October Catch Up, Part 1

The start of October had us landing in Brisbane bright and early on the 2nd. We were a little later arriving than planned as there was a problem with the airplane at the airport in Los Angeles so we were almost 90 minutes late taking off, of which they only made up about 20 minutes of during the whole flight.

We spent the first day unpacking and getting settled and watching with great interest as Callum and his younger cousin Alison figured out how to play nicely with each other. My Mum and Nanna had also flown up from Adelaide to stay with my sister, so it was a very full house. To be truthful, my Mum and Nanna booked their trip first and Jen and I just decided that that created a good opportunity to catch up with family, so that's when we booked our tickets.

The next day was Alison's 1st birthday party (the original reason for the trip up from Adelaide for my Mum and Nanna). There was quite a crowd in attendance, many of which were kids, so it was quite a busy day. The Princess theme of the party was heartily embraced by the host family.

My Mum stepped up again and made Alison's cake, which was in line with the Princess theme of the party.

Which Alison enjoyed eating later in the day.

Here is a good example of Callum and Alison playing together the day after the party.

Here is Callum having fun on a kids ride at the mall near Shari and Leon's house

And here is Uncle/Daddy Craig practicing the 2-kid balance, perhaps it is a skill that will come in handy in the future.

A couple of pics of us all playing at a nearby playground.


The next day we hit Australia Zoo, which is the zoo that Steve "The Crocodile Hunter" Irwin setup. So as you would expect there is a preponderance of crocodiles at the zoo, including this trained one that you can have your photo taken with.

And here is my Mum and Callum taking a break from looking at the animals.

Callum riding a turtle.

We had a quiet day the next day after our day with the crocodiles.

But the day after that we were back at it for some more Australian animal fun. This time myself, Jen, Callum and my Nanna visited Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary.

A peacock joined us for lunch while we were there.

And Callum got to pet a Wallaby (that's roughly a small Kanagaroo for those who don't know), and then both Callum and Jen fed a Kangaroo.


And that will do for this post. More to follow.

September Catch Up

The first weekend in September had us attending the (usually) annual Bennett Family Reunion, this year in sunny Lodi, California. So we spent some time at Jen's parents place and a day in Lodi catching up with everyone and of course, playing the mandatory bocce tournament. While up there, Callum did get to ride on Grandpa's tractor.



In the following week, Jen and I saw the Dave Matthews Band at The Greek Theatre up in LA. Surprisingly, this was my first concert at The Greek, which as it turns out is a fantastic place to watch a concert - the too and from the concert is a hassle though, parking and traffic etc. is horrible. After the concert, we decided to be adults and find a bar and have an after-concert drink. Which shouldn't be that hard when you think the road up to The Greek basically dumps you out into the Hollywood area. As it turns out, Hollywood is mostly an endless stream of grimy streets, prostitutes and crack dealers at that time on a Wednesday night. So we ended up buying a six-pack and taking it home to drink. Party animals!

On the 10th was my niece Alison's official 1st birthday.

On the 15th we had to rush up to the Australian Consulate to get Callum's Australian passport finally sorted out, because we booked tickets for a trip to Australia in October. I took this photo on the lawns outside the consulate. The composition of small little Callum and the giant lawn and building is cool (in my humble opinion!). Click on the photo to see it in full size.

We discovered that on the 3rd Sunday of the month there are free train rides at the OC Model Engineers park. And with Callum's current infatuation with Thomas the Tank Engine, it is was a no brainer to go and check it out. I took Callum by myself this first time and taking photos while actually riding on one of these trains was verboten, so I didn't actually manage to get a photo with either Callum or myself in it, but this photo should give you an idea. On each ride you do two loops of the park and it takes a good 10 minutes or so to get around as the park is quite large. Callum of course was physically bouncing and wiggling the entire time with sheer delight, I thought his head was going to pop right off.

Here is a gratuitous shot of Callum.

