The last couple days it has been Breanne that I really miss. Since moving to humid Lismore my hair has gone crazy and I miss having someone who can tell me how to make it look good. I decided it was finally time to get it cut and I was so nervous. At home I get so excited to get my hair done as I know she can make me look great no matter what. I walked around the mall twice before going into the hair salon and was so nervous I almost walked away when she asked for my name. It's not as good as when Breanne cuts it *~Of Course~* but I don't feel hideous. Breanne, I hope you're enjoying married life, but please remember that you are first and foremost my hairdresser, and I expect an appointment in early January. JK :) Love to all.
We drove up to Seaworld in our little car that we bought last week. It's a '88 Nissan Pintara named Chester Churchill (of course in honour of Marlene). Entrance to a theme park here is about $75 per adult pass, however they have a sale on every winter where you can get a VIP pass for $99. With our VIP passes we get unlimited access to Sea World, Movie World (Universal Studios but Warner Brothers style), and Wet 'n' Wild extreme watersliding park for a year. Boo-Ya!
One downside to the park was that you're not allowed to bring in a cooler of your own food except for dietary special needs, After scarfing some food in the parking lot, we shoved some granola bars in the diaper bag and headed in. At the front gate there were the regular ticket booth and a express line for VIP pass holders and the like. I started heading to the VIP line when Spen pointed out that it didn't go anywhere except to the end of the regular line. There were only 2 or 3 families ahead of us so we got in line and waited patiently. During our less than 10 minute wait, 2 different groups of people wound through the line dividers that go no where and then walked up to the ticket booth lady and knocked on the glass because they were VIP holders. Poor guys though they were going to get special treatment because they walked through the special ropes, honestly people.The first show we went to was a pirate show. It was a little disappointing in that it didn't have any animals, but it was kind of cool to see all of the people doing acrobatics with the trampolines.
We got to go on lots of rides (mostly Spencer) but Ros got to go on the carousel with Mom too. My favourite is always the log ride which was somewhat less than spectacular in height and they made you ride alone which always makes you feel a little bit like a loner.
Some of the really cool animals that we saw were some Canadian Polar bears, dolphins, star fish, sea cucumbers, sting rays, all kinds of tropical fish, penguins, and sharks. There were touching pools where you could touch the rays, star fish and cucumbers. The sea cucumbers were crazy squishy with almost no resistance to your touch. Amazingly, a sea cucumber will spew out all of it's digestive organs when a predator is near so that the predator will eat that and the cucumber will be safe. It will just grow back a new digestive tract.
The dolphin show was also really cool and because Ros had fallen asleep in the pram we got to go to the front row reserved for prams and wheelchairs. I was close to getting picked to touch a dolphin but I guess I'll have to appear more crazed next time as that's what got you picked while we were there. We had loads of fun and we're excited to hopefully go back again soon, but I think Movie World will be our next adventure. Love to all.
Last week we went to the greyhound races at a track that's only a 15 min. walk from our house. We didn't know if this was bad like going to a bar or anything so don't judge us if you deem it sinning. We did have to try to avoid the smoke but with races every 10-15 min. we had a blast!
Before every race the dogs were paraded along the track with their trainers so that we could get a look at them. With such a small group of people there, we were able to get right up to the track and be within a meter or two of the dogs. These dogs are amazing!! They are so lean and strong, and while they're running past you the thuds on the track from their paws is really intense. Spencer and I would make guesses at who would win based on jersey colour, dog colour, dog name, or how they looked when they did their little walk about. I think I only won once but it was still really fun. We didn't take a camera because we thought some people might frown upon that, so I apologize we don't have any pictures. I really had fun and although it was kind of late for Rosy I think she enjoyed seeing all the dogs too! Love to all.
