So Lynnie told me.....

Okay, so I just got off the phone with Lynnie who let me know that February was our last post, which was a long time ago, I was told!! So, I guess it's high time for an update. I seem to only be posting during my uni breaks as I'm now on the first week of three weeks off between terms. One more term of 5 months to go before I graduate and it can't come soon enough!!

 
Since our last post, it's been rather status quo. I had a placement up in Coff's Harbour (6 hours north of Sydney) and Jon and Kona came as well. We rented a little apartment with a beautiful view of the ocean...here's a picture of Jon having his breakfast and enjoying the scenery before starting work.

Here's a picture of us on the beach outside our apartment which was 200m away. Jon would use his lunch break to walk Kona on essentially a secluded stretch of beach. It was beautiful!

  

For our birthdays (which were in March) which seems like for-ever-ago, we went to Melbourne with my parents and it was AMAZING. Melbourne is a fantastic city with skinny alleyways (like in this picture) that are packed with people and little cafes, cupcakes shops and great coffee houses. We walked around the city for hours, ate great food and just had an all-round great vacay with my folks. Alleyways with amazing, clean graffiti were also quite common. They weren't like your normal alleyways that smell and are full of garbage and other unsavoury things...they were spotless and full of people admiring the art. We'll definitely be back for another visit in the near future.

Since then, Jon and I have become a proud Auntie and Uncle again and welcome Preston with open arms into the Fair family. He's an adorable (I want to say little, but he's a BIG baby!!) guy and we can't wait to meet him in the future. Look at that little face!! I just want to give him a big squeeze! Love him to bits already and we haven't even met.

Also, Elizabeth just welcomed Bella, Kona's half sister into their family this week-end. She's a little "mini-me" of Kona and already much loved. Can't wait to meet her too!

I'm sure much more has happened since our last post, but for the life of me I can't think of anything exciting to write! The plan it to pack 6 months worth of exciting things into the next three weeks before life gets crazy again. 

Miss you all!!

L, J & K

An action packed last few weeks!

It's hard to believe it's already February, and our one-year anniversary in Australia has come and gone. My parents arrived in December and the weather was perfect for Christmas! We were all invited to a friend's Christmas Eve Aussie BBQ where they served enough food to feed an army - an amazing feast to say the least! Despite being jet-lagged, we all chatted the night away and we didn't get home until midnight. We then celebrated Christmas Day the traditional North American way with a big turkey with all the fixn's and it was fabulous. We spent loads of time outside on our patio and I'm starting to think that we could really get used to a warm Christmas! We surprised my parents with 4 tickets to a Sydney Opera House performance (and thank GOD they picked us as their dates!) in the Concert Hall which turned out to be more than spectacular. We all really enjoyed it.

Shortly after Christmas we toured down the south coast to Jervis Bay. The sand couldn't have been finer or whiter and the water couldn't have been a more gorgeous shade of pale blue. We all ate more than our fair share of food and spent a lot of time on the beach which is really the hallmark of any great vacation (in our opinion). Jon and I will definitely be heading back.

Then it was back to Sydney for New Year's Eve and what a show this city puts on! The city spent $6.3 million and set off 7000kg of explosives in Sydney Harbour on 6 barges and the bridge. Never seen ANYTHING like it!! We watched from a great vantage point north of the city and Dad EVEN managed to stay up for it and it was well worth it.

On New Year's Day it was off to the Hunter Valley to wine country where we sampled many different wines (I'll leave out the part where you, Dad, asked a million questions at one winery...we'll leave that just between the four of us). The Hunter Valley was then followed by a trip to Port Stephens which is further north where we spent a few more relaxing days before heading back home. Mom & Dad are now touring around NZ and from the sounds of it, having a great time.

Once we shipped off my folks, Jon and I headed up to Coff's Harbour which is 6 hours north of Sydney to enjoy the last few days of Jon's vacation. We were planning on having a stay-cation for the rest of our holidays, but realized we sucked terribly at this and decided to head away. Coff's Harbour has so many quiet beaches and was a great place to relax. Kona had miles and miles of beach to run on without another person in sight.

Oh...I left out the part where Jon went hang-gliding! This was my Christmas present to him. It was amazing to watch (and obviously much more amazing to experience). Once they were all harnessed in, they lifted the hang-glider, took two steps and they were in the air. He spent about 30 minutes up and about and most of the time he flew it.



I'm now on the tail end of my school holiday and will be heading back to uni mid February for my final year (I'm really looking forward to being done). Jon's been working like a dog since the end of our vacation. Work aside, life has been good. We're looking forward to having my parents back for a few days before they start their Ozzie adventure.
Hugs to all of you!!
L&J&K

Spring time in Sydney

Well, as per usual, it's been a while since our last post! It has been a crazy, crazy time since our last posting and so much has happened! The Swords have come and gone on their whirlwind tour of Australia. They arrived at the end of October, spent a few days with us in Sydney and then we all headed to Canberra. Canberra is pretty, but very, very small and quiet which suited Jon and I just fine as we had been very busy with school and work. We toured the parliament buildings, ate and drank plenty...Ruth and David visited galleries and museums...and er...Jon and I slept in. After Canberra, Ruth and David spent a bit more time in Sydney before they headed to Ayers Rock, then to Cairns where they went snorkelling on the Great Barrier Reef and toured the rain forest and then all the way back down to Sydney on a self-drive tour with many stops along the way. It was great having them for a visit!

