Busking!

So it seems I am not the only one making a little cash on the side. Olivia has taken up street preforming (or busking- as they call it in Australia).  Busking on the streets is not as easy as it sounds. First, you need a permit from the city to busk. To get this you need to audition, and attend all the compulsory safety meetings. Once you get your permit you can only busk on certain streets. After six months of busking you can audition to preform on the higher end streets near the nicer shopping areas.

Olivia got her busking permit over Christmas and busked over the school holidays then. Her very first day busking she sang for 1 hour and earned $75.00. She donated her money to Millie (a close friend to Olivia and Mary who has had cancer 3 times now...she is 7 years old). We met her family in England, while Stan and Millie's dad (Brady Flamm) were studying at Oxford.

Due to time constraints, Olivia can only busk during the school holidays. She loves it. So- what does she do? She mostly sings karaoke to Taylor Swift :-)  She just started playing the guitar, but is not good enough to preform on the streets with it yet, so Karaoke it is!

Grandpa John bought Olivia her first guitar case to collect coins (Thanks Grandpa). When Olivia busks she zones out all the cars and people walking by and just sings her heart out and "pretends she is on stage" it is very charming.  If you are ever on the streets in the Melbourne CBD she would love to take a request!

My new JOB!!

I am excited to announce that I started working again!  After 10 years as a stay-at-home-mum, I have re-entered the work force. It was a great chapter in my life, but last year I spent the whole year home (mostly alone) which was fine, because I had a few things on my "to-do" list with no one to mess up the house while I was home, (which was great).

For starters, last year I (1) unpacked the house (we moved in 4 days before school started), (2) applied and was approved for our families Permanent Residency Visa here in Australia (that job alone took hours and hours of paperwork (finger printing, certifying documents for a family of five, getting police checks from other countries etc... ) It sounds small, but I kind of hold it in the same level of regard as graduating from Uni with a masters degree :-) (3) traveled... to the USA for a wedding, then hurt my knee and did physio for 2 months, then traveled up to Darwin-broom with the family, celebrated my 10 year wedding anniversary with Stan at the Whit-Sundays. Then I realized this would be it for the rest of life so I need to do something and move on with life!

Part of moving on was (1) getting my body back.  I started training for a Marathon, did the 10 day juice cleans (yummy), started lifting weights again (P90X anyone?), revamped my diet to eliminate most refined foods and significantly cut out my refined sugar intake. Started drinking water...and only water. I stopped getting RLS (restless leg syndrome, stopped having to take iron pills for RLS (which is think is from all the iron I get from all the spinach I started eating??). I no longer experience migraines, and I am just overall happier!

Last week I weighed in at 114 lbs. I no longer fit into my size 4 (USA) or size 8 (AUS) clothes...which is actually a problem because I hate shopping.  I wish someone could just give me a bag of clothes and then let me pay them for it. I am down to size 2 (USA) or a size 6 (AUS) clothes and I feel great! For those worried (let me remind you that I am only 5'3" and petite so this is totally with in my BMI) and I eat more now than I ever ate in Uni, its just different food. Mostly fruits and vegetables, and mostly raw ones at that. 

After I got my body back I wanted to organize other parts of my life. I organized the house and then started exploring all my options for what I could do with the rest of my life (I applied for a second masters degree in Psychology- got rejected), applied for a couple jobs both paid and volunteer (got rejected from some of those too...even the volunteer ones (gasp!)  I made a list of everything I didn't like about myself and wrote down solutions (with actionable items to implement). For example I now have braces back on my teeth (on the inside- you can't see them). I get them off in a year, but I wanted to fix my smile (should have worn my retainer after I got my braces off 15 years ago right?).  That is just one example, but I am DOING things! Not just thinking about doing them!

Tangent: One big perk to having kids young is that I never expected to be entering the workforce with many of my peers. A LOT of people used up their 20's to travel, get through uni, party, get married & then divorced, change careers a couple of times and then buckled down in their late 20's early 30's to get their first "real job"... not everyone... but enough people!

