Are Rainbows lucky?

We’ve seen two whole rainbows today – not for us these half-arsed efforts that disappear behind trees, oh no! We’ve seen two huge ones today that stretch all the way over the horizon in a beautiful semi circle. Which (for the quick amongst you), also means that we’ve had some rain……. Lots of it! I think we’ve had the entire winter’s quota in the last two days and there is lots more forecast for the next fortnight! Good job Oz is an Island already, otherwise I think we would have broken our tether and would now be headed for New Zealand! The boat’s sat on the drive collecting water like a very expensive washing up bowl! It’ll take us a day to dry it out after all this rain. It feels nice though. I get a strange happiness now from a day’s rain – in a similar way I suppose that we all used to feel happier after a day of sunshine in the UK. It’s lovely to hear the sound of the rain hammering on the roof tiles (lucky we haven’t got a rental house with a tin roof! Can you imagine the noise that would make?).

Well, the kids are now back at school. First week of the UK holidays and my lot are back with their noses to the grindstone! It feels as though they haven’t had long enough off though. We’ve done quite a lot with them I suppose, with days out and trips here and there, and we’re more knackered than Sam and Darcie are! The thought of back to the routine of shouting at them in the mornings to get their teeth washed and their faces brushed doesn’t fill me with glee – especially when Paul can’t get his carcass out of bed until 8.20am!! [:-(

We are now on ‘Fish Watch – Week 3’. One of Darcie’s beloved, best friends in the whole world, her bestest ever birthday present (her fish), has travelled to meet his maker on the porcelain pathway three weeks ago now – and Darcie hasn’t even noticed! She’s fed them (very occasionally), stared at them and poked her finger in the water, but she’s still yet to notice that one’s gone AWOL! And we thought about getting a dog? Good grief, none of us would remember to feed it in a fortnight and sit talking about how thin it’s looking. Perhaps we should know our limits and realise that we’re not good with children and animals!

So for the last week of the school holidays we visited Burswood Casino and treated the kids to a huge buffet lunch. You can eat as much as you like and after Sam’s fourth plate of pasta and lasagne, he reluctantly moved on to pudding – only to declare the savoury stuff much nicer and finish his meal with another slice of freshly cooked pizza! They had a pizza oven in the middle of the restaurant, so you can’t get much fresher than that! Darcie loved it too as they had a chocolate fountain in the middle of the restaurant! You got little wooden skewers that you could stick marshmallows on and then dunk them in the melted choc……..yum! Adam looked like we had held him by the legs and dunked HIM in the chocolate by the time he was finished – he is quite a messy eater! He’s also like Darcie and has a sweet tooth.The funniest thing was, as we came out of the restaurant, there was Santa Claus in full dress handing our sweets to the older people that had been there for the ‘Christmas in July’ celebrations! Darcie just ran towards Santa as fast as her legs would carry her! Santa smiled and posed for a photo and dished out the chocolates meant for the old folk to us! Paul joked however, that they were all the hard centres and we should check for denture marks before we ate them! I would love to show you the photo that I took of Darcie and FC, but I only had my mobile and don’t know how to download the pictures – doh! We also went to Kings Park so the kids could have a play for a while. It's beautiful there - over so many acres it's unreal and there are about 4 different kids parks - as well as a scary looking tree top walk that we haven't managed to persuade Paul to do yet!

Ooohhh, also had a very strange experience in a shop last week! Over here they offer something called a 'lay by' where you can get the store to keep the item for a few weeks/months whilst you pay for it in installments. Sometimes they charge you a few dollars for this service, but it's a good idea to start buying for birthdays - plus you don't have to worry about storing the stuff. Well, last week, Target had a HUGE toy sale and were offering free lay by until Christmas Eve. Well, we went in there at 10am on the day it started and it was like the opening ten minutes of the Harrods sale! It was complete bedlam! There were hundreds of hormonal women with shopping trolleys piled as high as they could get them with every possible toy imaginable - they were ALL doing their Christmas shopping - IN JULY! They must have taken a fortune that day and all the Mums left the store happy in the knowledge that they had broken the back of the Christmas shopping, could pay for it in installments between now and Xmas and collect it all on Christmas Eve if they wanted to. Mad? ........or a good idea? We bought a ten foot swimming pool with pump for less than £35!! That'll keep them cool in the summer (if I can be bothered to fill it up; although, yes - we don't pay for the water here, the landlord does, and he wouldn't let us have a dog in his poxy palace, so I may well fill one for the neighbours as well from our outside tap ;-)

