Merry Christmas

Our first Christmas tree in Sydney

Merry Christmas to our family and friends around the world! It's been so long since we posted to our blog (sorry) that I had forgotten our blog address and had to look it up.

We've pretty much finished setting up our apartment...finally. Some photos are included below. We love where we live - 10 minutes by train to the city, 10 minutes drive to Bondi and other beaches, and a few minutes walk to Centennial Park, the train station and nearby shops and cafes. We just got a bed for the second bedroom so we're ready for visitors :-).

Great news in December...Klas got a civil engineering job. He started mid-December (which means I have to start doing housework). So this year has turned out to be a good year as we've settled into life in Sydney.

Kylie and Jon arrived Christmas morning so we had a nice Christmas Day lunch at Mum's place. Today we went on a boat in the Harbour to watch the start of the Sydney to Hobart yacht race. Although the weather wasn't great, it was a fun day.

We hope everyone has had a nice Christmas celebration.

Our apartment

Entry

Bathroom

Our bedroom - king size bed, excellent!

Sunroom/office - still organising

Living room

Second bedroom

Kitchen with access to backyard

Shared backyard

Sydney to Hobart yacht race

Skiing in New Zealand...and we've moved!

We have lots of news to tell you. It's been a whirlwind six weeks since our last post.

I went to Christchurch, New Zealand for a work conference and then stayed for a weekend of skiing with 11 of my work colleagues. The work conference was fun, and I was happy that my first big presentation to the group was over. Skiing was a blast. However, it snowed a lot on the second day so we had to cut our day short because it was hard to see. I didn't come back as good of a skier as I was hoping to be but that's OK.

While I was away, Klas worked hard to get us ready to move into an apartment that we found to rent. It's a 2-bedroom apartment (with a nice little sunroom) in Woollahra. For those of you who live in or have visited us in Sydney, we are halfway between Paddington/the city and Bondi Beach - it's about 10 minutes drive in either direction. We're 7 minutes walk from Bondi Junction train station (4 minutes at Klas's pace) and a little bit more to the big shopping centre. We are 5 minutes walk to Centennial Park, which is great for running, rollerblading and family picnics.

We moved in two weeks ago and we love it in this location...and we love the apartment except when Clonkers - our neighbour in the apartment above us - wears her high heals on the hardwood floor or has a loud talking friend over later at night.

We've been buying furniture and appliances because we have to start from scratch again. Well, not completely from scratch. We have all of the great cooking stuff that we bought and brought from America. Surprise, surprise to all of you that I've actually been cooking since we moved. Mum stocked our cupboards and fridge with food while Aunty Lisa cooked lasagne and pasta sauce for us to eat, which was yummy.

So far we have a bed frame and mattress (we bought king size so we sleep like babies now), fridge, washer and dryer. We've ordered a couch. We use our camping table and chairs at the moment. We've been given a couple of TVs by our family too. We still have lots to buy and arrange but we're enjoying it. I'll load some photos soon.

Klas spent two weeks scrubbing this apartment clean so now it sparkles. It's amazing how grotty the previous tenants were. He has been coaching and playing tennis competitions; floorball season is over at the moment.

There has been lots of good news from our family and friends recently. Since many of you know them I wanted to share their news with you:

• A good family friend, Danielle (Eunice's daughter), got married in Bali - unfortunately it wasn't feasible for us to go but Mum and Aunty Lisa went.
• Kylie, Jon and their dog Aura moved to New York and love it. Now Kylie gets to hang out with my good friend, Steph, so I'm jealous :-). See more about their move at www.bandelle.com/blog.
• My Dad and Klas's brother, Erik, had their birthdays - happy birthday!!!
• My cousin, Richard, proposed (about time Rich) to lovely Angela so we're all very excited about the new addition to our family.
• Our good friends, Angela and James (see previous posts), also just got engaged so that's exciting news too!

Here are some photos from skiing. We'll try to post photos of our place soon too.

I had to share this photo with you. During a skiing lesson, this guy turned up with a plastic bag with his lunch in it. I still laugh even now when I look at this picture. He had sandwiches, tomatoes and carrots in there. At first he was holding it but then thought it would be easier to hang it off his belt. He didn't have gloves either. Clearly he had no idea but provided me with a lot of entertainment.

Our car was parked at the edge of the parking lot, which made me nervous because there was a cliff at the edge.

Happy birthday Mum!

It was Mum's birthday on Thursday 9 July. On the weekend, my Aunty Lisa and I took Mum to stay at the Arcadia Bed and Breakfast in Cambewarra (a couple of hours drive south of Sydney). It was a nice and relaxing time away starting with lunch in Berry on Saturday. I bought musk chalk lollies (that's what I call them because they look like long pink sticks of chalk), which were my favourite lollies from the tuck shop (canteen) at primary school. I can only find them at a few lolly shops now.

Then we arrived at our lovely little cottage. We had a very girly weekend. We watched three movies -- The Women, The Reader and Marley and Me -- all were good. We had a yummy breakfast and then spent some time driving around the area.

Where was Klas? He was in Canberra the last few days playing at the Australian Floorball Open. They made it to the quarter finals.

Time flies...

It's already been three months since the last post, which also means I've completed three of my six months of probation at my new job. Time has flown. Work is great (as good as working can be) - people are really nice and fun; the work load is high and challenging but not overwhelming or too stressful; and it's interesting to meet new people from all over the world. I'm one of the few Australian borns in the immediate group of people I work with. In one meeting that I sat in, there were people from Australia, England, Germany, Argentina, New Zealand, El Salvador and Poland. It was an interesting meeting with all sorts of accents flying around.

That's enough about my work. Some of you have asked about Klas - he's still looking. It's been challenging because a lot of road and bridge work has been put on hold. However, we're hopeful that something will come soon, especially with the government funding that will be coming through in the next few months for transportation.

What else has been going on the last few months? I'll try to tell you through some pictures so that I don't bore you with a lot of text.

Angela and James' Housewarming Party

Some of you will recognise some people who I played tennis with as a teenager. We had fun playing SingStar.

April 3-5 - Camping trip in the wine region of Hunter Valley with Floorball team

April 15 - Our niece (Pelle and Åsa's daughter), Tuva, was born

May 9 - Lunch with Grandma's youngest brother and his family

May 10 - Mother's Day at Pink Salt restaurant

May 17 - Half marathon

Where's Wally (or Waldo in America)?

May 26 - Kylie and Jon arrive in Sydney

May 30 - Mother/Sister/Daughter/Aunty Day with lunch at Limoncello and spa treatments in the afternoon

May 31 - Lunch for Grandpa's birthday

June 26 - Kylie announces she and Jon are moving to New York

Check out the article on her blog at Bandelle.com/blog