We have moved into our real proper jungle home... at last.

Now we are able to unpack our 16 boxes (and the fridge which I did tonight and i know it is silly but i love my fridge)

so its good to be finally here, the arts centre is outside our front door and the school bus comes to the corner outside the back door and iggy's daycare is a 3 minute walk away .. we never have to leave really...

and really, why would we want to...look!

up the stairs to the house ...and down to work ...

jungle path

and inside...

we are slowly unpacking ...

Every day when we get home to Wallaby Beach we are joined by a selection of the kids in the hood  - they flock to the house and ransack the joint - somedays it is totally too much but it does keep Sailor very happy and some of them are so great .. His main friends are Brandi, Christine and Francis. They are lovely - Christine is so like Sailor its amazing - they click on all levels - the main being their wild imagination.

 Francis and Christine (on the right)

 Christine ..with her shiny black shoes - such a bright girl

On tuesday Kade went bush to collect carving wood and returned back with the dirtiest car. Red dirt caked onto the windows so thick no one could see out.  On the drive home from work, Sailor got the idea in his head that it simply must be cleaned ( a moment of cleanliest - he doesn't usually apply this to anything else in his life) On arrival home, he rallied  up his friends and ordered them to help....

THE best time ever - cleaning the car ... ha! Should get them over to mop our floor!

I found a bike on the beach so I dug it outta the sand, washed it off and took Igs for a ride

thanks to everyone for the offers to send meat! we are OK .. i was possibly over exaggerating! We have got some good chorizo and bacon and Kade found the discount section at the butchers and, then of course there is always fish... Kade caught a big 'un this morning

Old Ladies

Each morning we leave Wallaby Beach for work with a troopy full of old ladies ... three of the great Yunipingu Sisters .. Barrupu, Nyapanyapa and Randjupi ... (they have a fourth sister Galumbu but she has been away) These sister are all great artists and so we take them to the arts centre to paint in the courtyard. Sometimes Barrupu doesn't make it and sometimes Randjupi is absent but always, always is Nyapanyapa. (she's my favourite)
These sisters are the funniest old ladies I've met. They have the greatest cackle and when all three of them start cackling you can't help but join in even if you've no idea what the joke is - and more than often you don't...
Nyapanyapa is the smallest of the ladies with a slow awkward gait that I think must came from her  being gored by a buffalo as a child. She reminds me of ET when she walks ... she is cute somehow which maybe comes from her being so small.  Her english is terrible and her yolngu is terrible - no-one really has any idea what she is talking about but that doesn't seem to matter...she just rattles on and then starts cackling. She carries a pair of thongs with her which I have never seen her wear except once and then they were on the wrong feet. Randjupi is always teasing her about that.
Randjupi has a great joy about her and always has a smile. she has five dogs (down from a previous eight) She is gorgeous and all dogs love her. She spends her nights on patrol, looking after the people in her community, bringing them home from town. Her totem is the quail, which is the same as mine now.
Barrupu is called the Boss of the Courtyard. She is a bossy mean old lady who everyone adores...strange. She yells at Kade to slow down and then laughs her head off when he does. She loves Iggy.

So thats our morning ride - sometimes we get another two or three relations to take too - and the cackles increase.

 iggy with barrupu and nyapanyapa on the steps of the arts centre (with her thongs)

 kade with nyapanyapa and barrupu

we leave wallaby on sunday - finally we move into our actual real proper house - which is good, great actually, i am so keen to unpack .. but i will miss the morning ride with the old ladies

bark collecting for cooking and filming

We went out to town on saturday .. woot woot!  The sweet Tanika babysat the boys and we went for dinner.  Date Night. There are two options for dinner in Nhulunbuy - either the Walkabout Lodge or the Arnhem Club. We hadn't heard much good about either of them, and one has a topless ladies section so, we went to the Arnhem Club... maybe saving the Walkabout for another time, in about a year, or two...
There isn't too much really to write about this evening but it was fun-ish....we had dinner at Macassan's Restaurant which was not too bad, and then we played some pool in the bar area ... and then we went home. We saw some people we knew which was kinda good but maybe a little bad ... our reputation could be enhanced or ruined, hard to say...

