HH Update.
A producer from House Hunters International wanted to talk to me on the phone to discuss a few things. They really would like it if one of us could fly back to the US to do a day of filming for the back story. She said it isn’t a deal breaker if we can’t do it – I really don’t think we can do that bit. Hopefully that isn’t the deciding factor. We discussed dates (good sign) and I requested a week that Sherry is here. How fun would that be to have her here for the filming?! There is some paperwork that the homeowner and property managers have to sign, so I am hoping to get that in the next day it two. This might actually happen!!
I told my boss that I might have to take some time off that week, and then surely after that Hollywood will need me to go do some full time shows. Surely. Just wanted her to have a heads up that she might need to look for a new SME. 🙂

Headlock.
Jay got a call from Ty’s teacher on Thursday. Apparently he was playing play-doh with a little girl today and he decided to put her in a headlock. Where would he have learned that? What would cause him to do it? Ugh. No TV the rest of the week… Whoever said parenting is easy is crazy. How does one go about raising a gentleman without completely squashing his natural personality?

El Bandito.
Aussies like to use the term “no dramas” but it seems like nothing ever actually gets done here without drama. The Seapen was supposed to be delivered on Thursday, and it was…sort of. They got it to our house, but got called off in an emergency (leaking Seapen) so they couldn’t do the permanent installation. The guy that would have been the backup plan to install it was off crook (called in sick). They promised to get it done on Friday.
We heard from the mechanic that the boat was ready on Friday morning. Jay called the Seapen place and they didn’t realize it hadn’t been permanently installed… So they sent a guy over to do it right away.
Meanwhile, Jay and I took a half day of vacation to go pick up the boat, so we were really hoping the Seapen would be ready soon.
We paid the mechanic (ouch) and chatted with him and his wife a bit about places to go, how to catch bait for fish, what to do as a first mate (I wasn’t even sure how to tie the rope to the boat & dock).
The Seapen guy called and said everything was all set. So, we climbed aboard, and nervously set off.

We had to fill up with fuel so I had my first duties as first mate. I used my new found knowledge and tied the ropes to the boat, and after jay pulled up to the pump like an old pro, I got us tied off. Phew.
$250 later, the tank was almost full.

The Gold Coast Marina (where the boat was getting repaired) was way closer to our house than I thought. It looked close on the map, but it takes 10-15 minutes to drive there. It probably didn’t take us more than 20 minutes to get home. We were both pretty nervous, but thankfully it was pretty uneventful. The Seapen worked great, so El Bandito is sitting high and dry.
We picked up the kids from school (Ty had a much better day) and Ty couldn’t wait to get home to see the boat. We got it all cleaned up and the cover put on before the rain comes. We are hoping that the weather stays clear a bit this weekend so we can go exploring!

Sharks.
The neighbors were excited to see our boat. We talked to them more tonight than we have in the 3 months we have lived here. :). They were telling us that the other day, the guy was fishing off their pontoon. His line drifted downstream to right next to our pontoon. He caught ELEVEN bull sharks…right in front of our pontoon… Holy moly.
In true redneck Australian fashion, he put 3 of them in their pool to freak out the lady of the house. I wish I would have seen her face when she came home to that!
I told them they have to knock on the door the next time they go fishing. I want to see this with my own eyes!

G’Day mates! Happy weekend!

Dolphins.
Sunday night I was up with a fussy baby several times. I finally let her come to the big bed around 4:30 to sleep in the middle – amazing how much better she sleeps next to mama. I know there are mixed opinions out there about this…not trying to start a debate. I just really didn’t want to get out of bed again.
Because it was month end, Jay had to get up on Monday morning and go to work, while I stayed home with the kids in celebration of Australia Day. He went downstairs for brekky, and not long after that Ty woke up and went downstairs. At about 6:00 I heard Jay yelling “Babe!!! Go look out the window!! Hurry!!” I jumped out of the bed to see what was the matter. And what to my wondering eyes did appear but 4 freaking DOLPHINS swimming in the canal. I was as excited as a kid on Christmas morning. At first I thought it was sharks, but then they jumped out of the water and squirted air out of their breathing holes. I checked on Lily (still sleeping…finally), grabbed my phone, and took a couple videos of them. They are on my Facebook page. A.maze.ing.