Paul was very chilled out last week. Monday afternoon we even took the boat out when he should have been working! – although a bit of a hairy moment when his mobile rang with an important customer on the phone and he left Sam to almost steer us into a bridge! All adds to the fun, I guess! We saw more dol-chins. Perhaps they were looking after us, like the Mermaids used to try and lull to sailors onto the rocks, perhaps the dolphins were trying to save us from the bridge and tow us out of the way of the oncoming concrete!

We also managed to fit in a trip to Perth museum. Sam was desperate to show us where he went with school and it was a good day. It’s like the Natural History, but about 1/50th of the size. Sam’s favourite part was the ‘poo draw’ where you can see samples of different animal’s poo! Very informative. Although the Curator didn’t seem that keep on Sam’s offer to add a new exhibit to that particular draw! It would be even better if Adam did it – all the spiders would use one of their eight legs to pinch their nose; I don’t know what happens to Adam’s food whilst it’s being processed, but I tell you, it smells BAD!! There was lots at the museum about how life used to be for the first settlers and covered everything from aboriginals, wildlife, through to the three fences the length of Oz built to keep the rabbits out! (I kid you not!). It was an enjoyable few hours away from the rain, and the best bit was, you only had to make a donation to get in. Paul and I shoved some coins in the box; Darcie put in a sweet wrapper, Adam tried to shove a train in and Sam attempted to withdraw some money as if it were a cashpoint!

Paul having an 'off' day!

Call that a snake? THIS is a snake!

We still haven’t completely finished the paperwork for the house…… they keep forgetting to cost for things that we thought had all been resolved, but then turn up to bite us in the a**e. They did it as we chose the more expensive kitchen doors, but on our pre-start they forgot to cost for them; that was another $2500. Today they phoned to say they’d forgotten to cost for the upgraded cabinet doors in the kid’s bathroom! We’ve already signed everything off, and it’s like accepting a tender to have a job done, only for the contractor to say….’sorry mate – I know we quoted you to lay a patio, but we forgot to include the cost of the slabs in the price……’ Stupid! So needless to say, we are in dispute with the builders already! They are being reasonable though and the Contracts Manager was VERY embarrassed when we spoke to her this afternoon. We’ve put a lot of pressure on the builder to get the site though as we had to have permission from the Foreign Investment Review Board (FIRB) to purchase land in the first place as we are not permanent residents and as part of this grant, we had to start continuous building within the year. This didn’t happen and they gave us an extension until the end of August, but they must start building by this date…..tick, tock, tick, tock………. Mind you, they couldn’t do anything if they went to site at the moment with the weather being as pants as it is! No – I don’t want to hear about how lovely and hot it is in Blighty, thanks all the same.

I think that’s about all our news for now. The kids have done a week back at school now and are tired out, but happy. Darcie’s class assembly is on 16th August and they are rehearsing now (the theme is something to do with monkeys – very appropriate, I’d say!). Sam’s had his mate Chad over a couple of times this week and they jumped on their bikes and went to the deli, bought a bag of chips and met up with some girls from their class. How mature! God knows what he’ll be like at 9 – shaving, no doubt! Darcie’s got a little fan club going at school and everyone seems pleased to see her in the morning and a few of them compete to get her to sit next to them. She also has a bit of a love interest (well, rivalry actually), in the forms of Ashley and Sean. Both of them have proposed and Darcie is a bit spoilt for choice! Sean never stops; he’s like a little ‘Billy the Whizz’. I think I’d personally go for Ashley – I’d be exhausted trying to keep up with Sean after a week!!

Oh look, it's Mum and Dad.