 But oh! What a night out in Nhulunbuy really makes us realise is how we were so spoilt for choice in melbourne, and how little we realised...alas!  The food here is so so so so so so so expensive -  it all has to come in on a barge (no roads in from anywhere - well, there is one but it is impassable during the wet season) The barge only comes once a week, and so by the time the food reaches us in Gove it is a little...well, sad ... and double the price.  The wonderful food in melbourne that i took for granted - i am sorry! I was a fool! How i miss having all those amazing options now...alas! The Preston Markets - i miss you! The Mediterranean Warehouse - i miss you! Casa Iberica! The Deli! Sourdough Bread! The Dumpling House! boo hoo hoo!


So, as well from becoming DRY because we have no permit, we have also become VEGETARIAN because we simply can't bear to spend the money on the crappy cuts of meat here... even the price of the humble sausage is outrageous! The cheapest of all meat products!
I worry about what my dad will do when he comes to visit...
no beer, no sausages! he may never come...

iggy threw up in our bed

the hot water system exploded and flooded the bathroom and laundry

and the rain hasn't stopped for 4 days - and by rain i mean R A I N

we have one dry towel between us


on a good note...something i'm sure,  can't think of it right now... maybe later


oh yeah, the dogs tipped over our rubbish bin and spread it all over the lawn, this morning when i drove off to work there was a pack of four dogs getting stuck into it


grizzle grizzle

some more photos of life at wallaby beach ...

Last weekend we went to middle beach, which despite its boring name is a most beautiful beach not far from yirrkala. We were joined by Watjumi (kade's yolngu sister) and her extended family .. babies, aunties, grandmothers who flocked to the rocks and collected oysters. Oysters are like gold around here - they are much discussed and much coveted - to have a bucket of freshly picked oysters in your hand is as good as a hundred dollars...better even. 

Will and his wife Dhalulu, his daughter Sienna and her friend Leila drove around in their boat so we were able to take turns and cruise over the island not far off shore and swim in the crystal clear waters there (even i swam..a bit)


Rachael, Dave and their one year old daughter Quilaavsuk (as hard to say as to spell) also came along and the kids had a great day chasing fish, swimming and playing. Sailor loves the beach and has an ability to make friends quickly and then boss them around (ha!) Iggy is off in his own world and wanders around with me in hot pursuit. I swear that kid is just going to spontaneously start swimming

 rachael and quilaavsuk

dave and sailor

beach scene

friday


first big week of school - everyday! sailor is horrified! every morning "what? again mum?"
tuesday was our hopeless day for the week (there is one every week i'm sure)
i woke up sick, 
kade went fishing at 5am and caught nothing (this is not so hopelessly bad but deserves a small mention)
iggy had his third day of childcare. I was called at 1230 to come collect him as he hadn't stopped crying (poor baby)... thou to be honest, he was fine when i got there and didn't seem remotely traumatised .. possibly the staff were the traumatised ones... I had been at work all morning feeling ill so secretly i was thankful to have a reason to leave and so took iggy home and shamelessly watched movies from the couch all afternoon ...
but then - hopeless day -  we got a call from the school office asking where we were and why no one had come to pick sailor up from school....?  I am not too sure what deep emotional scars this may have on our sensitive sailor, that remains to be seen, but he somehow didn't get on the bus and so while kade and i were happily unaware he was waiting anxiously for a familiar face to arrive at school and none did ... in the end di and will picked him up and brought him home where he told me he was not OK and missed us and that we would have to come and put him on the bus from now on...
SO poor iggy! poor sailor! bad mummy! bad daddy! 


the week has improved much since then and iggy has fared better at creche and sailor has been picked up everyday and dropped off most mornings too (which is mostly due to not having the morning skills to be ready for the school bus at 720am)
And i have had three days in the print room with di and am happy happy happy

i am also embracing the frizz  (thanks pen x)