Mood:  happy

Well today is a day of crazy weather extremes here in the land of oz, for us in brisbane we had crazy cyclone warnings and 38 degrees with high humidity where as in Victoria they actually got snow. Thats right ppl snow in aussie!! As for the cyclone they removed the warning as its moved away however they say there is a 50/50 chance of it coming back but its only a catergory one so if it does come back it shouldnt be too too bad.

Hope you are having great weather whereever you are in the world.

xoxoxoxoxoxox

Manda <3 ~ 163 DAYS!

Hello all!

I completely forgot last update that nate and i made some new yrs wishes...so here they are

Nates: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-wOwlAz_hhg  

Mine: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4eK0Mj9pZWE

Anyhow.. Mooloolaba [gah they really need to get better location names..] Beach was a blast! Bigger waves yet less surfers (boo) however there were a lot of people boogieboarding (including Nate). Im not a fan of the salt water so i sat on the beach and watched as Nate and John went boogie boarding. They were out doing it for over an hour so i decided to dig a hole. a damn good on too. In doing so however i burned the front of my legs lol. Oh well could be worse i guess. All in all a nice relazing day. Pics can be found here (after the new yrs photos) http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2117448&id=119100065&l=ec52583b84 also in this album is pics of some Kangaroo meat and other stuff found at Woolies

Thats about it happening round here. Enjoy your day!

xoxoxo

Manda <3 ~164 DAYS!

Hello!

Well not much new to report. Im hoping everyone had a fantastic xmas and new yrs! It was awesome to get to call home and see everyone via skype again. sigh i miss my crazy family lol. Our new years went well, we went down to southbank to watch the fireworks shows (they had an early new yrs at 830 and then a later one with countdown at midnight). A cool add on this yr was lasers that projected along the skyline onto the buildings. Somtimes it showed a msg such as the time, sometimes it displayed random NYE or 2010 across the four main buildings in the skyline and at other times just random designs over the buildings. It def kept me entertained until the countdown lol. Here are some pics of New Yrs http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2117448&id=119100065&l=ec52583b84 .

 As for school i have signed up and registered for my semester 2 classes. They are all focuing on the middle yrs (gr 4-7) so it'll be different then what im used to but im still looking forward to it. Im back to school the last week in feb and trust me it cant come fast enough. Neither can June 29th at 4:16pm..why u may ask? cuz that is the exact time my flight should be arriving home. Which works out well because it gives me a few days to get rid of the jet lag before the awesomeness that will be Canada Day and Xmas in july!WOOOO

Tomorrow Nate and I along with John and Brooke (2 of nates friends) are heading to mooloolaba (sp?) which is a beach somewhere on the sunshine coast. Should be fun!

Videos you should check out:

Xmas eve infestation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MaS1-JIRnAM

Bathroom Spider: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ezycvWKY6uE

and again: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIaXTV1HY4U .

[side note. we were watching Jaws when we found this spider. It makes the spider seem so much worse with the evil jaws music in the background]

xoxoxoxox

Manda <3  ~ 169 DAYS!

Hey Everyone

Sorry its been so long between updates but not much has really happened. The Monday after Nates 26th Birthday was his graduation! So that was exciting! [well the ceremony itself was boring as lol ] and that at the end of the ceremony the audience was asked , and I quote, "to please stand and show your congratulations enthusiastically" LMAO bahaah wow thanks tips. Anyhow pictures are here: http://s636.photobucket.com/albums/uu81/mcawesome-in-aussie/Nates%20Grad/

So our landlord has decided to re-do her roof. Courtesy of our rent checks I'm sure. Grrrrr so we have to keep all the blinds and windows shut since there are random men around :s

Other then that nothing really been happening. The weathers been really rainy and storm filled over the past week because we are getting the remnants  of Cyclone Laurance. Nothing too horrible just severe thunderstorms lasting for about a half hour then going back to sunny or light rain.

In other news we sent out some xmas cards to all of the awesome ppl. I've already heard from two people that some have been received. So CHECK YOUR MAILBOX!

Xoxoxox

Manda

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BABE!

