Have you missed us? Terribly???
In the last couple of months we managed to celebrate not one, but TWO birthdays here!
First in line for the birthday celebrating was my first born son. He had the privilege of turning ELEVEN years old. It's wonderful and heartbreaking all at the same time.
For his birthday we decided to gather ourselves up and get all organized and do something very VERY family orientated, and something completely up Reid's alley.
Camping!
This, I am ashamed to admit, was our FIRST camping trip as a family. We (okay fine, I) have been kind of reluctant to go camping in Australia because... well... the bugs are horrifying. And poisonous. And deadly. And there are also snakes. That are horrifying. And poisonous. And deadly.
But since it's "winter" here now, we thought we'd be pretty safe from all these horrors, since they are all cozied up in their creepy little homes and scared to venture out into all this "freezing" weather.
So, without further ado... some pictures and video of Reid's birthday adventure....
We got ourselves up bright and early and packed and packed and packed
some more. Then waited and waited and waited for Daddy to get home
from work. They had a lot of fun getting all their stuff together... Jarom especially,
as you can tell by the look on his face.
We drove about an hour toward the Blue Mountains, and set up our little homestead.
Enjoying some yummy campfire cooked breakfast.
One of the great (?) things about camping in Australia, is getting to know all the wildlife. There
were Kookaburras, Cockatoos, kangaroos... freaky opossums growling in the trees while you're
trying to sleep...
Just look at those Kookaburras sittin' in that old gum tree. Like they're merry merry kings of the bush
or something. Laugh Kookaburras... laugh Kookaburras!
Did you know that Kookaburras will eat pretty much anything? From
candy snakes to bacon.... they will eat it! And they will snatch it right our your hand
if they have to. And they did... believe ME!
Cockatoos, on the other hand, although unbelievably noisy, are much more polite. They will
patiently wait until you decide to share your food. Just watch and see...
Something I quickly discovered about camping with boys, is that they
positively LOVE playing with fire. Well, smoke and fire. They were
at it all the day long. Staring at the fire, poking at the fire, burning whatever
they could find in the fire... on and on it went. Would you like to see how the
boys spent 90% of their time? Then watch THIS:
Looks safe doesn't it? Well, it's absolutely not. What you
didn't get to see here was Reid tripping and stumbling and poking his
brother Jarom in the head with his smoking stick, and Jarom screaming
bloody murder. And now Jarom is the proud owner of a little pink scar on
his forehead. Ahhh.... the memories!
After we returned from the grand adventure of camping, it was time to celebrate the good old
fashioned way. Cake and presents.
Some smiling was happening...
And then it progressed to hugging...
And then it digressed to... uhh... whatever this expression on his face is. Drunk with happiness???
Typically we like to make our kids birthday cakes as fun and interesting as possible. Although after
so many years, so many kids, and so many cakes, we are really running out of ideas. So this year
I asked Reid what kind of cake he would like to have, to which he replied:
"Well... I'm really into bears right now."
I breathed a sigh of relief, thanked my lucky stars he didn't say he was
really into the Mona Lisa right now, and waltzed off to make the cake.
With the help of my beautiful assistant Wes.
After the cake was made, I realized maybe for an eleven year old, we
should have gone a little more grizzly with the bear, and a little less
Teddy... but of course, he didn't complain at all, being all eleven and
mature and such.
Happy Birthday Reid!!!
Stay tuned for birthday number two!