From our second week at church I’ve been helping out in the primary as their pianist. I was pretty sure I was going to get called, and we had a feeling Spencer might get called to the young men’s. Oh how wrong we were. I am now serving as second counselor in the primary as well as playing the ‘piano’ for them (it’s really a tiny electric organ). Spencer has been called as a Sunday School teacher for the 16/17 year olds and sometimes has the 12-15 as well. Spencer was in charge of speaking last Sunday in Sacrament meeting and I have been asked to speak this coming Sunday. As we still don’t have a car we have been relying on other members to give us a ride to church. The Bishop recommended a couple that live close to us and would have room for our small family in their vehicle. Sister O’Connor gave us a ride last Sunday, and we neglected to mention to her that Spencer was speaking and she picked us up a little later than we had agreed. I was of course nervous but Spencer was able to play it very cool. On the way to church she told us that she was speaking at church and was nervously preparing last minute, I thought it was ironic especially as his topic was preparation.
We got to church during the opening song and Spen went straight to the stand to get ready to give his talk. They were short on deacons so they asked Spencer to pass the Sacrament, he agreed and joined 3 other older gentlemen most of who rarely pass the sacrament. The Priest had to signal twice for them to stand up to the table and it was then that I knew it was going to be a bit of a gong show. Following the prayer and elderly gentleman passed the sacrament to the bishop and Spencer takes off to pass to the rest of the congregation. I guess he’d never noticed that you’re supposed to pass to the Priest’s first in this ward and the poor Priest looked after so longingly as Spencer took off to pass to everyone else.
Another odd thing they do in this ward is that a Priesthood holder stands at the door in the back and calls a deacon over if anyone is in the hallway that requires the sacrament. This gentleman was not there on Sunday and Spencer had never noticed this before, so instead of passing to his side of the Chapel, Spencer heads straight out into the hall through the loud creaky door without first passing to the Priest. If you can picture in your mind, Spencer doesn’t pass to the Priest and doesn’t pass to his half of the Chapel, but just takes off out the side door and nobody knows where he is going. I thought it was pretty amusing, especially because it all happened the exact same way for the water.
I presented my first sharing time as a member of the primary presidency on Sunday. It wasn’t a huge deal as the other counselor was going to be absent so she just gave me a memory game and asked me to lead that this last Sunday. Our Music leader was absent so I needed the game to last a bit longer so I put up more memory cards than I had planned on doing (the ABC’s of the gospel) and put up a pair for the whole alphabet instead of only half the alphabet as I had planned. Everything was going well and the kids were very patient and quiet and they listened to my directions. Only problem was that nobody was getting match and they kept turning over the same cards over and over again. I started to get anxious as it had been 15 minutes and only 1 pair had been matched. We were calling on teachers, bishopric members, and anyone who would please remember where a match was, but no luck. Part way through I asked the president who was right up there helping if we should leave some turned over to help the kids out. She didn’t think it was necessary so after 35 minutes of the memory game and only 3 matches, I bore my testimony and linked behind the organ. The President thought it went pretty well, and left the game up for next week. Hopefully it goes better. Love to all.
We went and saw an apartment in Lismore on Saturday and found out yesterday that we got it! We are so excited, especially after everything you have to go through and submit just to apply for an apartment. We showed up for a 10:30 viewing at about twenty after, and there was already another couple there waiting (they were male, as we’ve quickly discovered Lismore has the second highest gay population in Australia and I don’t know who’s first). By the time the realtor arrived just on time there was another three groups of people waiting to look at the place.
A swarm of people followed him into the apartment and you couldn’t help but laugh at what a group we looked like. The house has two bedrooms and isn’t furnished, there’s a tiny stove and an oven that our cookie sheets won’t fit into. There isn’t a fridge or a place for a fridge, but that’s pretty standard for Australian rentals. There are little sets of drawers in each of the closets and a nice big balcony facing east that I can use to dry clothes. In the bathroom there’s a fairly clean shower and toilet with a tiny sink for washing up at. The bathroom also has a huge sink for laundry next to hook-ups for a washer. I think I saw a little washer at the Salvation Army that looked fairly nice for around $50 that would be so nice to have as I think I’d spend more than that at a Laundromat.
