The End

So this is the end, my friend.

By the pool soaking up the last couple of hours in the Florida sunshine. As always holidays play a time distortion trick with my brain. I feel like we've been away for five minutes and at the same time five years. "Home" seems fuzzy, I can remember it but not very clearly.

I am trying to get my head around normal life: shopping, cleaning, cooking, work, school and after school routine. Like Pavlov's dig I'm sure I'll slip right into all the old behaviours without a second's hesitation. But sitting here by the pool it still feels a million light years away.

We certainly chose two very contrasting places for this trip. In a word Guatemala is dusty, physically and culturally. In a word Orlando is shiny, in all aspects.

Many times during this trip I have vowed to never take the children anywhere ever again. But in the sage words of Justin Bieber I know to never say never. Even as I write I can feel my resolve softening and the negative memories fading into the background, slowly to be reborn as humorous stories. The good, fun times jostle for position in the front row of my mind.

Who knows what the future will bring. Definitely more visits to Guatemala, next time hopefully in more of a helping role than simply a tourist role. A visit to Marianna's Colombia is a certainty in the next 4-5 years.

Orlando is hedonistic fun. It's beautiful weather, first class hotels, service, shopping and eating. We've loved every minute. Sharing part of the time here with my sister made it extra special and we are so happy they could join us.

But in the end it was all about this: Will leaning into me as we watched a movie in bed last night and saying "I'm really glad I met Ana Mercedes". Three weeks of middle class over indulgence with just one true purpose. One special day for us all but especially for Will.

So goodbye from Orlando...normal transmission will recommence from Sydney in 30 hours.

Scenes from a Mall

Last full day of our holiday.

Lazy start, kids watching Disney, us packing (and realising we really need to buy another suitcase).

Then off to Downtown Disney for what we thought would be our last hurrah at Pollo Campero for lunch. But we got waylaid and ended up at the T-Rex dinosaur themed restaurant.

It was pretty cool with moving dinosaurs and various areas such as the Ice Age, where we sat. Every 20 minutes there was a light show of sorts meant to represent a meteor shower. The kids loved it. The food was ok.

Then a taxi trip back to the Premium Outlet Mall where we juggled the children and managed to put in a solid three hours of shopping.

What can I say? The prices are just too hard to resist. A pair of one size up Nikes for Will for $30 (we paid $100 for the pair he's wearing now, bought at the start of the year for school sport shoes).

So shopping bags in hand plus the new suitcase we headed back to our home away from home.

I'm ready for home and "normality" but we will all be sad to leave. It's been a very enjoyable trip.

Islands of Adventure: Pics

Islands of Adventure

The weather was perfect for a day of theme park cruising, warm but not hot with some cloud. We were ready for some Universal fun. (Personally I was just a little over all things Mouse related.)

Universal's Islands of Adventure is home to the newish Wizarding World of Harry Potter and I was extremely excited to be finally getting to visit it.

Firstly we had to go through a few other sections, like Marvel Comics where Jay enjoyed the Incredible Hulk Rollercoaster and I went on the Amazing Adventures of Spiderman Ride with J and M. That's was a really fun ride - my favourite sort - the virtual ride.

Then we all got very wet on the Popeye and Bluto's Bilge Rat Barges. I may have screamed "make it stop" once or twice.

Jurassic Park was ok except for the whole weird ride rules for the Pterarodon Flyers ride which meant only Miss M could go on with one adult supervisor - lucky Jay.

Finally we reached Harry Potter and it was wonderful. The Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey ride was worth the very long wait, it was the most incredible virtual ride I have ever experienced. The detail was unbelievable. I'm glad the kids didn't go because it was quite frightening at times, the dragon, the giant spiders and the Dementors in particular. I could have easily gone again and again but there was more to see and do.

Jay loved the double roller coaster fun of the Dragon Challenge and, most surprisingly the kids loved the Flight of the Hippogriff, the smaller sized coaster - Will went three times.

We wandered round the shops where my sis may or may not have had an unfortunate incident with the jelly bean dispensing machine in Honeydukes lolly shop. We all got to try some Butterbeer which was delicious. I couldn't quite bring myself to try the pumpkin juice.

Reluctantly I dragged myself away from all things Harry Potter and onto the next section where we enjoyed a cool little magic show and the Sinbad Stunt Show.

