Showers with snakes

The pad for the new house.

footings for the new house. look at that jungle!

This is what I spend half of my time doing... running around the house trying to catch & remove wildlife from our house. Here I am trying to catch the baby goanna that mistook my cupboard for his new home.

Little man standing with one hand only for support. He does this often now.

Little laughing tree frog. I rescued him from our house.

My new shower mates! Thats the entry to the shower to the left, next to the pile.This is where I found the python.

We are getting less and less surprised by the things we encounter here on a day to day basis.

Our shower here is an outdoor shower. We have a water tower next to the house and the base of it has three sides covered by green privacy screens and the fourth has a shower curtain. The shower head is inside. There is a stack of kayaks on one side, and a pile of wood on another. I was having lovely shower yesterday & walked out to find a huge python in the stack of wood just a few feet away!! I looked a bit closer, and with the python were two huge lizards. Turns out the reptiles wanted a shower too. After some further investigation we found chicken eggs in there, and are assuming that’s why we have 10 chickens and only get one egg a day. The lizards are stealing them & eating them in the wood pile.

I looked out the kitchen window this morning & sure enough, a whole family of lizards were sunning themselves there on the wood pile. I took a few pictures, but they are a little fuzzy, because I took them through the screen window.
As far as Henry goes, he’s up and standing on everything!!! He pops right up now! Nothing is safe. He can walk using the couch as something to hold onto. He can transfer from the couch to the coffee table by himself & is very mobile! I’m getting worried! He is getting so big & growing up so fast!

I thought I put pictures of Ben's job site up last time, but don't' see them, so I'll add them on to this entry so you can get an idea of where he spends most of his weekdays.

Hope you are all enjoying the pictures etc...let us know.

Nature won't stop touching me!

Sticking his tounge out at daddy.

Our friendly roommates left us some presents.

Mr. Scorpion knocking on our door.

Sailing

Out at the reef

Henry loves the beach!! Look at how tall he's getting!

Playing in the sand.

Ok, so a quick update on the last week or so's events:

Ben & Hamish got a little shelter set up at the property for protection against the rain. They also have the foundation in. I have included some pictures.

Henry & I have been very busy. Henry has been to the pools in both Kuranda & Cairns several times, he had his first official swim lesson on Friday which went really well. He learned to blow bubbles in the water & float & kick. We had a ton of fun. There is a kids park in Cairns that has water features Henry can play in and we go there often too. He is becoming a real water baby. Hamish, Ben, Henry, & I sailed the Jenkin's boat "Free @ Last" out to the Great Barrier Reef on Thursday & had a nice snorkel. I'd never seen blue coral before, so that was an cool new thing for me.

We threw some steak on the Barbie at Naomi & Rob's house on Friday night & that was awesome. We had tons of fun & Henry got to play in their pool with their little girls & Jack, so he loved it.I have been introducing everyone here to the pumpkin pie of all things. Everyone in Australia eats tons of pumpkin, but no one has ever eaten a pumpkin pie. in fact, only one person I've asked has ever heard of it. I've been asked to make 3 so far. We brought one to tea at Deb & Andrew's house, then got a request to bring one to dinner at Mic & Kim's house, then were asked to bring one to Naomi & Rob's BBQ, so I'm turning into the pumpkin pie lady. Everyone has loved it so far & word is spreading. As you can see, we have quite the social life.

We came home to some more wildlife the other day & were quite shocked by what we came across. In the middle of the living room was a giant centipede! Creepy!!! They bite & according to our bug book it will hurt for days, so we whacked it several times with a frying pan & flattened it pretty well, then after disposing of it I came back to the house to find Ben taking pictures of the doormat... Turns out there was a scorpion on it!!!! Nature won't leave us alone! How are we not supposed to touch it when it seems intent on cuddling up in our house with us?! We have also in the last few days come across a night tiger, (brown tree snake) living in the ceiling above our bed. I included a picture of it's skin that it shed. It is not really harmful, but will bite & it will hurt, so we stay clear. We killed 2 more huntsmen spiders in the last 24 hours in the living room. Nasty!!!!! I also shooed a baby goanna out of my kitchen last night only to find that it has returned today & lodged itself behind my oven.... Can't seem to get it out. Oh well. At this point I'm giving up on that one. It will pop out when it's ready.

I think that's about it for now, I'll give you a quick update on Henry before I sign off though:

New skills: Clapping, waving bye bye, and throwing the ball to you. All very cute!!!

Also: Henry can pull up on furniture & stand alone. The coffee table is no longer a safe place to put anything. He tries to just get up & stand in the middle of the room, but isn't ready, so he just falls over. It's a valiant effort though. Henry & Jack play a lot. They have a good time together. In case I forgot to mention it, He has 8 teeth now! We actually think he may be working on more too. He's coming along & has even more personality now...he already had tons before. He's sooooo busy all the time! He's loads of fun.