On the up-side, I have already earned my masters degree, born three kids (who are all out of the house now), published (which I did from home, while nursing babies), and my friends who are married now are having to step out of their careers to have kids; for them to come back in their 40's seems much more daunting than stepping into the work force at 30 (if they choose to go back to the work force sooner then they have to look at day-care options, which I never wanted to do with my kids) so I am grateful (I feel like someone gave me an extra life line of 10 years all because I was productive in my 20's).

Ok so moving onto "my job."  I started working 3 weeks ago at a consulting firm called "First Executive" in the Melbourne CBD. Their area of expertise is in Human Resources (HR). I head up the research division which we do for (1) clients who have a question about their businesses or (2) broader research questions which compare Australian markets to American or European markets.  I love it. I use both qualitative and quantitative research methods and am ever so grateful that I finished my Masters Degree when I did (finished it while birthing two children) because it enabled me to qualify for this job.  

A week into my job with the HR consulting firm, Stan had a client over for dinner. He asked what I did and I told him. The next day at work he asked Stan if I wanted to help out for a couple of months doing contract work at Telstra (Australia's largest telecommunications company). They needed help coding qualitative data and then help implementing my suggestions for change (to make the coding more accurate) with computer programming. I never thought I would be a computer programmer, but now I am learning how to export XML codes and implement the changes. Cool hu? I spend several hours a week getting trained by software companies in America. It is all very exciting and I feel very empowered. 

The biggest hurdle for me to face with going back to work was what to do with my kids and will the house stay in balance? I am lucky, I drop off the kids at school (8:30 am) work and then pick them up at 3:00/3:30 pm when they get out. I can work from home for either company whenever I want. I am home with the kids while they are out of school for school holidays (both employers are super flexible). I never thought the workforce would be so flexible! I still take the kids to all their lessons and do homework with them and get them into bed at night. Then I clock back on and do work from home. Stan usually gets home after 10:00 pm so this helps me stay awake to see him and talk to him. With regard to the contract work, some of the work-stream I oversee were suggestions Stan made, so he is able to better explain his vision and I am better able to implement it. 

From a domestic angle, Stan has stepped in and cooks all the food for the week (and pre-packages all the kids lunches) on Sunday afternoons. I hired house cleaners (trust me they are so much better at cleaning than I ever was), and my main job is laundry for the family (which I love to do- because we have a clothes line!) The house has seemed to stay in balance so far.

It sounds funny but, the best part about working is that I am too busy to worry about girl things. I don't have time to over-analyse, gossip, feel jealous or sit around at mothers groups talking about what my kid put down the toilet. I don't have time to nurse a wound and if someone does something that I don't agree with (thanks to time constraints) I am a lot more emotionally honest. On the flip side, when people are emotionally honest with me- I can take it, because I don't have time to sit at home and mull it over. It is awesome! Seriously, men should have let women in the work force a long time ago with perks like these :-)

The second best part about working is the pay check. Every time I get paid I kind of smile because "I EARNED THAT" it was hard work, and someone paid me for it and I am proud of it. I can't wait to see what else life brings because so far every couple of years I look back on my life and think "I never thought THAT would happen"...and it did...and it has been good; it has actually been great!

Tenilles visit part 3

Thursday and Friday Tenille and I hit up Brighton 

Beach, which has a string of beach huts built on the beach in one of Australia's most elite suburbs. They are very famous and seen on postcards and calendars of Australia. The beach houses/ huts sell for around 250K. They stay in certain families and owning one is more or less a sign of status. 

After the beach we attended the Grand Prix, Formula 1 Car races...which just happened to be in town that weekend!

The cars would go so fast I had a difficult time getting good pictures with my phone!

Above, we thought our hand stamps were a tad...odd?

