2007 December 30, 2007

2007 has been an interesting year for me/us. We knew we wanted to move to Australia but we hadn’t sold our house. That finally happened, the same week a dear friend of mine passed away at just 43 years of age, in April. Also the same time of the Virginia Tech shootings which was the same day as Mike’s 30th birthday. April was a weird month.

In June we went to Vegas for 3 days the week before we closed on the house. We also applied for Mike’s visa to come to Australia and work.

Most of July and August was spent freaking out that we were leaving and were nowhere near close to finding someone to take Dallas. We had her micro-chipped in anticipation of having to bring her with us to Australia.

September saw us quit work and also saw Justin take Dallas and give her a good home. Mike emailed him a couple of weeks ago for the first time since he’d taken her, and Justin wrote back right away saying how great she was doing. That helps, but my heart is still broken.

In October we left for 25 days in Europe. We saw some of the English countryside and small, quaint towns like Stratford and Bath thanks to friends of ours Marie-Louise & Paul. We also saw London, Paris, Florence, Rome and Zurich. In Rome we found out we were going to be parents when an all-Italian pregnancy test showed up positive.

By the time November came around, we had shipped 9 boxes of stuff to Australia, I was exhausted, anxious and ready to be in Australia, but we had 3 days in Hawaii to get through first! It wasn’t that difficult to do. We finally arrived in Australia November 15th and were greeted by everyone at the airport. It was quite the home welcoming and they were all let in on our big news.

December brought my first Christmas at home in 5 years and Mike’s first summer Christmas ever. It was also the month of our first ultrasound, at 13 weeks, which showed us the living, growing, human being in my belly which in about 6 months will be our child. Out of all the ups and downs and events of the year, that afternoon is one I will remember and treasure the most.

It is hard to believe that tomorrow is the last day of 2007. Overall it has been a good year to us and I have super high hopes for 2008 to be even better.

I’ll leave you with this picture from the wildlife sanctuary today. Happy New Year everyone. May 2008 be filled with happiness, healthiness, prosperity and love.

Boxing Day December 26, 2007

Today is Boxing Day here in Australia. There are several theories as to where “boxing day” may have originated, some dating back to the middle ages when serfs would gather in the manor of their lord and they would receive their stipends and other practical gifts in boxes, hence “Boxing Day”. According to wikipedia, it was customary for churches to open the donation box on Christmas day and then distribute the donations to the poor the following day, so “boxing day” referred to the donation box.

Like Thanksgiving, Boxing Day holds its sporting traditions. The Sydney-Hobart yacht race started today at noon, and the 1-day test match (cricket) began today. The Sydney to Hobart race consists of hundreds of sail boats sailing 630 nautical miles (1,170 kms or 727 miles) with the current record being 1 day, 18 hours, 40 minutes and 10 seconds, held by Wild Oats XI who got off to a flying start this morning. There is also a shopping tradition and the sales today are equivalent to the “black Friday sales” the day after Thanksgiving. The traffic on the way to my Nana’s house this morning was RIDICULOUS! They were all headed for the shopping mall by her house. We ended up heading over there too, around 1 pm to go see “P.S. I Love You”.

In un-Australian-holiday-related stuff, the movie “P.S. I Love You” was pretty good in that one second you are crying then it makes you laugh. Or you are laughing one second and the next you cry. In short summary, its about a 28/29 year old woman who loses her husband to a brain tumor. She reminded me a lot of myself – always worried about money and where their life was going and “what if this is as good as it gets” for them. Anyway, he apparently knew about the tumor, though you don’t see any of that in the movie, and he set up letters to be delivered to her over the next year. It was definitely a chick flick, great date movie, or just a good one to get the girls together for a good ol’ cry!

Mike had yesterday and today off, but is back to work tomorrow and Friday. I’m hoping either Saturday or Sunday we’ll get to go to the Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary where they have kangaroos, koalas and other Aussie animals.

