Queen's Birthday Weekend

Well the weekend is over and we are almost settled in.

We got into the house on Friday afternoon. The house was much better than we had remembered it being. For some reason the bathrooms stuck in our heads as being terrible but when we saw them again we both realized that they were not that bad at all.

The furniture rental people showed up Friday afternoon and in the matter of an hour moved all our rental furniture into the place...they had a team of men to move all the stuff in and then a team of women came after them and unpacked everything. We went out to run some errands and when we came back it was all done for us.

Julia and Zak brought the kids over on the train while Mel and I used our rental truck to go pick up some used cribs that we bought, as well as go to Ikea ( yes, they have an Ikea here ) and buy some additional furniture. We had to spend about $750.00 on stuff at Ikea and another $200 at Kmart to round out our place but thats not bad at all. So that took up all of our day on Friday.

Saturday we just let the kids play in the back yard and at some local parks, then we went to dinner at the house of a Canadian couple that Mel met at one of the parks in Hampton where we were living. They are doctors from Winnipeg with 2 small children ( one older than Wyatt, one younger than the twins ). They are here on a fellowship and have been here for 10 months and are leaving in 2 months. It was interesting to get another Canadians take on the Australian cutlure. Oddly enough, turned out that Mel when to University with the husband from the couple ! She had only met the wife in the park and had no idea she would know her husband. A true "small world" moment.

Sunday we decided to leave the unpacking and took a trip to the Werribee Open range zoo. The idea is you show up and then take a 45 minute guided tour around the Zoo in a safari bus. The weather was great and the kids were ok on the drive to the Zoo, but got a bit restless on the bus ride itself. Seemed geared towards older kids to be honest...also, we got a late start to ended up on the bus around nap time so that didn't help. After the bus ride we packed them in the car and drove out to Geelong while we let Julia and Zak to explore the rest of the zoo on foot. The drive was nice ( highways here are in great shape ) and we took a quick detour to the waterfront in Geelong then turned around to head back and pick up Julia and Zak and head home.

Monday was a public holiday here and we were scheduled to attend a birthday BBQ for Wyatt's australian friend Declan. We thought it was going to be our first Australian BBQ but it turned out to be more of a Scottish BBQ. It seems that this particlur social group was one of Australian women married to Scottish men. Very surreal sitting in Australia with a bunch of Scottish men discussing Soccer and Scottish politics.

We now have cable and phone at our house, but no internet until a modem arrives by mail. Once we get that set up I will add some more pictures. They are building up ! If anyone wants our new phone number just email me at jeff.faulds@gmail.com .

Jeff.