Adam’s fine – talking more and more every day and he’s becoming a lot easier to understand. His new favourite saying is ‘YES SIR’. I ask him to get his socks; ‘Yes Sir’. ‘Adam, put your coat on!’ ‘Yes Sir’ ‘Adam, finish your breakfast.’ ‘Yes Sir’. I don’t know where he gets it from. Perhaps I’ll have to stop him watching ‘Soldier Soldier’ before bedtime. He’s pineing a bit for Sam and Darcie now they’re back at school and we do the register for them and their friend’s about 100 times a day. It goes like this…….

‘Mum? Where’s Darcie?’

‘At school darling’

‘Mum? Where’s Sam?’

‘He’s at school too’

‘Mum? Where’s Sean?’

‘At school.’‘

Mum? Where’s Amy?’

‘Ummm, at SCHOOL!’

‘Mum? Where’s Chuck?’ (Sam’s friend Chad – Adam can’t say his name, so it's a cross between Chad and Jack, hence Chuck!)

‘At school, honey’

‘Mum? Where’s Tick-la?’ (Sean’s sister Nicola)

‘FOR PETE’S SAKE ADAM – THEY ARE ALL AT SCHOOL. NOW BE QUIET!’

‘Yes Sir!’

Tries the patience of a saint, my son! Bye for now x

P.S I've organised a telephone number that you can dial from the UK which is just like a UK number and the calls are only 3p per minute. If anyone's interested in giving us a call, email me or post a comment on here and I'll let you have the number, Thanks!

Well, we are starting to get a little social life between us, you know and it’s rather nice! Last weekend we took a drive up into the Perth Hills. It’s very beautiful up there and the houses are large and sprawling. It reminded us of Tewin Wood. Apparently though it gets VERY hot in the summer there as they don’t benefit from the sea breeze that we get every afternoon. We came across a track with a car park and rest facilities and took some pictures of the kids at a view point. The view was fantastic and at points very similar to UK woodland. The best bit there was an open fire that you could build yourself with a hot plate over where you could heat your own coffee in a billy can, or cook eggs and bacon over a real fire. There was a family there that we got chatting to and they just take a saw with them, gather some wood, get the fire going and in no time at all, they’ve got coffee and lunch. It looked great fun and we’re definitely going back one day to try it for ourselves.

Delaney kids 'go bush'

They also had some very strange toilets! They were just like any other public toilets; in a little cubical, very clean. But when you looked down the toilet, there was no water and you could see down about 5 metres to all the ‘waste’ at the bottom! It was an environmental/biological toilet. Frightened the pants off of Darcie, who desperately needed a wee, but didn’t fancy falling down into the black hole of crap! I had to hang onto her for dear life (like in aeroplane toilets, when she is convinced she is going to be sucked from the aircraft with every noisy, super-suction flush!) while she watered the compost! They tell everyone that was the highlight of their day – the ‘funny’ toilet. It really didn’t smell though – very clever!

Adam and Darcie enjoy the view in a headlock

We also stopped off at a Vineyard and did a very small amount of wine tasting. We’d love to do it in the summer on a guided tour, where you just hop off and on the minibus that takes you round all the vineyards, getting more and more sloshed and poorer as you go. We bought a really lovely bottle of sparkly white from a local grower/fermenter/bottler for less than a tenner. Although I must admit you do feel pressurised to buy a little when it looks as though the lady manning the ‘shed’ hasn’t seen hide nor hair of another person for three weeks. What can you do? Have a slurp and then say ‘no thanks – not for me’. I don’t think I could stand the look of disappointment on her face. We weren’t however THAT bothered as we only bought the one bottle! Plus, you do feel a little begrudging as you can buy really great wine from the drive through bottle shop for about 4 quid! We can’t buy alcohol in the supermarkets. We have to go to a bottle shop, although you can just do a drive through where you wind down you car window, slur at them what you want, pop the boot and copious amounts of booze are then shoved into the car to be transported home. Good idea, but less hassle just to pop a bottle into your trolley whilst at the supermarket.