Before Ruth and David's visit, we celebrated a traditional Canadian Thanksgiving here in Oz! We invited 8 of or Aussie friends and cooked up a HUGMONGOUS 21lb turkey. We'd ordered a big one, but 21lbs was a BIT ridiculous...but with that being said, we actually didn't have that much left over. We cooked up turnips, mashed potatoes, stuffing, gravy, cranberry sauce and pumpkin pies which Australians do not typically eat, but all seemed to enjoy and and some went back for seconds. Although we missed our family and friends back home on my favourite holiday of the year, it was great to have wonderful people to spend it with here in our home away from home.

I had 3 placements during this placement block this term, one of which was in Newcastle, NSW which is about 2 hours north of Sydney. We dropped Kona off at the dog sitters and Jon and I headed north. Jon was able to work from the hotel during the day while I was on placement which made a placement away almost feel like a vacation. Newcastle was really pretty...they have fantastic beaches, great little restaurants and a seawall similar to Vancouver's all around the water's edge. Nobby's Beach, in the photo to the left, was just a short walk down the seawall from our hotel. We spent our evenings outside as the weather for the week was great.

Other than that, we've been spending a lot of time outside...the weather is getting warm and we've had some "feels-like 38C" days but most are quite comfortable. This is a picture of the family at the doggy beach in beautiful Mosman not far from our condo. My parents are arriving in less than a month and we're all pretty excited. They'll be here for Christmas which we're looking forward to!!



Hope all is well back home. As always, we miss you all!
Lori, Jon & Kona

Fine Wine and Warmer Weather

Wassup!?!?

As mentioned in our last post Lori and I finally had a bit of a getaway! We dropped the dog with our puppy sitters and headed for the Hunter Valley, a popular wine region about two hours North of Sydney. We spent a few days enjoying the hotel spa, winery tours and sight-seeing the area.


Notice that the kangaroo on the left has a joey in her pouch.

This was also the first chance we had to see wild kangaroos since arriving. At one winery a couple of roos were having a boxing match or "punch-up" as it is called here. One of the wineries had a pet sheep INSIDE the winery when we arrived and Lori was able to feed it by hand. We discovered some great new wines and we came home with a good haul that should last us a few months. We've started enjoying them on the patio in the evening now that the weather has warmed up. On that note, spring arrives in 2 days!

During Lori's break we also slipped in a trip to the Taronga Zoo in Sydney. Lori had been looking forward to this for quite some time. The elephants were the highlight of the trip especially for Lori who is a baby elephant fanatic. There were three babies that would run around, play and somersault into their "moat". Everything was a game. We spent a better part of the day watching them.

We also took a day trip down the south coast through The Royal National Park to Scarborough where we visited the Sea Coast Bridge which is a picturesque bridge running along the coast in an area where the seaside cliffs are too unstable to maintain a road. You can see it here at the 40 second mark. The scenery was spectacular and the road through the park screamed for a motorcycle - this is on my "to-do" list.

The days are getting longer and warmer. We are spending a lot of time on our patio. We are looking forward to my parents coming to visit in October and Lori's parents coming in December. Lori's back in classes and work is as busy as ever.

Miss you all,
Lori, Jon & Kona

Exams are finished! Winter break begins....

Well, it's winter break for me at least...unfortunately Jon is still working. I wrote my last exam on Monday and thankfully left on a high note (can't say the same for all the exams I wrote!). I'm officially on winter break for 6 weeks. Being the nerd that I am though, I have volunteered for two weeks of extra placements to gain a few more practical hours and clinical experience, but they won't start for a a week and a half, so it's sleep in and relaxation until then. Jon even brought me breakfast in bed this morning...and for no reason at all. I feel spoiled.

We have managed to do some exploring over the past few months and have seen some beautiful beaches - there are really so many to see! The beach in the top pictures is Dee Why beach which was blocks away from my last placement. I luckily managed to land 3 placements that were all blocks from the beach! The second picture is Palm Beach and it's spectacular even on the drizzly day that we went to see it. An Australian TV show called "Home and Away" is filmed here. On this day, this super cute entirely blonde family of three girls aged probably 10, 7 and 5 all jumped out of their land rover with their parents and surf boards and headed fearlessly into the surf. Very different from what we know!

The third picture is a picture of the "Three Sisters" in the Blue Mountains. We tried to see this 12 years ago when we visited Australia on a backpacking trip, but it rained heavily every day and we weren't able to even catch a glimpse.
Finally, on second attempt, the day was beautiful!!





We've also booked a much needed week-end away to wine country to explore some of the Australian wines that we are not familiar with. We found this fantastic German family that will be taking Kona into their home while we go away and they seem very keen to have her which puts our minds at ease.

