De-mob

The inevitable point of the project has come for us to de-mobilize our household. Maggie got most of the things in our house pared down before she and FFM departed in September. My job is to prepare it all for the movers. The process is sort of like corralling all the stuff you have accumulated on your overseas trip and trying to fit it into your suitcase. The difference this time is that the trip was 3-1/2 years long, the suitcase will be a modular sea container, and we are returning with more people than we departed with. Here are some photos to show you how the Perth de-mob is shaping up. (Anyone with sharp eyes may be able to compare to the relatively well-appointed house that we configured last year).

The living room is mostly down to our chair and sofa and rental furniture now. At least I still have a place to sit.

FFM's old room seemed like the logical place to accumulate toys and kid stuff.

This is what five sets of Ikea "Trofast" toy storage cabinets look like when they are disassembled. Ikea is made for expatriates: relatively inexpensive, immediately available, and packs flat when it's time to go.

The guest room is the holding pen for general household goods.

Stacks of clothes inhabit the bedroom.

The playroom gets more toys and duffel bags. The bags will go with me on the plane. I have them out now and as I think of something that would be useful to have in Denver before March, I stick it in a bag.

The ubiquitous, inevitable, and thoroughly enjoyed books. I love being in a family that reads.

And, lest you think I am starving as a temporary bachelor, a shot of the fridge to demonstrate that I do, in fact still have something in it. One of the immutable, perpetual, and inescapable fundamental facts of the universe is that the last things in the refrigerator will always include mustard, pickles, and something to drink.

Before long the rental company will come collect the appliances and assorted furniture, the movers will come to pack our things, the utilities will get turned off or transferred, and I'll turn in house, car and work keys. Thus will quietly end the logistical unplugging from this episode of our intraplanetary travels.

-Travis

Missile Range Camping and Wave Rock

Well, the Flying Tomato and the mighty San Juans are a pretty tough act to follow, but I'll see if I can entertain you with some Aussie action. This post was not sponsored by an energy drink.

A few weeks ago I headed north from Perth to do some camping with friends. While I am a veteran camper and have camped in many places and in many conditions, I now have a new camping experience: camping on a beach on the edge of a missile range. From the beach town of Lancelin we drove north on the beach until we arrived at a suitable camp site.


From the top of a dune, we could see this target off in the distance.

The missile range is used by the Australian and American navies. They weren't in the area that weekend according to the signs at the gate. When not being used as a missle range this is a recreation area frequented by off-roaders, campers, and beach-goers. How's that for a win-win use of the area?

The next day, we went to the giant white dunes to try out Gareth's power kite. First a few pointers from Nik.
Now a confident grin.

And I'm off! The power kite dragged us novices across the dunes. See the furrows behind my feet.

Last weekend I did a roadtrip to Hyden to see the famous Wave Rock. Here is an enterprise I passed on the way. One-stop-shopping out in the wheat country. This is right next to the gas station and across from the combine and tractor dealer, so you can get everything you need in one place.

The inner part of W.A. is rather dry, so some clever methods have been developed to collect water. This arrangement is at a roadside stop. Whoever needs water can help themselves.
This is another method - find a depression in a granite outcrop and dam up the bottom part. Then rain water will run in and fill the pond. Small diversion walls channel more water into the pond.
There are some salt lakes in the area. They are getting saltier and saltier, and are getting salty enough the surrounding trees are starting to die. Some of the lakes are an eerie green color.
This is wave rock, so named for obvious reasons. It is part of a large granite outcrop that also has a rain-collection lake. The little walls at the top are more water collection diverters. The average rainfall here is 337mm per year - not very much!

Another view of wave rock with bystanders for scale. The wave is about 50 feet tall and 350 feet long.

Near Hyden is part of the Rabbit-Proof Fence. This is one of three fences built around 1905 to try to keep rabbits, emus, and feral goats out of W.A.'s agricultural land. It goes off into the distance as far as you can see. This piece is 234km (146 miles) long, and the whole thing is 1176km (735 miles) long. Apparently the fence had some success, but didn't entirely stop the hungry critters from eating the crops.

