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It Was Good to Be Home

The end of the school year - was as any other year - busy. The kids had performances after performances, exams and more exams. One unique occasion, was a talent show, where Carson juggled and rode a unicycle - it was great break up to all the piano solos and the parents loved it. The older kids performed with their instruments and had two major productions; Andrew Lloyd Weber Night with Perth City Band (performing for a paid audience), and a religious cantata (Sally Deford's music), orchestrated by their music teacher, who is only 20 years old, with over 500 in attendance each evening, held two separate evenings. It featured a handbell choir, harps, full orchestra (Mikaela on piccolo and flute and Nathan on Bflat and Eflat Clarinets)and full choir, it was simply an amazing production, and mastered minded by such a young person. Here is a picture of the Mikaela and Nathan performing with the Perth City Band at the Governor's House:

Elise was invited to a Gala to award her a 'young artist of the year award' for piano, the evening went so long that she fell asleep - I had to carry her asleep onto the stage to get her award - to the delight of the audience. She never woke up and never realized she received it until the next day.
At the close of the International School, award ceremonies were held. and amongst other awards Nathan and Mikaela both won the Principal's Choice Award. It is an award given out to top students in grades 7 and above and only a few are awarded each year. Well done Mikaela and Nathan.

After school got out for the older three, we pulled Elise out of school and headed to the east coast of Australia. This break was our first chance to explore the other side. Queensland is so beautiful! I had always said we got the best of Australia here in Perth - but to be completely honest - Queensland is very amazing. The mountainous forest end at the ocean. Gorgeous greenbelts come all the way to the water's edge. Here is a picture that doesn't do it justice - I took it on a foggy morning.
We spent most of our time there seeing the Great Barrier Reef. This is right up our families alley. We took boats out to snorkel and dive amongst the reefs. Elise was a delight as her enthusiasm for the life below sea was so great! At first she wasn't seeing the marine life at all - she would put her little face in the water and her mask would leek. We got the smallest mask available, but her little face was too petite. Finally, we just put goggles on her and put the snorkel through the goggle strap and when she looked under she started screaming - A FISH, I SEE FISH - CORAL - LOOK THERE IS CORAL!!!! EVERYONE LOOK HERE .......... She stayed swimming around in the ocean until she was purple then she finally got out and warmed up. Our pictures of the Great Barrier Reef were all taken with film - I will check into getting them digitized so we can post some of the pictures.
The forest of Queensland are rainforest's. Crocodiles live there. Amongst other wonders we saw Strangler Fig trees, and duckbilled platypuses. We found out from locals were you might be able to see a platypus and we camped out by the river's edge until we saw some. All the kids were game to wait it out and we were rewarded with seeing several and even a baby one. Look closely at the following picture it is an adult platypus.

One of the best parts of Queensland was our rental car. We called around looking for a vehicle with six seats - after all we are, 'the six Woodfords', no less. We finally found a place with an available car, we booked it and Todd took a taxi to go pick it up. Turned out it was an old Ford Falcon station wagon with over 300,000 kilometers on it. The paint was peeled off the hood, the seat belts were moldy, and the car was still up for rental. The Australians really believe in use it up, wear it out, or do with out! That car started every time and went up all the mountain roads. Picture below is Todd modeling in front of the rental car.

After leaving Cairns, Todd flew back to Perth to work. The kids and I flew to Brisbane to tour there a little bit. The highlight of Brisbane was getting to cuddle a koala. You would not believe how wonderfully soft the koalas are. I honestly wanted to run away with it to keep it forever when it wrapped its little arms around me and laid its head on me. After the excitement of actually holding a koala wore off - reality set in and for the first time I realized how stinky they are and I willingly gave the koala back to the keeper. Here are photos of the kids holding the koala's.




At this same animal sanctuary wild birds have learnt that nectar is put out a couple times a day and the birds come flying in from all over to enjoy the food which patrons to the sanctuary can hold the bowls and let the birds eat. Here is a picture of the wild lorikeets, and one of Nathan and his new best friend.


I can't figure out our luck, but out of all the wild animal shows we have attended (between Australia, USA and Singapore), Elise or Carson has gotten chosen to be a participant at every show except for one. They want to be picked soooo bad - and somehow one of those two get to go on stage a lot. Carson was lucky one this time - he was picked to let a barn owl fly down to his arm, see below:

After our fun in Queensland and our new found respect for the area - we headed to Sydney to fly back home.
Once we arrived in Houston it was figure out Carson time. The morning after we arrived we had scheduled appointments for Carson. He was weighed on Dr. Bootin's scale a week before we moved to Australia. Almost exactly one year later and few inches taller he weighed in exactly 10 pounds less. He had three really bad 'episodes' with his digestive system while in Perth which would last about a week were he could not eat and for weeks following the episodes he would feel unwell. All this added together and the length of time that he felt unwell enough to eat - he lost at the lowest point 14 pounds. He missed a lot of school, and unfortunately during this time couldn't go surfing, scouts, and generally enjoy himself. He had a colonoscopy and endoscope done while in Houston and the doctors found signs of disturbance such as inflammation and dysmotility. But, they still don't exactly know why, guessing there could be inflammable bowel disease or severe reaction to an infection. We are emailing his doctor in Houston once a month to keep tabs and to see if there is some pattern that would help lead to a diagnosis or find out he is healing and this will all be over.
Outside of worrying about Carson we had a great time in the states. We saw our friends and family and loved every minute of it. Thank you to all who had us over - we miss you - and hope all is well with you.


