Yeepee.....They're Back to School

Gee....I am a terrible mum aren't I? I was so looking forward to send my boys back to school. It's not that we didn't have good time during the holiday, its just come to the point that they have been too long spending time at home, hooked in to the games, and I can't have "me time". Anyway, I better stop complaining and enjoy my free time while they are at school.


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Happy Australia Day

On 26th of January, here in Australia, we celebrate Australian Day, the day that commemorates the arrival of the First Fleet at Sydney Cove in 1788. At the local park near where we live, the celebration was started with spectacular hot air balloons at six in the morning, the circus shows, clowns, the amusement rides, flyball dog demonstration, the outback station, the international food stalls, and was finished with fireworks at eleven at night.
Here are some fotos that I took today.






We had a very tiring but enjoyable day. HAPPY AUSTRALIA DAY

Mom, What's For Dinner?

Its something that I hear nearly every day. For our dinner tonight, I made some pork and chives dumpling and steam chinesse brocoli with oyster sauce. We had them with some rice.

Here is the recipe for my dumplings

Ingredients :
500 gr pork minced
2 bunches garlic chives, chopped
50 pieces dumpling wrap
6 garlic, very finely chopped
2 teaspoon of sesame seed oil
1 egg
salt and pepper


Method:
Mix all the ingredients, then put about 1 teaspoonfull of the mix into the dumpling wrap, right in the center. Fold it, and wet the edge with water. In the hot pan, put some oil and place the dumpling till brown. Pour some boiling water and cover it for about 3 minutes or until cooked. Serve with chilli sauce.

Photos....Photos....and More Photos

I'd like to share some photos that I took in the last camping trip.
The view from our friend house's veranda in Tumut

Just out of Tumut

Sunset at Blowering Dam

Three Miles Dam

Three Miles Dam,

Family photo

The view from our campsite

The highest town in Australia : Cabramurra, elevation 1488 M

The housing complex in Cabramurra

The view from Cabramurra lookout

Some locals, not the best picture though.

Yarrangobilly

In our last camping trip, we stayed at Yarrangobilly Village camp ground. It was such a beautiful place and this is one of our favourite camp sites. The crystal clear running water of Yarrangobilly River becomes main attraction for us and it was a very important water resource during our stay there. The river has a perfect depth for Ari and Jamie to have a play. They went up and down the stream with their small rubber boats. When they got bored with it, they built a little dam made of the rocks they collected from the bottom of the river. The river is a good place for fishing too. Steven caught a few trout, but pity we couldn't have them on our dinner plates. They were under size so he let them back in the water.







Yarrangobilly Caves, which is about 20 minutes away from our camp site was a good place to visit too. There are several caves in the area, but we only did self guided tour in South Glory Cave. It has very spectacular stalactite and stalagmite formation. We all loved being inside the cave. At the beginning, Jamie was feeling a little scared, but we convinced him that there is no monster that would eat him.

On the way to the cave

When we walked toward the cave, we saw this snake.

In the cave

Having lunch

After we had our lunch, we walked down the fairly steep track toward the thermal pool. The water temperature is 27°C all year round. The boys had a great time swimming there, while I was worrying how to get Jamie get back up the hill to the car park. But I was wrong, because didn't even once he whined about the steep hill.
The superb thermal pool from high above

We enjoyed bushwalking too. Both Jamie and Ari were so strong and got a good stamina for their age.

How Was Your Weekend?

Ours was great. On Saturday, we didn't do too much, but on Sunday we had a great day. After a few choices of where to go for a picnic, we decided to do a beach picnic. We went to La Perouse, a beautiful beach located south of Sydney. It is very popular beach, even just to find a parking spot, we had to go around the block a few times. We finally got one, not too far too walk to the main beach.

Ari and Jamie went straight away and hit the water, while Steven and I set up our beach tent. It didn't take us too long to sit in comfort. From a distance, I saw Jamie trying to stand on his body board, as if he was a professional surfer. So cute.


Not long after, Ari came back to see us asking for lunch. We had sausage sandwiches, sausage rolls and some cocktail frankfurts. I also packed some carrot and cucumber sticks and some nectarines. For desert, we went to the local shop to get some ice cream. It seems that the beach day always goes nicely with some ice cream.


Then we walked to the other side, and we saw this snake show. I heard that this guy has been doing this show for years. He is basically telling about all different snakes and reptiles, how venomous they are, how to avoid them and how to recognise the snake if you are bitten. Its useful to know to inform the hospital to get the right anti-venom. We didn't stay there too long as my two boys started to loose their interest as they couldn't see the show. It was very crowded.



We continued our walk a little further, just to find another beautiful part of the sea. The crystal clear water looks so lovely. No wonder so many snorkelers and divers were there. We walked trough the very stunning rock formation and across the bridge. I just loved to see those rock and sand formation. Its gorgeous.

My boys in action








Thanks for visiting guys. I hope you had a great weekend as much as we did.

Tumbarumba Rodeo

Tumbarumba Rodeo is held every year, on new years day. My boys and I along with our good friends went to see it. There were wild horses, bucking bulls, barrel racing and team roping. Also the clown, sideshows and food stalls. It was a very big event. The crowd were large, babies, children, elderly, family, most of them dressed up as a cowboy or cowgirl. You can see the country atmosphere there. Very interesting.






We started our day with the busy morning preparing our lunch, drink and other nibbles. We left Tumut around 9.30 and we didn't get back until 6 in the evening. The day was beautiful, bright sunny day with nice blue sky and the cool breeze blowing once in a while. Steven really enjoyed the show, while for me once I saw a bull, I saw them all. I liked the horses though. Jamie and Ari had nice time with the games and slush puppy. I could just see the big smiles on their faces when we left the show.



Below is the video of a cowboy riding a bull.


Team roping


On the way home, we visited a friend that lives and works at the apple orchard.Pity that the apple season not starting till February. Otherwise it would be another experience for us to do apple picking.




While we were in the car, the boys already talked about when they can go see another rodeo.