The carpet didn’t look very clean so I’ll need to look into getting it cleaned soon and then getting a vacuum. Most of the walls are exposed brick which I’m a little nervous about as Rosalin is just starting to get braver with standing and she’ll be walking before I know it. I’m really excited to make the place look and feel more like a home. We decided to go with an unfurnished place because a furnished place was going to cost about $230/wk while unfurnished is costing us $190/wk so we figure with the money we’ll save we can afford a couple cheap things that we can try and sell before we go or even donate to ward members or the Salvation Army.
We are a little ways from the University, probably a 10 minute drive but we are really close to a big shopping centre. I am literally a five minute walk to a big mall, and kitty corner to the back of a McDonalds. I’m pretty excited about location as a lot of the places were in pretty scary neighbourhoods. We get to move in on Friday, so I’ll upload some pictures once we’re in. Love to all.
Our little family was invited over to a family’s house for supper on Sunday, and were asked to bring a dessert. We knew that another family was going to be there and so we wanted to bring something special from home. Unfortunately, we couldn’t think of anything Canadian that they didn’t have here in Australia. We finally decided on trying our hand at Nanaimo bars and stayed up late Saturday night trying to recreate the dessert. Sunday morning I tried a bite, but the ratio was off and the bottom layer made up 75% of the square so we ended up making a delicious Anne Ridgedale cake instead.
Interesting side note, 10 min. before we were supposed to leave for church, Marlene asks us why we’re all dressed up. I guess she had completely forgotten that it was Sunday and was already in her gardening clothes, she’s crazy.
We got to dinner and were so excited that there were 3 young families there as well as ourselves. The Oldfields owned the house and have two daughters aged 3 and 18 months with another daughter due in a week. His sister, husband and 3 and half children live with them (she’s due soon), and they are the Best family (that’s their surname). The third family were the Williams family and they have a 16 month old son and she’s just over 3 months pregnant. I felt a little out of place being the only non-pregnant one there.
Dinner was delicious as we had lasagna two ways as well as a huge garden salad with thick chocolate cake for dessert. After supper, the kids got bathed and ready for bed while most of the adults did the dishes and cleaned up a chaotic mess after all those people eating. Once the kids were in bed we stayed up talking and laughing until almost 10 o’clock.
A lot of crazy stories were told, but one thing we’ve been warned about is when the magpies start nesting in the spring. I guess they get very territorial and start swooping down on you if you get close. They aren’t afraid of humans and will actually draw blood by pecking your head as they swoop past. Some of the girls told me that in school they had to draw eyes on their school caps or wear ice cream buckets on their heads with faces on them because the birds won’t swoop you if you’re facing them. They even told us the story of a lady who was riding her bike past a tree and the bird was swooping at her. As she was waving her arm trying to wave the bird away, she swerved into traffic and was killed. Interestingly though, they all think that Canada is a scarier place to live because of bears.
Spencer met up with Ben Williams and some other guys today to play Australian Rules Footy, but he’ll have to write about that because I stayed home and washed walls while Rosy slept. Hopefully we’ll have our own place soon. Love to all.
Marlene can never get our names right. She calls me Lindell and has resigned to just call Rosalin ‘beautiful’ all of the time which suits us just fine. Spencer actually gets called some interesting names and they have a bit of a funny story behind them. At the beginning of our stay here, Marlene came up with the name Winston which we thought was hilarious, but no Marlene he’s not Winston Churchill. We reminded her that it’s Spencer like Spencer W. Kimball and she assured us that that would help her remember it with that association. Then a few days ago when her home teachers were over, she introduced us as Linde... and...um... Chester. Haha, no Marlene it’s Spencer, to which she replies oh yes, like Spencer Churchill, I should remember that. Oh Marlene, you’re hilarious. Love to all.