Travis

Travis' Mountains

Travis is from a small town in southwestern Colorado called Silverton. It's unbeliveably pretty there pretty much all year round (we'll ignore mud season) and he got to spend pretty much all of his first 18 years there. Those of you who know us well know we love to travel, love to see the world, don't let the moss grow under our feet, but that at heart we're mountain kids. We need topography, especially Travis, and Silverton has an abundance of topography.

Last winter the well known American snowboarder, Shaun White (aka the Flying Tomato) spent the winter in Silverton doing a secret project sponsored by Red Bull at Silverton Mountain. Red Bull has just unveiled their promotional video, which focuses on the giant half pipe they built for Shaun White to practice on. The video also just happens to show Silverton and the awesome mountains Travis grew up in.


Nice mountains. Oh, and some really good snowboarding, too. Makes me want to get my board out. Don't get too homesick, Travis, you'll be here soon.
Thank you to Travis' mom, Penny, for sending this to me. For more Silverton pictures, click here.

Oh the Logic

This is the way conversations are starting to go in our house. And it freaks me out a little bit.

FFM's gotten really interested in the 'big kid' concept. He's determined to be a 'big kid' and wants to know the criteria. He's not toilet trained yet (I'm not pushing it, he's not even 2.5 yet and our life is still in major upheaval) and is having trouble staying in his big boy bed. So right now the explanation is that big kids 1) stay in bed and 2) don't use diapers, they use the potty. FFM's not a baby anymore, he's a 'little' kid. After a few rounds of this talk he's accepted the explanation, and while not happy about not being a big kid yet he gets it.

Fast forward to this morning. Because of the not-staying-in-bed all of his books have moved, temporarily, into my room along with the rocking chair. FFM LOVES the rocking chair and LOVES reading in said rocking chair and will entertain himself by rocking in the chair and looking at books. So, during my shower this morning he plopped himself into the chair with a couple of books and got busy reading to himself.

Checking up on him a few minutes later I found him quietly rocking along. A few minutes later the rocking was getting pretty boisterous. F, I say, please just do medium rocks, not big big rocks in the rocking chair. FFM says OK, medium rocks, thinks for a minute, and slows down. Then looks straight at me and says:

Mom, I medium kid, not big kid. Not little kid. Medium kid.

Did I want to laugh out loud, oh yes, so badly. Did I duck around the corner and I have a little chuckle? Yes indeed. Oh my. He's going to be a handful.

Happy Halloween

I'm just not sure we'll ever top this Halloween costume.

Back in early September I was browsing in a children's consignment shop, anxious to outfit my child in snow gear for the winter. I was pawing through a large rack of puffy snow clothes and FFM spied a tiny (and I mean tiny) rack of costumes. He found this one. And latched on to it. FFM does not latch on to stuff. I'm incredibly lucky that we can actually walk in and out of any toy store without temper tantrums. He's very very good about picking up toys, books, etc but understands when it's time to go he's got to leave them at the store.

But this, this was the first and ONLY thing he would NOT release. Boy, says me, I sure hope it's his size and I'm awfully glad it's super cute. I put the top on him, thinking if it fits I can make do even if the pants don't fit, and - Whew! it fits. Then. It. Would. Not. Come. Off. No, not because it was stuck, my toddler decided for the first time ever this was it. NO MOMMY KANGOO STAY ON!!!! There was no removing it. Now, it was nearly 90F outside that day and he's sweating, but this discussion goes on and on and there comes a point (anyone who's been the mother of a two year old knows) where you just say, keep the $*%(@!# (edited for little ears of course) kangaroo on and you're just glad it fits and you're not buying some really ridiculous too big/small thing and you happily go pay for it.

Let me tell you the discussion when we got the carseat and the tail wouldn't fit wasn't so pretty.

So now we're up to Halloween. We did a practice run last week at Lowry Town Center. Grannie Annie came along. We nearly got blown away it was so windy, but it was great fun.

Today FFM got a special Halloween treat from his pal Debi, a new used wagon! Complete with Halloween windmill.

Just to make sure it worked he drove it back and forth to Debi's house a few times.

Then, on to the REAL Trick or Treating! Off through Grannie Annie's neighborhood with our new friend Colin from across the street. He's two, too, and had a great home made Bob the Builder costume.

And because every kid who gets treats should have a trick:

P.S. If you ask FFM what that baby kangaroo is called he'll tell you it's not a baby, it's a joey :)