More Randomness - August

A couple of days after we moved into our home, Lucy had her 7th birthday.  Since we didn't know anybody yet, we went over to the neighbors and introduced ourselves then invited them over for cake.

There are a lot of botanical gardens around Brisbane city. This is a pic of a fuzzy fern getting ready to open.

Monitor lizard by the pond

The "Spiky Tree" used thorns for self defence against monkeys

There was a marathon going on and a plane wrote the name of the newspaper putting on the event.  Picture was taken from our back porch.

Random Australia Pictures July and August

When we arrived in Australia, Brandon's company put us up in a beautiful apartment building right on Kangaroo Point.  It was close to church and work, easy to jump onto a ferry to go into the city, and the scenery was beautiful.  These are just a few pics of the apartment.  The pic looks much better on my monitor.

This is the hallway to the kids rooms and their bathroom.  There were 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms.

The Story Bridge seen out our window

 

Then we moved into our home (see older posts) and the kids went to school. See how happy they are with their uniforms?

"The Hire Engine".  A lot of people have birthday parties at the park across the street from the house.  They are usually on Sunday and this Fire Engine played loud music and sprayed the kids with the hose. Picture was taken from the master bedroom balcony

Our first Cane Toad sighting.  These toads are a real pest in Queensland.

Halloween 2011

Party at the McDougald's

Halloween in Australia is not that big of a deal.  It's starting to catch on, but not a lot of people celebrate this holiday.  So one of my American friends and I put together a great celebration.

Then we show the Aussie's how to Halloween.

Things needed for a successful Halloween party:

1. Spooky bouncy house - - CHECK
2. Awesome face painter - - CHECK
3. Lots of food provided by the guests - - CHECK
4. Pictures that don't turn sideways when you download them - - What the Hell??!!! Seriously, this is making me way to upset. I'm going to post the pics anyway and you all can turn your head sideways.
   
   
   
   
      

The really cute tiger and kitty cat are the first set of twins of Lindi

Hope (red cape) is helping Lindi (Mum in the middle) hold her new set of twin boys. Angela is holding her beautiful daughter.

What I don't have pictures of are the great "pumpkin" carving contest entries.  I have to do the "" marks, because there were only a few pumpkins.  We also had carved cantaloupe, honeydew, watermelon.  That is because American pumpkins are freakishly expensive here. $20 and up for a small one.  Zach carved our watermelon like it was throwing up. Cool thing about melons is they glow red when you put a candle inside.

I also don't have pictures of families or adults in their costumes.  We had two Guess-How-Many jar's.  One was filled with ear shaped gummies, and the other with chocolate skulls. Prizes were given for best adult costume and best carved "pumpkin".  The winner was actually a cantaloupe.

There were roughly 50 kids there that we took trick-or-treating. We set up 8 houses on one street that were expecting the huge group. I also think that all 50 kids may have been in the bouncy house at one time.

Madison was a medieval princess.   Zach was a creature from "The Village".  Lucy was a dead school girl, then a princess, then a dead princess, and finally settled on a dog.  Angielee was a devil.  She was actually nothing at first because there was no time to put a costume together, but then Jeanney (before mentioned American friend) showed up as an angel.  A quick wardrobe change and some face paint and Walllllaaaaa! Instant devil. Brandon was a big stick in the mud.  Not actually. He just wouldn't dress up