August 2009
 Sydney
was elected "eco-ambassador" for her kindergarten class which means
she is in charge of trash and composting. I fear my
environmental engineering "waste" oriented background might have
rubbed off on her too much but only time will tell. She has to
go to a meeting at lunch every week and she is struggling with the
idea of missing recess in order to learn about garbage. We
will see how she goes.
We recently went to baseball "try-ons" so she could see if she
wanted to play. As we expected there was an unusually high
percentage of Americans on the field. After the clinic Sydney
said,"Mom, I DO want to play baseball but could you sign me up for a
team that just does running and hitting, I don't really like the
throwing and catching stuff".
I actually volunteered to coach so we will see how that goes.
On the left is a photo of Sydney at Luna Park (an outdoor
amusement park overlooking the city) where she is really enjoying
the fun and games.
July 2009
As we settle in, Sydney is really enjoying having her own room
with her own things. She asks lots of questions about when the
owners of this house are going to kick us out and when we are going
to kick out the people who are "borrowing" our house. She
doesn't quite understand the "renting" or "moving' concept quite yet
so we do get the occasional bizarre question about those topics.
She received her first report card and her teacher said that she was
assimilating very well with the other students and that she has
outgrown her initial shyness in class. We were so concerned
about how she would handle the multitude of changes that we have
gone through over the last four months but she seemed to have sailed
through fairly unscathed. We feel so relieved that things are going
well and many of our anxieties have disappeared. Over term
break she went for 4 days to a multi-sport day camp where she spent
all day playing various Aussie sports including cricket, net ball,
squash, volleyball, soccer and tennis. It was a very casual
camp where kids of all ages played together but she didn't seem to
mind that she was often the youngest and the only female.
  
June 2009
Sydney was very patient during the crazy June move dance.
When we came to the new house, she was thrilled that all of her
stuff arrived from our old house and that the boat that brought it
didn't sink. She hugged all of her things for hours as she
reunited with older stuffed animals and some new "moving" toys.
She went to a birthday party with some school mates and was
disappointed that typical party pizza comes with Pineapple and Ham.
Luckily there was lots of lollies (candy), Biscuits (cookies) and
Fairy Bread to keep her tummy full.
We went to a local carnival where Sydney spent over two hours
painting a unicorn (see photo below). She absolutely loves to do art
and really has a lot of patience when it comes to creative projects.
   
School News- She had an excursion to the zoo which
Srima acted as a chaperone. It was a crazy experience to try to keep
track of 4 kids who were dressed the same as 110 other kids all the
while trying to get them to follow the required itinerary. It
wasn't an enjoyable experience for the adults but the kids had a
ball. Sydney's class also led one of the assemblies and she
did a great job speaking in front of the school about penguins.
It was such a wonderful experience to see all the kids sing their
school song then the Australian and then do their performance.
 
6/11/09
"I am really screwed in this game" Sydney referring to the fact
she no longer had any available moves in a board game. I guess
we better watch what we say a bit more although I am proud that she
did use the phrase correctly.
"Mommy, what is for afternoon tea?" (a.k.a. snack) Another clear
piece of evidence Sydney is turning native.
Ray, "Sydney are you hungry?", Sydney "Indeed I am"
5/31/09
This weekend Sydney was invited to her first Birthday party. It
was fun to see the different kids games that are played here. They
do “pass the parcel” where there is a large package with multiple
layers of wrapping paper (or newspaper) and when the music stops,
the person holding the package gets to unwrap a layer. Some layers
have treats (candy, lollipops, stickers) and some don’t. The kids
loved it and the final person was treated with a larger surprise
than some of the others. There was also a sausage fest which
basically consists of a lots of types of 4” sausages getting cooked
on the “Barbie” which are then served with mini-buns and a million
different sauces. Lastly, every party has “fairy bread” which is
basically Wonderbread with the crusts cut off, smeared with butter
and then generously topped with various sprinkles.
5/25/09
We have been going through a number of transitions (moving out of
our old house, living in a hotel, moving into an apartment in
Australia and starting kindergarten) and Sydney has managed all of
them without incident. Our only battle is the universal
"packed lunch" battle that has started in kindergarten. Each day I
pack her lunch, sometimes with her favorite things even, and it
comes back either entirely untouched or barely eaten. Based on
feedback I received on Facebook, this is normal for kindergarten but
it is annoying nonetheless. She claims that the food in
Australia looks and smells similar but doesn't taste the same.
She keeps asking for California turkey, bread and hummus for her
lunch.
She is picking up quite a vocabulary over here and continues to
make us laugh. Yesterday we asked if she was hungry and she
replied "Indeed I am". She also informed us that at
school she is learning "Australian" and that her school jacket is
actually a "jumper".
She loves going walking and exploring and has no trouble with the
long distances that we walk while using public transport.
   
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