Our First Day in Brisbane - January 5, 2012

Today is January 5, 2012.  During the long journey, we somehow seem to have lost January 4th completely!  Oh well, we have finally arrived in Brisbane.  It is cloudy, but we are all excited after the long flight.  We are met by a driver who is to take our ten pieces of luggage.  (It wouldn't fit in the car along with the five of us!)  We load up the luggage and take off to our new home.  I am so excited to see Mason & Avery's reaction when they see the house!  It takes only 20 minutes to get to our home.  It looks just as I remembered on the outside, but it is much smaller than I remembered on the inside.   It is pretty empty, but the company has some rental furniture inside so we have a place to eat and sleep.  The kids seem to approve of the house.   We found noodles for each of the kids, wine, food and toiletries that were left by our Relocation Agent, Janet.  She is the best!  They immediately get their swimsuits on and jump in the pool.  Here are some photos of that first day:

Avery getting ready to jump in the pool.

Getting used to the water...

Mason getting his feet wet.

The water feels great!

Avery with her noodle.

Colin swimming in his shorts.

Avery jumped in!

The back of our house.

Later that afternoon, Janet came over and took me on my first grocery shopping trip at "Wooly's" (Woolworths) on Oxford Street in Bulimba.  It was quite an experience.  First, we pulled into underground parking and then inserted a coin to get a cart.  We then took an elevator to the grocery store where I was shocked in every aisle by both prices and differences in products.  A case of Coke was $17.  The deli sold everything in Kilograms.  There were very few brand names that were familiar to me, and if they were, they were outrageously priced.  $250 later, we returned home and unloaded all of the groceries.  The kids asked where all of the snacks were.  They weren't used to the brands or products either!