The First Day of School!

 Emma's uniform is the gold polo with blue shorts, skort, or pants.  As you can see in the other photo, she also has a blue cardigan, and she wears a blue hat when outside.  In Australia, kids are not allowed out in the sun at school without hats on.  And they are supposed to go to school with sunblock, but so far we have only made that happen one out of four times (better luck next week).

 Kristen wears a white polo with black trim or a black polo with white trim.  She also has the black sweatshirt on that is part of the uniform.  Shorts are to be black or blue and shoes are black.  At the Canberra Grammar School the girls wear potato sack dresses - yes, I really mean it.

Here is Alex in her school uniform!  She wears whatever she wants!  

Big Eggs

Last week we were doing some grocery shopping at the markets in a suburb called Fyshwick.  The markets here are not the same as European markets.  At European markets, they are set up and break down style and a different vendor may be in a different location each week.  At the Fyshwick markets the buildings are permanent and vendors are always in the same place but they are only open with fresh goods from Thur through Sun and Sunday afternoon everything fresh is on sale to get rid of it.


There is an Asian store that sells American candy.  Candy that would cost $1 per box in the US is $4.50 here.  Our least favorite stores are the meat stores ... they just stink!


We were in a health food type store at the market and we found these amazing huge gigantic eggs.  The brown egg on the far rights is a normal sized chicken egg.

The real surprise with the eggs was cracking them open.  As you can see, all of them have double yolks!

Here is the end result:  Eggs on toast with potatoes, bacon (not as Americans know bacon, closer to Canadian bacon), fresh kiwi and a super-tart grapefruit.

Yummy!!

Tidbinbilla

Today we went on an outdoor adventure at the Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve.  Tidbinbilla means "boy becoming man."  It is a large nature reserve about 30 minutes from our house and you literally feel like you are in nowhere.  There is a lot of wildlife, though we didn't see a lot.  A lot of the wildlife comes out later in the day or you have to get further from the type of trail we were on today.  We took it easy and stuck to the paved path today.


At the playground on the way in ...

It has a water pump so Mike was trying to make a lake and turn it into a river, but the dams don't work so well, so no river.

This lizard like animal is about 12" long.

Also 12" long.

Our first black cockatoo sighting!!!

First Time Using the Dutch Oven

First Time Using the Camp Dutch Oven

Last summer at girls camp, we were privileged to have someone cook for us using Dutch ovens.  It was fun to watch and learn and ask questions during the process and thought someday, when I am not moving all the time (every 9-18 months) I will buy a Dutch oven or two.  Well, that day has arrived because:

A) My oven is tiny (a 15" round pizza stone will not fit);

B) The oven takes at least 30 minutes to get to 350 degrees;

C) The oven makes the kitchen super hot.

I ordered the 12" Dutch oven with the necessary supplies.  I wanted to cook two loaves of bread tonight, but I can only get one in my oven, so we decided to break in the Dutch oven and it was so cool!

You can see the process of heating the coals to cooking.  It was loads of fun and we cannot wait to do more with it.  And it didn't take 30 min to get hot, nor did it heat up the kitchen!

These things are SO cool to heat the coals!!!

We made a little wall to keep the wind off the oven.

Halfway through cooking!

I don't have a picture of the completed project, but it doesn't look too different from the above one.  The top of the bread looked stretchy and a bit shiny and I am not sure why it did that.  But I will learn as I go and oh what fun it was to learn something new!

Mike's Birthday Build Up

So Mike said he didn't want any presents for his birthday this year.  Too easy.  We decided, because he LOVES chocolate, to do Seven Days of Chocolate starting a week before his birthday on the 29th.  We got to work on chocolate dessert making.


We began with a flourless chocolate torte which translates into a whole bunch of eggs and melted chocolate and not much else.  The topping is even more melted chocolate and a smidge of corn syrup.  But I had to use glucose syrup because Aussies don't have corn syrup and glucose syrup is so thick it can almost stand up by itself.  But it worked!

I don't have the picture from night #2 but we made oreo truffles with a chocolate coating.  However, we had some issues resulting from ingredient discrepancies so the chocolate coating actually had to be rolled by hand until it was flat then formed around the oreo truffle.  Will not be doing that again!

Night #3 ... After TONS of labor, we decided to end the seven days of chocolate early and go out with a bang.  So we invited some friends over and enjoyed:

Chocolate Orange Cheesecake
It calls for condensed orange juice, but Australians don't have that either so we used a LOT of orange zest.

Though this looks like Lady Liberty's crown, it is simply torte slices arranged creatively.

The cupcakes were chocolate cupcakes and white chocolate cupcakes.  The choc cupcakes had melted chocolate in them and the icing consisted of melted chocolate and butter ... and that's it.

The white chocolate cupcakes had white chocolate in them, white chocolate in the icing and white choc chips on top of the icing.  I didn't eat any, but they got a lot of #1 votes.

Oreo truffles are on the blue platter ...

Because we had already cooked SO much and there was so much dessert leftover, we stopped at night #3.

In order to hide the evidence so Mike never knew what was up when he got home we:

• washed, dried, and put all dishes away
• hid any ingredients in placed he wouldn't look (like in the kitchen cupboards and drawers)
• took the trash out before he got home
• hid the desserts in creative places like Alex's dresser
• changed any clothing that had chocolate on it
• opened the windows so nothing smelled like chocolate

It was fun but TONS of labor.  And Mike may need to lose 5lbs, but he rides to work and exercises often, so it should go quickly.

Some of the more fabulous things about Australia ... Since I previously highlighted some of the not-so-fun things about Australia, I thought I would cover what is so great.

 1. Kangaroos.
 They are so cool! Kangaroos to Aussies are like deer to Americans - you see them everywhere all the time, but I have never lost the fascination with deer and won't with kangaroos either. I love the way they stare when we walk by, their HUGE ears twitching, and their human like arms hanging down.

 2. The Weather
The locals say this is the end of a ten year drought and I am SO grateful to be here this year and not a previous hot and dry year. The weather has been very mild with only two days around 90 thus far and we are right in the middle of summer. Most days are in the 70s, but it still requires hats and sunblock. The UV Index was 14 recently!

 3. Bike Trails Galore!!!
You can get ANYWHERE on a bike around Canberra.

 4. Nearby Mountain Peaks
 There are 33 or so mountain peaks ranging from 700m to about 1200m all within a days drive/hike/drive back home. Incredible.

 5. Two hours from the ocean.

 6. Two hours from snow-skiing (we won't talk about how much it costs, just that it is nearby).

 7. The People.
Aussies are SO laid-back and friendly and they think we are cool because we are foreigners to them. Someone asked me today where my accent is from ... never been asked that before!

 8. Having an APO
Our military post office box is a life-saver; there is no other way to put it. It is our one truly "American" thing here.

 9. The Church
No matter where in the world you go, it is the same. Phew!

10. Triple Cream Brie
Never had it before, don't know how I will live without it after Australia. It is the BEST ever.

The Playground at Mount Stromlo

Mount Stromlo is about a 7k ride from our house. There are bike trails ALL over Canberra, so it is easy to get anywhere in or near the city by bike. Mount Stromlo has mountain bike trails on it and an area called the playground with some challenging things to ride on (more challenging for some - like myself - than others - like Kristen). You can choose the easy green paths, harder blue or tough black at the Playground. For the really good there is a trials course where you have to wear full gear and a helmet - double black diamond!

The Playground has trees to ride over, teeter-totters to ride on, and other such fun things. Here is Emma on the planks and Kristen on the teeter totter.