Ok, enjoy the pics, love you all!

xoxoxoxo Team Davidson.

Catching up on pictures

Not sure if you can read this, but it basically indicates what a great place this beach is for a swim! Box jellyfish,and Saltwater crocs will be swimming with you. Yay!!!! There is actually someone in the water to the right of the sign too.

self portrait by Henry

Henry is showing you his new fully netted bed.

The goanna that wants to hang out in our bathroom. Check out his claws.

there he is again making himself at home. I wish you could see the way he struts when he walks.

This python was trying to strangle my arm to death.

Our open air bathroom looks out onto the water dam.

looking left out of our "dining room" jungle everywhere.

last day in the states. Davidson men.

Davidsons in the park in Seattle.

Riding on uncle Steve's big pencil & radio flyer in Seattle

You have to wear a cowboy hat to the rodeo! Yee Haw!

Yay, goats!

Packing up for the trip

Henry loves big starfish. slimy!

Hope you enjoyed the pictures. We will try to keep them better updated in the future. It took me a while to figure out where I had packed the camera cord away.

I am hoping to upload some pictures of our veggie garden. I planted it about a week ago mostly from seed with a few seedlings & the seeds have already sprouted & some are already 4 & 5 inches tall!!! the tropics are insane!!! I can't believe how things grow here!!!

Hi Courtney!

Bye!

If it's nature, don't touch it!

Hi again,
I keep trying to write a blog, but we have been so busy it's really difficult to find the time, not to mention there are so many new things to report that I just don't know where to start half the time.
As for the title of the this blog entry, team Davidson has a new rule. We don't know what anything is here, and we are surrounded by jungle. We keep having things pointed out to us all around the house that we can't touch, or that are dangerous, so we have decided that if it's nature, we just won't touch it. Here's an example... There is a plant that looks like a harmless berry bush right in the driveway. This particular bush looks like a thorn less blackberry bush. It lures tourists in with it's nice berries & before you know it you've been stung like you've never been stung before. The sting lasts on average 3 MONTHS!!!!! There is nothing you can do about it. OUCH!!!The "wait a while" vine hangs down from the top of the trees & it's spikes will rip your skin like razors if you hit it. It's hard to see, because it's above you, so you have to look everywhere, even up when you take a walk.
Coming home the other day we found a 10 foot amethystine python in the driveway less than 100 feet from the house. Hamish picked it up and handed it to me. It constricted my arm so hard I thought it was going to break it. It wrapped around so tight I lost all feeling in my hand for a few minutes after we got it off.
In the driveway you can find wallabies and Bandicoots. We have fruit trees all over, but you have to be careful when approaching them, because some have nasty wasps in them that are unlike any we've seen at home. Apparently they are relentless when they decide to attack you. They will attack if you get to close to their nest...you don't even have to touch it.
I found a goanna (large monitor lizard) in our open air bathroom....that was quite a shock. It was 4 feet long and not scared of me at all. This morning I found a 5 foot tree snake skin in the same bathroom. It had shed it's skin in there somewhere between the time Ben visited it, and when I went in about an hour later...We think it may be living in the rafters. Ben got a shock last night when a bandicoot popped out in front of him durring his middle of the night potty run.
We have bush turkeys all over the place, and down the road you can see kangaroos every morning & evening congregating at a particular park next to the road to eat. Ben got a shock when at work he picked some tin up to find about 8 bird eating spiders.... HUGE, deadly, nasty spiders as big as dinner plates!!! I have found two huntsman spiders in the kitchen & about had a heart attack. Spider spray & frying pans have been strategically placed around the house to solve that problem.
There are cane toads all over the place! They are fairly harmless if you leave them alone. If you scare them, or pick them up they secrete a poison from the glands on the side of their heads. Yuck. There have been stories of people getting really ill from these toads getting into water tanks & stuff. The other night I freaked out when in the middle of a nice deep sleep, out of nowhere a huge tree frog jumped on me and started hopping up & down my legs. I was alright once I figured out what it was, in fact, we let it sleep in the house & Henry ran around after it in the morning watching it jump around. It was a beautiful frog. We have geckos living in the rafters of the house. They are great, because they eat the bugs. They chirp and squeak and it's pretty cute. The frogs are so loud outside at night you have to practically yell over them at each other.
We have amazing beautiful Ulysses butterflies here that glow blue in the sun. They are a rare species & really amazing. We have them all over at the house.

Ok, so that's the wildlife update here. I know there's more, but I just can't think of it at the moment. We will write back soon.

G'day from down under!

