♪♫ It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas♪♫

Oh hey...it's Christmas-time...well at least it is in our house.  Yup, we've decorated!-or at least started.  I'm lovin the cozy feel of the holidays.  Regardless how how hard it is for me to think "christmas" when I come inside from a swim in our pool or a blazin' hot day outside to see our Christmas tree...I'm still getting in the holiday spirit.

Phil didn't need ANY persuasion to get his Christmas mood going. This kid just simply is Christmas.  We've been taking detours on the way home from the shops for the past month searching for Christmas lights.  The past month guys...this phil guy of mine is a teensy excited!

I love it though...and now our house does too!

Can I just tell you how much I ♥ this lantern that dear IKEA blessed us with?  Yesir-I love it.

Our first little nativity.  

You could say I'm a garland fanatic.  It's definitely my favorite way to decorate for Christmas.

Here's our table centerpiece.  I love candles!

We even added a Christmas touch to our bookshelf.  It kind of reminds me of old fashioned Christmas...my fave.

We put our extra ornaments to use!

And our grand finale: our tree.  We're real proud of this one. :)

and with lights, it's even better.

♪♫"It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas"♪♫

Thankful

.life.rain.trampolines.chocolate.thunder.friends.skype.

.missionaries.philip ross.shelter.gospel.my job.milk.

.cell phones.art.trees.temples.flowers.telephone.pretzels.

.sunscreen.airplanes.australia.family.snow.bananas.smiles.

.dasies.service.internet.miracles.piano..books.nutella.

.music.christmas.repentance.sewing machine.creativity.

.america.pictures.air conditioning.sunshine.organization.letters.
.dear friends.fridge.helpful hands.safety... 

{our wall decor-thanks mom!}

...and love.

Love keeps this world going.

Love keeps us going.

Love is what enabled us all to live as families together forever.

From one continent to the next...

Happy Thanksgiving

xoxo

Birthday Bash!

The Saturday following my birthday, we had the whole Bennallack clan (the local ones anyway) and our friends over for a birthday bash.  My brother-in-law, Eric, and I share the same birthday so we gathered at our place for one and all.

Food for 14 people is easy-peasy when everyone chips in.  Thanks guys!

Phil and I made my 'cake'.  We wanted to try something different.  I'm just not a huge fan of cake so cupcakes were the perfect solution.  We colored the batter and made our own funfetti icing (my fave!)

YUM!

They turned out so cute.

Make a wish!

POOL PARTY!

...via photos. :)

Fun in the sun!

It got even more exciting when a random down-pour decided to grace us with it's presence.  No worries though- we juat all crammed into our little bitty flat...yup, all of us!  We played a fun (and very cozy!) game of Apples-to-Apples to seal the deal.

Thanks for celebrating with us everyone!

xoxo 

Ideal

22 guys-Holy toledo. . . just look at me go!

This birthday was superb!

It started off with only a half-day at work (yeah Church Offices!)  Phil greeted me with a personal delivery of these lovely flowers.  He's a gem.

and my Mom's birthday package arrived at work just before I had to leave.  Perfect timing!

Then it was home to the present spread from Philip and all the fam.

Look at me...ha, on second thought, maybe don't!  I'm just eeking excitement to open these birthday joys.

We were joined by my family via Skype for opening presents.  First birthday without the parentals and sibs around...bit sad, but Skype is our best friend.

I was spoiled rotten!  My most missed American goodies and all.

These family people, extended included, are the best!  Thanks everyone!

Presents were followed by a swim in our pool.

Yes: a swim.

On November 10th.  My birthday.

Can't say I've ever swam on my birthday before!  Thanks Oz!

Next stop: Outback Steakhouse.

Get this- the most American food you can find in Oz = Outback Steakhouse.  Go figure!

love love LOVE it...I'm a little excited as you can see.  Just a little.  And Phil is doing his Jocelyn pose for your viewing pleasure.

We always get American waiters at Outback and they have American sized meals and free re-fills on drinks.

Ribs please?  Perfect.

I guess not everything  is American there.  Take the dunny for example...perhaps you would like to take a gander at the dunny?

Probably not folks.  Dunny is Australian for toilet. Negative on the gander eh?

After a scrumptious dinner and a trip to dominate some blokes in a round of laser tag, we came back home to a surprise cake Phil made for me.  Homemade guys-my man is legit!  Ice cream with all my favorite Cadbury deliciousness mixed in.
So good. Soooooo good!

Ice cream cake and a chick flick to finish the night.

My hubs knows me best.  It was ideal.

Not to mention the party that weekend...post to come.

Wow guys - 22

and married

and spoiled

and swimming

and in Australia

and all.

Who would've thought?

Questacon

Questacon = FUN

'nuff said.

