NCO Academy Graduation

The night before Lindsay's graduation from the NCO academy his parents flew in to meet up with us. It was fun to get ready for a fancier event with his mum, it felt like we were teenagers getting ready for a stake dance or something. So fun. Erik was milling around so excited that he was going to get a babysitter. He asks all the time if he can have a babysitter, that social little boy.

 Lindsay with some of his fellow classmates. Alex was the one next to Lindsay and was from the Singapore Air Force, it was fun getting to know him and another from his force while we were there.

 This is Lindsay and I with Seiler who was his supervisor at the time and his wife. It was fun to have someone we were familiar with at the graduation. And Erik was at their house that evening playing with their son of similar age, it all worked out so well.

 Lindsay took on a lot with this trip. Juggling us and his studies and family and fun. He missed out on a lot of the fun to study and he ended up winning the "Distinguished Graduate" award. He is so humble though I had to toot his horn for him!

 Getting his graduation certificate

 With one of the previous Generals that oversaw all the Air Force.

This academy that he attended was the whole reason he went to Hawaii and the whole reason we ended up deciding to meet up with him there. It seemed to go by fast and yet drag on at the same time, its a good thing we had so much good company while we were there!

Mock 2012 Olympics

Back in July around the time that the Olympics started a friend of mine asked if EJ and I would want to join her and her kids for an olympic themed play date at a park. We said "oh Yeah." So she mostly got it all organized and we had a great day. We were trying to dress the kids in our home countrie's attire (They are from Canada) and her kids were dressed accordingly with shirts and some face paint. I realized EJ no longer has any american tees or anything that fit him and so he made do with his blue pants, red bandana and blue sunnies. It was chilly that day and so he wore a jumper for about half the day (too bad the colors werent right-oh well).

We started off with opening ceremonies and Jody did awesome creating torches for the kids to start out with!

 First up were some track and field events. Kids at the start line prepared to race. We used streamers held across the finish line so they could run through a ribbon!

 Preparing for the hurdles (boxes of cereal on their side). I love how they were all trying to do a starting position!

 Long jump was next. The kids loved the running races but didn't quite show as much interest in the long jump nor did they quite understand how to do it-so that makes sense. I think the longest jump was maybe a foot.

 Next up shooting. I brought our nerf shot gun and some small nerf pistols. We used blocks built up a bit as targets and the kids loved this. They had a bit of hard time getting how to load the guns and if I remember right the shot gun wasnt quite working properly....but still mighty fun!

Miss A with the big gun!

 M takes a turn with the pistol with help from mom.

 EJ took his turn very seriously. He was very focused on the task at hand....

 And after a few failed attempts he decided his best bet for hitting the targets was to get real close to knock over the blocks. I say good on ya mate-for being so clever :)

 Fencing with wrapping paper tubes was next.

 And sometimes if you get the right spot they kind of tickle!

 The sisters duke it out!

 And then they ganged up on Jody! It was quite funny! Jody has another little one that was home that morning with daddy and I am sure if she was there she would have been in on the action. She stayed home because she is old enough to toddle around but young enough to disrupt. I am sure she enjoyed getting some quality alone time with her daddy though!

 Last event was the discus with a lid from a tin container. This one was fun to watch as the kids all had their own versions of throwing the thing and there was more than once that Jody and I had to duck or catch it before it hit our faces or heads.

 And the closing ceremonies where they all received their medals.

 Wahoo!

I had one of the older kids take this photo of us hence the slightly off kilter image. But I think they did a pretty good job! We had a ton of fun and I am so glad that we have friends here to do these kinds of things with. Jody and I were running together for a while last year before the holidays and crazy humid heat striked for the summer. Unfortunately life happened and we didnt pick it up again but we try to get together with the kids. She and I are the only ones that live on our side of the river-the one that seperates the city and we have fun together. She has taught me many a things about motherhood and is someone I really admire. I wish I had as many little ones as she does but I give loves to hers all the same. Her youngest was born just after we moved here and so its been fun seeing her go through all the stages, and she is a mommy's girl but I have finally gotten her to start coming to me which has been lots of fun!

phone photo dump

All right so I thought I would put up a bunch of random photos that I have taken with my phone from the fall/mostly winter season. We are just about to head into spring and I want to make sure I have some of our random things here from the past season.

