Living Cave-man Style

To follow up on Kelli’s last … I thought I’d take a moment and give a few lessons learned on how to survive in 40+’C (104’F) heat. Temperatures over the last few days have been torturous, and so we’ve had to learn to improvise a little. Kelli has been sick during most of this episode with a gastro bug that has had her on her back … so I’ve been playing Mr. Mom and learning quite a bit about how to manage affairs without the fall-back of ‘go outside and play!’ It’s fun to go outside every now and then just to suffocate in the heat for a second (at church on Sunday as we were got into the car Savannah turned around at the door and said, “Dad, it’s too hot! I can’t breathe!” … that’s the kind of heat we’re talking about.) … and then return straight to the cool AC air so you can appreciate what’s going on outside!

Growing up we used to poke fun at our Dad that he liked living in a cave. Our living room hard dark walls, the window blinds were often drawn closed, and there were few light sources which would, or even could, penetrate the darkness. I believe he felt it made for the best relaxation atmosphere … and after the last few days I would have to agree with him.

Lesson #1:

If you have even the slightest inkling that you’d like to exercise, you’d better get up at or before 6 in the morning. Even then the temperature is at 33’C (90’F) and only rising as the sun crests the eastern hills.

Lesson #2:

Draw the curtains closed, crank up the AC, and as a last resort lay on the tile floor. We have tile throughout the kitchen, dining and TV room, so the thin carpet we’ve laid in the TV room is perfect for absorbing some cool ‘rays’ off the floor.

Lesson #3:

Don’t even think of turning on the oven or stove. Go outside just long enough to throw some meat on the barbie and then jot back inside … coming out again only long enough to flip the burgers/sausages and then bring them inside.

Lesson #4:

The New Year’s Eve picnic is an inside event – no ifs, ands or buts about it …

Lesson #5:

You’ll need a few ingredients for this one – large banana, heap of strawberries, ice and ice cream. Throw it all in a blender and let it rip. That fresh little smoothy goes down REAL nice.

Lesson #6:

Keep the kids entertained with arts and crafts projects. TV only works for so long and they get cranky and ornery with each other. A little cold dowse of sprite can also do wonders for morale :)

Lesson #7:

As the day wears on, you can always rely on Mr. Penguin to bring some refreshment to the day. Once again you’ll need some ingredients: ice, cordial (very concentrated ‘koolaid’ in liquid form), sprite, and the penguin ice shaving machine (best Christmas present EVER!) After a few cranks of the handle, a sprinkling of sprite and lime cordial and wallah! … you’ve got yourself a treat that keeps the kids quiet for about 3 minutes and gives a much needed boost of rejuvenation.

Lesson #8:

Karaoke! It may require a little too much movement for the conditions, but the kids like the exercise and it’s even fun for Mum and Dad, too! Savannah was so proud to be able to do her ghostbuster dance she learned in school this year.

Lesson #9:

Board games – Candy Land can do wonders … even in the dark.

Lesson #10:

Be prepared to pay through the nose for the AC – because it’s worth every penny!

Cheers, Mates! Here’s to a crazy holiday season!

Hotter than @%&*!!

Sorry about that title. I was thinking of a nice one like "Warm Thoughts" or something equally cheesy, but there is nothing nice about the weather we are experiencing at the moment. Here's a link for anyone interested: Heatwave hits Adelaide, and keep in mind that they use Celsius here, so 29.9C=86F and 41.5C=107F. Yesterday was 43C...you do the math! For the Hutchinsons: are you sure you still want to come?
PS: We live in the northern part of Adelaide and inland, so there was no relief for us last night!

Merry Christmas!!

First off a big congratulations to Angie and Robert with the arrival of their new baby, Colton Jessy … I mean, Colton Robert Darger. Well done Robert and Ang, and welcome to the family, little Colton. So we’ve passed through our second Christmas season down under, and we have to admit that this one was definitely more bearable than the last. Attribute it to having seen family less than 2 months ago, or the fact we’d already been through it once before … but there is also the added element of the weather cooperating slightly more than last year. Whereas last year was near, if not over, 100’F, this year we hovered between the 60’s and 80’s. What a welcome break! We even had a day of overcast, rainy weather which made it feel like a Seattle Christmas! So it was nice to have a bit of variety.

