What we're up to.

I've been MIA for a couple of weeks and will be for a couple more weeks...

Eli, Rachael and I are in Florida visiting my family and having ourselves a grand time! And Michael and Jacob are in Australia visiting Michael's family (that's where he grew up and everyone except his mom and 1 sister still live over there). It's strange that it worked out the way it did, but we are essentially on 2 separate vacations.

I've posted some photos of what we've been up to on my flickr page. I don't have enough time to upload them all here, but you're welcome to hop over there and check them out.

We're staying with my parents and we've been to the beach several times, been out on my dad's boat, seen my grandparents, played lots with the cousins (my brother and sister-in-law and their 2 daughters live on the same property as my parents and it makes it easy for playing together) and we are really enjoying ourselves!

I won't be home and back to a normal routine until the 11th of July, so expect the hiatus to continue.

Vacation photos.

I thought it was finally time to update you on our trip to Florida to visit my family, since we've been home for nearly a week already...

We stayed at my grandparents' home and the boys shared a queen bed. It was their first time sleeping together and in the whole 2 weeks we were there, I had trouble only 1 time getting them to sleept!!!

Cousins enjoying dinner at my parents'. Skyler and Eli at the coffee table and Jamie in the Bumbo. Rachael was napping and Jacob was sitting with my youngest brother in the kitchen.

Aaahhhh, I miss this.

My dad with four of the grandkids, Jamie was sleeping.

A night out with my besties (aka the 3 Amigas). I didn't ask permission to post their names so it's W (with N), C (with H) and me with my three. I've been friends with W since kindergarten (22 years) and friends with C since 6th grade (16 years).

Jacob, Eli and Rachael with my grandparents (mom's parents)

Our seating arrangements on the way home. Eli is by the window and is sleeping on my hoodie and his blanket (for cushion) and he's propped on my leg with his feet against the wall. Rachael was in the sling, but wanted to get out.

Across the aisle, Jacob is on the aisle seat and somehow he's sleeping propped on his hand and remained that way for at least 45 minutes. I'm not sure how his arm didn't shoot out from under his head....

It was a great trip and flying with all 3 kids wasn't nearly as difficult as I thought. I was very busy keeping them all quiet or keeping Jacob from bothering the person he was sitting next to, but they were wonderful!

I've posted more pictures on my flickr site. Feel free to go check them out.

Spending a night away from my kids!!!

WOW! One of the few perks the military gives is to let you keep the points for flights and hotel stays when you're on TDY's/deployments, etc. Michael has earned a free night through one of his hotel programs and we are going to use it!! I'm so excited I had to tell you about it even though it's not happening until the 23rd of February!

Let me just give you a little background info. so you have an idea of how huge this is for me! I have spent a total of 12 nights away from Jacob - only 2 of those were voluntary. Here are the reasons: 2 nights when Eli was born and I was in the hospital in May, 2006; 2 nights when Eli was in the hospital with a virus in June, 2006; 6 nights when I was readmitted to the hospital for a blood clot in July, 2006; 2 nights when I was in Florida in August, 2006 and my mom kept him because I was exhausted with a newborn and Michael was TDY. Jacob is now four years old and I can remember every time I've been away from him...

I have been away from Eli overnight for a total of 6 nights. Those same 6 nights I spent in the hospital in July, 2006, when he was only 7 weeks old..... He is 20 months old and the only time I've been away was because I was in the hospital.

The reason isn't that don't like to leave them (because I will leave them with the right person - no problem), it's more like we've never had an opportunity to do something that would require spending the night away and be able to have a babysitter at the same time. We live zillions of miles away from family and paying a babysitter gets expensive.

I'm really excited about this because we have a really great babysitter, a $50 gift certificate to a great restaurant downtown (Mackenzie's), a get together with some friends afterward and we don't have to worry about going home afterward and getting in really late. We will go to our hotel room, sleep peacefully and get up and have breakfast and shower at a leisurely pace in the morning. And the only thing we're really paying for is the babysitter!!!!!

Sonic Manipulator

Melbourne, Australia is amazing! Though I've been here before (in 2002), I am just now realizing it is probably the best city I've ever been to! Mind you, I've never been to NYC to have that to compare it to.... The city is fairly large by my standards - about 4 million people - but the people are friendly, the city is old, but not OLD, it is well laid out and has (in my opinion) the best public transit system in the world. You can go anywhere in a reasonable amount of time and at a reasonable price using public transportation here. The system includes trains, trams and buses and it's wonderful and you use the same tickets for them all!

