Maybe this one will stick...

Okay, I think Steve and I have finally decided on a title for this blog. Australian meets Canadian. I think that pretty much sums up our life at the moment.

Steve (the fish) Dickinson...

Steve spent the entire time at the beach today in the water and since we always post pictures, I thought you might enjoy a video, for a change. It sounds so windy but it really wasn't that bad!

What we did today...

Today we rented a car and headed to Bribie Island (about an hour outside Brisbane). We actually got a Toyota Corolla as a rental (what we had in Montreal). Corollas here have the body of a Matrix at home, with the hatchback. I liked it but it wasn't very good on gas. The Yaris we rented last week was much better. Anyway, we hung at the beach for a couple of hours (Steve swam the whole time! He's such a water rat!) and then went for lunch. Then, we stopped at this little place on the side of the highway that sells plant pots. We bought a few very cool pots for super cheap! We also found an amazing garden store along the same highway and decided to stop and get some plants. They had SO many plants and they were really quite cheap! Like most of you know, it was sad for me to part with all my plants when we left Montreal, so it's nice to be getting some more. I really find plants make a house feel like a home. I love the plants we got today! It's almost like it was meant to be...first finding the pot store and then the garden place. They look so nice in our house! Now we just need a sofa! Here's some pics of our day...

The beach...This beach goes on for 34 km. You can actually drive it if you have a 4 wheel drive. Apparently, you can see dolphins, emus, dingoes, and kangaroos if you do the drive. We're going to rent a 4 wheel drive and do this soon! As you can see, the beach was dead! I think because summer is over now, Australians aren't doing the beach thing but we still find it warm!


All the plant stuff we bought...


Steve re-potting the plants...


And the plants...We chose ones that are supposed to be super easy to grow indoors...
This one is one of my favorites...love the red flower! Apparently frogs like this one and will live in it if you plant it outdoors.


We put this one in our bedroom. The plant pot is massive and weighs a ton! Poor Steve's back!


This one is on the front porch. We want to get a few more for out there...


This one is supposed to grow like a bird's nest. This is just it's temporary stand, until we buy a nice wood stand...

Good Friday

Yesterday everything was closed here, so we had a pretty quiet day. We did some stuff around the house and then went for a walk. We stopped for lunch before ending up at the Botanical Gardens, where we hung out for awhile. We plopped on the grass and this little bird came over to see if we had anything for him...



I think his wing was broken by the looks of it. Poor little bird. Anyone know what the normal life expectancy is for a bird like this?

We also saw some baby birds and a Mama bird feeding them. The Mommy bird would dive under the water and bring food up and give it to each baby bird. The funny thing is that the Mom would give each bird their piece of food in order and get cross with the babies if they tried to take it when it wasn't their turn! Amazing how even bird Mothers teach their offspring to share! Here's one of the babies...not too little...getting a bit bigger but still cute! They made a little squealy noise when they were looking for their Mama. The cutest thing...they could walk on the lily pads!:)



It was tough to get a good picture, but can you see the water dragon in the water, sticking his head out? He just chilled on the log for the longest time...



Last night we watched a couple of movies. Is it just me or does the movie scene suck right now?? We actually went to see a movie but there was nothing good playing, so we just rented some. Even the rental options were few and far between. We ended up with "John Tucker Must Die" and "Friends With Money". Neither were great but John Tucker was somewhat entertaining. Today we're off to a place called Bribie Island. Looks like a nice day so far, looking forward to heading out. Have a good one everybody!

Funny how life is sometimes...

Well, we're just heading into a 4 day weekend here in the land down under. Easter seems to be a big deal here (although any reason to have time off is well celebrated here!). People are constantly wishing each other a Happy Easter and there's lots of gift giving. Steve got lots of chocolate from his work and I got a healthy chocolate Easter egg from my boss (no dairy and 70% real cocoa). It was yummy! Anyway, I was thinking about where we were last year at this time and realized that it really is amazing how life can change from one year to the next. Last Easter, I was doing this...



...making Easter cookies with Jesse and...



...having Easter dinner with the Purdys (before there was even a Miss Breagha Purdy!). Anyway, who'd a thought last year, that this year, we'd be in Australia and Jesse would be in a kennel awaiting his long trip to join us?! Funny, life. Anyway, I hope you all have a super Easter weekend! Steve and I have reserved a car for Saturday and Sunday and are planning to do some day trips...I'm sure I'll have pics to post, so stay tuned! Friday and Monday are lazy days, which I'm totally looking forward to!

Let me just ask you...