Carson and Nathan got to go to camp whilst we were in Houston, and the girls spent their time catching up with their friends. It was so nice to be in warm water - I do miss the warm water in Houston. Carson and I had to stay in Houston for his biopsies so we were only in SLC for a day and half. Everyone else went on as scheduled to visit family there. We got to stay at the cabin and much to our delight we spotted a moose and her two twins. We also saw this beautiful deer not far from the cabin, he was turning to look at Elise when I got this photo:


After 11 flights in just a short amount time we found ourselves back in Perth. We had an unexpected layover in Sydney so we have now seen the Sydney Opera House and the Sydney Harbor Bridge. They truly are spectacular buildings. But, we were dressed for summer in America and it was mid-winter in Sydney and raining so we froze outside therefore, we spent most of our 12 hour wait in the airport.
We are settled back into routine now, kids have been in school for several weeks.

The International School has literally doubled since we came a year ago - 71 kids to 144 kids now. Our ward (church) has also literally doubled, it must be us!!?
Spring is around the corner now and I can't wait - I don't prefer winter if there isn't a Christmas to go with it. Winter in the middle of the year just doesn't seem right. The parrots are back and often we get a beautiful day and the wildflowers are already blooming see below, I found these blooming in Kings Park right by Todd's work:

Well, this was long as I hadn't updated for a long, long time. So good to see everyone back home and we miss you and are looking forward to those who are coming to visit - You will love it here when you get here!!!
Love,
The 6 Woodfords,
~Pam, Todd, Nathan, Mikaela, Carson, and Elise

Singapore 2009

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Autumn in Australia 2009

This autumn has taken members of our family from Tasmania to Singapore to even a few remote places of Australia with no people. The end of March was an exciting time. Nathan worked hard and earned a spot on the Western Australia triathlon team. The top 6 boys earned a place to compete in the National competition to be held in Tasmania. Nathan and Todd headed off to Tasmania along with the team to attend the competition. Nathan had a great race, getting his personal best time, and getting a ranking of 23rd in Australia. Think about geography for a moment and give your condolences for the triathletes having to swim in the frigid waters off the Tasmania coast. It was an open water swim.

The picture below is of Nathan leaving to fly to Tasmania.

While they were off to Tasmania, Mikaela headed off to Boshack. It is a camp that teaches the kids life in Australia in the olden years. The week she was gone she learned a bit about astronomy, Aboriginal customs, and general farming. They were given the foods the earliest settlers would have eaten, including: crocodile, emu and kangaroo. The following is a picture of Boshack:

Todd left Tasmania to head straight to Singapore where he had a Technology Conference. Since, Mikaela was gone to camp and Nathan hadn't returned from Tasmania yet, the two youngest kids and I flew out to Singapore to join Todd. We had an amazingly good time. For those of you who know Carson has been ill, we were a little worried to take him. He has now lost 10 pounds and it has been a real concern and undiagnosed problem. But, he was able to make the trip and enjoy skipping school and seemed to have enjoyed himself. (We are learning the Australian medical system, felt very frustrated for awhile, but feel he is in good hands now as he is under the care of pediatric gastroenterologist.) The kids and I took to Singapore on our own, we basically never saw Todd, except when we arrived at the hotel in the late evenings. See the smile box to see the pictures. The definite highlight of the trip was when the kids had a fish sauna. You stick your feet in a tank of little fish and the fish stick to your feet and clean the skin, the fish just work their way all around your feet.


Tribal men breathing fire in Singapore: Carson has been juggling and begging for a non-toxic accelerant ever since Singapore.

Elise got chosen out the audience to let a hawk take meat from her at the Jurong Bird Park. She was so excited. She had to talk to the audience in a microphone and a hawk swooped down and took some meat off the sticks she was holding.


After we all got back home, it wasn't long before fall break was upon us. We loaded up the van with everything but the kitchen sink and headed up north. We had no idea how much of nothing we would find. Once you leave the metropolitan Perth area headed north you find very little. At times we worried about the ability to get gas to keep the van moving. We had two destinations in mind, we only made it to one, a favorite of the locals, a place called Monkey Mia. - the distance to the other too great we determined for a 5 day trip. Here dolphins come into shore every morning for a tasty fish treat given out by lucky on-lookers under the guidance of the wildlife department. There are 5 dolphins that are fed, the 5 females of the group. The other dolphins just swim around and look cute. If you are chosen you can go into the water and feed one of the dolphins one of 5 fish they get each morning. Carson and Elise were both lucky enough to be chosen.

