Cheerios & bananas.
We thought we would try something new Saturday night. I cut up bananas into ridiculously small pieces and set them on Lily’s tray. She mostly mashed them between her fingers, and she tried to put some in her mouth but couldn’t quite get the job done. We also gave her some Cheerios. She was thoroughly entertained with the task of picking them up. I suppose it will take a little practice to get the hang of it!

Photo Shoot.
Since I couldn’t convince Ann Steward to come to Australia to take Lily’s pictures (wouldn’t it be a business trip??), Sherry and I had to attempt a shoot of our own. We put Lily in the ballerina outfit we picked up at the markets we have gone to, threw a blanket over a bean bag on the patio, and started clicking away. Ty came out and joined the fun for a few pictures. We got some really stinking cute ones!! Not bad for an amateur who just tried flipping through different settings on my camera…

Sunday Drive.
After a yummy brekky and some FaceTime chats, we got in the car and headed down the coast. We didn’t really have a destination in mind (lesson #1: never take off without a plan) and so we ended up at our surf club. However, the parking was unbelievable – no chance of finding a place to park. After we drove around for what seemed like forever, Lily woke up and started screaming. I got a bottle out for her, and we all decided it might be nice to spend the day at home. So we turned the car around and drove back up the coast. Ty kept asking if we were doing to park (probably about a hundred times). I think it was confusing to him to be in the car a couple hours and not actually go anywhere… Beach trip Fail.

When we got home, we hopped in Tiger and drove to the Marina for lunch. We stopped by the grocery store and then headed home to play in the pool. I love life with a swimming pool. Similar to the boat, something I think I was only this weekend able to put into words about the joy boats and pools give me. It isn’t necessarily about the boating and swimming activities so much as the time that we get to spend together, without distractions of housework, yard work, TV, or errands. It is like time stops for a couple hours and we just get to be together.

After swimming, jay and Ty watched a movie (about swimming), Lily fell asleep, and Memaw and I played on our computers. I started looking at Easter get-aways. It looks like flights to Fiji are going to be way too expensive. We are likely going to plan a road trip up the coast – Frasier Island for a couple nights then up to the Town of 1770, which is the southernmost tip of the Great Barrier Reef. More to come on this as we come up with a plan.

This week is going to be tough as Memaw flies home on Tuesday. It has been absolutely wonderful having her here. We are really going to miss her. It will be an adjustment getting back into the routine we had before Memaw. Ugh. She should probably just stay…

I hope everyone has a fantastic week. G’day mates!

Reptiles.
A week or so ago, jay, Ty and I were debating who would win a battle – a python or a crocodile. After much consideration, we thought the croc would win every time, due to its ability to drag the python underwater and drown it. Just a few short days later, this exact same scenario actually happened and it became a worldwide news event. In a lake in Western Queensland, a python took on an unsuspecting croc and actually won. I wonder what that python was thinking when it decided to go for the big meal… The purpose of me writing about it here is to let everyone know that we do not have crocodiles in our area of Queensland. It would be a 20 hour drive to get to the place where this battle occurred. Never mind that we do have pythons, as Jay is certain he could wrestle one if he had to. So if anyone was considering coming to visit us in paradise and had doubts because of this, I hope your fears have been eased. In any case, there are some pretty amazing pictures of the battle on the web.

Ten.
One night this week we were reading a book about counting and tricky plural words called “One Foot, Two Feet.” At the end of the book is a list of the numbers 1 through 10.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Ty pointed at the numbers starting with 10 and tried working his way backward.

10 9 8 7
And then he got stuck. He couldn’t remember that the shape he was looking at was a 6. What would you do? Panic? Ask for help? Give up? Not my little problem-solver. He went with what he knew to figure it out.

1 2 3 4 5 6

And then he gave the tough one another go.

10 9 8 7 6!!! 5 4 3 2 1

Well done, son. I am pretty sure he will be able to figure out how to solve world hunger someday.

Cinnamon Rolls.
Um yum!! Sherry managed to find some ingredients here to put together a delicious batch of cinnamon rolls! They were delicious. And they didn’t have any sign of Vegemite, so that’s great. ;). Have I mentioned how much I love having Memaw here?

