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Holidays, Great Ocean Road

Katy and I at our Turkey Day Potluck
Work did pick up a lot in December. I was really busy with filling in for lots of different shifts which was good.. However, it really made me think more on getting a scooter. Because of the different locations of my shifts it would make life so much easier and quicker with a car. Work can be difficult or draining sometimes because doing personal care for someone who wants something done in a particular way, but sometimes isn't always best able to explain how they want it done can be tiring. I do have one client who I really enjoy, but it takes me a while to get to him so I'll only agree to work with him on a Sunday or if I'm already on a shift with another client. He loves watching Aussie Football and can talk about it for ages. I usually just cook dinner for him, and then help him with laundry, and eating that dinner.

On top of a busy time at work, I had Nicole and Diana, two of my German friends staying with me until they could go and stay with their couch surfing host they were supposed to stay with after arriving back from Tasmania.

The Christmas Orphans and their delicious meal
I got to squeeze in a few Christmas Festivities. Katy and I enjoyed a Christmas Eve day at the beach followed by a big frisbee brunch dinner at a teammates home before I had to work an evening shift. For Christmas I did get to squeeze in a lunch with my German friends and their previous couch surfing host, Bruce a reporter on ABC here.. He cooked an amazing turkey dinner for us and three Chinese girls who also were Christmas Orphans. Everything Bruce made was from scratch and the first time that he cooked a turkey and it was so great. I have copied his menu from his facebook post.. try not to drool:  Turkey with cranberry sauce, carrots with thyme, orange zest and cumin flavoured butter, roast potatoes with mustard butter to spread on them, and broccoli with rosemary, anchovies and lemon flavoured butter.  He forgot to include the home made chocolate truffles, as well as the lemon tart pie... I left with the biggest food baby ever. It was a lot of fun, with some funny miscommunication with the young Chinese girls who were still working on their English. 

Queenscliffe Crew
I had a beautiful day trip to a beach town called Queenscliffe about an hour from Melbourne with some of the frisbee crew. We packed some meats to BBQ for lunch. The water was a little chilly but we still took a dip and threw the frisbee around in the morning. There are tons of free BBQs around Australia which are electric so you literally just push a button and you have a free grill... It makes camping and cooking sooo easy. Another day the German girls wanted to be outside because it was absolutely perfect weather so I texted almost anyone in my contacts that lives in Melbourne and invited them to come and have a bring a snack to share picnic which turned out to be a lot of fun. We had some silly snacks and threw the frisbee and enjoyed the sunshine. 

For New Years, I had a surprise visitor from Adelaide come to see me after his work shift. He arrived just before 12, so we headed down the street to a park where you have a view of the city to watch the fireworks since we didn't quite have time to get anywhere else. Sadly I worked the whole next day, but the following day we adventured to Dandendong Ranges just to the east of Melbourne. Adam cooked a delicious chicken soup and packed it with a bottle of wine and some chocolates for us the eat at the top. On the trail we encountered a sweet little porcupine, as well as a wallaby!

The Twelve Apostles
Then I was only scheduled for one work shift during the next six days... So Adam had offered to take me on the Great Ocean Road, which is the scenic way back to Adelaide. I could either grab a flight or take the bus back to Melbourne later that week. Google put together a cool little book of some highlights of the trip. It was absolutely amazing. Some of the coast line you get to see is incredible. Nothing like it anywhere else. A portion of the road was closed due to fire so we had to do a bit of a detour, however it ended up working out perfectly because in order to sleep in his car for free, we had to head to a National Park anyway. The national park was soo beautiful and we both wished we had more time to do some exploring in there.. But I'm sure I will go back and do certain extra things on the GOR again. Adam and I just would buy some meats and veggies to grill on the BBQs and snacks along the road. It took me a night to figure out how to comfortably sleep without a flat sleeping surface but the second two nights were much better. We got to see a koala just eating leaves on the side of the road which was a huge highlight. Now I just want to hold one.. :)


Great Ocean Road

Adam and I visited his sweet nephew who was born just near Christmas and almost 8 weeks prematurely and was still in the hospital. It was Adam's first time to meet him as well and he is such a little cutie with a full head of hair. Then I hopped back on a night bus to Melbourne to get to work in time for Friday morning. The trip was all such a whirlwind but so much fun and a much needed break from everything.

I have still been trying to play as much frisbee as possible but with the work schedule it can be a little bit trickier now. I had planned to train with a womens club team called Bauhaus.. however after reading an email of the selections of the teams.. I realized I was picked to play on their B team.. Which is pretty awesome because there were lots of people trying out and it was awesome to be selected. Just not what I had planned. I thought about it for a bit and decided that since I was selected and had the opportunity to just go for it. Even though it might be more commitment and money than I wanted to spend on frisbee.. I think the growth, friendships, fitness, and frisbee skill I will gain absolutely outweigh the costs. So frisbee will actually eat my Sundays and some weekends for the next three months but of course I never have a problem with too much frisbee!

So everything is definitely on the up an up! Keeping busy, rather social, and active as always.  I have been thinking a lot about the future and what I want to be doing. Having some goals in mind and somewhat of a plan feels really good.

Also, I promise more pictures now that I have a fancy (fancy for me) new phone with a lovely camera so I will do my best documenting things better.

With Love,
Nicole

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