A few more firsts

While in Australia, Michaela developed a fascination with pushing a foot stool around in front of her. So, when we got home, we thought it must be time to try the walk-behind toy Shelby & Dave bought for Michaela. And what a hit it has been! She loves being able to push herself around, but the only problem is, she can push it a bit quicker than she can walk behind it. There are occassional accidents, but on the whole she's pretty good.


On Wednesday we went to Toddlers and Granny came too since she'll be taking Michaela to Toddlers when Mom's at work. There was a little scooter there and Granny decided to try Michaela on it. And, surprisingly to us all, she was able to push along on the scooter all by herself and she loved it! Then when we got home, she decided to try balancing herself. It was so cute because you could see the concentration on her face and the joy when she was able to do it. She could only balance for a second or two, but even that came as a surprise to her Mom. So it's all go go go for Michaela!

Back to normality

We are finally back home from Australia. Michaela was pretty good on the way back home, which was amazing considering it was about 28 hours of travelling! And in Singapore, she was like a celebrity - people kept wanting to take pictures of her, they thought she was so cute!

We're just getting back into normality. Dad went back to work today and Mom is back to taking care of Michaela all day. I think today was a shock for her because she got quite attached to her Dad on holiday and loved spending lots of time with him. Next week will be another shock for her when Mom goes back to work two days a week.

And Michaela's finally in her own bedroom. We've been meaning to do it since about January, but were being lazy about finding a blind for her room. She seems to be fine, as we thought she would be. And, our sleeps are better because you don't wake with every turn or change in breathing. So even if we aren't getting a really long sleep, at least it's a really good one.

Since we've been back, we've done a lot of family visiting since it's hard to visit when Dad's working. On Friday, Dad took Michaela to see his granny in Cunningsburgh (as well as seeing Grandad's new lambs!). Then on Saturday, we went up north and visited with Dad's grandparents, with Granny Pat, Auntie Julie and Uncle Ingram coming for the visit too. And on Sunday, we went to Burra to see Auntie Laura and Michaela's cousins. Michaela seemed to like all this visiting and here she is with Auntie Julie.

Today we went to Toddlers and Michaela just loved it. I think she's been 'baby deprived' since we've been away so was quite excited to see all the other kids playing. But the rest of the day was a bit of a grump - is it teething? Here's hoping tomorrow will be a better day for her.

Still in Oz

Finally we've got a family photo for the blog. Here we are at the Indian Ocean at Cottesloe Beach. This photo was taken on a day with typical Perth weather - warm, sunny, gorgeous. Apparently we've been lucky since we've actually seen rain once while we've been here! Very different to Shetland.
We went to Sydney for about 5 days and stayed with Mark's parents. Unfortunately, we took most of our photos with an old-fashioned 35mm film camera, so not many pics for the blog. But here are Norma, John, Jonathan and Michaela in a mangrove park. There was a lovely walkway above the high tide level through the mangrove trees where loads of crabs and other animals live. We crammed in a lot during our few days in Sydney - toured around most of the beaches, ferry through the harbour, Taronga Zoo, Easter Show (a larger version of the Cunningsburgh Show) and a drive south through a national park to the famous sea cliff bridge. Fantastic time in Sydney and The Jacksons were amazing hosts!
Back in Perth. Carol found a bobtail, so Jonathan and Michaela went out to have a look. Keiran held it for Michaela to have a look. She loved looking at the bobtail and even decided to have a grip of him!And back to Michaela's favourite part of the holiday - Mink (with Keiran and Carol in the photo too, although Michaela only has eyes for Mink)! Unfortunately, Michaela has decided she can be adventurous with Mink and has taken to grabbing Mink's fur.
Still the holiday goes on and still we're having a great time. Only four days left though.

More Aussie Animals!

Silly Mom forgot to put on a photo of the horses in the first Aussie blog! The Jacksons have two horses - Master (foreground) and Miro (background). Michaela wasn't too sure of the horses at first, but she's starting to like them a bit better now.
We went for a lunch in John Forest National Park on Wednesday and decided to eat outside. We got to see loads of birds and some kangaroos. Once our food came, all the birds came for a visit - they like chips apparently! Auntie Carol was quite happy to feed the parrots, but then suddenly a kookaburra swooped down and stole a chip from her plate (see photo below). That really freaked out Mom, but then one of the employees came out with a big stick for us to shoo the birds away.
Michaela loved seeing all the birds at the park. Here she is pointing to some of them.
Today we went to the Aquarium of Western Australia (AQWA) - probably more for Dad's sake than Michaela's! Again, she loved seeing all the animals. We think the aquarium was maybe even more enjoyable for her than the wildlife park because all the fish move around so much and some of them are so colourful. She was pointing at the fish a lot!

So there's all of Michaela's Aussie animals so far. She's got her excited noise, which is her sucking in her breath very loudly into her throat (if that makes sense?), and we have never heard it so many times in a day until now! If she's this excited at nearly 10 months old, how would she be at four/five years old? We think another holiday to Oz will be on the cards.......

Michaela's Aussie Animals

Here's Michaela with her new best friend Mink outside The Jackson's house (with Dad and Auntie Carol).
Fortunately for Michaela, Mink is a lovely cat, who lets Michaela come up to her and play and even pet her!

On Friday we went to Caversham Wildlife Park. It was such a fantastic day that we spent about 4 hours wandering around the park. We were able to go into the koala enclosure and pet a few. And go into the kangaroo enclosure to feed and pet them too. Such an amazing park!
On Sunday we went for a drive and ended up at Yanchep National Park where we had a picnic. Fortunately (or unfortunately) for us, we had guests at our picnic - the ducks! Michaela loved to look at them until they got too close, then she needed the comfort of Auntie Carol. Again, another amazing day. Just a shame for us that Shetland weather isn't as nice, so picnics aren't usually on the agenda.
The holiday so far is brilliant! We would definitely recommend coming to Australia for a holiday. Michaela's settled in well, which I'm sure is mostly to do with staying with The Jacksons and being made to feel like home. It'll be hard for us to come home.......