Congrats you are now officially old <3

Baby Spiders on the door ?- check

Small spider on the roof ?(size of a toonie) - Check

Massive spider in the bathroom?(size of my palm) - Check

Barking Gecko in the closet - Check (he is now hiding in my pants - Just freakin peachy)

Possums fighting outside the door? - Check

Welcome to my life in Aussie. sigh.

Hey Ppls!

Well had a fannnntastic week of doing stuffs and general relaxing.

Tuesday last week we went to the Australian zoo again. Turns out when we got there that they were celebrating Roberts 6^th birthday so the entire place was decorated with a dino theme for him. – in case you don’t know/remember Robert is Steve Irwin (the Croc Hunter)’s son – Turned out to be a lot of fun and we got to see Terri (steve’s wife) , Bindi (their daughter) as well as Robert at the Croc-osium and we got to sing happy birthday to him. Hes totally adorable and looks so much like Steve. Other then that Im sad to report that im still incredibly nervous to approach the roos I make Nate go and pet them first then I approach slowly. I don’t think ill ever be used to it. Sorry they aren’t in order but here are the Pics: http://s636.photobucket.com/albums/uu81/mcawesome-in-aussie/zoo%202/

Unfortunately Beach was a no go on Wednesday  L

Thursday however Terry asked if we wanted to go to the Botanical Gardens since she has the car  and wouldn’t mind dropping us off. WOOT  So we went and spent 3 hours walking around the beautiful gardens. The fav of both nate and myself was the Japanese Gardens. They were so peaceful and so well done! We saw lots of lizards (Water Dragons) that day too. Their latterly everywhere but most run away when u get close to them . Afterwards Nate and  I went to the café to have a milkshake and relax. Which would have happened has a lizard (that Nate named Robert – pronounced Ro-bearrrr ) decided he wanted to get up close and personal with our table. And of course his Ibis friend decided to join him. – sigh-. Pics : http://s636.photobucket.com/albums/uu81/mcawesome-in-aussie/Botanical%20Gardens/

On sat Nate and myself joined Terry and her daughter Martha went to Carols By Candlelight which was a huuuuge outdoor concert of xmas carols. Unfortunatly we listened to 3 hours of carols in which only 3 songs were upbeat K I didn’t know so many slow xmas songs existed lol. ..The highlight of the show for me was when they had ‘santa’ out singing Jingle Bells and after the first chorus a man runs out in shorts/tshirt/flipflops holding a kangaroo and hes like “WHOA WHOA WHOA Santa! Sleigh Bells and Snow? Do you know what country your in !?” …then he did what ive since learned is a well known chant thing where someone goes “Aussie Aussie Aussie” and the crowd yells “Oy Oy Oy”. LOL . Then he said hed show santa how they do sleigh bells in Aussie and asked everyone to take out their keys and jingle them. Once everyone did at the same time it made an awesome jingle noise which lead this guy in to Jingle Bells – Aussie Style (lyrics and youtube link to someone singing it below)  He then did Deck the Halls or as the Australians sing it Deck the Sheds (lyrics also below). It was certainly fun to experience the different versions of some of the songs, Also head was the 12 days of an Aussie Christmas (lyrics below)  a good night over all.

Aussie Jingle Bells

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UH0vMpp3ma4&feature=related

Mood:  energetic

Hey Hey!

Nothing too interesting happened over the weekend so nothing really new to report.

On an upside Nate and I both got our school marks back and we both did kick ass!! WOO GO US!

As for the rest of the week, we are heading to the zoo tomorrow and the beach the next day so stay tuned for photos! In prep for the zoo i was trying to find a place in the freezer for our water bottles to go and the only way i could fit them in was to take out the ice cream. So i took one for the team and ate the worlds biggest bowl of ice cream at midnight LOL.... and now im WIRED!

la la la la la do do do do do ...hahaha dodo...hehehe

Hey Ppls!

