Hello world!

I moved our blog to this new domain because some of my computer challenged family and friends were having trouble with the Google Blogspot. I want to make this simple and very easy to use. Let me know what you think……I think????

It is Tuesday morning, 6 December here in Sydney. It is also day 3 of rain, cold and overcast skies. This makes it difficult to get the transplanted 11 year old out the door. Sunday we stayed indoors and saw My Wonderful Husband (MWH) off to Melbourne for the week. Yesterday I got My Beautiful Daughter (MBD) out on a short walk to see if we could spot the harbour bridge. It was a great walk through parks, neighborhoods and alongside a shipyard. We eventually crested the hill to spot the bridge through houses and trees. MBD took a picture which I will post later once she agrees to send it to me. Needless to say on the way back, we were rained upon! Oh well, cold rain never hurt anyone….right?

On the walk we decided we might start a list titled: You Won’t See That in the States! I think I’ll make it part of this blog so we can update it on a regular basis. Look for it soon.

This Friday we will begin the search for our permanent home here in Sydney. We will concentrate on the Northern Beaches and specifically in Manly. It is a great family oriented suburb with a fabulous beach and great schools! We quickly decided that Balmain was not for us. It’s a great artsy place but very expensive and very isolated from the city. Hense it lacks greatly in public transportation (PT.) When you don’t have a car, PT becomes very important.

It was a $60 AUD taxi ride to get to and from the mall last Friday. We needed to go back on Saturday so I researched how to get there via PT. Two walks and three bus rides later, I was no longer interested in going back to the mall. Luckily one of the items we needed (MBD’s new iPhone) was available on the main street in Balmain. Also happening in Balmain on Saturday (every Saturday for that matter,) is the Balmain Market. Tons and tons of booths set up by local people to sell their wares. I assumed it would be a big fresh produce market but it was not. We did explore each booth and ended up in this lovely church at the end. It is the St. Andrew’s Congregational Church.

St. Andrew’s (http://www.ohta.org.au/confs/Sydney/STANDREWSCONGREGATIONAL.html) was opened in 1855. The food section of the market was located in what is probably the community hall of the church. We enjoyed homemade Thai Chicken and Vegetable Dumplings and a wonderful dish called Gozleme. It is a Turkish meal. It was fabulous to watch two traditional Turkish women roll the dough, add ingredients, oil the griddle, flip the pastry, cut it and serve it with a lemon. Definitely NO extras laying around!

Gözleme is a savory traditional Turkish hand made and hand rolled pastry. Fresh pastry is rolled out, filled and sealed, then cooked over a griddle. The name derives from the Turkish word göz meaning eye. Traditionally, this is done on a large flat griddle. Gözleme varieties include:

• Spinach and Feta Cheese
• Spinach and Feta and Minced meat

MBD chose the spinach and fetta cheese one and ate almost 3/4 of the foot long by 1/2 foot wide meal. Yes, you heard me….she ATE GREEN VEGETABLES!!!! I do believe Australia suits her.

Toodles!