Finally it was onto Seuss Landing which was so much fun. Apart from Jay who loves his "real" (ie scary) rides we are generally a bunch of theme park wimps so these rides were much more our speed.

The couch ride through The Cat in the Hat was particularly fun. It was a really colourful and fun part of the park. I was so tempted to buy the kids Thing 1 and Thing 2 t-shirts but didn't really think they'd wear them after the novelty wore off.

By now it was 8pm and the park was closing. A huge, fun day had by all. We headed to Universal Walk for dinner at The Latin Quarter's churrascaria meat overload. It's amazing how quickly you can go from "I'm starving" to "don't come near me with your meat on a stick again, I'm about to explode". Special mention goes to the Sangria which was light and delicious and just what the doctor ordered after a hard day of theme park rambling.

So our theme park adventures come to an end. Don't think I can face another one for some time.

Today is J and M's last day as they head back to real life in NYC late this afternoon. We're having a pool day, we all need it.

Friday

Today was outlet shopping day for Jay and (yet another) relaxing by the pool day for me and the kidlets. Oh, and waiting for my sister and brother-in-law to turn up from NY.

So really nothing super exciting to report. The kids played and I started reading Neil Cross' autobiographical "Heartland" (I so love his books and now I'm starting to see where that darkness comes from).

The Hilton people had a DJ playing some great music and had dancing games and craft for the kids. Such a fun in the sun sort of day.

Then Jay returned with his spoils and J and M turned up all at about the same time. It was nice to sit and chat and catch up a little with my sis. The almost twelve months since the wedding and our trip to New York have just flown by so fast.

Then it was time to clean ourselves up and head to dinner at the Waldorf Astoria next door - we had a booking at the Bull & Bear.

Wow! What a great restaurant. Just the right ambience for an upmarket steak house: formal but friendly. Perfect service and truly wonderful food. The kids tasted almost everything, from the seafood platter entrees we shared to the brontosaurus sized steak sliced off the bone for us to the sublime little beignets (French donuts) and, as we all did, loved every mouthful.

After two weeks of dull, average and occasionally plain bad food it was a thorough treat. A meal I'll certainly remember as a highlight of this trip.

Disney Hollywood Stdios

Eureka!!! We finally had the sort of fun family day at a theme park I had been fantasizing about. Partially it was my plan to go in later in the day, giving the kidlets plenty of time in the morning to laze about, watch the Disney channel and eat their breakfast croissants in bed. None of the usual morning shananigins.

We also got our FastPasses (all two of them) first up as we've learnt they go fast (ha ha). This was done while Jay was lining up for an HOUR to get the kids photos taken with Buzz and Woody.

This park is more about shows than rides and we enjoyed the Muppets 3D movie, the car stunt show (both almost identical to MovieWorld on the Gold Coast), the back lot tour. I didn't go but the others loved the Star Tours ride and Jay said the Rock'n'Roller Aerosmith Rollercoaster was quite good but not full on enough for him.

For me the highlight of the whole day was the '50s Prime Time Diner where we had dinner. I chose it because I thought it might be a Happy Days style cafe but it was so much more.

For a start it's done up exactly like a '50s house; the details are amazing - the furniture, the knick knacks, the b&w tvs playing original programs. The menu is a throwback too, with meatloaf and pot roast and fried chicken.

The best part was our waitress who called us "kids" and told us the "rules: no elbows on the table, napkins on our laps, no talking with our mouths full, no arguing, no dessert if you don't eat your greens". She was hilarious!

The kids (and us) were enthralled with her persona and she had us in stitches each time she came past. The food was really good and it was a super fun experience. Like everything at Disney the details couldn't be faulted.

Then we did the film tour and headed off to Fantasmic which is their big light and musical spectacular (we can see the fireworks for it from our window at night). It was chockers and we ended up right at the back but it was very beautiful and worth seeing. Getting out was a pain in the bum but that's the price you pay.

A bit of shopping and then a long wait for the shuttle home (which was fine as we got to meet a sweet young family from Utah who were very nice to talk to).

Finally home after 11pm feeling tired but satisfied and very happy....especially when I checked the news and saw that Bob Brown had resigned (sadly it wasn't following an unfortunate incident with a goat as I had predicted). Bonus!