...how crazy is modern technology?!? Guess what Steve and I listened to while we made dinner tonight? C100! (that's Halifax's radio station in case you don't know). We get it through the internet. Mind you, it was the morning show and we were making supper here, but it was still cool. We laughed when they said it was calling for a nice day and it was only plus 5! hehe...sorry...we're so spoiled! Anyway, since you were just waking up when we were winding down, I wish you all a great day in Nova Scotia! Dress warm, they said it feels like -12 there with wind chill! Brrr!

Eggs and...Syrup...

I don't think you can get eggs anymore free range than this! This one came feathers and all! Too bad eggs have been added to the long list of things I can't eat at the moment. I'm still getting belly aches even with not eating dairy, wheat, soy, nuts or refined sugar, so we're cutting out the eggs to "see how I go" (another Aussie expression!). I'm not finding the whole eating thing too bad actually and I do see some improvement. I had my first acupuncture treatment on my belly today. Hopefully that, in combination with diet, will help speed the healing of my digestion up.



Oh! Look what I found at the store...100% Canadian maple syrup (I love the way it says that on the bottle!). I was happy about this...I didn't think you could get it here and the "Golden syrup" they sell here is yucky. It tastes like molasses. My buckwheat pancakes just got better and I can have this guilt free because it's natural sugar.

Just in case...

...you were hoping to brush up on some Australian slang, here's a few expressions I hear everyday, all day. Keep in mind that Australians speak fast, so these expressions usually involve all the words running together...
1. "How you going?" (Australian version of our "How are you doing? or "How's it going?").
2. "Ta" (Australian version of our "Thanks". They say this for everything...you hand them their credit card, "Ta", hold the door open for them, "Ta", ask them to hold for a moment on the phone, "Ta"...Anyway you get the point. This expression seems a bit odd to me.
3. "Yeah, you're alright." Remember...this one especially has to be said fast, with all the words running together. I'm noticing that Australians say this A LOT. If you ask to try on clothes at the store, they say, "Yeah, you're alright", you say you're going to heat some water for tea, they say, "Yeah, you're alright." The list is endless. This is one of my favorite expressions and I find myself using it already.
4. "G'day". This one is pretty straight forward but really is used a lot. "Mate" is often added to this as well. I find men use it more often and often say it to me when I speak to them on the phone.
5. "Toilet", not "Bathroom" or "Washroom". I still find asking where the "toilets" are rude. It just doesn't sound polite, but that's the way it's done here.
6. Mail here is referred to as "Post". So, when you speak to someone and they need something mailed to them, they ask you to "Post it out" or post it to them. I told one lady that we'd mail her stuff out right away and she's like..."No Dear, I need it posted to me." To avoid confusion, I've started saying "post" when I speak to people at work.
7. Nothing is done "right away". It's always "straight away".
8. You don't go to the "drugstore" here, you go to the "chemist".
9. You don't "rent a movie" here, you "hire a movie". Hire=Rent.
10. "Ground beef" is called "Mince" here.
Anyway, I think that about covers the basics. I'm sure this list will grow with time! I have to say, I like the Australian accent. It's especially cute when you hear kids speaking in a thick Aussie accent. I don't know that I'll pick up the accent but I can definitely see myself adopting some of the expressions...

Lazy Sunday

Today, we met Vic for breakfast and then did a little shopping. We also got some stuff done around the house. It was a good Sunday, productive but not tiring. The temps were a bit on the cool side and it clouded over towards the end of the day. It didn't rain but this pretty rainbow came out right over our house...

Noosa National Park

On Saturday we went back to Noosa, this time to go to the National Park that we didn't get to last time. Vic joined us and we headed out around 9. It was actually pretty cloudy and we thought it would rain, but it turned out to be a beautiful day. We went on a hike through the park and then hung out at one of the beaches. It was a beautiful beach but it actually turned out to be a nude beach! We figured it out pretty quickly when there were numerous naked old men walking the beach and swimming! Not everyone was in their birthday suits (we opted for clothes on), however, the ones that were nude, were definitely not shy! In addition to the super tanned naked old men, we also saw a wild koala in a tree (apparently there are lots living around there) and a pretty cool lizard sunning himself on a rock. Anyway, check out the pics below...Hope everyone had a good weekend!

Jesse

Here's all the pics that Nicole from the kennel sent us...Some of them are a little repetitive but I'm posting them all anyway! Just cause he's so darn cute!

More shop talk...