This week it’s been the first week of the school hols and on Monday I took the kids to a shopping centre as recommended by a friend. How fab! It was like a proper shopping centre! If you squinted and spun round a bit, it could almost have been the Harlequin in Watford, or part of Milton Keynes! It was great and the kids enjoyed spending some of the holiday money that Nanny B had sent them over for being good and working so hard during the term. Sam bought and devoured a foot long roll from Subway. He ordered it all himself and the guy behind the counter was chatting away. He said to Sam, ‘is this all for you mate, you’ll never manage all this’. Quick as a flash, Sam’s index finger shot up into the air (the same way my Dad used to try and grab a waiter’s attention ‘…….I say……..’) and said to all the people behind the counter, ‘you obviously don’t know me very well, do you?’ Err, no. How could they? They work at Subway and have never met you before and therefore could have no inclination that you are a champion muncher who could give Mr Greedy a run for his money! For the record, Sam ate his foot long meatball sub with extra sauce (and FWIW said he was still a little hungry and could have eaten seconds!)

Adam is now completely obsessed by Bob the Builder characters, so his money went on Scoop, Muck, Roley and Lofty! He takes them everywhere with him……along with Thomas, Henry, Percy et al! He’s going to need one of those shopping bags on wheels soon, just to carry all his essentials round with him when he goes out! He’s such a little old man! He’s really chatty now though and really competes with the older kids. We play a game in the car where we ask questions and have to ‘buzz’ in with our own buzzer sound when you know the answer - kind of like 'Ask the Family' for a dysfunctional family! Today, Adam buzzed in! He didn’t have the answer, but made something up, or repeated Darcie’s last answer, but he knew to buzz in at the right time! Whenever Sam goes to do something now, Adam shouts out ‘ME TOO!’ He’s very funny.

Adam and his mates!

Tuesday was a quiet day and the weather was a bit pants and Paul had to go into Perth, so we just bummed around the house and watched some DVDs.

Wednesday there was a little get together for the kids in Darcie’s class at a local park. The kids all took bikes and scooters and they had a little picnic whilst the Mums had a chance to natter, it was fun, if somewhat cold.

Thursday we went to a local wildlife park with Darcie’s best mate Amy and some friends. The kids loved it. There were lots of beautiful parrots and other animals they could get very close to. There was a fab park there too which I think the kids spent almost as long on. Darcie went back to play at Amy’s and ended up sleeping the night – her second sleepover!!! I handled it a lot better this time. I found it was better if I didn’t look in her room and see her little empty bed – that really upset me last time! Paul took the opportunity to do something fun with the ‘boys’, so they did home-made pizzas – yummy!

Friday morning I went for coffee and cake with a nutty mate round the corner. She’s off ‘down south’ on holiday for a week with her family next week to visit the Albany Whaling Station. Boy, she’s so excited - NOT! I asked her to bring me back something in ‘keeping’, so I’ll probably get a bar of Blubber soap or a take away Whale Blubber soup. Yum, can't wait for that one! Sam had a friend in and out to play in the afternoon and then we went off to another friends for drinkies in the evening. They are over on the same visa and have bought a BEAUTIFUL house in the northern suburbs. The kids were fantastic and played brilliantly all evening (Addy didn’t give up until he fell into the car at 11.30pm and he was still really happy and full of beans!). It was a little disheartening for us as they have bought a gorgeous house and are already settled, whereas we are going through the stress of building and won’t have a ‘home’ for at least 18 months, but it’ll all be worth it in the end. We made our decision to buy land and build and I’m sure it’ll work out for us. There were three other families there too all on the same types of visa, so we swapped stories and tales of woe and had a laugh and let our hair down. It was just what the doctor ordered and was great. Nicola and I spent most of the evening trying to persuade Paul to let us have a dog! Nicola was doing a really great job and I thought we were making headway, until Paul woke up this morning with his ‘Practical’ head back on (he’s a bit like Worzel Gummidge – changes his head with the weather!).

Darcie sporting mascara and earrings for a night out - whatever next?