Picking up Daddy from a flight one night

GQ model, ok not GQ because they can be quite raunch but he's got the looks! This was waiting for a taxi one morning when we were picking up the old smobi car from the shop. Ej loves riding in taxi's-probably because it rarely happens. Funny thing-the car was stolen again that night....boo!

 The awesome jacuzi tub we had when we stayed down in Byron bay in May. We had quite a few family baths in this tub through that weekend. It was great. It was like having our own hot tub without worrying about sharing it. Absolutely wonderful!

 Such a little cutie. Cant find this hat now...which is sad. It actually fits the Mr. Moon (he bought it for himself a few years back) but it fits Ej as well...the hat just doesnt stretch around his head. And yes he was buckling into the car without a car seat. It was one of those moving the cars around and didnt want to switch the car seat because it was a block or something. You dont need to scold me, I know.

 Ej enjoying some sushi at the mall. He is lucky he is in a place where seafood is so prevalent and fresh and good. He loves shrimp and although he usually picks a chicken roll I am so glad that he likes sushi. Here this is a very cheap way to eat while out. Sushi rolls run around $2 or just over which is the cheapest "fast food" you can find and its healthy to boot!

 A friend offered me a ticket last minute to the Jabbawockeez when her husband couldnt attend with her and I had a blast. They were a great show!

 Our favorite cold weather drinks here. There is no swiss miss hot chocolate, but there is Cadbury and its wonderful! Milo is an aussie favorite and Ej prefers this to cocoa. Its a barley drink but flavored sweetly. The caramel flavoring is for my cocoa...mmm..mm.good for the couple of months cool enough for these drinks.

 One night Ej followed the example of his father and gave me a foot rub and leg rub. It was great. Hopefully he keeps that up!

 Not a great face for the little man but in June our friends had a sweet little girl and they named her Sommer-yep after me! I feel very honored and special that she is my namesake. She is a sweet little one and I grab her up as much as I can and take in all her baby goodness!

 One night our family went to Southbank and the friday night markets were up. There is always a booth on the end that sells corn on the cob, a favorite of my little man and mine. We each scooped one up that night, we didnt want to share.

 The night of the Jabbawockeez show-dont know how these pics got out of order

 Ej got a nasty cold. Because he tend to have asthma symptoms it usually goes into his chest. I thought we may have bypassed it this time, until the end and then it hit him hard. He actually had an asthma attack in the car on the way home from shopping one night, when it was just me and him. I was a bit panicked. I was trying to get home as quick as possible to get him on the nebulizer-meanwhile it was pouring rain and the windshield wiper (aka-windscreen here) busted off on my driving side. Luckily a light turned red and I was able to fix it well enough to get home. This was Ej the next morning getting another treatment. Luckily he is old enough now that he sits well for them and doesnt fight them, even asks for them sometimes when he is coughing a lot.

 For my birthday I bought tickets for the cirque du soliel show "Ovo". It was awesome and although you can not take any pictures inside I was able to take a few outside the big top as we waited to enter. This show was better than ka and Love in our opinion but I know everyone thinks differently on the cirque shows. Our favorite is still mystere of all the ones I have mentioned though.

 After the smobi being stolen a second time we finally ended up selling it for parts. We didnt want to put any more money into it to fix it up to make it road worthy to sell, we didnt want to risk parking it anywhere long for fear of our bad luck and it getting stolen a third time, and I would not even touch the cursed thing until the tow truck came to get it because every time I drove it, that night it would get stolen. Seriously the police were very suspicious of me the last time I reported it stolen. Here Ej is holding the plates (since we could not keep them as souveniers) as a memory of the experience before shipping them in to get proper paperwork finished.

 A beautiful but cool afternoon with Ej riding his scooter around the garden of our flat and me soaking up the beauty of where we live. I get caught up sometimes in the daunting duties of everyday life in a foreign country that I have to remind myself to stop taking things for granted. Seriously we live in such an amazing place.

 Mr. Moon and I waiting to head into Ovo

I have a plan to sit down and write a bit of my every day life living as an american in australia soon. You know the nitty gritty stuff that most people dont think about. Stay tuned...