I suppose we are reaching that age when everyone is beginning to start families and I must say I absolutely LOVE it! Its so fun to help friends plan for their babies arrival and shower them with gifts. This weekend I hosted my first baby shower for Alexa. She is due November 14 the same day as Brieann, my best friend from home. It has been so fun hearing both of their stories and different events that have happened along the way. This is Alexa's second baby so we called it a "Sprinkle"
We would love for you all to follow us while we share our experiences throughout our journey for the next couple years!
Sunday, October 20, 2013
Monday, September 30, 2013
Melbourne
Last weekend Jason and I spent the weekend in Melbourne. So far, I think this may be my favorite city in Australia... only compared to Sydney so far. We did actually get to spend a few extra hours in Sydney due to a changed flight, delayed flight, canceled flight all which ended up being a 12 hour layover! But we enjoyed an excuse to see the Sydney Harbor again!
We finally made it!! Melbourne is such a nice, cute city with a lot of cafés and coffee shops in the ally ways. There is so much to see just from walking around the city! We were so excited to visit Melbourne, not only to see another Australian city but we also had friends that live there. Tom was one of my roommates in college. He lived with me and two other girls (poor guy). Tom was raised in Melbourne and came to EKU to play tennis. After graduation I wasn't sure if we would see him again, of course all of us girls said we would come to visit him and see Australia, but who knew it would actually happen!! Jason's friend, Joe, from high school also lives in Melbourne. Him and his wife relocated to Australia for work and unlike us, have been lucky enough to end up in a big city! It was so nice to catch up with old friends from the US on the other side of world!! The weekend that we were there was also the Grand Final for Australian Football League. The city was packed and had such a fun atmosphere... reminded of us of what it would be like for the Superbowl. We watched the parade and walked over to the see the stadium as well. There was definitely a lot of purple and yellow... just not on the same shirts or else we would have thought that we were in Minnesota Viking Territory!
We finally made it!! Melbourne is such a nice, cute city with a lot of cafés and coffee shops in the ally ways. There is so much to see just from walking around the city! We were so excited to visit Melbourne, not only to see another Australian city but we also had friends that live there. Tom was one of my roommates in college. He lived with me and two other girls (poor guy). Tom was raised in Melbourne and came to EKU to play tennis. After graduation I wasn't sure if we would see him again, of course all of us girls said we would come to visit him and see Australia, but who knew it would actually happen!! Jason's friend, Joe, from high school also lives in Melbourne. Him and his wife relocated to Australia for work and unlike us, have been lucky enough to end up in a big city! It was so nice to catch up with old friends from the US on the other side of world!! The weekend that we were there was also the Grand Final for Australian Football League. The city was packed and had such a fun atmosphere... reminded of us of what it would be like for the Superbowl. We watched the parade and walked over to the see the stadium as well. There was definitely a lot of purple and yellow... just not on the same shirts or else we would have thought that we were in Minnesota Viking Territory!
Sports Channel Coverage for the AFL game
This is a bar under the bridge!
Thursday, August 29, 2013
August- The Month of Running
Over the past 5 weeks Jason and I have been training for the Sunshine Coast Marathon Runs. Jason was training for the half marathon, 13.1 miles or 21K, and I was training for the 10K or 6.2 miles. I have never been much of a runner, I remember not even being able to run the mile for volleyball tryouts in highschool. However, much to my surprise a little practice and training went a long way. Jason on the other hand "enjoys" running so he was a good, somewhat annoying trainer. In the evening after work we would run the 5K trail together and Jason would usually go a bit further to get in the extra distance. Jason was training for a half marathon in Lexington but was unable to run it due to an injured Achilles tendon, this was on his "bucket list" for Australia and he did it!! On August 18, we ran the local Bontanic to Bridge 8K fun run to prepare for the next weekends big race. The following weekend we spent on the beautiful Sunshine Coast in Mooloolaba. The race was on Sunday so Saturday we enjoyed seeing the beautiful area and even went out on a "Maiden Voyage" with our friends Ann and Chris on their new boat. It felt so great to be back on a boat, although, ocean boating is much different that lake boating we still loved being on the water under the amazing Australian sunshine!
Monday, August 12, 2013
Happy Birthday Jason!
Jason is officially the same age as me and Bucky! 28! Must be rough living with two that are older and wiser than he is! Last year Jason was by himself for his birthday so I had to make sure that he felt extra special this year! We went to dinner at Scotties, considered an "upper" scale restaurant in Gladstone. The food was great and the company was even better. We had just ordered a bottle of wine and on my way back from the bathroom, Jason was chatting with the girl behind him. Turns out her boyfriend is from Kansas, of course since he was an American we became instant friends. They pulled their table around to join ours and 4 bottles of wine later we had made friends with everyone on the patio and could officially call Jasons birthday dinner a success!
Friday, August 9, 2013
My Friends
Jason and I have been good about documenting our adventures down under for the most part but one area, I feel we don't hi-light as much as we should because they are the biggest part of making living abroad easier and enjoyable is our wonderful friends that we have made! We all get together often and just don't think to take pictures, so on our recent girls night, I made sure to capture a picture of all the girls! All 5 of them are American and are in the same situation as us, where they are thousands and thousands of miles away from home and only have our spouses and eachother to rely on. Since the guys work such long hours, we like to get together for coffee, walks, lunch, sewing (a whole other blog post will be dedicated to this), crafts, book club, and bachelorette nights. All the couples get together for cookouts and game nights! They are all such amazing people and we are so blessed to have met them and have them in our lives.
So meet my friends... :)
So meet my friends... :)
Left to right: Katie, Alexa, Ann, me, Megan and Nicole.
Sunday, August 4, 2013
A Little Local Flair
This weekend Jason and I spend the weekend doing what the locals do. Every first Saturday of the month they have what's called, BAM (Beaches, Art & Music) in Tannum Sands. They have 80 booths set up selling locally made food, crafts, clothes and jewelry. There was also a local band playing all right on the beach. We tried our first "Potato Tornado"!
Sunday afternoon went to a Multicultural Festival at the Marina. We were secretly hoping that there would be an American booth set up with chicken wings, hot dogs and funnel cakes. Although, there wasn't much American style food. We did stand in the longest line for some Jamaican Jerk chicken and our new favorite boysenberry ice cream! We also sat and watched the girls dance from all different cultures which was very entertaining.
Fairy Floss is what they call Cotton Candy
After the festival we decided to walk on the beach. Hard to believe this is winter weather in Australia! No complaints here!
After the festival we decided to walk on the beach. Hard to believe this is winter weather in Australia! No complaints here!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)