We went out today to look at bedroom suites. We want to get something nice to go in our room where the kids can't wreck it and cover it in chocolate Tim Tam. We saw some really lovely ones, but had an indecisive moment and didn’t buy anything. Paul and Sam stopped off in a music shop and Sam asked about a guitar (that’s number one on his birthday list at the moment; electric guitar and amp!). The guy in the shop gave Sam a ‘Darkness’ poster and he’s rushed home and blue-tacked it to his wall. I ask you – 8 years old and music posters on his wall already (and 'rock' bands as well!! I'm sure Darcie is going to be one of his 'rock chick groupies' too as she came home from Amy's with felt-tip 'tattoos' all over her back and arms and is already pestering to have her ears pierced - as long as that's all she's getting pierced, thank you! She kept on and on at Paul about having her ears pierced and kept questioning me as to whether or not it would hurt! I said yes, it does hurt, but not for long. Eventually Paul was worn down and said 'come on them, in the car now. Let's go and get your ears pierced. Darcie winced and decided to wait until she's more mature - six, she said..... at least :-) Sam’s already informed me that if I don’t let him have a guitar and lessons, I’m ‘hampering his career prospects’ (I kid you not – he used those words!), as he is destined to be a rock star. Failing that, he’ll be (in order), an F1 driver, Premiership footballer or a builder. He asked me if I thought he’d achieve any of those………. I said absolutely (luckily he didn’t ask which one I thought!) How much would Adam love him though if he became the latter? Can he fix it? Yes he can!!

We had a BBQ tonight in the dark (again, adds to the adventure). It was lovely and we ate together and the kids watched a nice film on the TV. I installed the kids electric blankets that we bought for them from 'The Good Guys' - an electrical retailer where you pay less when you pay cash. Also had to buy a new washing machine as my one decided that it enjoyed it's trip in the container - quite liked the sun on it's back in the laundry for a few months, but has now decided Australia isn't for him, thanks very much! So glad I bothered bringing it halfway across the bloody world to break down!!! Mind you, with all his health issues, the washing machine's probably been watching Paul and sees this as 'normal' :-) :-)

We haven’t got as much excitement planned for next week, but Sam wants us all to go to the museum and I’m sure we’ll have a few days out. Oh, P.S if you have a look at the 'Links' to the right hand side and click on 'our Photo Album' I will be updating the pictures there rather than posting individual ones on here. There is a monthly limit on what I can upload, so keep checking back for more pictures of sunny weather (we hope!).

I’m warning you now; this entry is in total praise of my children….. I don’t normally praise them up too much – it makes them too easy a target to get criticised by others, and I’m the first to acknowledge their short-comings. They are not MENSA kids and heaven knows they are cheekier than most - however I am so proud of them this week, I just have to mention it.

This week was their last week of term and they received their school reports. Sam’s is great, with every aspect saying he ‘consistently applies effort’; the highest of the achievement level’s available. His teacher wrote at the bottom of his report ‘As Sam has not only had a change of school, but also country, he seems to have coped extremely well. He has settled into his class work and friendship groups easily and is always one of the first to be organised between lessons. Fantastic effort, Sam!’ I am just so pleased that his teacher has acknowledged what a huge upheaval he has experienced and coped so brilliantly.

And to top that, on Wednesday in assembly, Sam received a Merit Certificate! He had to go up in front of the whole assembly and get presented with his certificate and shake hands with the Principal. He got the award for joining in consistently and his ‘fantastic listening skills’. WooHoo!

And, not to be left out, Darcie also got her report this week. Hers was fab as well and her teacher commented; ‘Darcie has settled quickly into the pre-primary routine and socialises well with her peers. She is a well mannered student who completes her work quickly, quietly and neatly. Darcie always enjoys spending time in the home corner and writing table. Fantastic start to the year, Darcie!’

See? I think I have a right to be slightly boastful this week. When you think that the kids have left a school that they loved and left all their friends and family behind, yet have taken to Secret Harbour Primary like they have never been anywhere else! They really love school. Sam today declared he had the best day that he’d ever had at school. His teacher brought her 14 year old son in with her and he interacted with all the kids and Sam now has learnt to compile his own powerpoint presentations. I’m not even going to guess what he’ll be doing next – probably our VAT returns, they’re all greek to me!

