Good Morning!

I seem to be neglecting my blog this past werk.  Not sure why, as I still have a few travel photos and I have been scrapping a few pages too.

I worked Monday and not sure why the days I am there the unit has to be out of control? Not many babies, but very busy!  And having the added job of answering the phone and opening our secure door since we have no secretary.  My legs were aching when I got home.  They were elevated, took some Motrin and rubbed with Deep Heat!

We have been experiencing much cooler and rainy weather.   The moisture has been very much needed, so I won't complain!  But Cooper hasn't been thrilled he can't go out and play.  

We have a family wedding to go to this weekend! So Curtis' dad is riding the train over from Whitefish and will go with us.  We will also celebrate Curtis's birthday.

And I will iclude a few shots of Airlie Beach as we headed north up the Eastern Australia coastline.  Heading to the Great Barrier Reef.  You won't guess it by the photos, but we were dodging rain showers all day.  And it was so hot and humid!

They don't recommend going in the water here because of the stinging jelly fish.  The have made a special lagoon a little further down the beach where they recommend you go swimming.

Look at the colour of the water.  All the different layers of blue and turquoise.  And yes, that is how it truly looked!  So beautiful!

One little layout I will share.  Photo is from last summer.

The background paper is from Authentique.

Other papers from Glitz Design, October Afternoon, Fancy Pants design

Sun glasses- Crate Paper

Stickers- Echo Park

Flair- Fancy Pants

Bakers Twine

A Few Layouts!

Not quite finished with my travelogue, but thought I would break it up with a few layouts.  Soon I will be starting on my Down Under" album.  Slowly getting photos printed.  It is a tedious job sorting through all the photos that were taken and deciding what I want to print.!

A couple of weekends ago I went to a creative weekend.  I finished Cait's France album from when she visited back in high school(2006?).  It will be heading out to her on our next visit to the coast?  I also started working on a mininalbun from a cruise in 2009 we took with the cousins.  It is almost done too!

A Quiet day doing laundry after working in the NICU all day yesterday!  Had a visit from a friend that needed to stop in for a bit!

Happy Birthday Cooper!

Yesterday we celebrated Cooper's 3rd birthday!  Oh, where has that time gone?  It was quite the celebration!

The big kids were off school yesterday and they all were here for a while!  We got Cooper this huge blue ball.  This kid loves balls!

He chased Harlee with a pool noodle too!

For dinner we headed over to Kirsten's for a BBQ.  The day was beautiful.  

He opened gifts!

He tried them out!  They were found in Nic's bed this morning!

The awesome cake his mum made for him!  Cooper loves trains!

Everything was a little overwhelming!

But he was happy in the end

And he got an awesome train engine that plays music and blows bubbles from his auntie in Seattle.  It was a big hit!

Whirlwind Tour of Brisbane.

Wish we could. Have spent more time in Brisbane!  We spent the next day seeing the sites of the beautiful city with John. He picked us up at our hotel, toured us around all day and dropped us off at the cruise terminal so we could board our next ship and head north to the Great Barrier reef

We started our day heading to the Lone Pine Sanctuary! Lauree really wanted to hold a koala bear and there are very few places that allow that, despite the number of koalas that live in Australia.   

Kookaburras are terrestrial tree kingfishers of the genus Dacelo native to Australia and New Guinea, which grow to between 28–42 cm in length. The name is a loanword from Wiradjuri guuguubarra, onomatopoeic of its call.Wikipedia

The cassowaries (/ˈkæsəwɛərriː/) are ratites (flightless birds without a keel on their sternum bone) in the genus Casuarius and are native to the tropical forests of New Guinea (Papua New Guinea and Indonesia), nearby islands, and northeastern Australia.^[2]

This a beautiful bird and I would have loved to see one in the rain forest.

Yes, she got to check one off her bucket list!

The city of Bribane from Mt. Coot-tha Summit

Look at the art work on the concrete.

On board Royal Caribbean's Legend of the Seas!  Quite a let down after being on the Solstice!

Can you see the rainbow.

As we set sail from the harbour in Brisbane.

Away We Go!!

Did we end our adventure at the end of the cruise?  Oh, no!  It was time to fly to the other side of Australia to Brisbane. It is almost an all day adventure between the three hour time change and the distance flying.  

Here we are getting close to landing.

And who met us at the airport?  My scrapbooking blog buddy, Tracey.

Her blog is http://trace-elementz.blogspot.com/.  I know some of you visit her site already.  

How wonderful is it to actually meet up with someone you have communicated with over the internet?

And she made time for my sister and I as she was so busy with the up coming wedding of her daughter.  She drove us to our hotel and spent the evening with us.  It was great!  So much more meaningful now you have met this talented, creative lady in person!

 

After receiving 3/4 of an inch of rain yesterday, it started to snow overnight.  And we had 5.4 inches of snow today.  Very much wanted moisture.  It was heavy wet springtime snow hard on power lines and tree branches!

We have branches down 

My poor flowering bush

Harlee was happy to make snow critters after school!

Back to the 70's next week!