It was interactive, interesting and informative.

Triple 'I' yesiree!

We bike raced...

we flew...



and we learned a trick or two!

Really...this place was so fun.  Phil's fave is the level with all the 'sideshow' stuff.  He was so giddy when we finally made it to that floor.

He's just like a kid, but better! :)

Phil and I apparently have skills on this next lil' gadget...but then they sped it up...

Talented hey?

Now onto my execution.

I guess this was supposed to teach me something about fear...

...and by-jiggers it certainly did!  Fewph- I lived!

~the guillotine is not my friend.  Note taken.~

Anyone care for a slide?  A giant one perhaps?  Just come to Questacon!

We're all smiles (ha minus Dan) and ready for the adrenaline rush.

giant

See, told you!

Just let go and slide!  It looks smaller in the photo but in real life it was really hard to tell my head to let my hands let go of the bar...more fear learning.  Gotta love it.

We finished off our Questacon adventure at a little show about airplanes.  Georgia and I got to go on stage.  I was surprised she was brave enough to go up...I think the big balloons sealed the deal for her.

We loved Questacon...here are some last photos from our adventure.

~This fancy little shinanigan...there was a green screen and a huge flash went off while we were in front of the screen and then kept our shadows there once we moved away.  Yup-definitely played on this one for a while. :)~

~Caylee in the kaleidescope~

~this is Caylee's "waiting for Dan look" that we see all too often.  Love it~

By the end of the day, Caylee & I decided that our real kids were these two fine boys here...

...they were totally enthralled by this marble machine and by the whole museum as well.

Cute little Phile and Dan -our kids at heart.

I'll keep my kid around I think.  

Definitely a keeper.

xoxo

Capital

We went on a weekend excursion to Canberra this month...Australia's capital.  (Bet you didn't know that!) 

Our friends Caylee, Dan and fam joined us.

We had a lot of fun and this is what greeted us on our way in... 

First stop was the Old Parliament House...but even more first was the Aboriginal Embassy out front.  The Aboriginals have claimed this land as their 'embassy' and have a whole campsite permanently set up there.

Aboriginal drawings on the courtyard tiles

then the Old Parliament House.  This place was top notch!  My fave.  I want to go back and walk every inch of this place.  I love old buildings with history and culture and this had heaps of both. 

It's a beautiful building with perfect Australian verandas out front.

And straight out the front doors you can look all the way down the road, straight down to the War Memorial.  That was done on purpose by the architect so that the members of Parliament would always see it when entering or exiting the building and remember those that protect their country.

(the War Memorial is all the way down there...I promise!)

See!-culture and history...

.love it.

...Questacon came next but there will a a whole other post on that so we'll just skipperoo like a kangaroo to the next stop...

New Parliament House.

I live in Australia...crazy!

Here's the Australia seal

{cue national anthem}

View from the top of the New Parliament House...directly in front is the entrance to the New House, then further down after the courtyard is the Old Parliament House and then on yonder there is the -not so small in real life- War Memorial.

The inside was immaculate.  So pretty.

Check out my prince charming on those steps ;)

I just love this place!  It was gorgeous and I learned a lot about the government of Australia.  They follow the old rituals of parliament passed on from England.

So cool.

...more on that the next time we go back and have more time...I keep saying that...I really need to go back.

I loved driving around to see all the embassies in Canberra.  There must be at least 25 or so and they're all built to look like their native country.  They were interesting to see!

Here's just a few...

~South Africa~

~Papua New Guinea~

~Thailand~

and

~China~

The last one is my fave.  Can you guess which one it was?

~USA~

YES!-Canberra was good to us.  I even got to go home...almost, American soil at least.  Thanks Canberra!

The US Embassy was huge.  While the other embassies were a single or maybe a couple buildings, the US embassy too up a few blocks!

We definitely were taking pictures of the entrance, sign, seal and flag.

We definitely saw 3 guards at this embassy and zero at the all the others.

We definitely saw one of the guards come out with a camera-looking device as we were walking back to the car.

We definitely don't know if we were or weren't supposed to be taking pictures...but it shouldn't be a problem...right? :)

Guess we'll never know.  At least I got to see my flag, recite the pledge and maybe, just maybe got a tid bit excited!

Almost just like home. :)

and now just some randoms...

-the view from the War Memorial down to Old and then New Parliament House-

-the best tree ever-

-view from the Canberra lookout-

Canberra was just an area of empty land in the middle of Sydney and Melbourne and when Australia couldn't decide between the two fro a capital, they made Canberra.  It's laid out very geometrically and even includes a man-made lake.


-all smiles-

-the lovely Archibald family-

-me and the man-

and this is what greeted us on our way out...

good weekend Canberra, good weekend.