Ironically enough, the first time I felt like it was really the Christmas season was the Friday before when I stopped off at the plaza to get some gifts. Everything was all decked out on the traditional Christmas garb with the holiday music playing. Kind of sad when that reminds you of Christmas, eh? Of course, the next day Kelli decided she wanted to do a turkey/Thanksgiving type dinner because we were having the missionaries over and the last time we had them over was on Thanksgiving and we had to have burritos because our oven was broken. So I went from the commercial Christmas type atmosphere to cooking stuffing over the oven in summer-like weather only 2 days before Christmas. Talk about a play on the ‘culture senses’. I’ll never be the same :)

Aussies in general are not into the spiritual side of the Christmas season. You rarely see Christmas spelled out, it’s usually X-mas, which drives me nuts. There are also very few of the traditional Christmas shows on TV. Just the evening of Christmas eve they put a few Christmas-type shows on, although I don’t know if ‘Ernest Saves Christmas’ actually qualifies. We did manage to find Home Alone 2 which sufficed well enough.

We did some caroling with the youth program a week before Christmas. It was different to do it in shorts and a t-shirt, but we had some great experiences. We would start at some of the members’ homes and then they would escort us to some of their neighbors. The spirit was pretty strong and we had a good experience together. Indeed, music has been the link to the spiritual side of Christmas this season. We sang songs with the kids some evenings and read Christmas songs. Kelli picked up some more (we had one already) Aussie Christmas books from the bookstore and they will become Jones family traditions I’m sure for the years to come.

Speaking of traditions, we thoroughly enjoyed our fondue of grapes, strawberries, bananas (or dapples as Hunter calls them) and pretzels – minus the fondu pot of course. Kelli put together a mean batch of toffee via Mom’s ‘secret’ recipe that turned out very well. We also made sugar cookies which went about as smooth as smooth can be when doing it with a 6, 3 and 1 year old. We had the Christmas Eve pajama opening which was actually a double experience because Kelli bought some as well as G. Jones sending some down from the States. And we also had a couple new experiences. G. Jones sent some hot chocolate packets down which we had one evening. They were scrumptious, except I couldn’t bring myself to drink hot chocolate in our weather so we improvised into some cappuccino type drink by throwing some ice cream in. Call it Aussie Chocolate or something … but it was good. The evening of the kids were so excited in their new pajamas and Kelli got on the internet and looked up the Santa tracking software from ‘noradsanta.com’. It uses google earth to show where Santa is throughout the night. Around 9 in the evening he was up around the Marshall Islands and on the map you could see Australia. Savannah was so excited that he was so ‘close’ that she told Collin, “Hurry! We need to go to bed before he gets here!” So they went outside and dumped some reindeer food (glitter mixed with oatmeal) out on the grass so the reindeer would have something to munch on while Santa was doing his thing.

They went to sleep in Savannah’s room on the floor and Hunter acted like he wanted to sleep with them, until I turned off the light and left the room. Then he screamed and came running out – at which point we just put him alone in his own room, in his own crib and he went to bed without any problems whatsoever --- go figure. Both kids didn’t stay up too long – they were both asleep by 10 and we were done with our business by 12. I went straight to sleep and Kelli ‘claims’ I was snoring up a storm in no time (she was too excited to go to bed :)

The kids slept until nearly 7 and we had to send Hunter in to wake them up. We had a great time opening gifts, most of which were focused on Australia (Australian BBQ apron, kookaburra porcelain statue, water guns, bubbles, and Shrek ears/bike jersey!) After the kids had a hay day playing with all of their gifts we packed them into the van and drove the half hour to the beach. It was windy and fairly cold, plus the tide was way out so it was pretty stinky as well … so we didn’t stay too long. We did stop for a minute on the pier to throw our fishing lines in the water and just happened to see dolphin swimming right underneath us. That was pretty cool. We battled the flies for a few minutes while eating lunch at the playground and then headed home. A very nice family in the ward invited us over for dinner and we had a great visit. They cooked some meat on the ‘barbie’ and had a traditional Aussie Christmas evening which was very relaxing in the company of friends. We missed being with family this year as well as last, but we have had some great experiences which are memories for years and years to come.