Letter.
Uncle Stan and Aunt Cheryl sent a great holiday letter over the great big ocean. I was so excited to receive it and read about the summary of their past year. Lots going on! It somehow slipped my mind to give my blog shout-out earlier. Thank you!!!!!

Special Day.
Sherry hasn’t been able to spend alone time with Ty since she has been here, so today Jay, Sherry and Ty are spending a “special day” together. I had to work and Lily is at school. I think they are heading to the beach. To be continued…

Lizard.
I forgot something from Saturday. We were getting ready to go on a buggy ride. Ty went to the bathroom and was really quiet. He came running out, went to where Jay and Lily were laying on the floor in the toy room and said, “hey guys! Look at this!!” And then I heard Jay say, “catch it! Catch it!” And I yelled, “get Lily off the ground! What is it?” Ty had quietly caught a tiny lizard from behind the trash can in Memaw’s bathroom. After showing Jay and Lily, he caught it again and carried it outside. And then we found his dropped tail in the bathroom… Gross!!! We had a follow up conversation about how lizards are OK to touch, but if that had been a spider or a snake he can’t touch it. God help me to bring my critter-loving son home safe…

Sunday morning.
Lily was up a couple times during the night (hence my blog post at 2:00 AM), but she made up for it by sleeping in our bed after a 5:00 snack until 7:00!!! I don’t remember the last time I got to stay in bed until 7:00. I came downstairs to breakfast sandwiches and fried potatoes nearly ready – delicious! And….Jay was able to fix the Seapen last night when the tide came up. On one hand I am glad I didn’t watch him fix it, on the other I wish he wouldn’t have stuck his arms in the bull shark water without someone there just in case. But, he was able to fix it, which is great news. Hopefully we don’t have more problems next time we go out. Good job Jay!! Ty was extra cuddly with Lily and wanted his picture taken with her a couple times. So sweet. Great start to the day.

Polish 10.
The plan for the day was to explore Tambourine Mountain with Memaw. On our way to get fuel, Memaw was asking about some of my previous trips overseas. I told her that our driver in Poland taught us how to count to 10 in Polish. Ty said, “I can count to 10 in Polish. Polish 1. Polish 2. Polish 3. Polish 4….Polish 10!” If only it were that easy…

Glow Worms.
First stop on the agenda was the Glow Worm cave. It is a man made cave that was built solely for the glow worms. It was a lot like looking at stars in the night sky. The worms use the light to attract insects, and then they capture them in their sticky traps. It was sort of interesting, sort of not. A bit too scientific, not as much entertainment, in my opinion. I probably wouldn’t send someone up the mountain just to see it, but now my curiosity had been satisfied.

Brewery.
We had a light lunch at the brewery in top of the mountain. Beautiful restaurant. Not great food or service. The ice cream and live music was a saving grace. Might give it one more chance…

Rainforest Skywalk.
I finally found something to redeem my on-the-fence opinion of Tambourine Mountain…the rainforest Skywalk. There is a nice trail and several walking bridges that go out above the super tall trees in the rainforest. It was beautiful. It has been a fairly dry summer, so there wasn’t much water, but I think it would be even cooler after a few good rains – creek beds were fairly dry, just a trickle of water. Ty and I got to play Tarzan on a vine that was hanging down over the path. It is harder that it looks!
This is one place I will recommend to visitors – definitely not something we can see in Iowa! As we were leaving, I took Ty to the restroom. On the way we passed a family eating a snack – gorgeous mama, handsome dad, adorable 3 year old daughter. Ty spotted a lizard on their table. I said, “whoa. Is that for real? There is a lizard on your table!” Then the guy picked it up and said it was their pet. Ty loved it – and he made me touch it. I think that was the highlight of his day. I chatted with them a bit. He had been to Vegas recently. She is Russian. I would have never thought by looking at them that they would have a pet reptile that they took on adventures with them, but I guess that is proof that looks can be deceiving.

