Around the house . . .

Thought you might enjoy some photos of Christmas around the Witt house.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas from Down Under! After enjoying a wonderful 9 day trip to Tasmania it was such fun to return home and have loads of Christmas cards from our friends and family - thanks to everyone! We gathered around the Christmas tree, turned some Christmas music on, made a pot of tea, set out a tray of Christmas cookies and enjoyed reading all the beautiful cards and looking at the photos of your families. It was really fun and I''m sure it will become a Christmas tradition. At this special time of the year being so far away from home could be sad but we feel close to you through your beautiful Christmas cards and photos.

The littlest ant. . . .

Isabella's class was in charge of the Junior School Assembly last week. All the girls in the class had different jobs such as Being the MC, singing, doing skits and giving awards to Junior School girls. Isabella was originally disappointed to only have the role of the littlest ant in one of the skits "The Ants go Marching . . . ." - you know the song . . . .

The ants go marching one by one, hurrah, . . . . . .The little one stops to tie his shoe and they all go marching down to the ground To get out of the rain, BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

Isabella had a couple lines that she did as she was carrying the very large basket meant to be a sultana (raisin in Aus speak) she fell to the ground and cried out "this isn't much fun!" She was amazing - she stole the whole show with her one line and had lots of compliments on her performance. Once again we are reminded that this little girl was BORN FOR THE SHOW!

Surf Awareness Day!

Most Australians (there are only 20 million) live very near the coast - so there is sort of a surf culture here. All the school kids go to a Surf Awareness Course in Year 5. Jonah's class had their day last week. The kids learn about the rip tides and how to handle the change in conditions at the beach. After the classroom section the kids all go to the beach and they get in the water onto a surf type board and learn how to handle the tide and the surf. I'm sure this type of education saves a lot of lives in Australia but from Jonah's perspective it was just good fun to go to the beach with all his Year 5 Mates!

Chicken Boy!

I have to share a funny story about Jonah. Jonah loves chickens. He had a Chicken Club in second grade. The boys all loved to say "chicken" at the silliest times. He has a few rubber chickens (one is laying an egg!) attached to his backpack and he was a chicken for Halloween one time when he was 9. I remember when Jonah was about 5 years old, we were eating chicken and he looked at it and asked: "Mom, what are we eating?", and I replied "chicken" and he said "as in A Chicken", oh, yes that would be correct . . . "YUCK" was his reply (have to agree when you think of it that way, and while you are biting into it . . . ) Like most people these days I pretty much only had made chicken breasts, and boneless, so it is easy to forget it is all from A Chicken. The other day we were eating drumsticks for the second or third time in the past few months. They are much cheaper in Australia than breast meat and since food (and everything) is so expensive I have been trying to trim the grocery budget a bit. Jonah didn't eat much of his chicken. When I said, "Jonah, finish up your chicken.." He had the most squeamish look on his face and he just said "Mom, I just can't do it, I cannot eat chicken right off its leg!" It is the funniest thing! My Crocodile Hunter, loves to fish kid really can't do it, so I cut it off for him and he ate it but I just don't think he is ever going to enjoy a good barbequed chicken leg like the rest of us in this family do! That is our silly Chicken Boy!

Trick or Treat!

We had a fun time on Halloween. The kids went trick or treating with some friends - there aren't very many people that participate but one of my friends lives in a neighborhood with a few houses that do give out candy. We had a really fun time!

Roadtrip to Melbourne

The kids have 4 school breaks a year. Two weeks ago was their two week Spring Break. We have been realizing lately that if our tour ends up being 3 years we are almost half way done! We haven't seen nearly enough of Australia! With an adoption going on we decided it would be a great trip to drive to Melbourne (12 hours) , The Great Ocean Road and work our way back to Sydney - We needed to do all this in 8 days :) Since Matt had some meetings he had to get back to, Isabella is in the midst of her competitive gymnastics season and Jonah's baseball season has also started. We packed a load of adventure in just 8 short days (well the driving days were a little long . . . ) We had an incredibly great time! What a beautiful country this is. Here are some highlights of our trip.



October 1 - Leave Sydney at 6:35 am. Arrive Tourne on the south coast @ 7 pm. Yummy Asian noodles for dinner. We were pretty ready to get out of the car, a 12.5 hour drive can get pretty long for a certain little 4 year old!

October 2 - Check out of the hotel and head to The Great Ocean Road. We stopped at a few beautiful beaches and had a great time playing and walking. We watched surfers at a very famous surf beach. It was pretty cool. We arrived at our hotel called The Sandpiper Hotel in Apollo Bay in the early afternoon.

October 3 - We spent the day in Apollo Bay. As soon as the kids were up Matt walked with them the quarter mile down to the beach where they had a great time making sandcastles and playing in the sand. Later in the day we decided to take a drive to the National Park but we were stopped by a tree that had fallen into the road. We had a great time heading down a road and discovering a nice bush walk and ended up at a pretty isolated and beautiful bit of rocky shoreline and beach called Sandy Beach. We got a few good photos here and headed back up just in time to get in the car before it started pouring rain!

October 4- We check out of Sandpiper, It rains all day! We drove to the National Park and this time the tree was cleared out. You would not believe all the Koalas we saw in the trees on the way in. Amazing! We go over to the Waterfall and drive to Marriott in Melbourne, Dinner in China Town. Swim at the Marriott

October 5 - Sightsee in Melbourne

October 6 - We head to Philip Island. This little island is only about an hour south of Melbourne and can be accessed via a bridge. We stayed in the "Hollywood Hotel" that claims a movie star or two. We had a lot of fun going to the Penguin March - you sit on the beach and watch little fairy penguins come ashore. Unfortunately we didn't realize that unless you were in the first few rows you wouldn't see much. It was fun though as some had to waddle past us.

October 7 - Head to the Entrance - 90 mile beach. This was a beautiful beach . . . . miles and miles (about 90 -heehee) of beautiful beach with almost no people. The kids had a blast playing hide and go seek in the sand dunes and making sandcastles. We knew the kids loved it when Jonah said someday he wants to take his kids there, and Isabella agreed : )

October 8 - Head out, stop in Eden, Go to Narooma. WOW! We watched whales in the harbor from our balcony for several hours! They were flipping and blowing water. The big kids totally appreciated it and we were giggling and jumping up and down with excitement every time we got another glimpse. One time we watched a whale give the tail flip 15 times in a row! SPECTACULAR! This was the highlight of our entire trip!

October 9 - Head back to Sydney, stopping in Jervis Bay. Arrive home at 8 pm.