Darcie in full 'clown' mode

To celebrate the end of term, the school held another ‘sausage sizzle’ and the kids enjoyed that. Pre-primary also held a clown day where all the students (and the teachers :-) dressed up in clown outfits and played games and had party food. Darcie was SO excited and she had the best day! Here are a few pictures of Darcie in her outfit and the papier mache clown that she crafted (Mum – NO comments about the nose, please!). They’ve had such a good week, but they are really ready for a few weeks off. We’ve got a few things planned; Sam wants to go back to the Perth Museum, we’ve got a zoo trip planned with Darcie’s best mate, Amy and we’ll probably do the pictures and nice lunches. Some of the parents are getting together for a picnic every Wednesday, so that will be nice to break the week up for them. The weather’s still nice (low to mid 20’s during the day) although it is forecast to rain in the early part of next week – typical, school holiday weather!

Close up of Miss Pie-Flinger

Mr Clown - all Darcie's own work; just don't mention the nose!!

Adam is continuing to make progress with his potty training (if somewhat slowly!). He has become fixated with Bob the Builder toys and when I presented him with a scale model of Scoop (or Doop as he calls him…) I thought he was going to blast into the atmosphere with glee! Mum sent the kids some pocket money for doing so well at school and Adam immediately reeled off the list of remaining Bob characters that he was going to treat himself to. Sam immediately told Darcie what they could buy if they clubbed their money together – strangely enough, it consisted of things on his birthday list – hum!

Everything else is pootling along nicely. We are making friends and starting to know who to avoid ;-) Business is coming together slowly and the phones are starting to get a little busier. We have loads of quotes out there – particularly for Navman, so it only takes a few of those to drop in and the pressure will have eased a little. Paul has been really chilled this week which has been lovely – don’t know how chilled he’ll be over the next fortnight with the kids off school? Hopefully I have persuaded him that we need to chill out a little bit before the business really kicks in as six months down the line, we’ll probably look back, wonder why we were so stressed about everything, and wonder why we didn’t enjoy a ‘break’ while we had a chance. It just feels like we are on the cusp of something…… fingers crossed. It can’t be through bloody lack of trying, that’s for sure!

I had a fab coffee with a mate in Mandurah this week. We were sat in the café with Mr Cheese, (we had a window seat and could look out over the marina), when all of a sudden, Adam shouted out ‘DOLCHINS’. Everyone in the café turned to look at Adam who had spotted two dolphins in the water. A bit different to the view from Costa’s window over town, I suppose :-) Everyone in the café was laughing at Adam because he was so excited. Good eyesight though! We then took a takeaway coffee over the park and Adam had a play on the swings for a while whilst we swapped notes about husbands and kids. Always good fun and we’re never short of material.

Addy and Darcie on the 'bouncy bouncy' (as Adam calls it) in the Yard.

The golf club where we used to go for a BBQ on a Friday night are now offering roast dinners for $10! That should be good fun and seeing how crap our oven is, we'll let someone else do all the donkey work, I think. We'll try it out and report back! We're going to see if we can grab a few days away over the school break. I managed to get some of Paul's medical treatment costs back from Medicare; it's money we thought had been spent/gone for ever, so we might enjoy spending it again and having a few days in a hotel or something. Paul suggested taking the kids to Kalgoorlie - the biggest mining city in WA (and Australia), until I googled it and discovered it was a 7 hour drive! 7 hours of screaming, punching, kicking and 'are we there yet's??' (and that's only me and Paul!), I don't think so, so I'll be looking for something closer to home - like New Zealand ha ha ha!

Bye for now guys - keep in touch!

They’re dropping like flies!

Just to inform you all that Darcie lost her second tooth today. It was hanging on for dear life when she came out of school, then one bite of a chocolate Tim Tam and it was gone forever! (OH MY GOD - how lovely are chocolate Tim Tams??? They are like Penguins, but more honeycombey - absolutely delish!).

She was desperate for me to tell her friends and put a picture on the blog, so here it is:


I apologise for my dreadful attempt at face painting! Darcie has a ‘clown day’ at school on Friday and I got some face paints today that she insisted on trying out immediately. She wanted to be a butterfly, but would only let me use black, orange and red – yum!

Finally, here are two photos I took on Sunday when we went to the beach - not bad weather for the middle of Winter, although there was lots of seaweed been washed up onto the beach.

We can't afford sun hats - OK?? And what do you mean it's those knees that jinxed our World Cup Campaign?

One day.... I'm going to get all of that water into my little bucket. You just see!