Fun photos and other stuff

AJ and Sami, Warhol style:

We went into the GOMA (Gallery of Modern Art) today with some new homeschooling friends. There is an Andy Warhol exhibition on and we went to a special part of that designed just for kids. So we got there about 11 am and the place was over run with school groups. We hung back but were given preferential entrance into the 'silver cloud' room - a room with lots of huge rectangular silver helium-filled balloons. The idea was to lie down and watch the balloons float around, but they were too much fun to hit around the place too. (I didn't find out the reason behind this room - was this something that Andy used to do on a regular basis? Probably a good activity in various altered states!) There was a computer game about Andy's life and an area where people were filmed for their "15 minutes of fame" which was shown on a large screen next to the filming area after each segment was filmed. And there were photo booths which took the above photos that we emailed to ourselves.

After the GOMA, we had a picnic lunch next to the river. The kids enjoyed rolling on their sides down a grassy hill while the Mums chatted. Then we wandered over to the museum and looked at some of the animal displays. There are so many different kinds of animal, insects and birds on display. AJ was asking questions about how they got them all. He connected that most of the display animals etc were alive at one stage.

That was our main excitement for today. Yesterday we met the local unschoolers group and had a fabulous time with them hanging out at a park. I am so grateful that we found them. They are all so lovely and we all feel like it's the right fit for us.

In other news, our new caravan is slowly getting closer to being ready. The delays have been a bit frustrating but we're making the most of our time here.

I've been wanting to blog about other stuff going on here, but it's so hard to get a quiet moment to compose my thoughts that I feel I've been blogging about surface stuff. Oh, I should put my headphones on and turn on my MP3! Another use for it. I'll try that next time.

a few photos..

a toothy / toothless AJ 6.5yrs


On Australia Day we went to a place near the city called Southbank. It's a huge area alongside of the Brisbane River that has cafes, restaurants, a rainforest walk, playgrounds, a man-made beach and this fabulous rocky river wandering through it. (At one end of Southbank there's also a museum, science center, library, art gallery, and performance arts center. All huge city-size versions of those.) The kids had a great time throwing rocks from one section to another, banging small rocks on the larger ones, building dams and just lazing around like the above Sami mermaid.



Cary has the green sleeves, sitting on the edge. Nicky is just in front of him and Aj is to the right in the black after just having thrown a rock into some deeper water. That activity kept him busy for a long time. There's something therapeutic about throwing rocks into water. And it's just plain fun too!
Down behind Cary is another path that goes along the river. Directly across the river is the city of Brisbane.


Nicky thoroughly enjoyed the rock throwing action as well!