HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

Wishing all of you a very exciting and healthy and happy New Year 2008.
We will be celebrating with friends of Craig's in Figtree Pocket (this is name of suburb which always makes me giggle). Melitta is turning 40 today so there are plenty of reasons to party.
Lots of love,
Tanja xxx

My first Aussie Christmas!

I really enjoyed my first Christmas in Australia with the Millis clan. It was very relaxed, thankfully the temperatures were very mild (apparently this was the coolest Christmas in 8 years, only 26 degrees C), the BBQs were working hard and we had some hilarous attempts at Cricket!

On the evening of the 24th we had a little romantic Christmas just for the two of us with lots of lovely sparkling Shiraz and presents. :-) On Christmas day we got up really early at 7 am and I spoke to my family in Germany who were having their Christmas dinner without me (snif!). We prepared lots of salads and packed the car with additional chairs, BBQ accessories and bubbles. The family met at 10 am in Mollie's garden where the Webers were already lit and waiting for lots of meat to get roasted for hours! Craig's brother Rob and his family are very friendly with a talented German butcher called Schulte and we had a HUGE pork roast and some legs of lamb of course, a gigantic ham and a very very big chook as well as about 10 different salads and many many nibbles and deserts.

In detail we celebrated with Craigs mum Mollie and her four sons (see picture above): Craig and little me, Rob and his wife Jackie (who did a great job at managing all the BBQing) with sons James and Ben plus adopted 2nd dad Monty, Brian and his wife Mary and daughter Jo (who is great fun and takes me to the beach!) and Craigs oldest brother Alan and his wife Beth with their daughters Tanina and Ingrid and three dogs Huckelberry, Rollie and Shortz..

With all these people around you can imagine what fun we had playing Cricket in the backyard! Hee hee! I even manged to hit the ball a few times....

Merry Christmas!

Make a slideshow - it's easy!

Aussie Christmas

It is a bit silly to sing Christmas songs about snow and ice here in scorching hot Queensland, hence why some of the famous Christmas songs have been adapted with more appropriate lyrics. Jingle Bells for example always cracks me up! Sing along with me....

AUSSIE JINGLE BELLS
Dashing through the bush / in a rusty Holden UTE*
Kicking up the dust / esky** in the boot
Kelpie*** by my side / singing Christmas songs
It's summertime and I am in my singlet****, shorts and thongs*****!

Chorus:
Jingle bells jingle bells jingle all the way
Christmas in Australia on a scorching Christmas day, Hey!
Jingle bells jingle bells, Christmas is a beaut
Oh what fun it is to ride in a rusty Holden UTE

Engine's getting hot / we dodge the kangaroo
he swaggie climbs aboard/ he is welcome too
All the family's there / sitting by the pool
Christmas day the Ozzie way / by the Barbeque. Oh!

(*Holden is Autralian for Vauxhall/Open and a UTE is a utility vehicule, ie. pickup truck
**esky is Australian for an icebox to keep beer cool
*** Kelpie is a working dog
****singlet in German is Unterhemd
***** thongs of course Australian for flipflops)

I wish all of you a wonderful Christmas and some relaxing and peaceful days over the holiday period. I shall be missing you all while I drink cold beers and sit around the BBQ with Craigs huge extended family!
And of course all my best wishes for a healthy, content and funfilled New Year 2008. Frohe Weihnachten!!!
Lots and lots of love from Brisbane,
Tanja xxx

Pre-Christmas time in Brissie

It is only three days to Christmas and I am sitting here sweating away between two fans and cannot believe that it is indeed the time of Silent night and Rudolph the rednosed reindeer.

Only yesterday I went to Surfers Paradise beach with Craig's niece Joanna and we had a lovely day jumping through waves and admiring the surf dudes. Very cool! I wish I was able to surf and be comfortable in that scene but.... somehow my attempts in Devon did not quite pay off? I will keep working on it as you can see.

On the homefront we are finally making some progress on the renovation project and have finalised the design of our future IKEA kitchen and work will start early January. I cannot wait! As soon as the kitchen is done we will retile the house and then everything else will fall into place. Our belongings from England are still in Quarantine in Sydney harbour and we are waiting for them to get transported to Brisbane and I am hoping we can pick them up at the end of next week. I cannot wait to be reunited with my things, I have had enough of living out of a suitcase! It has been over 12 months now and I want want want a wardrobe full my clothes again and a fully equipped kitchen! Oh... it will be so nice!

Me now de facto spouse!

FINALLY! We at last managed to lodge my 50 page visa application as de facto spouse yesterday. I am now allowed to stay in Oz on a bridging visa until we hear whether or not it gets approved. This can take up to 6 months!!!
The good news is that if I stay in the country for over 3 months I can request a working permit which will probably be granted fairly quickly and I can look for a job.
Dear me! How exciting!
The bad news is that we had to pay 2000 $ for them to process my application and worse, I am not allowed to leave the country now, bummer! Sorry Manu, no meeting up in Singapore! Sorry Ali, I now cannot come to Penang. Snif!

Just a quick update, I will write more soon. Txxx

Our new home in Dobell Avenue

Yesterday we moved into our new home in Dobell Avenue in Collingwood Park which is about half an hour west of the center of Brisbane.

This is the little house with a huge gum tree in the lovely spacious garden which is screaming for some serious weeding followed by many many BBQs.

You will see from the pictures that the house is in desperate need of a makeover and we are currently working on getting rid of all the lovely lime green laminate in the kitchen and bathroom. I cannot wait for the skip to arrive!

Bathroom dreams did not come true...

We spent a few days mowing and pulling weeds out and discovered some beautiful plants in the undergrowth. If only it would not be so dry we could have the most amazing botanical garden out here! But I shall not even start talking about the drought... boring!

Paul the pestman was here as well and sprayed the inside of the house to make sure the spiders, silverfish, ants and cockroaches disappear and will not breed in it. I could have kissed him!

We also got our phone and broadband connected which is fantastic. Am very happy to be able to get in touch with everyone back in Europe any time. Our phone number is +61 7 3389 0530 and our Skype phone is always working on wireless, just call SKYPE: craigandtanja

Speak soon!

Welcome to Brisneyland!

We have safely arrived in our new and for now final destination of Brisbane and I have to say it is wonderful to be sitting outsite in the sun, wind in hair and blue skies above knowing that all the friends and family we left behind are having to cope with nasty wet and cold winter days.
I cannot quite cope with all the Christmas decorations but will hopefully get used to them soon!

For now we are staying with Craig's mum Mollie while we are getting our new house pest sprayed etc (yes! That is quite normal here!) and are waiting for our furniture to arrive next week.