Pie Face

As we are all feeling like we went down 1573 stairs and hiked 2.5 km yesterday(see The Three Sisters post), we  looked forward to a more leisurely tour of the Sydney Opera House.

But first… breakfast!

Australia is known for PIE! We could stop right there and I would love this country! Add the delicious sea food and fish and chips, but I digress...
They take PIE very seriously and I am not talking just apple or cherry pie!

MEAT pies are the way to go in Australia!

We saw this cute little pie restaurant. We had seen these store fronts several times and knew the time had come to try it out! 

Every pie had an adorable little face each kind with a different expression- it was too fun!

For breakfast we had chicken and veggie pie, 

Beef and mushroom pie, and Sausage pie. 

And then we had dessert… pecan, chocolate and cherry. If you don’t normally have dessert after breakfast, I would to invite you to try it. It really makes for a great day! And we didn't need to feel guilty in the least, remember, yesterday we went down 1753 steps and walked 2.5 km (which is only a little over a mile - hee) UMMM wait, shouldn't that be 1573? 

Anyway, you should try PIE for breakfast- it is a fabulous way to start your day, especially if you are headed to the Sydney Opera House for a tour….

We were in no way reimbursed for this post, and Pie Face has no idea who we are! We just fun eating their yummy food!

The Three Sisters

Warning: The word amazing is used many times in this post, and it is very 'photo heavy'.

There are all kinds of amazing, incredible rock formations in Australia! See The 12 Apostles post… but today we spent the day with The Three Sisters. There is always at least one aboriginal legend that goes with the amazing rock formations, and these formations have multiple versions. I will share the most popular one.

There were three beautiful sisters, daughters of a great tribal leader. They fell in love with three brothers from a neighboring tribe and were, of course, forbidden to marry them. War broke out and to protect the daughters, the witchdoctor turned them into stone, planning to undo his spell as soon as the battle was over. However, he was killed during battle and the three sisters remained as a stone reminder of this battle forever.

This is a really beautiful rock formation in and incredible valley of the blue mountain range.

The forestry service maintains an amazing stairway of 1000 steps, which leads down to the valley floor (or up from the valley floor, depending on where you start – it is true). Thankfully we went down. Here is the beginning 

From here we went down

And down 

Here we are actually right at the base of the sisters... isn't that view amazing!

 and then YAY!

And down

You get the idea...

When you get to the valley floor, you can then hike 2.5 km to the other side or go back up the stairs.  We planned to hike, but then we saw that there were a few more stairs along the trail, here and there... scattered about—WHAT?? 

Seriously, we had a great time on the trail 

and we saw some really beautiful scenery! 

 Praise BE!!

A look back at the sisters from across the valley:

At the end of the trail there was this scary little train to take you back up to the top (for a fee!) so you can then ride a bus back to your car. OR you can hike all the way back. We took the scary little train up the mountain side and then got on the bus. It is billed as the world's steepest railway- YIKES!

Photo courtesy of http://www.scenicworld.com.au/rides/scenic-railway-en

And we want to personally thank Beej for counting all 1573 stairs from the top of the Three Sisters, down the mountain and across the valley and up to the scenic railway. We all appreciated it very much!!

Time Well Spent?

In our ‘new’, smaller space, we were able to spend a lot more time TOGETHER. Like, ALL our time together. There was no yard, lots of people living around us, rain most day and only 3 rooms- well, there was a door on the loo!
What did we do you may wonder? How did we not damage each other? We spent hours each day writing and memorizing scripture, we decided to write our own in depth study of Revelation and then memorize the entire book of Phillipians. We also, of course, have read “How To Make Brothers and Sisters Best Friends” and so we had continual bliss. BWAHHAAHHH! (I will not translate that as hysterical laughter or frantic weeping! You decide!)

Honestly, there were moments, when I questioned the sanity of this whole thing. I mean really, there are not families as large as ours here. The wonderful folks at church were very surprised the ‘whole mob’ came. J When we go to a coffee shop and ask for a table for 6, they look at us like we are crazy- really. BUT, those doubting moments are few and far between and have usually come after spending more than 24 hours in the same room with 4 other people!

And, please don’t think I am complaining about the rain. We love the rain- it reminds of our dear, dear friends north of Seattle. We still miss you.

So what DID we do really?

