Thursday, February 24, 2011

Last morning in Penang



Heading home this afternoon. I can't wait to see the kids and Mark! This is a pic of the sunrise from my hotel room this morning. -kel

Wednesday, February 23, 2011

Dinner and the Market




Last night after a long day in the office we headed out for dinner at a Hawkers Market. This was in a fairly touristy area but full of locals having their dinner. The food on offer was pretty varied and mostly Chinese as Penang is a mostly Chinese area of Malaysia. After dinner we headed to Batu Ferringhi market, it was pretty lame, stall after stall of knock off purses, watches and nick knacks. Not my thing at all, interesting, but no purchases for me. Tonight is another shopping adventure after work...-kel



Tuesday, February 22, 2011

Penang Malysia


This week I am in Penang Malysia for work. Tonight we had dinner in an open air cafe with a tin roof. This "resturant" was pretty much street food with a roof. It was pretty crazy, especially when asked to go "choose" my dinner from the seafood tanks! The lighting wasn't that great so it was difficult to get pictures inside, but here is a pic of me and my dinner to be...it was soooo good! Tomorrow after work we are heading to the night markets at Batu Ferringhi should be another fun adventure. Missing the kids and Mark heaps, but hoping I can find them each a cool present at the markets tomorrow.-kel

Thursday, February 17, 2011

Ice Cream You Scream we all Scream for Ice Cream


Mark was at a work function tonight, so as soon as I got home we headed down to Manly for a special treat, ice creams and some good old fashioned sea gull chasing! We had a blast, the ice cream was super messy, Luca had chocolate and managed to get it in his arm pit in about 5 seconds. After ice cream we took a stroll down towards Shelly Beach, the kids ran after the sea gulls on the walk the entire way there and back. Poor sea gulls were just trying to get some dinner snacks from some of the many people enjoying early evening picnics and fish and chips, only to be harassed by my two! We pulled into the driveway at home at 7:45, kids were washed up and in bed by 8, sound asleep by about 8:01! So simple yet so fun. -kel

Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Happy Fathers Day


Yes, this is the second holiday I have moved to a more convenient date in the last six months. To be honest, it's a total pain, but at the same time completely necessary. Australia celebrates Fathers day in September, normally cool not an issue, however last year we were in the States on holiday and amongst the fun times I totally forgot. The day passed, we didn't even call Mark's amazing dad, to wish him a happy Father's Day. Sooo....after being reminded once by Mark that I basically skipped the one holiday totally dedicated to him I decided to make good ASAP (certainly before Mother's day).

Marks Mom and I planned a surprise day at the beach complete with picnic and presents on Saturday...then Luca got an ear infection (no swimming for a week), ok picnic at the park, play on the toys lots of yummy food....then Saturday morning we woke up to rain, lots of rain (yes, just like halloween)...so we had a surprise Fathers Day picnic in Mark's parents living room.

Mark and his dad were very surprised. It was a totally fun afternoon, not at all what we had planned but fun none the less. Not to worry, this won't happen again, we'll never ever miss fathers day again.

None of this really sounds like high drama, but in reality, it was. Planning a surprise for them was really hard, trying to keep the kids quiet, quickly changing our plans every few days, and even at the last min when Mark's dad showed up at our house about an hour before I was supposed to get the whole family in the car under false pretenses and drive to his house to surprise him!

Every min of drama was totally worth it, when I look back a the last year and the amazing dad Mark has been as well as grandpa and father Mark's dad has been there are no two more deserving dad's out there. From fixing our leaking taps and endless hours of babysitting, building pirate ships and reading princess bedtime stories these two are the absolute best.

Happy Fathers Day Mark and Graham. -kel

Wednesday, February 02, 2011

Cottage



Today was Luca's first day of Cottage at his new school. Cottage is the pre-school (3 days per week) program at the school where he will attend Kindergarden through year 12. Luca was pretty relaxed, happy that he was wearing a school uniform (all "big" kids wear uniforms to school in Australia), happy with his new big boy backpack and that he got a special breakfast of cinnamon rolls. Scout on the other hand was not so happy, she was insisting on going to big boy school too and having her own special breakfast. She even refused to say goodbye to Luca, to think we have another two years before she starts!

Luca and his best friend Sean both started "big boy" school today.

As we walked into the big school, I was a little misty, he is growing up so fast. With his hair cut and his total confidence I couldn't help but think how fast the last four years have gone. He is growing up into such a fantastic little man, we couldn't be more proud of him. -kel