I googled it today and it doesn’t sound like dolphins in canals is a very common occurrence. A few days ago a family of dolphins was spotted in a canal quite a ways south of us. The article said that in 10 years, they had never seen dolphins. The coast guard was monitoring them to make sure they had enough to eat. The high tides are partially to blame. My professional opinion is that the developing cyclone in northern Queensland is either throwing them off course or making them run for cover. And whatever has been keeping my kids up at night also affected the dolphins. I am sure there is scientific evidence to back up my theory.
I have limited memories of my dad (he died when I was 8), but I do remember that he always wanted to live on the water. He was a die hard fisherman, wetting a line whenever he had the chance. He even made a living out of his passion. I wonder what he would have had to say about us seeing dolphins in our backyard. :). Might have been a little sign from above that even though I might have a not so great day every now and then, to not forget about how fortunate we are right now. Thanks for that, dad.

Australia Day.
So the dolphins swam off, leaving me and the kids to find other ways to entertain ourselves. It was pretty windy out, and on the cooler side, so my plans of going to the pool were nixed. I did a little housework while Ty watched Wreck It Ralph. We wanted to get some fresh air and a “work out”. The last time Ty rode his bike he got a little ahead of himself and took a spill, so he has been a little gun shy about climbing back in the saddle. I somehow managed to talk him into it, and we took off down the road at a snail’s pace. We made it half a block before the fear took over and he said he was done. I convinced him to ride it home, only after promising a special treat. Thank goodness he didn’t fall off. We will try again soon to reinforce his progress. After dropping off the bike, we walked around the block. As soon as we saw our driveway Ty reminded me of the treat (he doesn’t forget a thing), so we had a Zooper Dooper (freezy pop) to cool off.
I fixed a bowl of rice cereal for Lily and started feeding it to her. Ty crawled under the table, and I smelled something stinky. Wasn’t the kid wearing a diaper, unfortunately. So I left my starving baby crying in her high chair to clean poo out of undies, then returned for a few bites before hearing, “mom, I’m done” forcing me to leave the starving baby again, only to realize that toilet paper wasn’t going to cut it. I sent Ty up to get in the shower, finished Lily’s morning tea to stop her screaming (she was probably going to die of starvation), and helped Ty get cleaned up.
After the shower, we went back downstairs and I put Lily in her bouncy chair. She got a little fussy, so I picked her up and my hand went right onto a wet spot on her shorts. You guessed it. More poo. On her, on her clothes, on the bouncy chair, on me. So we got that all cleaned up and decided it was time for lunch and a nap. 2 hours later, I woke up (my excuse for that is that I hadn’t slept for 3 nights) and fiddled around for another hour before the kids woke up. After nap we played Legos and cooked dinner. We were happy to see dad pull in the driveway. It was funny, though. Any other day I would have complained about all of the poo. But then I remembered that we saw dolphins in our backyard. Life is good.

