Champions.

Our Wednesday night netball team were the champions!!!  Woo hoo!!!  Most of the team were able to get together at a little cafe on the Broadwater in Southport on Sunday afternoon for wine, tapas, and a little impromptu awards ceremony for our FREAKING AWESOME MEDALS!!!!  I have collected a few pretty awesome Australian souvenirs, but I am most proud and excited of this one.  Have I mentioned how much I am going to miss netball?  Do you think there is any chance I can start up a league in Des Moines?   

    
   
F-ing Butthead.

The day has come when Lily has decided to hear a bad word and repeat it.  Over and over and over again.  I have no idea where she picked it up (possibly Ty – who likely heard it from big kids at after school care – trying to get her in trouble???), but after listening carefully to see if she is saying something else…packing, maybe???…we are certain we have translated.  We all panic when she says it.  To date, we have been ignoring it.  Surely she doesn’t know what she is saying?!?  We are taking the “don’t make a big deal out of it” approach, hoping that she forgets it soon enough.  She is such a little pistol.  I might have to resort to Santa Claus bribery.

Why?

We have officially entered the “why?” phase.  Why? Why? Why?  No matter how good my explanation is (or how obvious), she follows it up with another “why?”  While I admire her curiousity, this might make me crazy.  I wonder how many times she will have to ask why before she is satisfied that she has gotten down to the root cause.  I am getting a taste of my own medicine, as I have asked my coworkers “why?” about 200,000 times.  Paybacks…

Nanny cam.

Just a few random pics from the nanny cam before vacation. 

    
    
    
   
Brumby.

Jay drove Brumby to work one last time this week.  We dropped the old ute off at the Port of Brisbane on Wednesday, 25 November, to load it on a big ship.  It is due to arrive on the east coast of the US in early February.  Hoping for calm seas, no icebergs, and no pirates.  See you on the other side, Brumby. 

    
    
 Vacation!!!

Why not pack in one more mini vacation before heading back to the frozen tundra in the good old USA?  We flew to Hamilton Island on Wednesday.  Emily thought we were landing on the water – close!  I love this “landing selfie.” 

    
    
  We grabbed our bags from the baggage tram (which is a free for all), hopped in our buggies, and off we went to our holiday home overlooking the marina. *sigh*.  The home is called Uisce – beautiful home, beautiful views.  I love Hamilton Island.  We got ourselves settled and then went out for a cruise.  We had a little late afternoon snack at the tavern (Sherry – had to have some chicken fingers), and then headed to One Tree Hill to watch the sunset.  We put on our swimmers to go for a little night swim at the pool.  The water was perfect.  The full moon looked spectacular through the palm trees.  Giant bats flying above keeping the bugs away.  Fun night! 

        
  
    
    
  
  
    
    
    
 Thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving on Hamilton Island is far from traditional.  Morning family photo shoot, beach, cuddles with a sleepy Lily on the beach, a picnic on the beach, pool.  We took the kids to the Clownfish Club for some little people fun for a few hours while the adults went to the swim up bar for some big kid fun.  

    
    
    
    
    
    
    
 

Family photos.

Em and I went and viewed our photos from the morning shoot, which turned out surprisingly well considering everyone was hot and the kids (and Jay) were not into it at all… They are no Ann Steward Photography, but I do like quite a few of these!

   
    
    
    
    
    
    
   
After we picked up the kids from the kids club, we got cleaned up for dinner at Romano’s Italian restaurant.  The kids were so well behaved, despite being incredibly tired.  Both kids were asleep by dessert.  Happy thanksgiving!

Friday.

We had breakfast with the koalas on Friday.  I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone.  Yes, the two koalas were incredibly cute and adorable, but the food was nasty.  One of Jay’s birthday presents was to go off and do the ATV tour around the island, so he got to go play after brekky.  Em and I took the kids to the pool, where Ty and Lily did approximately 5,749 cannonballs.  We thought we would see how Lily would do without her swim vest in the shallow pool.  It didn’t take her long to figure it out, and she grabbed stuff off the bottom of the pool over and over and over again.  She is such a little fish!

Jay took Ty mini golfing while Lily took a little nap.  Ty really wanted to go back to the kids club for an afternoon of bowling, so Jay dropped him off and made a pit stop on the way home to buy me my super awesome jellyfish painting!!!!  Thank you Jay!! 