Merry Christmas! December 25, 2007

Coolest. Thing. Ever! December 22, 2007

Not even another PayPal mess up could upset me today. Yesterday we had our first ultrasound and we got to see our baby. It was by far the coolest thing I have ever seen or done in my entire life. It is amazing how much the fetus moves around at just 13 weeks! And how much detail you can see – arms, legs, bone structure, FINGERS, there were 5 of them! At least on 1 hand there were! We have one ultrasound picture that looks like its poking its tongue out at us and waving. We didn’t hear the heartbeat but you could see it pounding away in the chest area. I think the tech said it was at a rate of 158bps. It was just the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen. And it makes this whole pregnancy thing that more real and exciting.

Before yesterday, I’d worried that we’d get there and the tech wouldn’t be able to find a heartbeat, or they’d tell us something was wrong, and I think in a way I was trying not to get my hopes up about everything, not truly believing that this was happening. But she said everything looks absolutely perfect and now my hopes are sky high. I can already tell I’m going to be THAT mum who carries around pictures and talks about the baby non stop. Friends are going to have to tell me to shut up!

Anyway, here is the pic of the baby facing us, waving. The tech really got some great pics. In 7 weeks they should be able to tell if it is a boy or a girl. She also estimated the due date at June 27th instead of the original July 1st and said there’s a 1 in 36,000 chance that it will have any birth defects. I will take those odds any day and twice on Sunday!

Boycot PayPal December 17, 2007

So, PayPal says its free to transfer money to family and friends, and “Its your money, get it quick!” or whatever the h-e-double-hockey-sticks their website says. I will never use PayPal again. I tried to send money from my PP account in the US to Mike’s PP account here in Australia. It seemed to go through, but then my account in the US freaked out thinking a third party had accessed my account, and then Mike’s account freaked out and put the funds on a temporary hold and opened a ‘case’. And now we can’t get the money that is ours! Its not available to either of our PP accounts! We spent over 30 minutes on the phone with them a couple of nights ago and thought we had it all sorted out, but we apparently don’t, because the money is still not back into our US account. At this point I don’t care how inconvenient that is, I just want the money that is MINE.

The girl on the phone said you can’t transfer money from a US account to an Australian account, but apparently we CAN add our US bank account to our Australian PP account and transfer money to ourselves. Does that make any sense at all to anyone else? Because I can’t make heads and tails of it. I really wish I’d just written a check and deposited it, but at the time, 20 working days seemed way too long to wait to get our money. But the way this PP debacle is going it’s going to be at least that before we see our money anyway. This is so infuriating!!

Baby Names December 14, 2007

I have been tooling around on ivillage.com and their parenting and pregnancy message boards. I came across a woman who had made a list of baby names she and her husband liked and she put it on babynames.com for people to vote on. SO, I did the same thing! Here’s the linky link to it:

Its anonymous, so you can be totally honest and I won’t know if you hate any of our names! And no, we will not use the name voted most popular, but it will still be fun to see what people think. So what are you waiting for? GO VOTE NOW!

Nanna December 13, 2007

We just got home from waiting with my mum for an ambulance for my nanna. We were originally waiting for an after hours house-call doctor, who was supposed to show up “after 6″ and at 9 pm he still wasn’t there. RIDICULOUS. So the ambulance came in about 30 minutes, and took her to the hospital. She’s had this back/leg/sciatic nerve problem for a few weeks now and some days are worse than others. My grandmother’s medical history is totally clear, yet the last few months, everything seems to be breaking. And none of the doctors will fix it. I don’t know if they won’t or if they can’t. I do know that she is sick of being stuck in the house doing nothing and the pain is absolutely killing her. Its bad enough that when she gets up, she is in so much pain she feels like she’s going to pass out. They’ve taken her to a different hospital this time, so maybe the doctors there will look at the problem with a fresh start and fix it. She has been a very active person all her life and this pain and immobility is making her miserable. And it is hard for us to see her that way also. They keep giving her muscle relaxants and pain killers to take, and she was on an antibiotic…for someone whose practically never taken anything in 83 years, that is a lot to keep up with and make sense of. I don’t know if she’s been taking the right pills at the right times or not. Keep your fingers crossed that the doctors at this different hospital have a better solution than just pills.

Semi-relatedly, one of the EMTs that showed up seemed like a kid. God I’m getting old!

