Doing the tourist thing in Melbourne

On Saturday we headed out on the tram to do the tourist thing on a sunny Melbourne autumnal day. First we headed down to the Botanical Gardens for a very pleasant stroll about and some fine lunch in the cafe overlooking the lake. Thea insisted that we play 'What's the time Mr Wolf?', a game that she has learned at a few recent parties and is just getting the hang of. She was initially far far too scared to actually play it, but was fascinated to observe it. Now she has plucked up enough courage to be Mr Wolf herself, or to let Mummy be Mr Wolf if she has a pre-agreement to catch Daddy and not Thea. She's a sensitive little soul who finds parts of Sesame Street distressing enough to need to leave the room. Miss T is also becoming quite a proficient photographer - see the self portrait of her shadow. (She does also take a lot of pics of people's feet.) The Botanic Gardens has a magical children's section with bamboo hiding places, rocks to climb on, a pond to attempt to fall in etc, and we played there happily for ages.

Next we headed for the National Gallery of Victoria to see an exhibition we had heard about where you go and build some white lego into an ongoing structure. The NGV has a wall of glass with water running down it which is quite hypnotic (and rather chlorinated) so you get a peek of the exhibition through a haze of water before you go in. It also has a splendid stained glass ceiling and a coffee shop, and we ended up devoting most of our time to those rather than the lego.

Dulcie is sitting up really well now with only the occasional face plant. She is also dribbling until her clothes are saturated in a matter of hours, so she may be hatching some teeth. We've got to take her for an ultrasound on her hips soon as apparently she has unsymmetrical folds in her leg flab & bum cheeks which is sometimes a sign that a hip ball isn't properly in its socket. We're not particularly worried. But missing the NHS! I find being asked to pay $55 at the end of a 2 minute GP consultation for a baby sticks in the throat, even tho you can claim some of it back.

Autumn happenings

Yes, it's autumn here, but not many mists or mellow fruitfulness as yet. It's been a beautiful time of year in Melbourne. The mornings are chilly enough to make you want to stay in bed, but by around 11am it's usually warm (and sometimes hot). At around 5pm it starts to get nippy, and then you need a jumper for the evening indoors. We haven't needed the radiators on yet, though we have noticed that most of our Australian friends have their heating on. Wimps.

Big news for us is that we finally have a car. Scooby the Subaru arrived a week ago and we are very VERY pleased with the new addition to the family. It makes it so much easier for Vics to get around with the kids and to get back home from activities before one or both of them is going spare from wanting food or sleep. Driving in Melbourne is pretty straightforward too. Just don't get stuck behind a tram.

On Weds 25th we had yet another bank holiday, this time for Anzac day. (Incidentally do you know the Aussies even have a bank holiday to celebrate the Queen's birthday? We are missing a trick in UK.) We took advantage of the weather and the Subaru to go up to the Healesville Animal Sanctuary in the Yarra valley. Healesville is one of the zoos that Thea got annual membership of for her birthday; it's home to indigenous animals and set in really beautiful grounds. We were accompanied by Emma and her boys Alec (Thea's friend from kinder) and his older brother Sebastian. On the way back Emma took us to the Yarra Valley dairy where they make their own cheeses and ice cream. Yum.

Ballet heck

Ever since Thea's godmother Rosy sent an Angelina ballerina DVD for Thea's birthday, the girl has been ballet mad. Last week we finally crumbled and started her at a local tot's ballet class on Thursday mornings. It's fairly low key, and Thea is fortunately young enough to think that her fairy dress and Dora the Explorer socks are no different to the pukka ballet dress, wrapover, tights and shoes that some of the other weenies wear. She is loving it, especially the bit at the end where Miss Melissa (why are ballet teachers always Miss something or other?!) pretends to be a tree and they all stretch up on tippy toes to pick an apple out of her hand. I am surprised to report that she is rather elegant and occasionally graceful, which is odd considering her genetic makeup.

Lazy saturdays

It's not all whizzing around doing exciting things. Sometimes we just laze about a bit.

Dulcie starts solids

Four go camping

Or should that read, four go mad in the Katmandu sale? Yeah, you guessed it. We are now proud owners of a luxury family tent. And the mother of all airbeds. I'm not quite sure how I got talked into it, but one minute Will was chatting to a couple from church about their Easter plans and the next we were fully signed up members of the camp Cormorant experience. This involved a 4 hour drive down to the beautiful East Gippsland lakes to camp in bushland by the beach with about 8 other familes, mostly with small children. The first night was pretty sleepless, but once we realised how many layers Dulcie actually needed to get warm, things settled down quite nicely. Will enjoyed a spot of waterskiing, and Thea enjoyed a lot of pretend waterskiing. All she talks about now is getting a wet suit and a lifejacket! Highlights included a very popular Easter Egg hunt on the Sunday, lots of atmospheric campfire moments, watching pelicans landing on the lake... you get the picture.

Busy busy weekend

Hi guys, I'm getting a bit behind in the old blogging so here's a bit of a rush job to catch us up to Easter. All going v well. We had a particularly cool weekend the one before Easter when Melbourne was hosting the FINA swimming finals, there was lots of performance art on, and there was a food and wine festival, all at the same time. We tried to do our bit and participate as much as possible, so here's the photographic evidence. It's a shame you can't put captions on the pics, but see if you can match the description to the image: Vics and Thea dancing in Federation Square, Thea and Will go to the finals of the synchronised swimming ('ladies doing ballet in the water') - before, during, and after (crazy with excitement), Thea enjoying some Japanese installation art (seconds before the curator told her off for standing on it), the whole family...