Our road trip to Queenstown

Due to the fact that the Queen was born we get a long weekend in her honour. So, with children in tow we headed west. My brother and his family live i the mining town of Queenstown and it has been almost 3 yrs since we have seen each other. My parents traveled up from Bicheno on Friday and we headed over there on Saturday. it is almost 4hrs drive and some of the road is quite windy and often snowy/icy. Fortunately the worst we got was rain and fog.

Some absolute proof that Gunns really does love Tassie! So much so it removes all the annoying trees!

Look back thru the valley from the road heading towards Tullah

Lake Plimsoll

Beren and Harrison(my brothers eldest) . H is 3mths younger than B. It was unbelievable how alike they are in mannerisms and looks.


This is Charleton, he is a bit over 2 and so full of character. He became Nienna's shadow over the weekend. He is gorgeous!
The accommodation. We hired a holiday house so we could all stay. There are cabins there too but much too small for all of us.



The boys, can you tell who is usually told to stand and smile and not be silly??Nienna and her latest fan!



on the way home today we stopped at Ulverstone for lunch. There is a playground there that has been there forever and the kids just loved it
This is my mum

The church over the road from the park had this sign out and I have to admit I found it hilarious for some bizarre reason

Fur Babies

Did a bit of shopping today in my break. Went to a little antique place in Latrobe that sells a teensy bit of yarn and got me two lush skeins of Malabrigo, mmmmmmmmmmmmm for malabrigo. Squishy, wishy washy yumminess.

Heading to the Western side of the state on the long weekend and as it is not uncommon to be travelling in snow to get there I thought I should prepare myself. Made some wrist warmers (see below below) and am working on a neck warmer too.

My fellow couch potatoes. they have no idea about intelligent conversation, boring blobs!

Beauty Point

Beauty Point is on the Western side of the Tamar heading North. It is a small town that is home to some of the Australian Martime College, seahorse world, Platypus house and next to the town of Beaconsfield and the Beaconsfield Gold Mine Museum

Beren and went on a field trip last Sunday for the day. First stop was the Platypus House. This was awesome and so informative. I must say the information Beren could give me about Platypus and Echidnas was astounding, where do they learn so much stuff!
Did you know that baby Platypus are called 'puggles' how cute is that. The house are trying to breed the platypus and the echidna as they are both susceptible to disease and numbers are decreasing. the echidna was just gorgeous and we were able to sit down and have them come up to us. This was the favourite for both of us.

Next stop was Seahorse World, now don't let the tacky, plastic and just plain horrible souvenir shop turn you off. Inside is well worth the visit. It is very informative and the sea horse are just adorable. they really love attention and are great show offs!
Did you know that the male sea horse carry the babies and give birth! Pretty cool huh.
They have a huge breeding program here and as you can see in the pics there are masses of the little critters, thousand in a tank.
The rest of the day we spent at the water front, me reading while Beren turned over rocks and found crabs with a bunch of other kids down there. It was lovely to see him interacting so freely.
We didn't do the mine museum but did stop under the Batman Bridge. I love the angles of this bridge and Beren just loved the name of it LOL
We took lots of photos then headed home. This is all just an hour away from where we live too

snapshots

My folks came and spent the night last night. So nice having them driving distance away. The middle pic is them and my gorgeous friend Janine. The others are the kids ofcourse. Bottom right is Nienna setting out her clothes for tomorrow. She STARTS KINDER!!!!!!!!!!!!! Where has my baby gone, I got quite teary watching her do this. She is soooooooo excited. Over here the kinders are part of the public school system so Nienna is in a classroom across from Beren's.

Beren is loving his new school, surprising considering that he didn't want to go back at the end of last year. Mind you he is finding the decision making required in grade one very challenging; today he was faced with who to marry, Brittany or Lauren LMAO He seems quite popular as kids are constantly saying hi to him as we go to and from school.

We are 5 minutes from Janine and it is the first time in 18yrs we have lived in the same town so we are spending our wise years together. I am truly grateful for this and feel so peaceful having someone who 'gets' me so totally nearby. We have over 20yrs of history and memories so far. Her eldest is 20yrs and I love her as if she were my own child. She now has her own 18mth old, Bailley who is a delightful little girl and I feel priveledged to be able to watch her grow too.

As I sit here in my 'study' I heard Beren ask Nienna how to spell her name. I stopped typing to listen as she spelled out N-I-E-N-N-A! How surprised am I and proud. My kids are just divine and play so well together now it is lovely to sit and listen to them. We are growing so much as a family of three individuals.
This week Nienna started at the uni creche that is run by Lady Gowrie Centre, she has settled in perfectly and made friends already. The staff gush over her and are amazed at her social skills, my little butterfly.

The children's father has seen fit to follow us here. His mother gave him money to get here, seems easier to handball him somewhere else than deal with him. He is currently homeless and camping who knows where. He hired a caravan on the weekend so he could have the children. Apparently he is too busy to actually look for somewhere to live yet. Not sure how long the kids will tolerate this and they didn't seem too happy about no house and having to spend time in a caravan. We will see.... All I can do is shake my head in disappointment. I am beyond shock now when it comes to him.

I had an orientation at Uni today and feel very excited about it all. I am enrolled as a BA student but will transfer to Social Work or Social Science after 2 yrs as required. Mind you I have applied for a community Development job with Playgroup Tasmania that sounds perfect so will defer if I get that. oooh, before I forget I also picked up two of my required texts at the opshop for $12 rather than $135. I can hear you swearing!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The photos with the circled faces look pretty cool huh! For some reason I was walking around with an empty toilet roll when taking the photos and put it over the lense of my camera and experimented with it. I had to turn the flash off but I thought they looked pretty funky.

I have heaps of posts and have tried post dating them so they come out over the next few days. So as not to clog up your readers.
Missing everyone and hanging for Kevies $$$$ to book myself a flight back to Melb for BWS in July! WOOHOO

Anyway, this weekend we are off to the Symphony Under the Stars which should be great!