Australia Day

Maren started day care this week – the first day was great, the next 2 were more difficult (at least for drop offs) as she realized what was going on. She has great teachers and a really neat outdoor play area – hopefully she will enjoy going as much as she did in Ohio.

The big girl on her first day of daycare in Australia:

We took the bigger kids on some errands and to the library so they could have something to read/look at while Eric and I got in some work hours. But we also got in some play time. We took a 20 minute drive south and swam at Lake Buffalo:

 

The school for the older kids (Myrtleford P-12 college) is on our road only 600 m from our house and Maren’s daycare is about 500 m beyond that so one of our “to dos” this week was figuring out bicycles for everyone. The house came with 2 adult bikes and we scoured garage sales, thrift stores (called “op” shops for “opportunity”), and roadsides for options for the kids. We ended up buying an infant seat to attach to my bike for Maren and got new helmets for the lot of us.

Maren and E’s wheels:

 

Cadie and Eric testing their brakes on our driveway:

 

Thursday (today) was Australia Day. This is similar to Independence Day in the US but commemorates the day that the first English fleet landed at Australia. We spent the day at the Bright splash pad and river park with new friends from church (and about 1,000 other people). Lunch Oz style: sausages grilled on the “bar-be,” watermelon, and pavlova (a cooked meringue cake topped with fresh fruit – today it was mango and passionfruit). The bigger kids and Eric tried out the water slide that dumps you in the river:

Maren was content with splashing and puddle jumping:

Celebrate with face paint!