Our 'Chock-A-Block' Full Satruday

The Dean of the Medical School here at ND invited all of us to lunch at South Beach and Corey invited Peta (the lovely woman who helped organize all of our travel details including house rental) and her family for dinner (husband Jeff, and little girl Olivia same age as Lily who Lily had a chance to bond with at the ND kids fair).

We left at 9am to walk to a grocery store that we had not yet visited, that we think may officially be our closest one, and walked by way of the fields for Net Ball, a block up the road.  The traffic resembled that of parking at a large sporting event with cars everywhere!  We are thinking we may sell a spot in front of our house next weekend :)  Net Ball is an interesting sport whereby you have a net with no back board and only 2 people on the team that are allowed to shoot the ball.  You cannot dribble the ball, merely pass the ball within 3 seconds.  Quite fast paced and a lot of intricate rules on top of all this, so not a game I think we could put the kids in.

We stopped at Nine Seed for a coffee and muffin next.  We are thrilled to have this little spot so close by.  Very trendy, open, and excellent food!

Can you tell what Gia was drinking?  They call their hot chocolates 'Baby Cino's'

Grocery shopping complete, we rushed back to our house to try and do a 13 minute turnaround to make it to the bus in time to make our lunch appointment.  We have figured out a new stroller system where Lily and Caden rotate every 2 blocks to make it fair and save Corey and I from beating the kids in public!

Our turnaround took 15 minutes, so we missed the bus.  Luckily they come every 20 minutes.  So we caught the next one into town, and then hopped on the CAT, which is a free bus that loops around downtown Fremantle. The lunch spot was right at South Beach in another great little cafe.  Australia seems to certainly have more than its share of great little cafes with such interesting food!  Squash seems to be in season here and I have been ordering everything I can with squash in it.  Today I had the quinoa with squash, blood oranges, and other veggies.  So good!

We ventured down to the beach there, which was gorgeous, littered with shells.  Lily spotted a starfish and we were thrilled.  Then another, and another, and another!  It was amazing!  They were just rolling in.  We are not sure if this is typical, if they were living and the tide would take them back out, or if they were dying.  The kids excitedly ran up and down the beach collecting them from the surf and shallows, again in their clothes!  My lesson has been learned and I will not go anywhere ever again without a change of clothes for each of them.

Realizing it was now 3pm, we rushed back to our CAT bus stop as quickly as one can with 3 wet and sandy kids.  As luck would have it, the stop was right in front of the fresh seafood mart, so picked up the scallops we needed for our Jaime Oliver dish we were making and headed to the train/bus station for the 501.  Corey and the girls headed back immediately to get started on dinner and Caden and I ran to the grocery store for some fresh bread and the liquor store for some wine.  Home at 4.  Dinner at 5.

Peta and Jeff and lovely.  Peta played collegiate Net Ball and manages the international efforts of ND Australia.  Jeff works with a company that manages the tug boats that help the large ships maneuver ports.  They met when there were both a part of a crew sailing an old schooner ship.  A very interesting discussion about ships, cargo, and Australian history.  We put on Wreck-It-Ralph around 7 to try and keep the kids awake, to no avail.  Lily and Caden were out within minutes.

Looking forward to a relaxing Sunday...