Wednesday, December 15

Today was another busy day for me.  I worked a fairly long shift and then had to go to the super market to purchase some baking supplies.  Tomorrow we are having "Super Cake Christmas Thursday" in my group and I decided to bring some homemade American "cookies".  They don't call them “cookies” here, just “biscuits”.  My fully furnished apartment was had the bare minimum in the kitchen, so I needed to buy more items.  As is my luck, it was my third trip to the supermarket this week and they still did not have any rolling pins in stock, which meant I had to make another stop.  I walked down to an independent grocer a few blocks down form my apartment and no luck, they don't even carry them.  I did get the rest of the ingredients I needed though.  I planned on baking before going out for the evening, but ran out of time with all the stops.

In addition to my plans for baking tonight, I had tickets to a Christmas choir show at St. Michael’s (where I attended service on Sunday).  Since I was planning on taking a tram into the city, I decided to Big W on the way since it was only 1 stop past where I would need to get off for the church.  Big W is similar to Walmart or Target in the States and they had my rolling pin.

I met my coworker out front of the church and we stood in queue (line) for a while before going inside.  The church had some nice decorations up and was full for the show. 

 

 The show was different than I expected, however I still enjoyed it.  The first performance was by a group of disabled students at a local school called A.C.E (Ashwood Choir Extraordinaire).  They were not very good, but they tried very hard and were obviously proud to be up singing in front of everyone.  The next group was the Choir of Hope and Inspiration, which used to be called the Choir of Hard Knocks.  It consisted of adults who were experiencing homelessness or disadvantage in life.  As part of their performance, Grace Knight (former lead singer of the Eurogliders) was a guest singer. The final performance was by a group called The Choir.  They are very large and very good.  It was worth going just to hear them.  Many of the songs throughout all the performances were sing-along style.  One of the songs was an Australian version of Jingle Bells, which was very amusing.

Dashing through the bush

In a rusty Holden Ute

Kicking up the dust

Esky in the boot

Kelpie by my side

Singing Christmas songs

It's summer time and I am in

My singlet, shorts & thongs

CHORUS:

OH, JINGLE BELLS, JINGLE BELLS

JINGLE ALL THE WAY

CHRISTMAS IN AUSTRALIA

ON A SCORCHING SUMMER'S DAY

JINGLE BELLS, JINGLE BELLS

CHRISTMAS TIME IS BEAUT

OH WHAT FUN IT IS TO RIDE

IN A RUSTY HOLDEN UTE

While we were walking a few blocks to our tram stops, we stopped in a plaza to take pictures of this huge Christmas tree.  It was very pretty the way it changed colors. I saw it during the day a few days ago and took a picture of it then as well.  And yes, I had to get a picture of every color...

 

 

Next to the tree is this wall with water flowing down it that looks really cool at night.

Although it was late, I still had to come home and bake cookies.  When I got back to my apartment, I realized that I didn’t have any mixing bowls or measuring cups and spoons.  I am so used to having everything I need, that I did not even think about not having them.  So I made the dough the best I could by estimating measurements and mixing it in pans.  Since it needs to chill, I will bake them tomorrow morning before going to work.