After the Grand Prix, we headed over to a pre-season AFL match. Since Tenille played a little rugby at Uni she wanted to see if it was similar. Yes...but NO!

Here Tenille had her first meat pie (it would be like eating a hot dog at your first American Baseball game). She liked it ok :-)

End of the game!

Tenilles Visit part 2

Tuesday and Wednesday Tenille and I spent in the Melbourne CBD. 

We trained into Flinders Station,

 saw Federation Square, 

and Saint Paul's Cathedral, 

had lunch along the Yarra River, here we came across some bells that would play songs-

walked over to the Rod Laver Arena (where they host the Australian Open), 

scoped out the MCG (where they host many AFL (Australian Rules Football) games. AFL is a mix of soccer and rugby!  

On the second day we walked up and down Collins street for the boutique shopping. 

We also walked China town for some cheap souvenirs,

visited Stan's work and rode the City Circle (which is a little tram (similar to one's you  would see in San Francisco) which goes around the  major streets in Melbourne.

In the evening Stan met us for dinner on Lygon street, which is a series or Italian family restaurants famous for great food and reasonable prices, and waiters who will stand outside their shops and talk you into coming in with free desserts or drinks. It can sometimes get very exciting if there are multiple restaurant owners outside all at the same time!

Tenille's visit Part 1

A  couple weeks ago my little sister Tenille came out for a quick visit during the American "spring break". We were lucky with timing and weather. She arrived on a Saturday morning and it just so happened to be a 3 day weekend (labour day), so I left Stan with the kids, grabbed a beach tent and we headed out to Wilsons Prom (a national park just two hours south east from Melbourne). It was the last week of summer and around 80/90 degrees the whole time.  

Once we were up in the park we ran out of petrol and decided to head back to the city to fill up. The petrol stations were closed until morning (it was maybe 10:00 pm) so we decided to camp out on a nice patch of grass we found next to the road. By morning we realized we had slept out on someones lawn (seriously we were next to their mail box off the side of the road. I expected Tenille to be exhausted after her 24 hour flight and able to sleep anywhere but she was up most of the night listening to the Australian wildlife (kookaburra's sound like cranky monkeys in the early morning), and there were a couple wallabies jumping around our tent between 2-4:00 am.

Although this is a one step pop-up tent, we apparently struggled setting it up in the dark :-)

After the sun came up, we ran back to fill up with petrol and then drove back into the national park. We spent the whole day on the beach, running/ working out, boogie boarding, tanning, reading and listening to music, talking and I have to admit (especially since Stan had the kids) it was an actual sisters trip/vacation!

Here we are after a hike looking at the sunset-

Here we are at squeaky beach 

Here we are watching the sunset-

After watching someone dislocate their shoulder, Tenille wanted to try sand-boarding  down this hill on a boogie board. She was successful...and we scored someones boogie board!

After the end of three days at Wilson's prom, we started driving back to Melbourne, and decided to stop off at Phillips Island to see the Fairy Penguins run from the ocean to their burrows at the Penguin Parade. 

It never gets old and Tenille has always loved wildlife (budding biologist) so she enjoyed it more than the average tourist! :-)

We got home around midnight, Thanks Stan for taking the kids!

Student Council & Valentines Day!

Last year Olivia ran for Student Council, and lost. She was the new kid who moved in 4 days before the school year started. Her teacher said "good risk-taking" which is kind of an understatement when you come home from school and realize no one voted for you but...YOU :-)

With one year under her belt, Olivia has risen to the top. Things kids made fun of her for on the excursion bus (like her American accent- they would imitate it really loud from the back of the bus) she has turned into a strength. Below is her campaign speech, which she gave in front of her new year 4 class. 

 I wasn't sure how it would go over, but she WON by a large majority- and the class is actually giving some American traditions a go :-)

For Valentines day, the task of each person doing a Valentine for everyone in the class was a bit daunting. There are no little card packs in the grocery stores here and Valentines is not really for kids, but for adults. In addition, Chinese New Year always overlaps with Valentines day and with a very large Asian population here in Oz, Valentines takes second place.