We honestly did have some great scriptural discussions after our morning studies and we ARE attempting to memorize some scriptures.
We are all reading something. We have colored pencils and paper, so drawing is a favored activity.
The Older and The Tall One both have ukuleles…Don’t ask! (That is another post)
We have done laundry.

We have played the favorite games (see previous post) and have added few new games.Here’s the ‘low down’ on them:
Yahtzee Hands Down- modifies the dice game to be played with cards…please note this game can take a long time to play.

In a Pickle- which the Older loves. You play your noun cards in order of smallest to largest. Sounds easy, but some of the nouns are tricky, like love and hope and some can have multiple meanings, like log. So you have to make a case for your order. It requires some creative thinking.

And PIG- thanks the recommendation T! Essie LOVES it!

We had sock fights- yep, seems to be a family tradition on our vacations. When the big boys were little and we traveled with Traveler, I found nothing makes little boys happier than throwing things- ie socks- at each other. We haven’t broken very many things over the years. – hee

This place does have a massive flat screen TV. The techie people here with me figured out how to play movies, from our computers on it. And we watched movies. Not more than one a day, but an hour and half of ‘down time’ has been nice!

And when the rain stops, we dash outside and walk!One day we stopped at a cute little coffee shop, had a spot of tea, and looked around.

Essie wanted to get her friends each one a stamp set and tablet, so they could write letters in code. : )

Moving in Melbourne

So, as is often the case when the Traveler travels, schedules change. The plant in Melbourne requested an extra week’s work, so we stayed another week. It offered us an opportunity to visit a really wonderful little church- Grace Community Bible Church. It made us miss our church family back home even more. They had a sweet fellowship, a solid sermon and wonderful music. Hello folks at Grace.

Then we moved. Yep we left our wonderful apartment and moved closer to the bay and downtown. I’ll tell about our new apartment/hotel room soon. But first, our day...we went to the market.

 It is a little flea market type of set up, with crafts and wares. I found a local clay artist (hi, to my clay spinning friend!) who makes koalas, kookaburras, echidnas, platypuses. They are really beautiful.
And we saw some beautiful silk scarves.. which reminded us our scarf painting friend and her family- hello G fam!)

There is an amusement park in Melbourne called Luna Park, apparently they have these all over Australia- at least on the Eastern seaboard. We passed on the rides(maybe because the entrance looked to ‘creepy’, ‘scary’, ‘disturbing’) but we did notice that the roller coaster operator rode with the paying customers-and he rode STANDING UP! No kidding! Beej totally freaked out!

We passed Luna Park on our way to Acland Street. When we were at Philip’s Island penguin parade, sitting in the freezing cold, we met a family from Melbourne. (They had a French exchange student living with them- Hi guys!). They gave us some tips about things to do in Melbourne… high on the list was Acland street.

“They have the best cakes in Melbourne, you have to get cake from Acland Street.”  So we struggled with the decision and  finally decided to go- HA!  Here is what we saw.....

Evidentally these bakeries have been here for more than 50 years(not the cakes, but the bakeries).  They sell whole cakes or just samples of incredibly yummy looking yummy stuff.  We choose the later and here is what we got….

Hazelnut fudge, Lemon tart, chocolate covered waffle (which was filled with a hazelnutish/coffee cream stuff that was divine!), and chocolate mud cake. We couldn't choose a favorite, or even list them in an order of liked the most to the least because they were all so delicious!

It was crazy crowded and we were all concerned that Essie would get lost in the crowd. Someone had a hold of her the whole time. It became a joke as we stopped every few minutes for someone to ask 'Whose got 'Essie'? We saw some interesting sites....

We saw this and it reminded us of our Harley loving friend… (Hi. Mr. N and the N family!! We miss you!)

We also took a little stroll along the bay's beach. It was much less crowded and very relaxing! I guess everyone here can go to the beach when it is warm, so they don't go when it is cool! It was wonderful!!

Puzzles anyone?

When I was growing up, wintertime puzzles were kind of a tradition.
The card table with the puzzle on it was in the living room and as people would drop by they would frequently stop a minute and place a piece or two.

I think it was secret ploy by my dad (Hi Poppy!) to slow my high school friends down long enough to have a conversation. It worked; I think my high school friends loved my parents. We certainly hung out at our house enough- great memories.

So, since it is wintertime here…. We started a puzzle - a ridiculously difficult, really large puzzle. It has been like a magnet, drawing us together at the table, fostering interesting conversations and together time.

TADA- Here it is

Care to share some of your simple family traditions?