Happy Halloween!

Halloween is just getting some traction here.  Many complain that kids do not need an excuse for more lollies and that it is a silly American tradition.  I think they will be all in within 5 years.  And I'm prepared to come back to monitor my prediction :)

There were only 5 houses on our street participating, marked by hanging out a Halloween decoration of some sort. We headed to a cute little street -Duke Street - where over half the houses were participating. Kids had a ball.  We even had our neighbors saying "candy" by the end of the night :)

Painting pumpkins after school - traditional American pumpkins were $50 per, so we went for these little guys instead.

Gia's pumpkin

Font porch all decorated - Gia as a princess, Lily as a bat, and Caden as a ND/Dockers football/footy player.

Our spooky set up - ready for trick-or-treaters.  And check out that Perth blue sky.  Ahhhh....

Lily, Gia, Daisy, Cooper, and Caden - ready to hit the town...  Cooper and Daisy's first-ever Halloween!

First trick-or-treat house

Reviewing the loot - a lot of open candy given out here. 

Gia enjoying her haul.

Tough Mudder

I finished the Tough Mudder today!  It was the first time the Tough Mudder has come to WA.  The race was out at a farm in the beautiful countryside about 2 hours north of Perth.  I was a part of a team my friend Nancy helped put together that was running for a brave little girl named Chloe, a local 14-year old battling brain cancer.  Go Chloe!

The race was CRAZY!  Quick summary of some of the obstacles that were set out over an 18km route: crawling under barbed-wire in the mud, swimming under a wall through a pool of ice (where I lost my beloved Nike running hat that has been with me for 12 years '_'), climbing concave walls after running through waist deep mud, swimming through a cage, balance beams and slipper monkey bars over mud lakes, and two obstacles that had electrical wires hanging down with shocks that hurt.

Our team - back row: Dani, Ian, Declan, Cherise, Steve, Emily - front row: me, Nat, Rosemarie

Once home, I took a loooong shower to try and wash the mud away, then we went to Clancy's, for dinner - great fenced yard to play, and then to mass.

Beautiful statues :)

Pool Play

Our pool is warm and the kids are in heaven!  We have been doing a lot of swimming this week.  Friday Corey took Lily for a swim, after having a special daddy-daughter date in the morning to the Left Bank.  However before their swim, they first cleaned the pool a bit and scrubbed the cover.  Love those little worker bees!

 After school we had Lily Hawkins over for a play with Lily, and Cooper for Caden and Daisy for Lily - and Cooper and Daisy's parents too :)  The kids had a ball.

Caden

The crew

Caden and Cooper

Caden

Bathing beauty Gia

Lily and Lily

Splash!

Gia and Daisy

Gia, Cooper, Caden, Lily A., and Lily H.

Daddy and 'Littlest' Daughter Day

Corey and Gia headed out to breakfast, just the two of them :)

Selfies

Morning Life in WA

As they'd say here, we begin with 'cuddles' - all of us in our queen bed

Sitting in front of the heater in our dining room - a daily routine.

Gia's "supwise" for daddy

Beach night

Gorgeous weather in the low 80s Wednesday - and since it was snowing back at home in South Bend '_', we really felt compelled to head right to the beach after school!  I picked up the kids with the car and threw their bikes in the back of the car, then picked up Corey.  Our friends Nancy and Kat met us too.  The kids loved playing in the waves.  Beautiful night!

Wednesday was the last day of school for high school seniors here, and apparently their tradition is to head right to the ocean, in uniform, and jump in.  It was a sight to see all the girls from the girls school running down, hooping and hollering, as the boys school cheered them on.  Kind-of beats my Cedar Pointe trip!