In interesting and funny stories, Kelli came downstairs with Hunter the other night when he couldn’t sleep. She didn’t have her glasses on, but from across the room she could see a moving black blur on the wall. She got out the camera and snapped a picture of a ‘local’. Apparently these big black spiders have been pretty popular in the area this year, although the Aussies haven’t seen too much of them before. Savannah has also had a few moments. Last week she was riding her bike and ran into one of the poles around the porch that supports the house. After falling over she got right back up and then started to smack the pole as if it was the pole’s fault. She promptly got back on her bike and continued on her way. She was also playing a song on the piano one evening and asked Kelli if it was ‘right’, to which Kelli responded, “Yes, it sounds right.” Savannah retorted back, “I don’t want to hear if it sounds right, I want to know if it IS right!” Yes, quite the spunk.

Merry Christmas to you all and we hope everyone has a stupendous 2008!

Afterthoughts

After posting the blog last night, I had a few random afterthoughts. Savannah just came in to inform me it is spitting (sprinkling rain) outside. Last night we went on a walk, just like the night before, because Collin wanted more "cherries." There is a huge mulberry tree along the trail, right next to the lemon trees Grandma and Grandpa Whetstone found. They are SO YUMMY!!! (And extremely messy.) There is also a peach or apricot tree there... We ate some berries and then played at the park and then headed home to finish our loop. It wasn't until we got to the bridge right by our house that we realized we couldn't cross because of the construction--it's only open on the weekends. So we had to backtrack and it made for a long walk. Savannah was on her bike and after going up one of the hills she announced she was puffed out. Jessy had never heard that phrase but I heard it a lot playing tennis. She also told us at one point where it was a little stinky that someone had done a poff-off (pop-off?). You can guess what these things mean... And, last but not least, Jessy will never brag, but he came home Friday with a soccer trophy for the Golden Boot (most goals scored) for his work soccer league. YEA, Jessy!! He gave it to Collin, since Savannah had gotten her netball trophy the day before and Collin has slept with it every night since.

It's Christmas Time in the City!

What an extremely eventful couple of weeks. I spent several days at conferences on the Gold Coast and in Sydney, so Kelli and the kids were left to fend for themselves and finish off the home stretch before school holidays. They somehow managed without too many hair-raising experiences, but it wasn’t without its own ‘dramas’ (or ‘dramars’ as they say it in these parts.) But, most of all interesting stories these days lead back to Hunter … so let’s start there.