As a PS I have to comment on one family group I saw (and you do see more than your average amount of freaks at theme parks). This particular mother had thoughtfully dressed her three daughters (ages approximately 7, 10 and 14) in identical, very fetching ensembles of smocks made of Buzz and Woody curtain fabric with matching frilled pantaloons. I tried to take a discreet non-identifying photo but it was too crowded. I'm sure the older girl in particular would have been thrilled. Being the perfect parent myself I can sadly say "some parents are just cruel".

DisneyWorld: EPCOT

EPCOT is where we spent our Wednesday. We seem to be establishing a pattern on theme park days: kids, particularly Miss M, don't want to get out of bed, don't want to get dressed, don't want breakfast. Jay and I spend a lot of frustrating time begging, cajoling and threatening them from one step to another.

Finally we get two limp rags (jellyfish, Jay calls them) to the shuttle bus stop. They bicker about nothing in particular. (Yesterday, to be fair, they found two boys they had been playing with at the pool on our shuttle and we all spent a happy journey chatting with the family - from Chicago - during the short trip. It never ceases to amaze me how much easier it is when the kids make a friend of someone outside the family - defuses the sibling squabbling one million percent.)

At the park, as previously, Will refuses to go on the first few rides despite many assurances of fun and safety and non-scariness. Usually he decides this when we've already been standing in the line for a while (sometimes when we are literally about to board the ride, like yesterday with Mission: Space). Around lunchtime he warms up and starts enjoying some rides.

EPCOT is a combination of Future World and World Showcase. The former areas have all the rides including the almost impossible to get on (we didn't) Soarin' which is by all accounts amazing and Mission: Space which was fun and Ellen's Energy Adventure which was fun and funny.

I really liked Living with the Land which was lame but informative. Jay loved Test Track and we all enjoyed Re-imagined! Spaceship Earth (except Will who wouldn't go).

The World Showcase area is replicated areas of various countries like Canada, Norway, England, Morocco. The attention to detail is mind blowing. We really enjoyed wandering around this part of the park - especially the 360 degree tourist movie of Canada hosted by Martin Short (beautiful and funny) and the cover band playing all music British in the little park near the pub.

If we weren't so tired by then we could have explored in much more detail but we were stuffed and hot by 6:00 pm when we decided to head home.

EPCOT was hosting the Disney garden festival and looked incredible with the stunning gardens, especially the Disney themed topiary. We were speculating on the numbers of staff required to keep things looking so magnificent; there literally isn't a blade of grass out of place...and it would need to be maintained at night because you never see maintenance or gardening people (apart from basic rubbish collection) during the day.

The kids always enjoy themselves in the afternoon (the morning is when Jay and I curse ourselves for being so stupid for taking two ungrateful brats on a trip like this and swear never to take them anywhere more exciting than Woy Woy Caravan Park ever again).

We got "home" in time for a swim and a drink by the pool, then showers and room service dinner with a family movie (something about a talking dog, I was finishing "A Tiny Bit Marvellous" on the Kindle - loved it BTW).

This is where hotels like this come into their own. Tired after a big day out there's nothing like someone else taking care of dinner and a cosy bed to snuggle down in.

Tuesday

Tuesday was a rest day. Jay had booked in to play golf at the Waldorf Astoria next door and I was planning a day of serious nothingness.

The pool area here at the Hilton is well designed to keep kidlets busy with watery fun all day; there is a lazy river which meanders around the entire pool and a decent water slide.

I didn't see them for the first three hours at all (apart from when I'd make a point of picking out their heads bobbing along as they went around the lazy river for the 500th time).

This meant it was just me and Dawn French (well her delicious novel "A Tiny Bit Marvellous") in the sunshine. Oh, wait...just me and the loudmouth ignoramus who had plonked himself on the sun lounge next to me and proceeded to make and answer a gazillion phone calls during which he swore, yelled and generally abused his employees, colleagues and family in a very broad (what turned out to be) Long Islander accent.

Talk about disrupting the peace! If I had rolled my eyes any further I would have been in danger of losing them inside my skull forever.