Before I get into the excitement of the animal reserve, there is exciting news on the baby front. We’ve been working on some of Rosy’s tricks so now she can give you a kiss, clap her hands, give a high five and...stand! Today we noticed that Rosalin wasn’t really holding onto us while standing against our legs so we tried standing her on her own and she can hold herself up for up to 10 seconds! She’s done it a few times now and we’re super excited, I guess tomorrow will be spent trying to get a picture of it.
After swimming the other day at an awesome pool with a beach entrance our underwater video camera doesn’t work anymore. It’s waterproof-ness proved to not quite work so hopefully we’ll be able to get it replaced. Unfortunately this happened only days before our trip to the Currumbin Reserve which is ultimately a zoo which only has Australian animals. The International Students got to go for free so Spencer got us special permission to go with them on the bus as long as we paid my way. We were so excited and got to the school a little early so that we’d get a good spot on the coach which ended up really paying off as we got the front two seats upstairs on a double decker bus! We were so excited as we were heading out of the city because all of the trees were smacking us practically in the face. We got half way through the city and then had to return because our International Student lady was late and had gotten left behind. At the same spot that we had to turn around last time, the bus started smoking and we got left on the side of the road for half an hour while we got another bus. The second bus wasn’t a double decker, and we had to sit amongst the commoners.
After an hour and a half ride to the Reserve, we got off the bus and went to buy our tickets. The lady told us to wait because there may have been more tickets bought than students who made the trip. A girl had gotten sick, and so our whole little family got in for free! Next we were off to our educational session that is saved for school groups and special classes like ours. We met several animals that had come to the reserve because of injury or some that had been born there and were now being used for educational purposes.
We met a red tailed black parrot that had been shot with several pellets making him unable to fly so he will be staying at the reserve for the rest of his life. He hadn’t been there long so we weren’t able to touch or hold him but it was still interesting to meet him so close. Next we met two blue tongued skinks (lizard). Neither could return to the wild and were both pretty sombre. Spencer and I got to touch the skink and I was pretty nervous. I remember in House A, I touched one of Ricky’s iguanas and after touching it I ran to the bathroom and cried for a little bit. So, in anticipation of touching the skink, my heart was pounding and my legs started going numb no lie. So, when it came in front of me I touched it and it was so weird! It felt so smooth and hard almost like an armour feeling. I expected it to bend under the touch, but it didn’t and I was surprised.
After that we saw a possum that was about a year old and still just young so he was still pretty skittish and we had to be really quiet so he didn’t run up the walls. The last animal we saw were two brother pythons both about a metre and a half in length. Their names were Darth Vader and Spock, and if you asked a question you got to hold them. Spencer thought of a quick question and went up, however taking a picture is difficult to do while you’re holding a Rosy. Afterwards on our way out Darth Vader was there and I got to touch him and I wasn’t nearly as nervous this time. I pet him for a while and was impressed by how cold and smooth he was.
Other exciting things that we got to do there was see a lot of koalas lounging about in their trees, a 3 metre long crocodile, lots of birds, wombats, Tasmanian devils, wallabies, and about a hundred kangaroos. It was so exciting to see the kangaroos and they had them in a huge petting zoo of sorts. Kangaroos were just lying around and you could go up to them and pet them or feed them the food that was for sale there. We got lots of pictures and had a great time with the kangaroos. That was my favourite part of the trip to the reserve followed closely by a show called Free-Flight of the Birds.
The birds show was very cool with all kinds and sizes of birds flying around our heads and huge eagles in the sky. A giant pelican ran just in front of us, and a huge eagle flew over our heads several times. The show definitely held up to the hype that people had given it. Rosy really enjoyed the birds, and was crawling around my lap the whole time. On our way out of the reserve we got to see one more show that had Aboriginal dancers. We got to see the main guy play the didgeridoo and then sing while 6 dancers performed traditional dances and even taught us games that they teach the children in ‘dance memory’. We had so much fun and I think we’ll likely go back again. Love to all.
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