We spent most of our time at Monkey Mia. We took a tour on a boat that took us out in open waters to see DUGONGS, 10 points for anyone who had heard of those before.
These are a mother and baby dugong

They are similar to manatees that live in the waters off N.America. We saw lots of other marine life, tiger sharks, dolphins, dugongs, and my personal favorite a sea turtle. Australia hasn't devolved yet into a liturgist society so we got to sit on a net behind the boat and get pulled through the water. That was a lot of fun. The kids really enjoyed that part. Once we came upon the group of tiger sharks we banned the kids from riding in it further.

The only down side of the trip was the flies, flies and more flies: The following picture of Mikaela says it all:

We all got fly nets and wore them outside so the flies wouldn't bother us. Emus are wild in north and meander all around the populated areas. Some have become tame and help themselves to your lunch others are still quite shy and avoid human contact. This picture shows an emu that wanted to join us for lunch or rather eat our whole lunch we eventually had to pack up - he was fairly persistent. (You can see two of the kids still with fly nets pulled up on their heads.)

Australia is huge and has a very low, relative to its size, population. Although we knew before headed out that large stretches of land contain no settlement, it was quite amazing to see for ourselves how quickly leaving the Perth metropolitan area to the north there becomes very little inhabited areas. Australia is beautiful, and we hope to keep exploring it and seeing all its beauty, even if these places are located in remote areas. Smileboxes containing pictures of Nathan's triathlon in Tasmania, the trip to Singapore, and our Northern Australia pictures are now posted on the blog.

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Half Year Mark Reached

In Jan. we reached our half year mark of being in Australia. It has gone quickly, but seems like forever since we have been home.
Australian's are mourning the loss of lives and property due to the fires in Victoria. The Australian's are pitching in and people all over the continent are giving to help the 7000 people left homeless. In all the bad of the fire one sweet animal rescue stands out as spectacular. A fireman spotted a koala walking raggedly along the burnt forest floor and stopped his truck as the poor koala gave up and sat. He quickly got a bottle of water for her and she eagerly drank the water. As she was easing her thirst she reached out and took the fireman's hand and continued to hold it until she finished drinking. She is now in a wildlife rehab clinic to recover from her burns. The national geographic website has put the rescue video on the web if you wish to see the fireman interact with the wild koala.

I wanted to include some photos of another island we went to, Rottnest. This place is facinating. It is a beautiful island with an unusual animal, a quoaka. It is a marsupial and looks like a big squirrel, beaver, kangaroo mix. The name of the island originated from the Germans who thought the quoakas were giant rats so they named the island "Rottnest" meaning 'rats nest'. The Aboriginals named the animals and the name remains.
Elise was facinated by the quoaka and spent most of her time watching and feeding them the leaves they eat. Mikaela also spent a fair bit of time watching the quoakas. See pictures below:


You can only access the island by boat(unless you are Nathan and are going to swim there, part of a four man team next Sat. more on that later.) There are no cars on the island. There is a store, theater, restaurants, hotels, campgrounds etc... but no cars or private dwellings. We brought our bikes on the boat and camped on the island. We snorkeled and saw some amazing sea creatures. There are reefs right by the island, causing many a ship to sink, but allowing for spectacular snorkeling right off the coast. Carson and Nathan made it on their bikes the entire circumference of the island and enjoyed fishing and biking.
It was nice not to worry about cars when we allowed them to take off. I will add a smilebox of the island pictures, it will probably appear before this set of text.
I can't believe we have been here for 6 months - we miss you all and hope you are well! (See below for a post about Penquin Island another island we visited.)

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Summer Vacation 2008-2009

Hi everyone,
We spent the kids holidays from school trying to do and see as much of Western Australia as we could. We found places we will never forget and got to spend time just enjoying everyday life in Australia.
On one adventure we went to Penguin Island, a small island off the coast, south of Perth. Here a population of Little Penguins (that's their actual name) live and breed. This is the only place they are found in Australia. You can walk to the island via a sandbar if you don't mind getting wet and having to swim a distance, otherwise you need to kayak there or take the ferry. The little penguins were molting when we were there, when you look at the pictures you can see the old feathers turned brown and fluffed out from the new black feathers. There are some native lizards to the island and they are large and harmless except to your picnic. Nathan had a fever the day we went and we left him with all our gear, picnic lunch etc... to rest under a tree while we went snorkeling and exploring. He covered himself with a towel and fell asleep. While we were away, and he was asleep, the lizards found our picnic lunch and began helping themselves to the food. When we got back one lizard was crawling over Nathan's face as he lay asleep guarding our belongings.

I have included a smilebox more pictures of Penquin Island - I dedicate all slideshow to Kyle, Carson's friend, from back home - who was an avid penguin enthusiast.