After a while he disappeared to spend "quality" time with his unfortunate offspring but would periodically re-appear to yell at some other subordinate. [Later in the day Jay returned from golf and, as he does, engaged Mr Dropkick in chit chat prompting me to break out in a cold sweat at the thought of an imagined dinner invitation. Luckily he wasn't charmed by Jay's Aussie style and told us in no uncertain terms that Australia was "too far away" and was in no danger of him visiting it anytime soon. Lucky us!]

Anyway, apart from the occasional unpleasant distraction from the sun lounge next door it was a totally idyllic day. At about 1:00pm the water logged kids emerged and requested food. I just love poolside dining: momentarily a tray appeared with burgers, Shirley Temples and one very toxic looking (but delicious) frozen Blue Lagoon.

The afternoon saw me in much the same position as the morning but I did drag myself from the Kindle for 15 minutes for a refreshing swim.

Jay returned not totally happy as he ended up playing the round on his own (two others booked in to play with him had not turned up - possibly his hole-in-one reputation had preceded him?). It was a shame as he had really been looking forward to playing on this immaculate course.

That evening we had an average buffet dinner at the main restaurant, the highlight of which was the informative chatter from our waiter.

Then a family movie in bed. Oh! Bed! I love these Hilton beds and bedding - its like sleeping on a cloud. The pillows are heaven and I will need to source some at any cost upon returning home because the thought of my old Tontines at home fill me with dread.

Turkeys and Penises and Mud Crabs, oh my!

Sunday night I returned from a weekend in Noosa with my mum and sister. It was my non-denominational Festive Season gift to them and a much anticipated break.

I have never been to Noosa before and was filled with anticipation, especially for the legendary shopping.

My introduction to the shopping was swift and painful. The very first shop we entered on Friday afternoon presented me with the most glorious handbag, a beacon of handbagy wonder. Eagerly I asked the saleslady to get if from the shelf for me. Eagerly I examined its beautiful, intricate detail; already projecting how much happier and more fulfilled my life would be with it on my arm. Eagerly I fumbled for the price tag, mentally reaching for my credit card and finalising the transaction. Eagerly I threw the bag at the hovering saleslady: $1585, that's how the price read. At first glance my brain simply registered $158.50 and instantly I thought "wow, what a reasonable price for such a beautiful bag, wrap it up". At closer inspection I realised there was no full stop or dash seperating any of the digits and the horror dawned on me. ONE THOUSAND, FIVE HUNDRED AND EIGHTY FIVE DOLLARS (not Lira or Yen or even NZ dollars to bring down to a figure my mind can comprehend).

It was almost totally down hill from there. The first half dozen shops we entered featured $800 dresses, $400 jeans and the most wonderful boots, the price of which I was too terrified to enquire about.

But this is not a totally sad tale. At one of the shops I discovered Desigual, a Spanish brand of clothes made just for me. Crazy colours, fabrics, prints and textures; just the sort of stuff I love. Mum and J bought me a skirt for my birthday and I can't wait for the weather to cool down a little so I can wear it.

Apart from the wonderful/horrible shopping there a number of other memorable things about Noosa.

The turkeys. They are everywhere. The streets, the cafes, hiding in the scrub around the beach. Where do they come from and why are they are there?

The penis trees. Otherwise known as Padanus Palms, these trees literally look they are growing penises instead of roots. Yes, I am as deep as your average puddle but these just cracked me up every time I saw them... and I saw a lot of them. [See pictorial evidence below.] Mum and J got well and truly sick and tired of me nudging and pointing each time we passed one (about 100 times a day).

The mud crab. We had the most delicious, indulgent Queensland Mud Crab cooked in garlic butter, with lots of herbs and big slabs of crusty bread to mop up the gorgeous buttery sauce on Saturday for lunch. Mud crab is one of life's true treats for me. It's something I rarely have but often crave. Mmmmm....

And memorable for all the wrong reasons was Noosa Marina Sunday Markets. If there was an Olympics for piss weak markets this would certainly be in gold medal contention. "Markets" is really too strong a word for this collection of crappy stalls: stick on fingernail decals, handmade pottery mermaids, new age crystal rubbish... and these were the best of them. The advertised "fresh produce" consisted of one stall, out the back in the car park, with a sad display of half a dozen of a few fruits and vegetables. The only positive of the day was the lovely Ferry ride from Noosa to Noosaville and onto Tewentin. Oh well, live and learn.

So onto a few pictorial moments from the weekend...

Mum and I enjoying some Krispy Kreme action before boaridng our plane.

Ladies who lunch. Waiting for our

Mud Crab while enjoying some

very yummy cocktails.

Yes, I have no shame.
(But it does look like a penis doesn't it?
It's not just my dirty mind.)

A Family Moment

This afternoon we returned from two nights at Pearl Beach on the NSW Central Coast. It was a rare time indeed, a pure family weekend. Generally speaking we like to do things in packs, possibly with the idea that there is safety in numbers when it comes to entertaining children. We almost always weekend and holiday with friends and/or family.

But this weekend was just the four of us. The way I was feeling last week I was a little anxious about how the weekend would pan out, especially with the forecast bad weather. My fears were unfounded as it was a tiny bubble of family heaven (and that's not a term I tend to use often).

The house itself, Wildwood, was quite isolated; at the end of the last street, surrounded on all sides by trees and bush and wildlife. Let's not start about my personal feelings on these. Suffice to say I was able to tune out these things and simply enjoy the quiet and the far-away-ed-ness of the place. Of course I couldn't have possibly lasted more than the two nights but enough about my mental health problems.

We arrived late-ish Friday night and pretty much went straight to bed. It was raining, we were tired after a wearying week, it was perfect snuggle and sleep conditions. We did just that.

Saturday morning we enjoyed a leisurely family breakfast at the local cafe, followed by a short walk to discover Pearl Beach (which took all of a few minutes). We then took a drive to neighbouring Patonga Beach to see what attractions (not many/any) it had to offer.

Returning to our hideaway we decided a trip to the beach itself would be nice as the weather seemed to be holding off. We ended up having an absolute ball, a blissful two hours of playing in the surf and the sand. There was hardly anyone else there and it was just pure joy, the four of us body surfing together.

Almost as soon as we returned to the house with our lunch of fish and chips the rain started, and stayed. We were housebound for the rest of the day, watching movies, reading and sleeping. The only downer was the take away Chinese dinner. Big Jay drove to Umina for it and it certainly wasn't worth the drive. Horrendous! Luckily we didn't get food poisoning but I wouldn't have been surprised. If you're down Umina way stay away from the Silver Dragon. You have been warned.

This morning our Central Coast based friends met us at the cafe for a big Sunday morning breakfast. We had already packed our stuff and since the rain was still coming down we headed home. It was a brief but lovely respite from real life. I needed it.

The World's Biggest Above Ground Cemetary

That's what they call the Gold Coast.

And that's where we've spent the past week, holidaying up a storm and managing to avoid both retirees and Schoolies.

There were three of us families staying at Treasure Island (arrghhh, me hearties) - it sounds much more glamarous than it actually is. What it is is a Big4 Caravan Park which also has lots of very comfortable "cabins", ours was actually a two storey, 3 bedroom, 2 bathroom house - plenty of room for 4 adults and 4 kids (our other friends had their own cabin as they have 3 kids). Our cabins were situated around "our own" pool and bbq area, which was really nice and mostly we had the pool to our selves. Another family have their own holiday apartment on the Gold Coast and we spent a couple of days with them too. So on Monday night there were 17 of us at dinner.

These families are our fabulous holiday buddies. We went to Fiji with them last year and had a ball. We all have adopted children and know each other through our adoption playgroup. The kids have virtually grown up together. Each family has an older boy (our Will being the oldest and the others are 8 and 9 years old) and then younger girls (around 4 and 5 years of age) like our Marianna. Then there is poor little J who is a 4 year old boy and a bit of ring in. Anyway, they are all the best of friends and go crazy together on holidays; watching them bond is beautiful.

It was a wonderful family holiday. The dads took the big boys to Wet'n'Wild on the Monday (where they had an asbolute blast), leaving us girls to hang by the pool with the little ones. Tuesday was Golf Day for the dads (out of 40kg baggage allowance for our family 17.7kg was Jay's golf bag, sheesh!) - and may I take this opportunity to congratulate my dear husband for winning the Cup (he is so horribly pleased with himself it's a little bit scary). Again us girls spent the day hanging out with the kids by the pool. It's a hard job but someone has to do it.

Wednesday was DreamWorld day and Thursday was MovieWorld day. For someone who isn't into the big, scary, spin-you-round, spin-you-upside-down rides I just love those theme parks. We managed to fill each day from opening to closing time and could have spent a couple more hours at each park. They are just so much fun. I love the feel of these places. I especially love the sets and look of MovieWorld.

There are great rides for big and little kids, there are shows (I really enjoyed the Stunt Driving show at MW), there are animals (like the beautiful tigers at DW). Too much fun to have in one day!

Our darling Will, who is generally an absolute chicken when it comes to rides, even went on the Road Runner Roller Coaster at MW about 15 times. We couldn't believe it. Never say never, I say. Speaking of miracles, even I went on a small roller coaster at DW (it was scary, but really fun!).

The good thing about going with a group of friends is there is always someone to go on a ride with you, always someone to take a child to the toilet or wait with yours while you go, always an extra set of eyes to watch the kids, always someone to share a bag of fairy floss with.

I could go on and on about how much fun the theme parks were but all I can say is they were awesome. If you're going to go I recommend going outside of school holidays and going during the week (not the weekend). We had very small crowds and didn't need to wait for any ride (occassionally just a few minutes). The kids were able to go on a ride and then run around and get straight back onto it.

Friday was again a rest day, which involved yet more hanging out by the pool. Saturday morning we packed up and headed to the airport, just making our plane. I was exhausted Saturday night (after partially unpacking, doing some laundry and going out to do the grocery shopping).

I need a holiday after our holiday.

I wasn't going to write about my trip to the Gold Coast last weekend at all. My first reaction to the trip, upon getting home on Wednesday night, was to curl up in the foetal position in the corner and rock myself in a self-comforting manner. A few days later and some perspective has returned. After all, I have survived with some semblence of sanity, so all is well.

There is absolutely no need to go into details. I went to the Gold Coast for 3 nights and 4 [horrificially long] days with mum and the kids while Jason was at a work-related (sort of) golfing trip to Coffs Harbour. It seemed like a good idea at the time. It wasn't. I'll stick with the positive. Sea World was great fun and I would recommend it to anyone, especially those with younger children. George's Greek Restaurant at Sanctuary Cove is great. Good food, great value. When was the last time you paid $14 for a whole dozen oysters at a restaurant? (Some thieving scumbags are charging $35 here in the Emerald City.)

Lesson learnt: Do not go on holidays with the children without the physical and mental presence of their father. It won't end well.

Here are a couple of pics to capture the happy memories...

Doesn't look like the human incarnation of Lucifer on earth, does she?!

Two's company, three's a pain in the backside...

A couple of pics from our recent trip to Port Macquarie.

[Our dear friends Therese and Brett and their girls Claudia and Kimberley recently moved up to this lovely little holiday town and we made a long weekend for ourselves and drove up there for a four day visit. We had a fabulous time. Thanks for the wonderful hospitality!]

Here's Claudia relaxing by the pool with Marianna.





















Here are Will and Kimberley. We've had these two betrothed since playgroup days.

We're back... and trying to adjust to real life. The worst part about holidays is having to come back. Woe is us (I'm sure there's a lot of tiny violin playing going on out there right now!).

Anyway, the Fiji trip was wonderful. We stayed at the Shangri-La Fijian Resort which is abou 60 kms from Nadi on the Coral Coast. It is very much a family resort and if I didn't have children I would think it would be my worst nightmare.

The Fijians are just beautiful, the most friendly, welcoming people... they just work on Fiji time. I've heard people complain about lack of professionalism with the service in Fiji; to me it's the perfect service for when you're on holidays. Sure it's a little relaxed but that's what I want when I'm hols and generally I'm happy to wait a while, after all when you're kicking back with a book by the pool it doesn't really matter if your fancy cocktail with the pineapple and umbrella garnish takes an extra five minutes.

We went with three other families, all of whom we know through our adoption group and who we've become very good friends with. There were nine children in our group: four older boys and five little ones. They are all great buddies and apart from a few fatigue induced squabbles they got on beautifully. It was such a pleasure to watch them playing in the sand on the lagoon or running around on the grassy area outside our rooms. There was a really fun kids' disco on every night and we took the kids a few times - they loved it; the limbo competition was hilarious.

There were many highlights:

* The children playing together (I could watch them for hours - as long as they're not bickering).