Big cities have such a wonderful atmosphere (once you can get past all the crazy people!!). We have gone into the city in the evening several times without the children - but usually with one or more of Michael's siblings (he has 5) and it's been so wonderful. We have gone to some of Michael's old hangouts from when he was younger and lived here and we've done A LOT of walking. During our walks we have come across some amazing buskers (street performers)....

One night we came across a Sweedish (he spoke english!) magician doing a show, so we stopped to watch. About 3 minutes in he called ME up to be his assistant for about 10 minutes!! Crazy! And some of the tricks/illusions he performed were completely baffling.


This is me with the magician after his performance and my wonderful assisting!





We've come across lots of other street performers, as well: one guy was drawing art on the sidewalks with chalk - and he was really good at it; we've seen lots of people playing keyboards, guitars and drums made of 5 gallon buckets; and even a guy who had his upright piano on wheels and had brought it with him - but by far, the best performer we've seen is The Sonic Manipulator.



This guy is amazing. I took this video last night. We like him so much we've gone to see him on 3 different occassions! After the first time we saw him, we came home and looked him up on You Tube to see what we could find!

He has posted a video that he made to give the public a little information about him. He has done so well in his performances that he lives solely off the income he makes doing his performances and he only performs on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights in the city (usually at one of 3 intersections). He has a website and can be hired for parties, as well!! Crazy! Oh yeah, and he makes all of his own instruments/sound machines, etc.

Australia update

I know it's been a while but we've been super busy.....

* The first 3 days were spent with Michael's dad and stepmom (the kids were at summer camp) in Melbourne.
* Then we drove about 8 hours to Adelaide where Michael's grandparents all live as well as one uncle and aunt and their 5 kids (we stayed with the uncle and aunt) and one of Michael's cousins who is married with 5 yr old twins. We spent a week in Adelaide visiting with all the cousins and grandparents and were there to help Michael's grandma (his mom's mom) celebrate her 89th birthday!
* We then drove back to Melbourne, which is where we will be for the rest of our trip.

Because it's nearly impossible to chronicle our entire trip, I've created a slide show. It's fairly long but is a good sampling of what we've been doing. I've narrowed it down to approximately 25 photos of the more than 1,500 that I've taken so far.....

Los Angeles - BLECK....

Well folks, the time has come!! We are in Australia!

Short story first - Michael was born in Australia. When his mom remarried when he was about 4 and married an American who was in the USAF and stationed in Australia. Then Michael's ex-stepdad got stationed in another city in Australia, they were transferred to Holland when Michael was about 11 and were there for a few years before moving to Florida - where I met Michael. So, Michael's dad, stepmom, siblings, grandparents and aunts and uncles all still live in various cities in Australia. We have not been over since 2002 (before we had kids) and other than Michael's dad visiting us a few times in the last few years, Michael doesn't get to see his family very often and none of them have met our kids! So, we started planning this trip (and saving our $$) about a year ago and here we are!!!!

We left Colorado on Sunday, December 23rd and flew to Los Angeles. We spent a few days in Los Angeles - and drove down to San Diego one day to go to Sea World! This post is actually going to be about our stay in Los Angeles....................... I had never been there and Michael had been once on a TDY for a few days.

Day 1 - we arrived around lunch time and got our rental car and headed 2 miles to our hotel! Gave the kids a short nap and then we decided to go to Santa Monica for the rest of the afternoon/evening.



This is a photo of the famous Santa Monica pier. It was 2 days before Christmas and it was totally crazy. I know it's part of LA and LA is famous for the zillions of people, but it's really crazy to actually see how many people there are and all the different "styles." Oh and all the "crazies!" I could definitely NOT live there.

Day 2 was spent at Sea World in San Diego.


The kids had an amazing time, loved every minute of our time there and were very well behaved even without naps!! Jacob's has said several times that his favorite show was the Sea Lion and otter show!





















Day 3 - the morning was spent driving around looking at famous Hollywood things and then we had to head to LAX at around 3:30 for our flight.


Of course, no trip to Los Angeles is complete without a photo of the Hollywood hill!




Grauman's Chinese Theater and a few "characters" standing outside. Hollywood Blvd. is very strange...... characters everywhere. We saw, Darth Vader, some storm troopers, spiderman, batman, incredible hulk, Homer Simpson, a transformer and Chewbacca!

Sunset Blvd.

I know I already said this, but I NEVER, ever want to live in/near Los Angeles - thankyouverymuch!

Next time I'll write about our flight (with 2 small children). Let's just say it's LOOOOONG.