This kid has the greatest knack for getting into mischief. If you’re not convinced by the end of this paragraph then there is something wrong with you! So there I am living it up on the Gold Coast when I give Kelli a call to see how everyone is doing. I get the, “I’m going to go crazy!” type response. She tells me about some of the shenanigans that Hunter has been up to. One of his latest things is to take any chair available and hike it around the house – preferably in the kitchen where he can find the most ‘opportunity for excitement’. He would get upset at Kelli, asking for some water or milk and then proceed to dump it all over the floor. He would pull things off the counter and throw tupperwear all over the kitchen. But, nothing could compare to the events of the last couple days. I get a call from Kelli and she says, “You will never, ever guess what Hunter did this time.” She proceeds to describe how he got into the pantry (yes, he’s figured that out now as well) and pulled out the chocolate syrup. He then poured it all over the kitchen tiles and proceeded to hand paint with it. You think that might have satisfied him, but no, he was only getting started. He took his chocolate covered hands and ventured into the family room where we have white couches and love seats for visiting … and yes, one of the love seats got a new paint job. Kelli came into the room a little bit later (probably got uneasy when it was too quiet), and to her horror took in the scene around her. She just put her hands to her face and screamed for several seconds – enough to scare Hunter! Kelli removed the slip covers and cleaned up the mess. That’s a good story in and of itself … but it’s even better if I were to tell you that the same thing happened the next day! Only this time there were no slip covers and he just planted his mitts all over the chair itself. Kelli wasn’t too happy, obviously. That was in the early afternoon and by the time I got home from work he was up in his room, in his crib with the door closed because he’d managed to pull his chair over to the sink, pull down our digital camera from the ledge, throw it into the sink … and turn the water on--and he was saying, "Naughty, naughty." Thank goodness it was our old digital camera which was about to go out anyway, but he definitely has crossed the line several times this week. I caught him the next day pouring water on the same chair he’d covered with chocolate (the two of them must have some crazy bond), so he went up to his room again. I think the message may be getting through, at least. We haven’t had any more mishaps this weekend. He even played good while the kids did a messy paint project. So, maybe we’re turning a corner. That and he asked to go on the toilet as well – even without doing anything ‘productive’ he was pretty proud of himself.

Ok, now that I’ve painted that menacing picture of our little 1-year old, let me give some positive highlights as well. He has turned into quite the singer. He loves to sing one of two songs – I Am a Child of God and Star Wars. He also loves to talk – in his own language of course. But, most of the words you can make out and he’s entertaining to listen to (for instance, loves to say ‘doggie ‘side – doggie outside’ … ‘gaubamanman – garbage man’, ‘bug!’, ‘shoes! – meaning he wants to go outside’, ‘bike’). The problem is getting him to be quiet! He does love bugs, though. This morning he came in and starts grabbing my hand and telling me ‘pollie, pollie!’ That proceeded to crying ‘pollie’ until I would follow him. On the way out of the room he grabbed one of my shoes. We then proceeded into the kitchen where he stoops down and gets his little pointy finger out and points at the ground. And there was a rollie pollie bug – or whatever you call them. He then took my shoe and tried to smash it – because of what he’d seen me do with other more menacing creatures like spiders. After showing him this one was ok, he held his little hand and I put it in his hand to take outside. So yes, he does have his endearing moments as well.

Collin on the other hand is also a little mischief maker. He is our little class clown. While not nearly the trouble maker that Hunter is turning out to be, he does his own fair bit. This past week he got into some crazy glitter glue and managed to get it on the carpet and on his head --- which didn’t come off for some time. He’s also having some trouble obeying as well. The other day he asked Kelli if he could have some cordial (concentrated koolaid if you will) to which Kelli said no. Well, Collin took that as a, “no I won’t get it for you” … so I’ll get it for myself. So he went into the kitchen, unscrewed the lid and proceeded to pour cordial into his cup … and then all over the floor. Without making a peep he made for the paper towels and started to try and clean up his mess … which is when Kelli happened upon that lovely scene (are we starting to feel Kelli’s pain a little yet?)

Savannah on the other hand has actually been having several good days recently. Kelli said she was a huge help while I was away and is always a good play person with Hunter. Her and Collin have a lot of fun in the backyard riding their bikes around and around the circuit (as long as Collin follows her bossing around). Savannah also finished up her last day of year 1 this year and is quite keen on going into year 2. She gets the same class as her best friend Keely (they are still best friends despite their first major fallout fight – one of those classic confrontations of doors slamming and little girls bantering at each other with quips of ‘stop being bossy’, ‘you stop talking to me’, ‘I’m not talking to you’, ‘Yes you are!’ … type of stuff … quite entertaining actually :) In any case, they finished up their last netball game as well and their last swimming lesson. Savannah got a nice little trophy for netball but as soon as she got it she ran over to us and right in front of all the other parents she goes, “Look what I got! But it’s only plastic!” (It's metal and faux marble--quite nice for a participation trophy!) Very embarrassing … All three kids are doing really well in swimming. Savannah is doing well with breathing and the freestyle. Collin keeps getting in trouble because he plays off of the wall without the teacher’s permission. And Hunter loves to run and jump off the floating duck platform – the kid can cruise! Anyway, now it’s off to school holidays and the task of keeping the kids entertained. I have from 21 Dec – 1 Jan off, so that will be a nice break in the action.