Sad News & Random Musings December 11, 2007

We found out tonight that Mike’s grandfather passed away around 8 am Monday morning Detroit time. I know from experience how difficult it is for him right now to be this far away and lose someone you love. My grandfather died a year and a half ago, while I was still in Atlanta. And it is really tough to know how to feel and how to handle that situation. We are very thankful that we had dinner with him before we left, and that Mike got to talk to him a couple of weeks ago at Thanksgiving.

The random musings part of this blog is mostly to ponder the idea that the state we’re living in, Queensland, does not do the daylight saving time thing, so the sun is up at 4:30 am, and it is dark at 7 pm. For those of you in the northern hemisphere, dark early in December is normal, but keep in mind it is summer here, not winter! So the daylight saving time would make it light until about 8. It’s a little weird, but kind of nice. I’d never been a real morning person until I moved here, now the sun gets me up early and I go to bed early. I’m turning into a desperate housewife…up early to make my husband lunch and drive him to work. I’m just missing the 5 bedroom house and convertible car.

The other random thing is that I really miss Chick-fil-A, Shane’s Rib Shack, LaParilla, BW’s…and the fact that I’m hungry now is not being helped by mentioning those places. My mouth is literally watering. And we just moved into the unit today so we have no food in there for breakfast. I think I better stop talking about meals and food before I start gnawing on my fingers. Maybe I should open a Shane’s franchise here. I wonder if they’re franchised…I don’t know if Aussies love their BBQ the way Georgians do.

Atlanta Thrashers December 8, 2007

I am currently listening to the Atlanta Thrashers radio on nhl.com. They are playing against the NY Rangers and the game is tied at 2-2. I could have SWORN the announcer yelled “Score” but he yelled “Save”. I wish he wouldn’t get as excited about saves as he does about goals! It would make it much easier to listen to the game!

Not much has changed or happened since my last post. A friend of mine from an internship I did years ago found my blog. I’m assuming he found it by googling my name. Maybe that’s why I haven’t got any jobs, they’re googling me and finding my website and finding out I’m pregnant and that’s the end of it.

I’m already wearing some maternity clothes because many of my pants don’t fit anymore. I found out my mum looked 5 months pregnant when she was 3 months. So I’ve got that going for me it seems.

Job Offer December 4, 2007

I got offered a casual position with a golf store that sells equipment, accessories, clothing, etc. But it is a 45 minute drive from where we live and at this stage its only 9 hours a week. So its not worth taking it. The money I make would be spent on petrol to get there and back.

I am missing my TV. Brothers & Sisters, Grey’s Anatomy, Private Practice…all on ABC, and abc.com has full episodes online, but as I just found out, only people in the US can watch! What a rip!

I tried to transfer some money from our account in the US to our account here in Australia, and I can’t believe how difficult it is! You’d think with online banking and everything that something like that would be fairly simple these days, but no. How long do you think an international check would take to clear a bank? Take a guess. What’d you guess, 2 weeks? 3 weeks? Try 4! 20 business days! I couldn’t withdraw the money out of the ATM because I guess we’re not authorized to withdraw that much money (that much being not THAT much, and had it worked, I’d have had to go back 4 days in a row to get the amount out we’re trying to get). So that’s a pain in the butt.

In happy news, I have to call to schedule our first ultrasound today. I’m trying to schedule it for the 18th of December because that is the 12 week mark. I think at 18 weeks you can find out the sex of the baby, if the baby is cooperating! At the very least, we should get to hear a heartbeat at 12 weeks. It’s also to find out what my risk of having a Downs Syndrome baby is – low, medium or high. It’s not to find out if it has Downs Syndrome, that test comes later on and is optional. I guess the decision to have it would depend on what risk you are of having it. I’m just keeping my fingers crossed for a heartbeat at this point. I’ll think about Downs Syndrome later.

I’ve started looking at baby stuff. Yikes it is expensive! Especially at the baby shops. But that’s to be expected I guess. Never to worry, one of the local Targets has quite a good selection of stuff. I think it’ll be quite a few more weeks before we even start thinking about buying any of that though. That’s really about it. There’s not much to report on when you don’t do anything all day.