Not very much happening here ..booo! Last Friday Nate and I went shopping and i got an awesome new pair of sunglasses (or sunnies s the aussies call them). Yay for not looking like a bug LOL. Then on saturday Nate and I went down to southbank and spent the day walking round the beach and down the board walk just exploring. We stoped in the jungle area and took a bunch of photos of us being random LOL enjoy ! : http://s636.photobucket.com/albums/uu81/mcawesome-in-aussie/Sunglasses/ btw if ur wondering about the alien guy he was super freakin creepy! ..not cool. lol

After the day at southbank we headed back across the bridge to KGS where some popular country star was signing autographs so we got a picture of him to in the album above. We then decided to go see New Moon which turned out to be pretty awesome. Its 100 times better then the first one and actually sticks pretty close to the book with the exception of one or two scenes. There def were some awkward moments when u have to question the writers/talent ofthe actors lol, and some just plain horrible parts that u just laugh out loud at. Over all i really liked it :)

...We interrupt this blog for Nates Notes...

So, on Tuesday I had my Education Queensland interview!!!  Honestly, I was SO nerve wracked but it turned out to be a solid interview.  Luckily, I had memorized the Queensland College of Teachers Standards (super nerd) and made this huge teaching portfolio scrapbook, which worked in my favour.  Then, BAZINGA, there I was, dressed to nines, professional scrapbook in my hand, and last nights dinner stuck in my teeth.

My interview panel turned out to be my principal, deputy principal and a teacher that I had gotten to know over the year, which was fantastic.  I had just walked in like I was Bruce Lee in Fists of Fury too (Awesome Entrance WASTED!!).  Anywho, it was super awkward at first cause the first question was “describe yourself”.  Describe myself?  What the hell was I going to talk about?  Before I could go into my shpeil on why I thought Spiderman could kick the crap out of Batman, I quickly diverted into talking about my experience with cadets and with ONeill CVI, which was an awesome segway into other stuff.  Then one thing led into another, started right away with catering for diversity and every other crazy thing that teachers needed to know (which was all outlined in the scrapbook btw).  Afterwards, I had ended with if there was anything that they wanted to know about me, and they said I answered all their questions already.  Surprised as I was (cause I had just blabbed on for about 20 minutes), they seemed really impressed with my interview and it turned out to be more of a conversation between professionals than an actual job interview. 

Anywho, so I thought the interview went fairly well and they are going to send my suitability ranking (which was what this interview was for, I think its about pay and areas I can teach) to Ed Queensland.  So here’s hoping all the beaurocratic paperwork nonsense pulls through without a hitch.  However, I think from here on in, I can call myself a career man WOOOOO!!!  Time to celebrate with some long awaited cartoon watching and video gaming (yes, I AM going to teach your children MWA HA!!!).  Don’t let the man get you down and keep on trucking in the free world!! Cheers!

And now back to your regular scheduled blogging....

Christmas is usually my fav part of the year but i just cant seem to get excited about it without the cold. weird eh? i see santas villiage and all the decorations and they just seem silly when ur walking around in shorts and a tshirt. Even the xmas music seems out of place. sad days. ps. i am dissapointed with the lack of effort that goes into santas castle at the mall.The one at the PTC is a million times better . Altho the mall windows have put up a giant display of the book Olivas Christmas (now for those of you who dont know, Olivia is a pig and a very popular childrens book character). Here are some pics of xmas decorations around the city : http://s636.photobucket.com/albums/uu81/mcawesome-in-aussie/xmas%20decorations/

Anyhow thats all for now. Love and Miss you All!!!!

K so the storm last night just turned out to be a really bad thunderstorm - 1300 lightning strikes in 5 hrs and what the news called 'gun-shot" thunder- so nothing too too severe - thank goodness :)

On another note check out this song, its by Carrie Underwood. It kinda reminds me of my life right now. Especially the second verse (i wrote it out below and changed the lyracs a tad)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tpFxcI9ynvI&feature=related

altered Lyrics :

This downtown apartment sure makes me miss home
And those bills there on the counter
Keep telling me I'm on my own
And just like every [Saturday] I called momma up last night
And even when it's not, I tell her everything's alright
Before we hung up I said
'Hey momma, don't forget to tell my baby [brother] I'll see [him] in the [summer]
And tell [Grandma / Nona] that I miss her
Yeah, I should give her a call
And make sure you tell Daddy that I'm still his little girl
Yeah, I still feel like I'm where I'm supposed to be
Don't forget to remember me'