Magic tricks and ginger

Hello! Wow, blogposts are like buses at the moment - none for ages and ages and then three come along at once!

Last weekend, we went for our first proper day out trip since about February. It was amazing to see some other scenery, although it was a rainy day and we needed our wellies (gumboots!) and umbrellas. We went to a maze where we had to find the centre and solve puzzles about the Seven Dwarves and Harry Potter.

Here's another photo from when we climbed Mt Tinbeerwah:

Ninjago craft from the Red Ted Art website:

At Lake McDonald, from the Noosa Botanic Gardens. There were lots of little turtles in the water that popped their noses up to see us!

The Amazing Floating Isla!!!

The Amazing Floating Evie!!!

About a month ago, the play parks opened again. It was amazing to go to the park again and have a play.

A beach trip after school to make a sand car:

It's the school holidays again! Two weeks off from school. So far, we have been clothes and shoe shopping and to the beach. Evie made a solar system and Isla has been doing some Harry Potter puzzles and reading 'The City of Ember'.

Yesterday we went to the Ginger Factory. It is a mini theme park with a Ginger theme (the food not the hair). We went on the boat ride, the first time Evie has enjoyed this one, and on a train ride. There was a big queue for the train ride as there was social distancing onboard but we eventually got on. Then we had ginger-battered fish and a ginger scone for our lunch.

May still at home, June getting back to normalish

Hello! Here's some photos of what kind of thing we were up to around May/June time. Evie had to go back to school a couple of weeks after the Easter holidays and she was pleased to be back with her friends. Teachers met the prep (reception) and year 1 students at the school gates to take them to their classrooms and then we had to pick them up from 'Kiss and Drive' in our cars. Isla went back to school a couple of weeks later, in the middle of Term 2. It was very nice to see people again that we hadn't seen for a couple of months.

Before they went back to school, we had fun home schooling and playing in the garden and riding our bikes. We did some violin, piano and recorder with the idea of making our own album of songs but didn't get that one finished.

We're very lucky here to be able to see our friends again and hope all our friends in the UK will get back to normal again soon too. Meanwhile, you might like to meet a python that came to visit our garden one evening when it was still warm at night. It slithered past the cats and over the rocks:

We climbed Mt Tinbeerwah:

When the National Park was reopened, we did a mammoth walk to Alexandria Bay:

Tiling our laundry room:

Our pumpkin from the garden.

Evie's science:

Homeschooling:

Evie made Anzac biscuits:

Evie's maths was more fun with M&Ms:

A venomous assassin bug:

More science:

Playdough spellings:

A striped praying mantis:

Watching the bin truck:

April at home

Hi! Today it's me, Isla talking about what we have been doing lately.

This was back in April/May when we were not able to go to school or work. There was no toilet paper, pasta, pasta sauce, rice, flour or hand soap in the shops. We didn't go to the supermarket, mummy went once a week. We had to use hand sanitiser when we were out. We were only supposed to go out to exercise, which we mainly did at the beach or for a bike ride. We couldn't see our friends or go to each other's houses. We couldn't even go to the play parks as they were taped off.

Instead, we spent time with our family and talked to our friends on zoom. We also played Minecraft with our friends over the internet. We did school work in the mornings. Isla did most of her work on the computer herself, while we helped Evie with her maths, English and science. Isla and Evie did maths warm-up games and PE together. We really liked seeing videos from our teachers on the school website. We got really good at skipping and hula hooping and also did obstacle courses in our garden. One morning we woke up to find our driveway had been decorated by our friends with chalks! We left chalk rainbows on their driveway too another day.

We made cupboards for our new laundry room:

We made marbled art using shaving foam and watercolour paint:

A nature mandala for Evie's weekend homework:

A case-moth caterpillar climbing our glass fence:

Evie decorated the rocks in the garden with watercolour paints:

Lots of fish in Noosa River:

Noosa River was so quiet and peaceful without any boats:

Our pet Lily the praying mantis:

We got really creative with our sandcastles, especially the tunnels:

Our obstacle course:

There were swarms of blue tiger butterflies:

Easter cornflake cakes:

A plane had sky-written love and kisses:

A little bit of swimming in our wetsuits:

We made vanilla cakes by ourselves using a packet mix:

Lily laid some eggs. We had to catch moths and spiders for her every day to eat. We released her on the hibiscus tree in the garden and she stayed there for a few days.

The Great Glendinning Bake-Off: Andrew's coffee cake and Isla and Evie's vanilla cake

 We tested the pH of some things in our kitchen using boiled red cabbage water:

Isla and daddy made a computer out of spare parts:

We got ice creams at the beach after our first day back at school: