Festive Season in Melbourne

The school year finished on December 14 and Seb and I wasted no time jumping on an aeroplane south on the 16th, leaving poor Manuel to fend for himself for a whole month.

But the Melbourne homecoming was not to be what we expected as temperatures had dropped to a very scary 18 degrees!!! Or at least scary to Seb and I who have been use to 30 + for the past 8 months.

Thankfully we endured and started to get into the Melbourne Christmas mood. I had a few last minute Chrissy presents to organise and a lot of catching up to do, not to mention a gorgeous little nephew to meet. And the following Saturday saw another trip to the airport to collect Jane.

Seb slid back into Melbourne life very easily although missed Manuel trembly.

Christmas Day began as you would expect with the emptying of 'Santa's Sack'. We all then headed to Nadine and Pete's for a fantastic breakfast of pancakes and fruit, before sitting around the Christmas tree and having Seb, Ali and Ben hand out all the presents. Little Jake managed to sleep through all the excitement!

For lunch it was off to Jan and Glenn's. And as the weather had restored itself to a proper Melbourne summer we were able to enjoy an excellent festive dinner outside in the sunshine!

Oceanpark and out on the two wheeler!

It was a super hot day on Sunday so Seb and I decided to take Manuel to Oceanpark. We had been once before, but Manuel was in the Philippines.

Oceanpark is a fantastic waterpark about 45 minutes away. It has lots of different areas to explore, waterslides, wave pool, a huge little kids area and waterway for big floating tubes.

We started by exploring the kids area before moving onto the wave pool and slides. For a bit of relaxation we then grab some tubes and slowly floated our way along the waterway. Seb loved pushing us along and guiding us under the waterfalls and water jets!

Unfortunately I forgot the camera, so the photo is from our first visit.

After another long play in the kids area the afternoon came to an unfortunate end when Seb slipped off a toy 'turtle', landing on his back. He now has a wonderful big bruise to show for it.

Sebastian has had a fantastic time while Manuel has been on holiday. They have been playing madly every afternoon, riding bikes, having friends over and going swimming. In fact they are both pretty much exhausted by the end of each day! But it won't last much longer, Manuel is back to work on Monday. Seb will probably be glad of the rest!

Hope you like the new picture at the bottom of the page.

Relaxing Weekend!

I think the title says it all. Not much to report. The Verdaguer's had a pretty quiet weekend. I conned Manuel into driving me to Senayan City, (one of many of the huge shopping Malls in Jakarta) to get my hair cut yesterday. While they waited for me the boys headed for the movies to see Stardust. In hindsight probably a bit scary for Seb but he said he enjoyed it.

On the way home we fulfilled a promise to Seb who has been asking to go and play pool for the last week. So he got to dust up a pool cue and practice his shots, the scary thing is he is pretty good! Then before heading home we stopped in Kemang to try out an Italian restaurant that had been recommended to Manuel. He knows I keep an eye out for any restaurant serving Risotto - something very few and far between in Jakarta! So being the lovely husband he is we headed to 'Toscana' where I would be happy with risotto and Seb loves any opportunity for pizza!

Sunday morning Manuel and I woke to the cries of Seb, both of us flew out of bed and down the stairs to find him in a crumpled mess on the kitchen floor with Frizzy standing over him. He had been playing with the dog when he tried to climb onto the bench to get his breakfast, slipped and banged his knee. As you do at 6am on a Sunday morning! Thankfully the rest of the day was not so abrupt as the first few minutes. After a morning of computer games and playing with the local boys Seb hit the pool with Manuel. Definitely both a little water logged by the time they had finished.

And the countdown has begun, 4 weeks til Seb and I head home for Christmas. Seb has a list of things to do, plus he has requested another birthday in the park.

First Posting!!!!

We have finally decided to follow in the footsteps of many expats before us. That's right - we have blogspotted ourselves on the big world wide web!

In an effort to keep everyone up to date with the Verdaguer madness and also keep a record of our amazing experiences. The question is where to start. We have been here for several months now; Manuel since January and Seb and I since April. So much has happened already. I am thinking back now of all the completely crazy sights we have witnessed and the pure hilarity of some of the situations we have found ourselves in. Our time here has certainly been one of ups and downs, but one I certainly would not change.

So the idea is that I will update these pages as often as possible with all our news and latest pics. Wish me luck!