A really great day!

This weekend we walked across the Harbor Bridge. It is one of our "bucket" items that we had been dying to do. Also on our list the bridge climb. We will tackle the climb when someone adventurous comes to town (Matt and Julie?).

That morning he woke Mike up, later I asked him what he said to Daddy when he woke him up, he said firmly, "I SAY GET UP DADDY, GO PEEP PEEP" When we were deciding what to do for the day he was "reading' one of the Sydney guides and said, "how bout ice hopper." Opera house

Checking out the stair climb

Car...your going the wrong way!!! 

Pylon

The bridge climb

Have I mentioned Sydney has an accessibility problem

The view from Observatory Park

His new thing is to line his "guys" up on the pillow to get them ready for "night night"

They are getting so big, only Daddy can manage storytime in the rocker still, I can barely get my arms around both.

Lots of white boomas

Mommy sleeping with two babies

DINGO!

The boys thought this was the coolest!

The first time I have ever seen a peacock in full regalia! AMAZING! When you see a creature like this it is hard to deny God.

My little animal lover

Car dumped his food on the roo which upset Colin who was enjoying feeding the roos

Pretty good stuff huh?

Mama Wallaby with a BIG baby in her pouch

Yeah, I have no idea either?

Carols at Balmoral

They did not sing 6 white boomers! It is not so popular here! My brother steered me wrong!

No one wants a picture with Mommy :(

The very very very nice American Jenny from Cali who has helped us transition into life in OZ. It seems there are no real coincidences, if I had not found her on my own through stalking her blog, I would have probably found her anyway, her BFF's mom is one of Sally's dear friends in Cali. Small world, really really small world! 

Her daughter, who Carson attached himself to and if he was not two would have probably had a restraining order against him or an angry Daddy at best. He even touched her tushy at one point! Where does he pick up this stuff????

Are you serious there Clark?

My pics stink, if you want to see beauty check the Sydney website

When Mike first mentioned he really wanted to take the family to see the fireworks in Sydney I actually ignored him and thought he would forget or maybe I thought it was the Pinot talking? He did not forget. He brought it up again and again. It is really rare for Mike to say he REALLY WANTS to do anything so when he said he REALLY wanted to see the fireworks I figured I should try and be amicable and  humor him, afterall, he puts up with all of my crazy so I kind of more than owe it to him. To clarify about why this is such a crazy idea, some people arrive to watch fireworks 4 days prior, by us, it is 6 hours prior, that is still way too long for the boys(and their mama). So the plan that was executed was: Wake the boys up from a peaceful slumber at 10 ish(Mike started asking if it was time at 9:30, I sent him on packing duty to try and occupy him for an hour or so) and walk to a point that was not an official super crowded lookout and watch. As a Mom who has done so many late nights and no sleep nights, to wake a sleeping baby was as much against my nature as a fish walking. But, I did it. Col rolled over and hid his little arms under him so I could not get to him, Car gave me this look from Mike's arms that said, "MOMMY, are you letting the inmates run the assylum, does this mean we don't have to eat veggies and brush teeth anymore???" No, Son, it just means Mommy is temporarily insane, we will be back to our regularly scheduled life soon!

So we loaded them in the trusty BOB and headed toward the harbor.  We found a great spot, the boys were so excited, running around in their jammies and sneakers saying "firewohk, firewohk firewohk," then the firewohks started and the boys were not so excited when they realized firewohks were "too loud, like thunda" Col got back in the stroller under the blankets and Car watched pretty happily. They were an extraordinary display, the best I have ever seen or will probably ever see! We got in around 1ish to bed by 2, I was sure we would be up at 7, but the boys gave us a great gift, the whole family slept past 10. I felt like a teenager on all that sleep!

I got all dressed up for the evening!

I prefer a world bathed in sunlight

It is true, I would never ever make it in Seattle. After 5 straight rainy rainy days in Surfers Paradise(which I decided is one stop above Daytona Beach, only kept that way by the Asian tourists which class it up a little and don't "show out" the way some of DB finest do), trying to "make the best" of it, we were released from our sentence to continue our trip. We headed down PCH to Coffs Harbor. We drove the same drive 5 days prior and I thought huh? it is nice but was it worth the drive? In sunlight...the answer is clear...YES!

Sadly, I did not stop at the M.N.H for HOT NUTS, apparently I was the only one who did not stop, there were cars EVERYWHERE! Nor did I hit up a roadside stand but I did get to enjoy all of this in Coffs Harbor. This place is great. I would love to go back but I feel there is so much more to see! 

We stayed at the Coffs Harbor Novotel, the last place with vacancy, and it was a far cry from our lovely Surfers Paradise Marriott. Ahh trade offs!

 In Coffs we ate at The Fishermans Co-op at the marina. Walk up get ultra fresh fish( for so cheap, Mike's cajun fish was $5) find a picnic table and enjoy. After dinner we were driving around checking out the town and we passed this carnival. Carson was adament from the back seat that he needed to ride a horse. So we stopped and he rode a horse. Col wanted to but there was a ride making a loud noise behind him, he choose the boats. But what he really wanted to ride were the bumper cars and the crazy "matterhorn" ride where the cars go around in a circle fast, so fast they get airborn and then they stop and do the same thing backwards, my adrenaline junky cried and cried to ride it, "i ride I ride i ride"

I ride I ride I ride

A beautiful antique carousel, imagine the work it takes to transport this treasure

Coffs Harbor Carnival

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Seaworld

Bottomline: Thank goodness we did not pay for tix to Seaworld! We have a friend that says if you think of Oz as Cali 30 years ago some of the quirky stuff does not seem so quirky. Well said and applicable for Seaworld. My first thought when we walked in is that it looks like Disneyland does in some of the historical pics. Seaworld is small, really dated, and feels crowded due to the really poor design of how people get around the park, rides and shows. One road in one road out kind of set up. It also rained and rained and rained. Our kids did not realize the animals doing tricks in the shows were animals so they could have cared less. We went twice and both times it was miserable. It even rained on us in the monorail, yes it rained inside the un-airconditoned monorail. That is before the monorail broke down.

If you have older kids it does offer alot of one on one interactions with the animals for an extra fee. It also has a big grown up style play area and a small water park These look really fun for the older set.