To ameliorate this dilemma,  the teacher decided they would put names in a hat and each person would draw one out. The name they drew out was the one person they were supposed to be nice too on Valentines day. Olivia got her friend and not the boy who is mean to her (aka- the boy who has a crush on her), so she was very happy.

When the kids got home from school- we had a Valentine in the mailbox from Great Grandpa and Great Grandma Tengelsen. They were the little Valentine cards sold in the American stores that I had tried to describe to my kids. They were over the moon to see what they looked like and I was happy to see one too!  Thanks Grandma & Grandpa!

For my Valentines, Stan sent me long stem roses with a beautiful card- his cards are always the best! Happy Valentines day!

Swim Carnival

This week Olivia had a swim carnival for the senior school (grades 3-6). When you are new to the school you are assigned a house (yes, just like Harry Potter) and every time there is a school competition, you barrack (cheer) for your house team. Olivia was assigned Mackie, and her houses colour is red. So she is under the red tent.

 Here are Olivia and Maddy (Olivias BFF) all ready to support their house...and sit next to each other at the same time! ;-)

 Olivia took second place in the 50 meter free style for her grade.

 Olivia also signed herself up for the noodle race

 If you enter in the 50 meter races doing an actual stroke (not a noodle race) and you get a certain time, you can qualify for regionals, to then qualify for state. So these are the Elementary school competitions, but they are taken quite seriously  by some who want their kids to get sports scholarships to private schools for high school.

 She took 1st place. She was pretty proud of herself, but I explained that those races are for kids who can't swim so next year let someone else win that race and sign up for the backstroke or breath stroke etc.

Good job Olivia- nothing like a day in the sun for school!

First Day of School

Our first day of school came a bit fast this year. My dad had been in town for most of January, and the week before school started we decided to take a quick trip (4 days) down to Tasmania for the Australia day weekend. When we got back we had 1 day to prepare for school and with an empty fridge and laundry to catch up on we did most our school shopping later in the evening. Thank goodness Aldi's is open until 8:00 pm and Kmart until 10:00 pm...everything else closes at 5:00 pm in Australia so my shopping choices were limited BUT sufficient! 

Our plane left very early on Tuesday morning (we had to get the kids up around 5:30 am) so Tuesday night they were ready to go to bed early (8:30 pm)- This couldn't have been planned better as the summer holiday resulted in a lax bed time routine, so the kids actually got to bed at the normal time the night before school started!

In the morning Olivia was the first one up and dressed and very excited. This year Mary has officially outgrown Olivia (two years apart) and Olivia is dealing with it the best way she can...by going on her tip toes in all of the picture.

 Mary-Adelle (year 2)

 Olivia Sue (year 4)

 Mary and Olivia

 Better lighting away from the door... All of Australia is in a flood zone and Melbourne is in a drought...so excuse the lawn we have water restrictions :-)

 Finally one with Olivia on her flat feet! 

Mary and Olivia bike to school together in the morning and afternoon. We live 6 blocks from school and since two of the three kids have to be at different places at the same time we are excited the girls can get to from home to school on their own.

 Mary walking in to her new classroom for the first time!

 Mary meeting her new teacher and seeing who is in her class!

Mary got a very nice teacher. She reminds me of 'Miss Honey' from the Roald Dahl book 'Matilda'...She will be perfect for Mary. Olivia got the blond teacher who wears hot pink and does first pumps...I think Olivia will be in heaven!  Both girls loved their first day of school, but I am wondering if 5 weeks is long enough for a summer break! I guess it is our trade off since we get 3 two week vacations throughout the school year(one in spring, winter and fall)... in addition to our summer vacation. I JUST DON'T WANT SUMMER TO BE OVER!