A Wonder Full Day at the Airshow

Kookaburra was let loose with the camera at the airshow on the weekend and of the gazillion shots these are probably the best! I was so surprised he didn't take more, right down to including the tarmac of the runway.


This was a Dadda day. All the men headed off to a neighbouring town about an hour and a half away while I had a rest and recoup day visiting friends and hanging out at home.

Fulltime Mumma's need a little time to refresh!


Kangaroo at the wheel of the Rocket Car. Check out the back!


An eye for the sky? Our boys get a closer look at the inside of a cockpit. I'm guessing there was a little glare that day, he he.


A snapshot of the future perhaps.


Those tricky planes tearing up the sky.



Our boys really do love the police vehicles.


Ahhh... yeh.... sad faces in the back of the paddy wagon. Maybe Dadda was all worn out after all the questions, excitement and chattering and the constant buzzing of ideas?! Two little boys nattering endless can wear us out :).

Our little men really did have a wonder full day at the airshow and sharing it with their Dadda was super way to grow a little closer together.

Snapshots of our 'Wicked' Day

We'd been waiting ever so patiently since last August to see our very first stage musical and wonderfully, as a family. I was apprehensive about the family friendliness of this musical but after scouring the net for every piece of video of the show I could and through seeking the advice of friends who had been to see it, I was able to piece together enough of the show to have a fairly accurate visual. Upon this information Mr E and I were able to make enough of an informed decision to chance it. After all, it's a mega load of dollars to have to walk out on.

We took our seats in the middle of the third road and I could feel excitement thrill us as we took in the amazing set. And then the music began! If you haven't seen or even heard of 'Wicked', check it out. Truly amazing. I frequently stole quick glances at the faces of all my boys in the dancing light cast from the stage, they were rapturous.

Wicked was truly amazing.

We wandered out of the Lyric theater on a total high with Wicked music drumming through our heads (and has remained there for the past week) but our thoughts turned pretty quickly to the hunt for an apparently new Max Brenners hiding away somewhere at Southbank. A misty, silvery drizzle began to gently fall upon us as we hurried in our hopeful search for the elusive chocolatier. It was such a romantic and blissful feeling to come in out of the cool wet air into the warm restaurant and then wrap our hands around intensely rich, hot chocolates.

A simply pleasurable day.

I love my men and it was so nice to be with just them. Even though we were surrounded by people wherever we went whilst in Brisbane, the busyness of the people couldn't touch us. Wrapped up tight in the cocoon of our family's togetherness it was so easy to get lost in us.

This is why we love to get away. The experiences, exposures to ideas and the wonder. And happily the exclusivity of our family unit. When we escape like this I feel like we float in a temporary bubble of complete happiness. Just for that moment no stresses or worries can touch us.


The display outside the theater was uber cool:

Loved that and this....

A chance for a lovely photo with my boys....

We traipsed back through South Bank over the Goodwill Bridge where bikes zoomed by at frightening speeds and over enthusiastic fitness peeps hammered the concrete past us, Kangaroo was inspired and took off in a run. He really makes me laugh!

A perfect end to a perfect day.

Exuberance :D

'joyful enthusiasm;

the emotion of great happiness;

a feeling of excitement;

overflowing with eager enjoyment'


Live and Love our Lives with great Exuberance!!!



I just can't keep quite on Wordless Wednesday :)



For more beautiful pics please visit
Hope, Faith & a whole lotta Love.

The Key Word was Places

and so please, pah- lezze!!!!!! I beg of you to grin and bear my photo log from last weekend :D Our little visit to the castle was not the point of our trip away but it was actually to see Mr E's grading for Martial Arts.

Zen Do Kai - Blue Belt

and Muay Thai - Blue Singlet

So my Fantastic Mr E has increasingly become more lethal weapon over the past year or so and it is awesome to see him enjoying and striving towards a goal and working hard and being dedicated to achieve it. Nice one Babe ;)

And just to counter all that hard work I got to introduce my darling Mr E and little company to the decadent and indulgent Max Brenner. A cafe, I guess it would be called ?, devoted entirely to the love of chocolate with an extensive menu offering an array of sugary concoctions to sweeten our day. We ordered divine hot chocolates and delightful milkshakes,

The wait was almost too much to bear for our little Kangaroo. To see our hot drinks served but not the main saw him almost dissolve into a storm of tears and at the very least his bottom lip expanded into a big, fat pout. He flashed us the saddest face whilst emitting strange cranky growls of frustration. Yep, that's our Kangaroo - a torrent of emotions!

but the piece de resistance was the Chocolate Fondue Towers served with tempting, red ripe strawberries, delicious banana bites, fluffy marshmallows and chunks of freshly baked banana bread all cut perfectly to size for dipping inelegantly (or maybe that was just me :P) into the chocolate fondue and covering it thickly with rich, sweet, oh heavenly sweet choc-O-lat! Oh dear, getting a tad too excited there, best settle down :P!

Way too delicious to just look at :D

Bye, Bye Num Nums!

So after we came down from our sugar high we zipped to our hotel , eyed the bed greedily for a denied kindy nap and quickly dressed ourselves for the Belle of the Balls Birthday Party.

Princess Sparkles is now 18!!!!

The one time tiny little girl who was our teeny, little flower girl at our wedding eleven years ago has grown into this beautiful woman. I'm hoping and praying that she'll keep her feet firmly rooted to the ground and works hard to rock our little world with the amazing things she'll do. Can't wait to watch her story unfold.

So one more skip and a jump before we headed on home to our poor, abandoned Little House.