* The children dancing with the Polynesian dancers on stage.

* Meeting the local school children during our day trip.

* Jason taking Marianna for a horse ride on the beach.

* Laying by the pool chatting and reading with my dear friends.

* Some lovely dinners - adults only (thank goodness for evening kids' club!).

* The "big night out" when we hit the disco and danced the night away (well, until 12:30 AM anyway - that's a big night for us old parent types).

Lots more but I'll just let the pictures do the talking...

It's getting exciting now.

After only FOUR MORE SLEEPS we will be jetting off for our Fijian holiday.


We'll be having breakfast somewhere like this...
















Dinner somewhere like this...

















Enjoying this view...






















Reading our books and sipping our Pina Coladas by this pool...


















Please don't hate me... much!

Because my life is a constant stream of ideas to distract myself from the reality of daily life I have this morning booked our family holiday to Fiji for next year. "But you just returned from your family holiday to Phuket!" I hear you shout. Yes, I know, I know. I've decided that the planning of a holiday and the subsequent anticipation are actually the best parts and that the holiday itself, no matter how wonderful, is actually somewhat of an anticlimax. So my remedy for crashing back to earth post-Phuket is to launch another planning-anticipation-preparation cycle.

It also worked out that the resort of choice in Fiji, the Shangri La, had a good deal and, in combination with air fares paid for with frequent flyer points, we can have 10 days of tropical bliss (including the ALL IMPORTANT KIDS CLUB) for a very reasonable amount of money. Not only that but our friends D and M and their kids S and V are going at the same time so we'll have others to annoy once we're tired of annoying each other (which will be about 10 minutes after we board the plane).

So far 2008 is panning out to be loads of fun: the Australian Open in Melbourne at the end of January in honour of our 10th wedding anniversary; Easter weekend on the south coast with friends; the ever wonderful Camp Connection at the end of March; and Fiji in June.

Then there's JB's and mine 30/40 birthday holiday to plan for early 2009. I should have been a travel agent... except that I hate people and customer service... apart from that it would be a perfect job for me.

We returned from Phuket on Saturday and while I'm exhausted from the through-the-night flight home and the subsequent sleep deprivation my head is still filled with the beautiful, crazy sights and sounds of the place.



It was the most wonderful holiday we've ever had. The Evason Resort on Rawai Beach where we stayed was magical. Three gorgeous pools, including the inifinity pool overhanging the ocean where we spent many hours contemplating the state of the universe with a Heineken and a Mango Daquiri in hand and the family pool where we spent many hours playing with the kids with a Heineken and a Mango Daquiri in hand.



There were the many beautiful restaurants both at the hotel, near the hotel and in Patong itself where we spent many hours devouring super delicious, super cheap local seafood (but not the Australian beef - sheesh!) with a Heineken and a Mango Daquiri in hand.



The kids had a great time in Kids Club (every second day, I just felt too guilty putting them in everyday even though they had a fabulous time there and were asking to go - I'm a good mother, really I am, repeat x 100).



I did struggle somewhat with the shopping. Look, it was OK once I got a handle on the bargaining thing but overall it didn't sit well with me. I don't like to bargain but when the initial asking price is crazy you soon start to get into the swing of things. However, we ended up buying some things and missing out on a whole lot of others because we'd refuse to go higher, they'd refuse to go lower and then we'd end up too tired and pissed off to carry on and ended up leaving without the item/s in question. No huge loss really as how many pairs of fake Billabong shorts does one husband really need?



The best parts were the people who were endlessly accommodating and happy to please; the simple relaxation of a day doing close to nothing; the stunning scenery; the scrumptious food I didn't have to prepare or shop for; the endless cocktails. Well, you get the picture... it was just a friggin' fabulous holiday. Enough said.

Bless me father for I have sinned. I have been a very bad blogger of late.

There is so much to blog about (in no particular order).

Stupid lesbians.
OzIdol.
The rollercoaster ride of parenthood.
My dear Anthony becoming a dad.
Politics.
How much I hate Telstra.
Other stuff I can't remember right now because my brain is a sieve.

But I have no time right now.

We're off to Phuket on Wednesday to spend 10 days relaxing in this amazingly beautiful place.

I promise to be a better blogger on my return (technology allowing).