It feels like we've had lots of holidays the past couple of months, what with my mum visiting from NZ, Abigail's birthday, and then my friend Kim visiting from the UK on her way to NZ. But we've been eager to go camping again so we went camping for four nights up at Maroochydore over the weekend.
As usual, we planned to avoid the holidays, so being only a couple of weeks into the school term there weren't many others pitching tents around us. Wide open space was ours to enjoy. Caleb's running around was quickly put to an end when we discovered there were prickles. I hadn't brought shoes along as whenever I had tried them on him he would YELL and fuss until they were removed. However, we ended up going out and buying him a very lightweight thin pair which he happily accepted wearing. Shoes on one's feet are better than prickles in one's feet, after all. Caleb, for those who missed it, started walking about 9 1/2 months (!); he is now almost 11 months old.
We visited Underwater World one of the days after procuring adult tickets with our FlyBuys points. The seal show was definitely a highlight, and the escape stories of the otters were also very entertaining! Caleb was fascinated by all he saw; watching his face was a pleasure. The girls still remember visiting the Sydney aquarium and enjoyed spotting various sea creatures they remembered (the sharks and sting rays hold a particular 'scary' fascination). Abigail impressed us with her classification knowledge when she pointed out a lionfish!
For the most part, our time was spent on the Maroochy Palms campsite - there was a pool, jumping pillow and playground, and quite simply, lots of open space around us. Jon and I miss being able to walk at an adult pace now that Abigail and Sarah are out of the pram (and Sarah can walk painfully slow when she chooses, which is often!), so I especially enjoyed being able to get in some 'adult walking' again - even if it was only to the kitchen and toilet blocks! I read the third book in Janette Oke's Acts of Faith Series (I am a fan of Janette Oke's writing, and this series is particularly good - it fleshes out the book of Acts and has given me much food for thought); Jon got in some golf practice, and we both enjoyed chucking a few frisbees around together. Being out on a dark campsite also makes the stars more accessible for viewing so we used Jon's monocular to look at the moon and Venus; a telescope is on our 'to buy one day' list.
On our way home we stopped in Caloundra to see Grandma Randall. And we did something new - we all went to McDonalds for lunch! (We have recently 'discovered' Hungry Jacks and have been going every week or two with the kids to get ice creams and for them to play on the playground there - a treat everyone looks forward to; the girls call themselves hungry little jacks when they know we're going there; and they have dubbed McDonalds as Old McDonalds farm). Grandma seemed to quite enjoy the change in scenery and the kids enjoyed having a romp before being bundled into the car for the 'long' drive home. And home we are all again, sun kissed and ready to meet the demands of home again.
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