The kids have been having some fun in other areas as well. As evident from the pictures, they are living (as much as we will let them anyway) on ‘ice blocks’ or popsicles. They recently decided as well that they like their bedtime puppet shows so much that they have started doing their own plays outside. It’s pretty entertaining as they don their Christmas hats and run around the yard in their shorts and hopefully not getting too sunburned. They’ve also been creative enough to take their sidewalk chalk and color their noses red so they can act like reindeer.

In other news we are getting closer to Christmas and we are pretty much done with our shopping. Kelli was pretty happy to have obtained a certain item from the stores. A sale here in Australia (at least in Adelaide) consists of about 10 items at the sale price and unless you are there within the first half hour of the store being open then you are out of luck … but then they have you in the store and perhaps think they can get some of your other business. Kind of frustrating, but we’re learning to just go out and shop for something specific and then get out of the shops as quick as possible!

Other than that we are enjoying our days of barbequing (don’t be knocking the size of my BBQ either!) and enjoying our second Christmas down under. Last week was pretty rough on everyone in that respect. We were having a rough time with the job search on the Air Force side and the kids (Hunter!) were causing havoc. The heat outside was just an added ingredient to the whole situation. The last straw though was Kelli listening on the radio over the internet to a country station back home. They were talking about the snowy, Christmasy weather … so after I got home we just looked at each other like, “Sure would be nice to be able to drop the kids off at Grandma/Grandpas for a weekend stay :)!” But, we quickly turned things around and did a bunch of fun stuff over the weekend like riding bikes in the park, watering the lawn during our 3-hour allotted window (Hunter watering the lawn that is...every Saturday night the kids get soaked!), doing some arts and craft projects, and cleaning the house! Good times were had by all.

For those in the dark on the job search, our efforts at finding something in the Air Force that would be enjoyable for the next 4 years … and beyond … has proven very difficult. That combined with the potential opportunities of going into industry back home have led us down the track towards separating from the military. We are excited on the prospect of moving back to the states, and possibly to Utah, after traveling the world. There are a few things that we still need to figure out before making the decision final, but I’d say we are 90% there. We’ll see what happens. We are both at peace with the decision and you can’t ask for much more than that …

Why "hills" is one of Collin's requirements for our next yard

Some Yuletide Ambience...

Here is a long-distance Christmas recital from Savannah to you!
Merry Christmas!!

I’m pinching the computer away from Kelli for a second to sneak in a quick update for the past week (she’s been working on the

traditional family calendars and thus she gets to hog the computer – I think we’ll have to become a 2-computer family before too long :)

Things have been pretty hopping the past week or so. Savannah had her Christmas concert at school. It was quite entertaining. They had all the school kids from years ‘reception (aka, kindergarten)’ up through year 7. There were probably 500 kids and they combined to sing about 15 songs. The setting was quite unique. Instead of doing it inside with a stage and what not, all the parents ‘rucked up’ with their lawn chairs ready for a sausage (hot dog) sizzle which was the school fundraiser for the night ($2 was a bargain for a sausage on a slice of bread :) Everyone picked a spot on the school playground and they made a stage at one end and everyone just pulled out their ‘sunnies’ and settled in for the show. It was blazin’ hot as well and the flies were out in full force. Luckily we had some cold water which kept the kids entertained for a bit. They sang some traditional Christmas songs like Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer (except for the part where it goes, “ … and Santa came to say “ to which everyone in the audience, kids and adults alike, responded “G’day!” instead of ‘ho ho ho’. I didn’t quite catch what they said, but Kelli snagged it. The other songs were all Aussie, similar to the ones that the Hutchinsons posted on their blog last week. Savannah’s class sang, “Christmas Where the Gum Trees Grow.” Here are the lines to it:

