We asked each of the kids to list their top 5 things of the year. We then made our top 10 list.

Here are the kids top 5

Brock - 15 years old

1. ASB Rep – one of 9 for his Freshman only campus.

2. Played a successful year in Football and Lacrosse.

3. Love going to seminary (he leaves at 5:50 and yes he put this down himself)

4. Have decided to go to BYU Hawaii

5. Can’t wait for EFY next summer (He attended EFY in Tacoma this year)

Top 5 photo’s of Brock (I don’t have photo’s of all of his top 5)

Brock completed his eagle project now he just needs to complete all the paperwork to receive his eagle.

Lindsay – 12 years old

1. Snowboarding

2. Babysitting and mothers helper

3. Gymnastics

4. Swimteam

5. Hanging out with friends

Top 5 photo’s of Lindsay

Lindsay got to drive the soap box derby cars this year.

Brett - 9 years old

1. Skiing

2. Baseball

3. Soapbox Derby Races

4. Pumpkin carving

5. X-box

Brett’s top 5 photo’s

Becky - 4 1/2 years old

1. Snow Angels

2. Pumpkin Pie & Carving Pumpkins

3. Playing with her friends

4. Singing and Dancing

5. Posing for pictures

Becky’s top 5 photo’s

Kris and Owen’s Top 5 Photo’s

Kris and Owen visited the Opera House, sailed in the harbor, ran across the bridge, and walked on the beach – in Sydney. (see previous blogs to learn more!)

We had a wonderful last day in Sydney.

After my run and breakfast and while Owen worked in the room, I slipped away for an hour long massage.  :)     It was wonderful.  I came back to the room and just relaxed on our bed.  The story was that we were given money that would be applied to room incidentals.  Since we aren't big mini bar (and boy do they have a huge mini bar) we had lots that needed to be used.  It was a use it or lose it option.  So I was willing to sacrifice the hour to help out.  It has been two years since my last massage in China so I'm good for another couple of years.

We then headed out for Manly Beach.  We took a 30 minute ferry ride to the beach.  They have great walks (called Bush walking) all along the shoreline.  We went bush walking up to a near by head (rock cliff) and were able to look out over the whole beach (probably a couple mile beach).  We then were walking by the restaurants along the beach and saw a couple of couples from the group and went in and ate with them.  10 minutes later another father/son from the group walked up from the beach and joined the group.

Tonight was the final dinner and party at the Botanical gardens.  It has the perfect view of the opera house and Bridge.  The most amazing part of the night was the flight of the bats.  At dusk, we looked up in the air and there were bats flying around.  Not just one or two, but at least 100.  They are the biggest one you'll ever see (probably 2 feet wide).  We had great food (prime rib!!!) and they had lots of other food.   I even had a bit of alligator.  Not to bad, tasted mostly like pork chops which aren't seasoned.  They had a video showing all that had happened this week.  It was lots of fun to watch it and remember all that had happened.   They had entertainment for us.  The was a man who played the Didgeridoo (the long wooden tube that Crocodile Dundee played).   We had two opera signers who sang 4 opera songs (the only one I could understand was from Carmen).  We also had 20 minutes of a Cirque du Soleil style interpretive dance with 4 people on 15 foot swinging poles.  We were on the first bus back to the hotel.  Had we wanted to dance the night away we would have stayed, but if you know our love of dancing then you'd understand why we left quickly.  That and the fact I am still waking up at 5am every morning.  (ok better than the 2:30 or 3:30 from the beginning of the week)

I have a couple of pictures of the pedestrian walk next to our hotel.  The next picture is the inside courtyard of our hotel.  Our hotel is has been restored back to the original General Post Office.  They have used the original walls and turned the original courtyard into restaurants, shops, etc.  It makes if very open and airy.

It was been a wonderful week.  Thanks for reading along and this way something has been written down in my journal.  Until the next vacation!  No Worries!

Good Day Mate!

Kris & Owen

Kris was asking me (Owen) why noone has been posting comments...  I thought that I'd post a guest entry here to remind everyone to use the Comment link under each entry to ask question. 

Just a quick note about my run this morning.  Today was the first and only day that I went for a run in Sydney.  I had been asked by my chiropractor to take it easy and paying $15 to run on a treadmill was not my cup of tea.  Our hotel is amazing.  They have a running route card (provided for them by runners magazine).  It gives you direction for two runs (one adds on a bit more than the other).  It takes you down and around the harbor.  I have wanted to run across the Harbor Bridge all week also so I used this as my chance.  I ran a little more than six miles or so all around all the sites of Sydney.  A couple of things that I have noticed about Sydney is the following:  it is an amazing safe city (I had no fears of running at 6am around the town) and it is an amazingly clean city.

Couple of cool things about the run were: I was running along side the harbor near the ferry terminal.  I was running to the left of a large flock of sea gulls who were sitting on the ground.  Just as I was passing them they all took off right through me.  I felt like I had my Finding Nemo expience with sea gulls chanting "Mine, mine, mine" and I was the sail they sailed through.   Running across the Harbor Bridge was so cool to be up and see the entire skyline from a bit of a different angle.  No pictures since I really didn't want to carry a camera or a backpack around.  It was interesting to see how others exercise in a big city.  You'd see groups of runners with their trainers running stairs, doing exercises on grasses areas, using poles to do squats, dips or push ups.  It was great to see everyone outside doing things.  This was a great way to see most of the places one last time prior to leaving tomorrow.  To top off the great run, when I walked into the hotel the bell hops pulled out a liter of water and a small towel to wipe off and gave it to me.  What a totally cool small gesture that was greatly appreciates (since I had forgotten to drink anything priot to the run).  All in all it is a memory of a lifetime.

What an amazing day.  It couldn't have more beautiful.  We woke up to the sunshining.  That is a first for today.  It was warm high 70's and not much wind.  

We had a chance to go sea kayaking in Sydney Harbor.  We were able to spend around 2 1/2 hours out on the water.  They had a morning tea for us on Shark Island in the middle of the Harbor.  Hopefully these pictures are worth a 1000 words.  (I don't have a 1000 words.)  I'm way to tired to do that.

We went to the Powerhouse Museum in the afternoon.  It is a museum which shows the power (trains, turbines, etc.) history of Australia.  They also had a special exhibit on the Great Wall.  It was fun to go through it and remember the great time which we had vising the Great Wall.  We then went to Paddy's Market.  It was basically a park and swap inside. 

We ate dinner in Chinatown (of Sydney).  Following dinner we were able to visit the Sydney Temple (for our church). It was quite the taxi ride, but was great to spend some time there.

We are looking forward to our last day in Sydney tomorrow.