandon paid an extra $30 so that I could go on a hot lap too. Let me just say it was awesome and I want to do more. Speed is addictive. Brandon and I both agree that this was the best date ever.

For the hot laps Brandon and I were both hoping, hoping that we got the guy who is Australia's drifting champion, Luke, and we did!

We were going 150ks on the straights. My stomach felt like it was on a roller coaster. I told the instructor, Luke, that it was an addictive feeling. He agreed. Luke was threading this car through boulders and around hairpin turns with an ease that is quite amazing. At times I couldn't tell if we had our nose pointing down the line. He knew what he was doing. I lost all sense of direction. I will have Brandon do a write up of his experience.

Here is an album of the party and Saturday's rally driving



Here is a video of Brandon's last few laps. I took the video from my iPhone, sorry about the wind noise. I forgot to cover the mic.

Mem Fox - Lovely writing & blasphemous speaking

Mem Fox spoke last night at Skilled Stadium in Geelong. Mem Fox is one of the most famous children's book writers in Australia. Some of her well known titles are Koala Lou, The Magic Hat, Where is the Green Sheep?, and Possum Magic.

Koala Lou and Where is the Green Sheep? are two of my personal favourites.

Last night Mrs. Fox gave us the pleasure of listening to her read a few of her own books, followed by her thoughts on reading to children.

I enjoyed listening to her read, it was as if she was singing as times. You can see her past studies in drama come out in how she reads aloud.

The enjoyment of being read to aloud was overshadowed by her flagrant taking of the Lord's name in vain. It was so frequent that I was quite uncomfortable. It wasn't just slipping out, she was using it to create drama in her speech. I found that to be very disgusting.

I thought about raising my hand and asking her to stop but then wondered if that would be respectful and loving. In the end I didn't, maybe I was just to scared and using the "respect/love" argument as an excuse. Anyway, I have decided I will write her and tell her how wrong that was.

After the readings were finished she began to tell us stories about her experiences with people and their children reading, her world view, and how reading out loud to children is so very important.

I agree with her in that reading out loud to children is important, very important, but that is where I stop. Mrs. Fox seems to think that reading will change human nature. I am not so surprised by this. I have heard several people say how education/teaching people to read is the key. Mrs. Fox said last night that people in prison have not been read enough fairy tales. If they had been read fairy tales they would know right and wrong.

She gave an example of a young person breaking into a car to steal a five dollar note. That child did not know it was wrong. They had obviously not been read to enough., especially fairy tales.

As a Christian I know this does not match up with what the Bible says.

Psalm 51:5 "Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me."

Romans 3:23 "for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,"

Psalm 119:11 "I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you."

Fairy tales/stories/myths are not what society needs. It is God's word, the truth, that will show people what is right and wrong. Knowing right from wrong is not enough. We need to acknowledge that we have sinned and then turn to Christ seeking repentance and forgiveness. Christ dying on the cross is our hope not books, education, reading, or fairy tales.

Challenge update and a long Saturday

Well I don't think I did very well on Saturday or Sunday.

Saturday was packed full, enough so that I barely took the time to eat breakfast and lunch.

Jolene had a birthday party to go to that morning. We had to leave early from that so I could get her to the ballet photo session. Each year the ballet group gets photos taken before the end of the year concert.

After that I went home and Brandon left to go shopping for a surfboard. His company gives each employee $500/year to spend on health and well being. For the second half of this year B decided to buy a board.

After he got back, I went grocery shopping. I was interrupted by a call from Brandon letting me know Adele had been hit by our swing in the middle of the forehead. She was bleeding profusely and needed to be taken to the doctor. I ran home, dumped the groceries, and took Adele to the doctor. The doctor put some glue in the gash and squeezed it shut until it began to dry. Put a few steri-strips on it and all better. Adele screamed while this was going on but held very still. She was a brave little girl.

After we got back from the doctor we fed the kids, put pajamas on, and then headed to McEwen's. They were watching our kids while Brandon and I went to my soccer club's end of the year dinner.

I was awarded best and fairest of 2009 for the Women's team. A very cool thing for me to get. I really like how they did the voting. The ref, for each game, rates the top three players. The first ranked player from each team gets three points, second gets two points, and third gets one point. At the end of the year they are tallied up and each club announces their B&F. It is kind of like MVP of the team.

I won with 21 points, second place got 17.

All in all a long day.

Sunday we were in McKinnon.

This week Brandon heads to Brisbane Tuesday - Thursday

By the end of this week it will be less than two weeks before I and the kids leave for the States.