Christmas where the gum trees grow

There this no frost and there is no snow

Christmas in Australia’s hot

Cold nd frosty is what its not

When the bloom of Jacaranda tree is here

Christmas time is near

From England came our Christmas fare

They even said what Santa should wear,

But here down under the summer’s cool

Santa should dip in a swimming pool

Santa rides on a sleigh on snow

But down here where the gum trees grow

Santa should wear some water skis

And glide around Australia with ease

To ride ‘round the bush where it’s often dry

To cart all the presents piled so high

Red nosed reindeer would never do

Santa should jump on a kangaroo

The whole thing lasted 2 hours, quite long for an elementary program … but then again, we are here in Australia and everything is just a little more laid back and easy going :) So we just learn to relax and go with the flow.

We posted Savannah’s exciting milestone with riding her bike. She practiced for so long with the training wheels just trying to keep them from touching the ground. She was pretty excited when she was finally brave enough to let it work. Savannah’s class also had an excursion this week to the central markets. Kelli volunteered to chaperone, even though she had to take the boys with her. It was a 5 hour trip and a 95 degree day, but it was fun. We went to China town and saw the food and souvenir shops, and then to the markets, which are stalls of fruits and veggies, nuts, flowers, whatever—a typical market place from anywhere in the world. Each of the kids (we only were in charge of Savannah and Keely), had a purse with $6 and a shopping bag to fill with fruits and veggies for their family. Kelli was amazed at how cheap the prices were and how wonderful the quality of the produce—we should have gone there when bananas were $16 a kilo!!

Jessy also mentioned in his previous entry about lice causing Savannah to crash. Well, yes, we have had another run of the bugs!! They are disgusting and pointless, but hopefully we have them in check. It’s hard because when the weather warms up like this, they just thrive and multiply like crazy. I found one on Saturday, so I treated her a first time. Then, on Tuesday (in case we weren’t busy enough getting ready for the school program and getting to tennis), her teacher told me she had been scratching her head a lot, so I should probably check since a few other kids had reported problems with it. Sure enough, there were more. I’m confused, though, because there are very few nits and even fewer bugs, so I guess we’re catching them quickly, but she keeps getting them. Lucky for us school gets out for the summer next week!! Hopefully we’re done smelling like lice shampoo for a while!

Collin just can’t wait to go to kindy again this week. On Sunday night he was so excited that there were just 2 sleeps left until he could go again. He went with no problem to nursery this week (because the nursery bully wasn’t there this time – he did say that his nursery leader is a good blocker, though :) His hair is growing back fairly quickly so his artistry is slowly fading away. He also talks on his cell phone to his ‘girls’ … whoever they might be. And … he keeps asking how long it is until Cooper comes to visit … to which we have to remind him that Christmas is coming first.

Hunter – well he has really been a bowl full of laughs this past week. Not even sure where to start. Ok, the other morning we kneeled down to say our family prayer. Hunter comes over like a good boy ready to say the prayer and then just stood up and walked over to Savannah, put his hand on her head and said, “duck …” then walked over to Collin and put his hand on his head … “duck” and then pointed to his own head and said “goose!” and started to run away … Another funny thing was his menu one day – he downed all the butter remaining in the butter dish, and then had some of Kelli’s deodorant. His 2 favorite songs which he likes to sing are “Child of God” and then the Darth Vader march theme. Quite the contrast when he switches from one to the other. And last but not least, he takes his little yellow or red chair from the kids’ dinner set and uses it to do a myriad of quirky things like unlock the door to go outside, pull candy from the counter, grabs the diaper rash ointment and wipes (and would proceed to eat it if we didn’t catch him in the act.) The tell tale sign is if he’s quiet for longer than 30 seconds … then you know he’s doing something that he shouldn’t. He still won’t go to nursery, but we are making incremental steps each week :)

So that’s been our fun, crazy week the past bit. Enjoying the Christmas season down under … It’s warmer than ever, but it’s definitely a time to remember!