House Hunters.
I have (not so) secretly wanted to be an actress my entire life. I was really surprised when Hollywood didn’t come knocking after my 1996(ish??) appearance as Aunt Eller in OHS’s performance of Oklahoma. Weird.
Back when we first found out we were moving to Australia, I used lots of different sources to find information about the country way far away that we were about to call our temporary home. I talked to co-workers who had worked at the branch in the past, I nearly found the end of the internet, and I even recorded HGTV’s House Hunters International to catch glimpses of what life is like in Oz.
As I watched episodes of House Hunters I thought, hey, we have a pretty cool story. We have a newborn baby, a toddler, and we are leaving small town Iowa for the beaches of Australia. Seems like a good storyline – at least as good as the chic who quit her job in the states and hurried to Australia for her new job as organizer of the solar eclipse…. So what the heck, I sent them an email and a family photo (thanks Ann Steward Photography for the great pic). I didn’t embellish, really didn’t say much more than what I just told you. I didn’t expect to hear back from them.
Jay’s house hunting trip came and went. At one point I had the thought, “I’m kind of glad I didn’t hear back from House Hunters because I wasn’t able to do any of the house hunting.”
Here we are 3 months settled into our new life and I get an email wondering if I am still interested in being part of the show. Um, pretty sure I had said in my original email that we were moving at the end of October. I politely replied that I would have loved to, but we were already moved in, and if our lease runs out before it is time to move back to the US, I would surely let them know.
*spoiler alert!!!*
And then I got a reply back saying, “oh, that doesn’t disqualify you from being a part of the show.” Silly me. How crazy to think that to be on House Hunters you had to actually hunt for houses. Just answer a few questions, send some more pics, and we will see if we can get you on the filming schedule.
WHAT?!?! For real?!?! I knew Hollywood would call someday. I just knew it.
So…don’t get your hopes up (talking to myself here…) because a lot of things could prevent this from actually happening. I have to make sure the company doesn’t have a policy against this sort of thing since we are here for work. We have to make sure the week they want to do filming isn’t during month end, or SAP upgrade testing. And the fact that we can’t go back to Davenport for “pretend that we are leaving Davenport to move to Australia” filming might be a deal breaker. But just the thought of it, and getting a real response back, is pretty stinking exciting.
Surely the dolphins had something to do with this stroke of good luck.

Bottomless Pit.
Even after introducing rice cereal and veggies (so far squash, zucchini, and carrots), my little chunky monkey is still hungry. So, the 2-3 bottles of milk that I am producing in a day isn’t keeping up with Lily’s 3-4 bottles per day consumption. I am admitting defeat (sadly) and starting to introduce a little formula into her bottles this week. *sigh*. I will keep producing as long as I can and be thankful for what I have been able to give her.

Here’s to a great week ahead. G’day mates!

Apple Pie.
We ate a piece if the Yatala apple pie Saturday night. It didn’t taste like mom’s (not even close), but it wasn’t terrible. The crust was strange – was more like a cookie. I was going to have another piece on Sunday, but the ants got to it first. Every so often if I leave any food on this one counter, we will have an infiltration of tiny ants. They don’t go beyond the counter (somehow they haven’t noticed the entire pantry full of food). So gross.

The Bearded Dragon.
We heard from a co-worker that a restaurant/tavern has a reptile show and cane road races every Sunday. We saw online that the reptile show was at 11:30, but weren’t sure about the cane toad races. We took our chances and “hopped” for the best (wah wah). We had to drive over Tambourine Mountain to get there, and I have been wanting to go to Mt Tambourine since the week we moved here, so I was all for the Australia Day adventure.
The drive over the mountain was beautiful. The road could use some repairs, and I was glad the kids fell asleep so I didn’t have to catch puke. I was amazed that there is a for real rainforest 30 minutes from our house. At the top of the mountain there is a little village with a bunch of shops and people milling about. Hold that thought…
About 10 minutes later we pulled into The Bearded Dragon. I am not exactly sure what I was expecting, but it wasn’t that. In the spirit of Australia Day they had a “carnival”, which consisted of a sketch Ferris wheel, bumper cars, a haunted house, bungy jumpers, and an inflatable water slide (that was held up by ropes tied to the wheels of a car). It was kind of chilly, so I didn’t see a single kid go down the water slide. There was a large covered outdoor patio area. We grabbed a table and ordered an early lunch since we had about an hour to kill before the reptile show. The food was just meh, ok. The people watching was great – quite an interesting group of people that chose to spend their Australia Day at the Bearded Dragon. I guess we were one of them, so what does that say about us? Ty didn’t really want to do any of the rides (thank goodness). 11:30 came and went and a band was setting up where we thought the reptile guy was. I asked a bartender if there was a reptile show today and she said, “oh yeah, he’s out back. Running a little behind today.” Turns out “out back” also contained a small pasture with a couple alpacas (random). We found the reptile guy. He had a little pen set up with 5 or 6 covered tubs inside it. He pulled out some gross looking reptile, walked it around for everyone to touch (ewww!), and talked for 10 minutes about lizard facts – for each one… Ty was the kid that said, “dad, I’m done.” We made him tough it out for 3 reptiles, and then we decided to hit the road. Kind of a flop.
Oh, and the cane toad races…those didn’t start until 3:00. We for sure were not wasting the whole day at the tavern. Nuts. I thought it might be fun to start adding pictures of maps of the places we go so 50 years from now we can remember where we went.

