Quarantine Is Over!

Disclaimer, this is a really old post that I never finished and am just posting now :)

If you know us at all, you know we love our dog. That actually is an understatement, I am obsessed with Bone Crusher. But how could I not be, he is so handsome!

I mean look at that face! 

We've had him now for 6 weeks and I am so glad he is here. This week Chris started traveling for work, its nice to have someone to keep me company! We were so excited to get him from quarantine. Jules and Oscar were less excited to drive us there...at 8 am...on a Saturday....on Jules birthday. But they are the best, so they did! We didn't really take any pictures of the facility, honestly, I was just so excited to see him.

The fence driving up - its very serious!

Apparently people think they can buy these dogs - back off! 

Once we drove in we had to wait until exactly 9:30, about 20 minutes, for the doors to open. I could see them unloading the truck with all the dogs, there must have been 30 dogs in their respective crates in an open air holding room. There was a guy from a transport company there who I talked to for the 20 minutes of waiting. He was picking up 5 dogs that were flying again (poor puppy's) to their final destinations to see their owners. There were also 2 people that had driven all night from Melbourne (about 10 hours) to pick up their two dogs from Canada - they had not seen their dogs in 8 months! I can't imagine! They also did not have teeth. I also can't imagine that.

Once the doors opened, we headed in and they checked our paperwork and IDs. Once they verified everything, they lead us back to the holding room. It was just tons of crates full of all different types of dogs. They let Bone Crusher out and he just bolted for the 4 of us, he was one happy man. The rest of the dog went crazy, its was really, really loud.

He surprisingly was not as stinky as I thought he would be, don't get me wrong he smelled, but it wasn't that bad.

I feel like everything with moving him here aligned for us - they shorted the quarantine period from 3 months, to 30 days, to 10 days; we learned that day the Sydney quarantine facility is in the process of closing, the only facility will be in Melbourne. I don't know if we would have brought the little man if there were so many obstacles pilled up against us.

When we got home we also bought a couch that day. The couch came in 2 huge boxes, so clearly Chris built a fort for Bone Crusher. It was adorable! I am actually not sure who had more fun with the fort :)

Thanksgiving Down Under

Thanksgiving week was a big week in the Speelman household! I started work that Monday and then we hosted a party on Saturday to celebrate. It was strange to start week after all of my time off on Thanksgiving week! I was definitely not planning on drinking until about midnight on Friday with new co-workesrs, grocery shopping at 1 AM and then waking up at 7 AM to cook....but hey you only live once. #YOLO as the kids say.

Of course we celebrated in style. We wanted to really give the Australians a true thanksgiving experience, that meant fancy dress. (Fancy dress is what Australians call costumes, it still gets me a bit confused, fancy dress = cocktail in my head)

The whole family 

The cutest turkey out there!  

We had a mix of American and Australian friends over and one Frenchmen. The food all turned out well, it was my first turkey. Most of the ovens here are fan forced, I am not sure if I like them more or less. It does cook faster. We took the turkey out to baste and discovered it was already done in only 3 hours (it was a 7kg bird). Please also notice the baster - we could not find one anywhere, so we used a tomato sauce bottle, empty of course.

Chef Oscar made an appearance and I forced him to wear this apron.

Our kitchen is soooo small - three of us in there was intense!

The spread - thanks to Hayley for the photo I stole from her blog.

And of course there was a drinking game, it was called chug a beer as fast as you can. This consultants have a way with coming up with creative games.

We had a great day with great friends! My only regrets were not taking a picture of everyone and not saving leftovers for Jules :) This is sure to be an annual event!

Visitors!!!

We were so excited that Cool Mix (one of my college, called uni here, friends) and Topher were flying though Sydney after their 40 day honeymoon in New Zealand. They were only here one night and it could not have been more perfect (well other than the torrential downpour they get stuck in trying to find "the basement"). Seriously people, you have no idea how nice it is to see friends in Sydney!

We went to Mr. Wong's for dinner. It was SOOOO Good, I have been dreaming about the twice cooked pork cubes daily since Wednesday.

If you visit Sydney Mr. Wong's is a great place to go! And you will look cool, cause its in an alley, there are a few restaurants right near it as well if the wait is too long.