Queensland Trip

Now that Chris is finished with work in Canberra, we're all going on a 3 week vacation to Queensland. Here's a map of Australia.



We lived in Canberra (in the southeast corner of the map). Queensland is the north east territory. We drove up to the Brisbane area (2 day drive), and are starting our vacation about an hour north of Brisbane. Then we'll drive about an hour south of Brisbane for about 5 days. Then we'll fly up to Cairns (it's a little north of Townsville) for 6 days. Once we're back from Cairns, we'll start the drive back to Canberra to take care of a few things and then it's back to the US for us!

Our first day in Queensland was a relaxing beach day. Morning playing on the beach, and afternoon checking out playgrounds on the beach.

Happy boy at the beach! He loves to eat sand and army-crawl into the waves. Emily refused to touch the sand until just recently. Funny how different they are :).


He's checking out his path to the waves


She was a little nervous at first, but now she will run right into the water on her own :)


Playgrounds on the beach!


Fun sand-pouring toys




Family photo

Floriade

Every spring, in late September and early October, there is a festival in Canberra called Floriade. It is a celebration of Spring, so we had to check it out on our last full weekend in Canberra. There were rides and food and arts and crafts and lots of flowers and games and shopping. We had such a lovely time!

Super dad!


Lots of fun arts and crafts


Checking out a butterfly


Little did we know at the time - this guy LOOOVES him some sand.


Water table


I think they adore each other :)


Drummer Girl


Our Music Man plays the maracas


Parachute Fun


Picking at the ground


The kids aren't feeling the "photo shoot" vibe mom wanted.


They had teacups...so of course we had to go :)

Boy, are we overdue for a post!

So we had Ethan's birthday party at Lollipops. Everyone had a great time. Here are a few photos from our small party at home with just family, and our larger party with friends.

We started things off with some finger painting.


Artist hard at work


Not a huge fan of opening presents...it was almost his bedtime.


So Emily offered to help


I love these kiddos!


Checking out his cake (we had candles, but no match/lighter to light them :()


Yum yum


Daddy loves cake!


So does Emily


That weekend we took the birthday boy to Lollipops


Some of our friends came to celebrate


Not a fan of his crown


Went for a ride in the birthday throne


Group shot!


His first ride on the teacups. He did great!

1 year old

Happy first birthday to my sweet E-man! I can't believe he's one. What a sweet charming little boy he is. He loves to flirt with strangers. He worships his big sister. She's the first thing he looks for when we get him out of his room in the morning. He sings (or hums) along when you sing a song to him. He loves to dump his bucket of blocks all over the living room and make a big mess for mom to clean up :).

We had a small party today for him just the 4 of us. This weekend we are having a larger party for him with friends at an indoor playland called Lollipops.

We love you sweet little man.

Grandma Susan and Grandpa Mike

Grandma and Grandpa came to visit in early August! We spent the first weekend at Jervis Bay, the following week in Canberra, and the second weekend in Sydney. I was feeling very sick at the end of the visit and didn't get to copy over Grandma's pictures :(.

On a whale watching tour


And we saw whales!


Towards the end of the trip, Emily was feeling a little seasick. So we sat at the rear of the boat like this for a while. The captain saw that she wasn't feeling well and gave her a stuffed dolphin. Emily named him "Seal".


But then dolphins started chasing our boat as we re-entered Jervis Bay! There were at least a dozen of them


Playing on the whitest sandy beaches in the world! (according to the Guiness Book of World Records). Kinda hard to tell during sunset though. All the day-time pictures are on Grandma's camera.


Throwing rocks in tide pools.


Grandma and Grandma discovered these neighborhood Roos just down the street from our house when they went on a walk.


Grandma bought Ethan a cupcake for an early birthday party. :)


In Sydney, they went to a Wildlife Park and got to see lots of Aussie animals!


These Roos were "hugging" (or fighting).




They had really cool albino roos!


Grandpa Mike is shaking hands with a Kangaroo :)