Village.
We got in the car and drove back up the mountain to go to the little shops that we passed on the way over. I was imagining it to be kind of like Galena or a Breckenridge sort of shopping experience, full of interesting things made by local artists. Um. No. The “handmade crafts” were cross-stitched doilies. There was one store that sold Australiana, but it wasn’t great stuff. There were, however, about 15 different places to have tea… There were HEAPS of people, willing to spend cash on stuff, but there was absolutely not a single thing worth buying. More opportunity for all of you entrepreneurs…

Next time.
So the next time we go to the mountain, we will not be going to the Bearded Dragon or the shops. We will do more of the adventurous things that we didn’t feel like doing today with the kiddos. There is a skywalk that goes out over the rainforest canopy. There is a waterfall with a pond at the bottom that you can swim in (just like the movies). There is a distillery, some wineries, and breweries. We just picked the 2 worst things to do on Tambourine Mountain. We will give it one more try…

Swim.
Since the day’s outing was a flop, we decided to go for a swim when we got home. It was kind of chilly – pretty windy, but as long as we stayed in the water it was fine. Ty and I played a bit while Jay kept Lily happy and warm outside the pool (and cleaned up carrot puke – the new veggie of the day).

Holiday.
So all in all, Australia Day was kind of lame. I still couldn’t tell you what the holiday is celebrating – am guessing many Aussies couldn’t either. It sure didn’t feel like the 4th of July. I think it didn’t help that we were tired because Lily was up several times during the night before with a stuffed up nose.

Jay has to go to work tomorrow (unfortunately the corporate month end schedule doesn’t care about Australian holidays), so the kids and I are flying solo. Not sure what we are going to do yet. Hoping for a better day tomorrow.

Lazy.
Ok. Really. If you are too lazy to walk your dog, don’t get a dog. If your solution involves using your buggy to “walk” your dog, don’t get a dog. I have seen this on numerous occasions in our neighborhood. In a way, it reminds me of Wall-E.

Cockroaches.
I think the cockroaches here are on steroids. I wouldn’t consider killing them by stepping on them – the thought of the crunching noise it would make causes me to nearly vomit. Ewwwwww! I tried to find a good picture online that shows the size of these, but couldn’t find the perfect one. Just Google “Australian cockroaches” and have a barf bag ready. Thankfully the only ones I have seen in our house have been dead, but some at the office have been alive. A small child could ride these things (nearly).

Fruit bats.
I don’t know if I have mentioned this in a prior post, but most evenings we see giant fruit bats flying along the canal. Lately there have been heaps of them. One of the guys at work said he saw hundreds flying near his house. Ewwwwww!

Seniors.
The CEO and a few members of the senior executive staff visited the office today. Call me a nerd, but I was thoroughly interested in what they had to say. It was nice to see some familiar faces (not saying we are best buds, by any means, but reminded me of my days at Corporate). I left feeling proud of the company I work for – not that I needed a reminder. I have to admit I was most interested in the bits of the discussion that were related to Treasury, JD Financial, and our investors. You can take the girl out of Treasury, but it’s tough to take the Treasury out of the girl. All in all it reminded me of the big picture. I think that lately I have been overwhelmed with the details. Feeling refreshed and motivated (for a while anyway…).