Hello everyone!
We've made it safe & sound to Australia and had a few days to settle in....sort of. We have been flat out busy since we arrived! We will take some pictures for you soon! We just haven't really had time. We arrived here on Thursday night and stayed up a bit with our friends Sarah, Hamish & Jack, then woke up the next morning and off Ben went to work & I stayed with Henry & tried to put the house together & sort our luggage out, then on Friday night we went to Mic & Kim's house for dinner & had a great time with them. On Saturday The boys moved the boat up river to a new mooring & Sarah, Henry, & I did some shopping...thats an adventure all on it's own here! Then, Saturday night we had the jenkin's friend Naomi over with her two little girls Chloe & Georgie (4 & 2). Today is Sunday & the guys have gone out to the building site (the block) to dig footing holes & The ladies & Henry are here at home having tea & Violet crumbles watching huge amounts of rain come down...they assure me this is nothing though, that this torrential downpour is only a sprinkle & just wait until the wet season comes. I can't imagine!
This week I've already got a playgroup scheduled for Wednesday, also this week, we are going to the nursery to get seeds for the veggie garden, and picking up chickens, possible baby swim lessons & aquarobics as well...plus more dinner dates with friends!!! We are so busy it's amazing! We love it!!! 9 months will fly by in no time at all!!!
We basically live in the garden of Eden as well. We have avocado, pineapple, pomegranate, litchi, lime, lemon, grapefruit, and some other fruit trees all over the yard which is huge & gorgeous!There are wild turkeys & wallabies everywhere, wild pigs, dingoes, Cassowary, kangaroos...and so much more here too. We've only seen the birds & wallabies so far, but heard dingoes last night & the python took a chicken right before we got here, so it will be back.
Well, Henry needs me & I've got Lemington cake ( a very Australian item)to make for dinner, so I should go. Love you all & can't wait to hear from you! We do miss you despite being so busy.

-Kristen

Another blog

Henry on his first flight

Dad & Henry having a good time at the cabin

Rockin daddy's sunglasses in the store.

Hey everyone!

We are up on the island again. Nothing much new here. Henry has 6 teeth now. He is working on 7 at the moment & still chewing like a mad man. He learned how to sit up all by himself on Wednesday. He did it once, realized what he could do & hasn't stopped since. We are very pleased. It's a little easier for him to entertain himself now. Henry is also scoot/crawling quite well now. He's quick, but I'm sure he will be much faster once he figures out real crawling up on all fours. It's sort of an army crawl at this point.

As far as the adults in the family... we are getting ready to ship out. We are off to Australia on the 14th of September.We are extremely excited, but really overwhelmed also. There is so much to do & not to much time left. We are trying to fit plans with friends & family in, but everyone seems to want the same weekend with us.... We still need to pack up the house & get a storage unit. The basic plan is to get a large storage unit in Ellensburg & throw everything in it. We will store vehicles at various locations and we will be taking only the very basics with us. We are allowed two bags each on teh plane & Henry is allowed one.

Our amazing friends Sarah & Hamish have it all set up for us over there so that the studio/mother in law cottage next to their home is all furnished with everything we could need. They have all the baby stuff Henry will need as well. A crib, car seat, high chair...etc.... We will just pack his clothes, favorite toys, and books for him. We are trying to figure out just what exactly we will need for ourselves. It's a bit easier for Ben to live out of two suitcases for 9-10 months than me. It makes me feel better though that if we forget something we can always just buy it there.

Hope everyone is doing well. We'll be in touch.

-Team Davidson.

Adventures on & off the Island

Bath time is always fun with Henry!

Henry had his first airplane ride on the way home from Blakely!

Tall ship in front of the house

Hey guys!

We are back on the island. We were up here last week & went home to Roslyn for the weekend so Kristen could work & Ben could get some stuff done. We ended up catching a flight off island with uncle Doug & Henry did really well on his first flight! He was looking out the window at everything & trying to figure out what was going on. The next flight he takes may be a bit longer.... Australia is going to put us in the airport/on planes for nearly 24 hours.Hopefully we can keep him occupied.

We are enjoying our time up on Blakely. The weather is so much colder than at home even though we really aren't that far away. We have the heater on up here & the fans going to cool it down in Roslyn. Ben is almost finished with painting. The new cabin/garage is done & the old front cabin is done, he is working on the small old garage today. Next week he will build them a new deck on the back of the old cabin. I think that may be the end of our stay up here.Ben has a few small projects back on the mainland to take care of.

In a few weeks we will begin the move out of our house into storage....not looking forward to it. We are looking forward to Australia though. Can't wait to start this new adventure. We have been keeping a close eye on Hamish's journey on free @ last across the Pacific & he is only a few days out from docking in Cairns. Can't wait to talk to him & hear stories!

I'll write back & keep you all informed on what Team Davidson is up to.

Bye for now!