Hope all is well with everyone back home. So glad summer has finally arrived for you after a wet spring. The weather is cooler here but really nothing to complain about considering it's winter with highs of about 18 and lows overnight of about 10C.

Miss all of you!
Lori, Jon & Kona

What the hell is "crema"?

Ok, so Lori and I don't generally drink coffee. Actually, I don't think I have ever seen Lori drink coffee and I drink it only rarely, but... we both enjoy a mocha... not just a coffee with powdered hot chocolate mix added or from a bottle of chocolate syrup.

Call us spoiled, but it has to be an espresso with REAL chocolate. Well, it turns out that Australians don't do mocha. None of the local coffee shops can make a good mocha AND even if they could, their business hours suck! We did find a chocolatier that makes a great one - but that is a 5 minute train ride away, so after $10 in train fares and a pair of mochas it is near $20! So what did we do to overcome this horrendous tragedy? Naturally we convinced ourselves to buy an espresso machine and make our own... and we do have a 10kg bag of chocolate to use so it makes sense... right?
So after a crash course in espresso and having learned what crema is (the foam on top of an espresso), along with 101 useless facts about espresso, we purchased a Nespresso automatic espresso machine. You insert an air tight cartridge with the flavour of espresso beans you want and 45 seconds later you have a hot cup.

So far we are learning the ropes and enjoying it - and the caffeine buzz I had for the first few days is just starting to wear off :)

On another note, it is definitely autumn here. They do not use the term "fall" because most of the leaves do not fall. Overnight the temperature has been dropping to around 14

degrees and during the day the high is between 20 and 25 degrees. It has rained more, but unlike the Vancouver rain it rains hard and then you get a stretch of nice weather. The other interesting thing about autumn in Australia is that a lot of the flowers are going into full bloom. At some points on our evening walk with Kona the perfume is amazing. To the left is a flower next to our walkway at the condo.



I also thought I would post a few Australia teasers here to encourage you all to come visit us...


... So I guess we will be seeing you soon!

Don't forget to post your comments below!

Miss all of you!
Lori, Jon & Kona

Where has the time gone?

So, our plan of writing a regular blog has definitely gone by the way side as I just realized that our last post was during my first week of school and now I'm 6 weeks in. As Jon put so eloquently...."we suck". :)

Lots has changed since we wrote last. I have suffered through 3 midterm exams and 1 essay with success and will be starting clinical placement preparation next week for two weeks after which my fist clinical placement starts. I have 3 (two or which were assigned to me and 1 of which I volunteered for...I know...nerd). Oddly enough, all of my placements are in beach towns - Dee Why, Mona Vale and Bondi clinics. I'm very excited and a bit nervous to get started. I went out shopping today to update my professional wardrobe...ala Australian style....so I should be all set. The program is great, yet very demanding. I'll be looking forward to a break in the near future.

So, we both have had our birthdays since we wrote last...thank you for all your emails, phone
calls, cards and gifts. They were all greatly appreciated. Jon has REALY been enjoying his new BBQ - I think we've cooked on it every nights since his birthday. Jon has been asking me to bake a cake on it...but really, in my opinion....why??

A little crazy excitement the other day....Jon was out walking Kona and noticed a large-ish spider hanging out on our apartment building's door mat, caught it (in one of my Tupperwares!) and looked it up online. Turns out it was a male, funnel-web spider which is considered the deadliest spider in Australia and one of the most dangerous in the world. I was asleep when he brought it into the condo and wrote "DANGER" on a piece a paper that he placed over the Tupperware container for the night. The next day, Jon brought it to The Sydney University of Technology where it was handed over to their spider guy who will either keep it for research or send it away to get "milked" for the creating of anti-venom. Good thing I'm not afraid of spiders...cockroaches...well that's another story of which I fully blame on my brother Scott who used to catch cockroaches in Saudi Arabia by putting squished up bananas around the holes in the manhole covers over the sewers. Scott - expect a hefty bill from my therapy sessions. ;) Thankfully we do not have any in our unit, but this childhood "trauma" makes me jump and scream whenever one crosses my path on evening walks with Kona.

The weather here is starting to cool down with highs in the early twenties with cooler evenings. It's funny how quickly we have acclimatized to the warm weather and that this now feels cold - I know...we'll likely not get any sympathy in this department!!

This week-end we will be changing our clocks and "falling back". This is not great news for Jon and it now makes it much harder to have overlapping work days with Ottawa. This week, he does have a 4:30am meeting!! Not being much of a morning person and being quite the night owl, he's likely going to have to make some adjustments to his sleep schedule to survive it.

Otherwise life is good. We're pretty much settled into our new condo. We certainly don't have as much time to explore this beautiful country as we would like at this point, but that time will come soon enough. The people are very friendly and relaxed here. There is sooo much to see and do and we're really looking forward to making plans to explore. BTW - we're on Skype, so feel free to call us so we can chat - you can find us by searching for our full names - location - Sydney, Australia.


As always...we miss you all terribly! Hugs your way!
Lori, Jon & Kona