    
    
 We took Lily to the beach.  Em and I went out for a snorkel and SWAM WITH A SEA TURTLE!!!!!  Seriously cool.  They are such beautiful critters, she didn’t mind a bit that we were hanging out with her.  It was a loggerhead turtle.  As she came up for air, she brushed up against us.  Epic.   

   
While Jay was having a go with the snorkel gear, Lily and I were wandering around the rock pools as the tide was going out.  We saw lots of fish, and I’m pretty sure I saw a small reef shark.  I picked up Lily out of the water but it wasn’t big enough to do any harm.  Looked just like this. 

 We picked up Ty, got cleaned up, and went to Sails for dinner.  The kids had a party in the main lobby.  Lily loved the Wi dance game and the hula hoops.  Ty liked the ping pong and basketball hoops.  They were hot, sweaty messes when it was time to go home.  Good times! 

   
Saturday.

Happy birthday Jay!!!  The day started off with Jay cooking us brekky (which was a billion times better than the nasty $105 koala brekky), then Jay opened his presents.  I found a “G’day mate” license plate for Brumby.  Em used her connections and somehow managed to get an Outrigger staff uniform shirt from her Fiji friends for Jay.  He was SO excited!  Ty made some little toy guns out of packing materials.   

 We got ready to head out on a boat ride – first stop Chalkies beach, where Jay, Em and Ty got to swim with a sea turtle.  I was SO proud of Ty for venturing out far enough to see the turtle.  It can be a bit intimidating to swim in the ocean where you can’t touch the bottom, but he did it!  Em watched the kids while Jay and I went out for a swim.  No turtles, but quite a few pretty fish.  

Second stop – Whitehaven beach.  We had a little picnic on the beach, went for another swim, played catch, watched the sea planes come and go.  So beautiful. 

    
 We went for a little dip in our hot tub and then Jay and Ty went go-karting.  Em, Lily and I walked through the shops.  Then it was back to the pool to cool off.  Lordy it is hot!   

    
   
When we got home I thought I would just try to see if we could arrange to have a babysitter come watch the kids as they were both so sleepy and wouldn’t have enjoyed going out for dinner.  As luck would have it, one sweet little gal, Sarah, gave up her evening of a few drinks with friends to come play with Ty.  Lily was asleep pretty much the whole time, but Ty stayed up to watch Shrek.  Apparently they had a lovely conversation about how Ty’s favorite food is vegetables (WHAT?!?!  The dude won’t touch veggies) and fruit, and of course chicken nuggets.  What a goofball.

Em and I had dinner at the seafood restaurant.  We had prawns (Em learned how to clean them), scallops, trout, mahi mahi, and Jay had a steak.  Em and I ate clams – they were ok, but I wouldn’t order a plate of them.  After dinner I managed to pour hot coffee over ice cream all over the table (classy chic) but what was left of it was yummy.  We cruised around the island and ended up sitting on the beach staring at the nearly full moon for a bit.  I’d say Jay had a pretty great birthday.  Cheers to heaps more!! 

   
Sunday.

Ugh.  Last day of vacation.  Ugh.  We packed everything up in time for check out, but had 4 hours to kill until our flight home.  What to do?  What to do?  I reckon we ought to go back to the beach one last time…twist my arm.  We grabbed a couple kayaks and paddled out a ways.  We watched a couple turtles come up for air, but couldn’t see the turtles under the water.  We were about to give up and headed towards the shore, when a fellow kayaker pointed to where a turtle was playing not far off the beach.  It was fantastic!  Lily could see it!!!  We hung out with him for about 15 minutes.  Perfect.   

 We got a bit cleaned up (as much as we could with beach showers) and headed to the airport.  So sad to leave…I think I might retire to Hamilton Island.  So incredibly beautiful.  Until next time, Hammo…

Smooth flight home, Lily slept the whole way.  Ty crashed as soon as we got in the car.  We got the lawn mowed, suitcases unpacked, laundry started, photos uploaded, groceries bought (thanks Brian!!!), and blog posted.  Ready for my last full week of work in Australia!  Bring it on.

G’day mates!!