Please meet the tallest building in the southern hemisphere and the twentieth tallest in the world.

The week before our trip away my boys were watching the ABC Schools Shows and the feature was on buildings. After much excited discussion we decided a trip to the top of this building was a must to reinforce all the lovely concepts they had learned during the program.

I cannot adequately express just how buzzed I was to have Mr E along for one of our excursions!!! It was hugely exciting for me to see him offer up to our boys his knowledge and answer their ga-trillion questions.

Quite a view. Our car is on the next block and it was just a speck of blue. We were behind enormous floor to ceiling glass windows which was fantastic because not only did we feel (mostly!) safe about being up so high but it was the only way we'd be getting any of my family up there :D Bunch of scaredy cat chickens that we are, or is it that we like our own skins intact?! and at a safe ground level :P!

Yep, 77 storey's high! And the elevator travels from the ground floor to that seventy-seventh floor in a mind-boggling, ear popping 45 seconds or less!!!

Imagine hauling yourself out there to tighten a loose bolt!

Spectacular!

My brave comrades and I.

I guess once we came back down to ground level, Kangaroo must have had a difficult time readjusting and just felt he needed to be above the crowd and where better than on Mighty Dad's shoulders - the absolute best seat in the house.

Oh the Places You'll Go

Remember last Friday's post that Mr E and I were taking our restless, little natives away for the weekend? Well here are some photos of our visit to a 'real' castle! (A tourist attraction but as far as Kookaburra and Kangaroo were concerned it was pretty darn real :D

Kangaroo was bouncing off the walls excited to go and everyone we met oohed and ahhed over his little costume. Which of course made him chattier then ever! We even had other tourists encouraging their children to pose for photo's with Kangaroo like he was a part of the attraction :D

Entrance to the castle held a humorous, little warning :)

Kookaburra and Kangaroo pointed and chatted their hearts out. I'm a wee bit guilty of being glad to leave in the end :P - I was thoroughly exhausted from all the questions!!!

Real Knights Armour and of course Kangaroo was fascinated and wanted to know all about their weaponry. How on earth do I shift his focus from weapons?! His play continuously involves weapons of some description - guns, knives, swords, bombs etc, etc. Even though I try to distract him and if I think hard enough I know the theme is not constant and rarely malicious or directed at other children, I feel mostly that my efforts to discourage such play is in fact futile. We read so much history and inadvertently we are reading tales of battles, armies conquering, stories of survival - we love our hero tales - that for better or worse Kangaroo is playing out what his mind is being fed. So to balance this theme out I try to consciously include character type books so as to feed his mind with another type of food.

Remember the television show 'Xena: Warrior Princess'? Well this is the real throne from the set! Pretty cool for me as I watched the show during my twenties (I think) but I was the only one really excited to see it.

I want one of these!!!!
Somewhere I can hide out :D

So, so many steps.
Up and down and around and around.

Play acting in the Dungeon!

What a view.

Our ever cautious Kookaburra struggled to ascend the last remaining few staircases, whilst Kangaroo was hurrying on ahead out of sight.

Like chalk and cheese our boys.

I'm pretty darn proud of my Kookaburra for getting as far up as he did. Kookaburra has a very healthy fear of heights which frustrated him nearly to tears during this excursion. He battled indecisively to go as far as he did and he was so disappointed when he found he couldn't make it to the very top of the final turret.

Exploring.

The castle housed an enormous doll collection which we could have hung out in for hours reading everything and admiring it all. The doll that left the biggest impression was one made entirely from sugar and stood about a hand high. Fascinated by the concept, Kangaroo and Kookaburra were still talking about it a few days later.

When it was time to go, I was glad to see I wasn't the only one absolutely exhausted. Our poor little showman needed his beauty sleep :) because there is always a new audience waiting unawares at wherever our next stop may be!

A Long Awaited Treat...

has finally arrived. Naturally, we waited till the eleventh hour to part with our voucher for the kiddies to go horse riding. Only yesterday, Brother Bear and I called with baited breath the Horse Riding School regarding a suitable time and fortunately here we are on Sunday, the ride completed and loved!!!!!

Kookaburra was dubious but excited, apprehensive and a dash of nervous.

Princess Calamity on the other hand was Kookaburra's polar opposite. Brimming with excitement, her little face glowed with the coming of the horses.

Two hours of moseying along in the saddle, trotting through Australia's beautiful bush listening to her soundtrack of Galah's and Cockatoo's, pretty Nice way to spend a Sunday morning :D

I'm going to mark this one up for the future, as an excellent confidence building exercise and next time Kangaroo will be coming too.

*btw - every now and again or perhaps more often than not, I'm going to post a Confession and a Pride Point at the end of a Post. Why? Confessions are to keep me real and human and usually humorous, the Pride Point helps me feel like I accomplished something whether it be trivial or grand. So here goes:

Confession:
* I loved horse riding today. Kookaburra had someone else to ask his gazillion questions of and therefor gave my poor little cabbage ears a chance to rest.
* I refuse to enter our playroom/ storage room because it's a freaking tragedy and if I close the door I can be oblivious to it's existence :)
* And I let my kiddo's run around the backyard freezing wet because I ran their bath too hot.
* One more, I can't wait for Kangaroo to hit the sack because if he bellows"MMUUUUMMM!!" once more, we may end up one less child here at Irini :P

Pride Point:
* Floors cleaned and washed.
* Herme's bird cage completely scrubbed and sanitised all ready for him to flutter and poop his little heart out in. Just got to put everything back where it belongs and I'm ready to start the new week.
* Had a great time with my son's today.

Hmm... well, that looks kinda balanced :D