Well...first week back to work down and so far I have no complaints! I REALLY like it. Yesterday at work, I wasn't feeling well and I mentioned to my bosses that I had a very bad neckache and headache. So, my boss gives me a massage and does acupuncture on me and immediately I felt better! How great is that to happen at work?! Today was the first day in a week and a half that I didn't wake up with pain! I did acupuncture in Montreal and didn't see a difference at all but obviously it was the person who was doing it, because I feel much better today, after my treatment yesterday. I am definitely going to book some appointments for some more treatments. They encourage you to do that because they like it if you have an understanding of what each practitioner does and also it's nice for the receptionists to be able to speak from personal experience when talking with the patients. Plus, they just want you to feel good and be healthy. Anyway, here's where I work...http://www.newhm.com.au/default.htm...check it out...It's a great place! It's so calm and "full of positive chi" there!

House guest...

Steve's boss and her husband are building a house about a 30 minute drive from where we live. They went to the house and found this guy hanging out by their window. He was actually injured on his back, so they called the Australia Zoo. However, by the time the people got there, the snake was gone. I actually feel bad that he was hurt:(

Back to work...

It's actually been a pretty busy week! I had my second training day on Monday at my new job and all went well. Since then I have started working what will be my usual 9 to 3 shift. I was by myself yesterday and today and so far it's going good. I think I'm going to really enjoy working there. The people are super nice and it's a very calm work environment (nothing like the daycare!). It's taking me some time though to get used to just being back to work. It feels like forever since I have had to get up and be at work by a certain time! It's definitely going to take me some time to adjust again, but it's nice to have something to wake up and do each day! Other than that, all is going well. The weather is starting to cool off a bit. The evenings get pretty chilly...well chilly by Australia standards, but the temp definitely drops at night and first thing in the morning. I even wore a sweater to work the other morning! The days are still warm though...it kind of reminds me of the end of summer in Canada, when the days are warm but the evenings cool off. Considering if you look through the floors in our house, you can see outside, it gets pretty chilly inside too! We're already planning to get an extra blanket for the bed. We've become total babies...how will we ever go back to a Canadian winter?! I'm going to buy a thermometer for outside so I know what the temp is and then I'll let you know...Oh! and one more thing...The lady who owns the kennel where Jesse is staying sent us some beautiful pics of Jes the other day, but for some reason I'm having a lot of problems with posting pics right now. I posted just one for now but hopefully, I'll be able to put more up soon. Until then...I'm off to to bed...6:30 comes early when you're used to sleeping until 8...or later!;)

New Jesse pics...

Melissa went to visit Jesse the other day at the kennel in Montreal. She put some pics of him on her blog. He looks good! I'm finding it harder and harder to not have him with us:( Check out the pics at www.missasadventures.blogspot.com. I wanted to post one of the pics of Snugs, but blogger isn't letting me...grrr!

My Celebrity Look-alikes

My cool celebrity look-alike collage from MyHeritage.com. Get one for yourself.

My kind of new job...

So, I got a job...kind of. I had the interview at the Holistic Medicine Centre on Thursday morning and they had me go in yesterday for 5 hours to be trained. I am also going in on Monday for the day for more training. So far, I really enjoy it. It's a small clinic but it's busy! It keeps you on your toes! I think I will learn a lot working there. I already learned how to mix some of the Chinese Herbs (Steve says he pictures me in a witch's hat, stirring a big pot, when I talk about doing this). Anyway, hopefully on Monday, they will let me know if I am actually going to start there fulltime (well not fulltime but 30 hours a week...9 to 3, Monday to Friday...how great is that?!). I think yesterday went really well. There is a lot to learn but it's like any job, with time, it'll all come easy. So, I'm going with the flow and hoping that they are happy with me after Monday and everything just falls into place...Fingers crossed!

Well, it seems to be true that everything usually happens at once. I put my name in with a temp agency at the end of last week and they called me on Friday to tell me that they had put my resume through to a company that needs a temp for a 6 month contract. I am still waiting to hear from them about this job. Since Friday, I have also been contacted for 2 interviews, one from a place I had applied weeks ago and the other one is for a receptionist at my naturopath's office (she called me and asked if I had found anything and if I may be interested). So, I've been doing tutorials to improve my excel and power point skills for the temp agency (I go tomorrow to be tested) and then have an interview tomorrow evening and one Thursday morning, with the other 2 places. Who knows if any of them will actually work out but it's nice that I'm FINALLY getting some feedback!!! It would be nice to find a permanent fulltime job that isn't through the temp place. Cutting out the middle man would make it much easier. So...I'll just wait and see what happens and I'll keep you posted...