Thunderpark.
Next stop was going to be a place called Thunderpark. Ty is really into rocks – loves picking them up and putting them in his pocket or backpack. This place has some rocks that you can hunt for and then crack open to find neat stuff inside (can you tell I am not a geologist). We got there about 3:00, only to find that they close the rock hunting area at 2:30. Thankfully the gift shop was open and Memaw bought Ty a rock to have cracked open. I was feeding Lily so I am going off of heresay, but they didn’t think it would have been worth the $65 entry fee to go find our own rocks. Um, yeah, pretty sure that is ridiculous for a few rocks…
Jay did point out that there is a caravan park attached to it (campground) and it had some pretty fabulous campsites. He compared it to a campground full of Uncle Eddy’s. Sorry I missed that.

Reality check.
Hold on. Did I just write about spending the day exploring a flipping rainforest?!?! With Memaw!! Blessed.

Swim.
Normal Saturday morning swim lessons – continue to be amazed. Ty is doing so well!

Boat.
We got home and loaded up the boat. Sanctuary Cove is about a 10 minute drive from us, but we decided to arrive in style and drove the boat. We had a little trouble leaving the Seapen – something was making the boat get stuck on the pen. After quite a bit of exertion (and Jay having to put his foot in the bull shark water), we got out.
Sanctuary Cove was having Mummy Tree Markets (no, Jay, it has nothing to do with zombies). It is a little farmers market geared towards mums with small children. So many cute things! Aunt Yvonne will be happy to know that we picked up some ballet slippers for Lily. Memaw and I stopped in to check out some of the women’s clothing shops and I found a couple things.

Hotel.
We walked over to the hotel pool for lunch and a swim. It was such an awesome pool. It is a real sandy beach that stays sandy for quite a ways into the water. It gives kids the feeling of being at a beach without having to worry about sharks. The pool is HUGE. I am trying to figure out how to convince Jay I need one of these pools in our backyard in Iowa.

There is a bar/restaurant area near the pool, so we sat and had a nice lunch while Ty played in the pool. Ty and I made a “snowman” out of sand – thinking of our friends and family stuck in the polar vortex back home.

Broadwater.
After lunch we got back in the boat and headed out to the Broadwater. Both kids fell asleep, and Jay put the hammer down a bit. It was a beautiful day, slight breeze – enough to bring out the sailboats. At one point we had to turn around because there were about a dozen sailboats headed our way…fast… The parasailers were out, as well.

Seapen.
We got home at low tide. We are hoping this is the cause of our problem. When we pulled into the Seapen and tried to have the rear gate pop back up, it wouldn’t go. Normally this part takes 2 minutes and requires very little energy. It seemed to be caught on something. Jay tried to pry it up for a half hour while I was unpacking the boat stuff, and them I went out to try to help. It would be great if we could hop into the water with a set if snorkels and try to see what was causing the problem, but there is no way I or Jay are jumping in knowing there are bull sharks lurking nearby. We decided to wait for the tide to come back up to see if whatever it was caught on would give at high tide. I fell asleep before the tide came back (and Jay is sleeping now so I can’t get an update) so I will have to give an update on this later. My gut feel is that something is broken and we will have to have the repair guy come out on Monday. B.O.A.T.

Swim again.
Just in case Ty hadn’t gotten his fill of swimming, when we got home, I couldn’t wait to cool off in the pool. Ty and I splashed in the hot tub a while, and then when Jay came out to join us, Ty said he wanted to go in the big pool. He never wants to go in the big pool because A) it isn’t heated and B) he can’t touch the bottom. Jay and I surrounded him with pool noodles and he swam from noodle to noodle to wall to wall. I was kind of in shock. He was doing cannon balls off the side, then he swam to Jay or me. Such a little fish.

Tiger.
I asked what everyone wanted for dinner and Ty shouted “chicken tacos and Mac and cheese and fruit!” He never really cares about what we have for dinner, so this was quite funny. Thankfully we had all of the above and had that for dinner. After the sun went down we took Memaw for a ride on Tiger to see the houses lit up at night. Some of them are pretty extravagant with their exterior lighting – I love it. The architects really put a lot of thought into making them look awesome at night. Mental note if we ever build a home…

Exhausted.
By the time we got home, all of us were pretty exhausted. We watched a little bit of The Incredibles and then called it a night.

G’day mates!