I think I have caught up!

I think I have caught up with my blog - hooray! There has not been too much news this week. We are all very busily getting into the swing of school. I now know all the names of the kids I teach, which is a bonus, although I am finding Joseph is a good name to call out if you can't remember - there are a lot of Josephs. This photo below is proof we need to leave Korea... Now Corky even uses the two finger gestures that Korean's use in photos.

Oh we do have some news. Paul has bought a motorbike - more like a moped. We are trying to work out how we can fit the whole family on it. In Thailand the record we saw were 5 people. So 4 Ciempka's is not too much. Here is my Corky in Daddy's helmet.

Here are two more happy snaps form the last week.

Happy Brithday Uncle Stephen for the 3rd.

Thailand Baby!

All my life I have wanted to go to Thailand - don't ask me why, because I can't tell you why. I just love everything about it. So needless to say I adored our time in Thailand and took a million photos.

Bangkok

We had two nights in Bangkok so we decided to hire a car and a driver and let him show us the lay of the land.

The tuk tuks were a huge hit with the girls!

Just in case you forgot where you were.

Our first stop the cleeping buddha and the temples arounf him.

Then onto the Golden Buddha

Let's see if I can make this work - here is a video of our time in Phuket (you will need to click the play button twice).

Don't show your teeth!

Korean's think that showing your teeth is not attractive and that a photo with you covering your mouth is far better than to have a photo of your whole face. Here is a photo I took of two of my students today. When I showed it to them to point our how silly they looked, they loved the photo so much, they wanted a copy - some things I will never understand!

Goodbye Jessie and Charlie! Our dear friends the Swan's are leaving us to go back to America. We are very sad to say goodbye to them. The main reason is that Charlie was one of the few Americans on staff to understand the Australian sense of humour. Another reason is that they are awesome people. Good luck in the future, we will miss you.

Happy Birthday Corky!

We celebrated Claudia's 5th birthday with a BBQ at my Mum and Dad's house at Springbrook. It was a gorgeous day in the sunshine eating sausages, cake and just catching up.

The birthday girl.

Mum hired a jumping castle. I think the kids had more fun letting it deflate and then inflate, than they did jumping on it. Mind you the big kids liked it too!

Special Friends

A very happy birthday girls chowing off her presents.

The Gold Coast

How do you compact three weeks into one post? Lots of photos I suppose. Our time on the Gold Coast was great we loved catching up with old friends and finally getting some deccent coffee into our system.

Our trip started out at Springbrook where we collapsed for about 3 days. Here is a shot of Farmer Em ready to go bush bashing with my Mum.

At my Grandmother's house the girls found a bag of wigs and we spent the morning playing dress ups. I warn you some seriously ugly photos to follow!

We caught up with Katherine and Hunter and Marina and Joseph. When you are living overseas you really value and appreciate your friends and miss them dearly.

How good was it to see the beach - this we could net get enough of. We are so blessed to have amazing beaches at our doorstep here in Australia.

We also celebrated Claudia's birthday - twice! Once on her actual birthday by taking a trip to the top of Q1. Q1 is the tallest residential builing in the southern hemisphere. So we caught and elevator to the 75th floor. It was so high our ears popped! Then the view was amazing, so were the coffee prices! $5 for a cup of coffee. It was worth it though and we were lucky that Pi and Grandpa and GG came along too.

Ok I am exhausted I will leave Claudia's birthday and Springbrook till my next blog.

Happy Birthday Aunty Renata.

Dorothy I don't think we are in Kansas anymore?

We are in Oz - Home!



We landed in Australia on 23rd June and spent ten days in Sydney. Then on to Queensland where we divided our time between Mum's and Springbrook, an apartment at Burleigh and then Kingscliff staying with my Granny or GG to the girls. We had the most wonderful time catching up with family and friends and of course the time flew by so quickly.

This post is highlights from our time in Sydney.

When we arrived in Sydney we were straight onto catching up. That night we celebrated Paul's Mum's 70th and Paul's sister Grace's 40th birthday.

Birthday girl Babcia and Miss Emily

The four cousins reunited again.

Special friends - Bella and Emily

The next week was spent hanging out at Babcia's house and catching up - the only problem was that each of the four cousins and Aunty Renata all came down with the dreaded flu that everyone seems to be catching in Australia. Nothing like a cold 4 days after landing in Australia from China - I had visions of being quarentined for bird flu. The Dr assures me we caught the bug in Australia.

So most of our time in Sydney was spent looking after sick kids.

Here are my sick babies.

We also celebrated Claudia (5) and Amiee's (18) birthdays in the middle of coughing fits, sneezes and 40 degree temperatures.

Paul's Mum was cooking a tongue to eat (gross I know) and Paul found it and wanted a photo with the tongue - I know some things never change!

First Day of School

I am completely aware of how behind I am in my posts and I promise this week I will give you all and update of our travels over the June/July break. I just wanted to pop in some photos I took of the girls this morning on the first day of school. Claudia started school today and I am ashamed to say I cried. I just can't belive my baby is big enough for school.

Emily started grade one and you can see she is pretty happy about being back at school.