And one more for good measure, this time peeking in from the backyard.

The last week of September was basically consumed by getting ready to leave for Australia - you would think we would be well practiced at this by now, but apparently not. We took off on the night of the 30th and landed in Brisbane in the morning of the 2nd of October (because of the time difference, oh and the incredible length of the flight of course). This photo of Shari (my sister) and my niece Alison was literally taken while Jen, Callum and I were on the flight on the way to visit them.


The October update will be mostly consumed by the details of our trip, so stay tuned!

August Catch Up

August started (literally on the 1st) with our friend Jacque's 40th Birthday Party. Here is Callum and Jen taking advantage of the pool on a hot afternoon at Wayne and Jacque's.



And the next day, Callum was burning off some energy showing us how he can dance.





Callum had such a good time when we took him to the aquarium back in February, that Jen purchased an annual pass. Here is Callum at the aquarium on the 5th.



By the way, Callum is getting better at driving.



If you were wondering what we do with the empty diaper boxes in our house, then the answer is we turn them into toys - which sounds creepier than it really it is. One of Jen and favorite games is "Clubhouse" where they both wear a single diaper box on their heads at the same time - which is exactly as odd as it sounds, trust me.



On the 14th was my team's beach picnic. We decided to bring Maple Bacon Fudge as our dish to share - yes, you read correctly, that is chocolate fudge that has (a lot of) bacon included in the recipe. On the surface it looks pretty normal, except the white stuff on top is not coconut, it is sea salt.



And Callum and I testing out the waves at the beach.



This is Callum molesting the toy monkey from his first birthday that was a present from his Nandi (my Mum).



On the 20th we received a care package from Australia from my Mum. Here is Callum getting ready to tear the hell out of the package.



And this is him working on the secondary layer of wrapping paper separating him from his presents.



From the 22nd through the 29th I was in Chicago for a super nerdy conference and I won't bore you with the details of that. However, I did get some time to do a bit of sight seeing, including catching a Bears (football) and a Cubs (baseball) game.






This is a picture of the new "The Ledge" at Sears Tower - basically a glass ledge you can step out on too on the 103rd floor which is 1,353 feet (412 meters) from the road below.



On the 30th, the day after I got back from Chicago we caught the last day of the Sour Beer Festival at Beechwood BBQ in Seal Beach. During lunch I asked Jen to make a face that represented how she feels about all her friends and family and this is what I got.



I then asked Callum the same question and this was his response.

July Catch Up

We spent 4th of July in northern California in tiny nowhere town called Quincy which is up in the mountains to attend the High Sierra Music Festival. Basically a four day dirty hippie get together of camping and music and surprisingly decent beer. We mainly went to catch John Butler on his solo tour (which was crazy good), but there were a bunch of other good bands that we had the chance to see as well.



We left Callum with his Grandma and Grandpa (Jen's parents) and picked him up on the way back south, although we spent just enough time in Lincoln to watch the lowest exploding fireworks display in history with Brian and Nikki.

On the 10th my buddy Trent from Australia made the long trek to LA where I picked him up and we drove straight to Las Vegas. We spent the weekend in Vegas and I drove back late Sunday while Trent stayed on for the conference (which of course he claims was the real reason for his trip). He then flew from Las Vegas back to LA on the Thursday and spent the weekend with us before finally flying out to New York to continue his trip.

That same weekend we also had Jen's friend Alicia visiting, so we had a full house. Here is all of us at the Orange County Fair on the Saturday.




And a view from the Huntington Beach Pier on the Sunday.



Here's a gratuitous goofy Callum photo.



And a bonus naked butt shot.



And one of my wild-eyed niece Alison who is the spitting image of my sister at the same age.

Alright already!

Yeah OK we have totally slacked off on updating this blog. We will post some quick updates to catch everyone up on the last couple of months and then hopefully get back on track.

the lunatics are running the asylum...

Learning to share...