Dingoden Family Outback Yapper

Homeschool-Related Activities are Now Shared at "The Homeschool Den"

In order to separate our family posts from the homeschool-related posts we have created a new website called "The Homeschool Den." If you are interested in our homeschool activities come join us at our other blog,
thehomeschoolden.blogspot.com.

Elora Turns Two Years Old, Feb 3

Birthday Breakfast Picnic and Playdough Time

Happy Birthday Elora!

Above: Decorating the cookies for Elora's cake (and eating
them!)

Below: Elora turns two!

Elora's 2nd Birthday

Birthday Balloons!

xoxox Thank you Grandma and Grandpa!

Telegraph Station

Don't you just love when they're saying CHEESE for the
photo?!

Playing Here We Go Round the Mulberry Bush

Musical chair version!

Science Experiment & Building a Boat

Medusa Mask

I DID IT!

Elora's so happy with herself (for picking up
the eraser with tongs)!

Elora's Such a Big Girl Now!

Another VIsit to the Desert Park

Elora and Delenn, Jan. 7

We've been doing lots of experiments

Go check it out at thehomeschoolden.blogspot.com.

Happy Holidays!

Merry Christmas!

Elora, Logan, Santa and Delenn and the Six White Boomers.

The six white boomers comes from a song by Rolf Harris. Since
Santa's reindeer can't cope with the heat, he has six large white
kangaroos or boomers to pull his sleigh across Australia.

(Now you can understand why we named our dog, Boomer. She
can clear a five foot fence without much trouble!)

Happy Holidays!

Our family went out to view the Christmas lights around
town last night. The winning families spent days setting
up their display. The family pictured below spent 12 full
days and 15 half-days putting up their display. Another
family started putting up lights in September.

Christmas Candy

We made Christmas candy today using a candy corn
recipe I found last Halloween. I thought the candy turned
out cute.

I also made fudge and posted the recipe at thehomeschoolden.blogspot.com

Our Little Fishies

Last week we had a full week of swim lessons. All three
of the kids really improved a lot -- both with their skills
and their comfort-level in the pool. Elora (now 22 months, blue
and white striped bathing suit) is very (perhaps too) brave
under the water. She's happy to jump into the water (and even
wants to jump from the diving platform!)

Delenn spends most of her time swimming under the water.
Her strokes are especially strong, but she sure is
comfortable and has come so far since last year when she
didn't like to get her face wet!

Logan has been working on his swimming strokes. He
dives fairly well (even from the diving platform) and has
a lot of fun in the water.

Feeding the Kangaroo at Cleland Wildlife Park

Cleland Wildlife Park

Delenn loves the Christmas puppies

Decorating the Tree

We put up the Christmas tree yesterday. The kids are
very excited for Christmas.

(Guess we'd better take Logan's human body drawing
down now; it doesn't fit into thedecor does it?!!)

Breakfast Grins

The kids wanted me to take their pictures at breakfast
yesterday morning.

Nighthawk

Logan and I worked together to make these paper
airplanes of the Nighthawk.

Swim Lessons

The kids had five days in a row of swim lessons at the
town pool this week. It was quite crazy since we arrived
home from our three week trip on Sunday at 5:30pm!
We had a wonderful time catching up with our friends,
though!

Swim Lessons

The kids have done a full week of swim
lessons. After swim lessons the kids all
played around. Delenn is jumping off the
diving board and Elora decided she wanted
to as well! (I held her hand.)

Logan's T-Ball Pictures

Logan's team is called the Wallabies.

Our Trip down to South Australia

The Roadhouse at Kulgera

Touring our Underground Hotel in Coober Pedy

Checking Out Coober Pedy

Underground Mine Tour

Noodling in Coober Pedy

With great care, we braved the noodling pits and
searched for our own opals! We even went out to the
public noodling mounds and searched.

What did we find?

We found a few bits of opal while hunting around, but
what we found really intriguing was the flaky, fragile rocks
called gypsum.

Logan and Delenn had some sweet bonding time in
the hotel room while introducing Elora to Diego. Elora's
now obsessed with "Deedo." Up until this point she had
only ever seen Signing Time and Baby Einstein videos.

Goodbye to Coober Pedy ... off for another long day's
drive south.

Rest Stop in Woomera, SA

We stopped for lunch in Woomera, a formerly "closed"
town that was a launching test site for rockets, missiles
and things like that (primarily for the British and
Australians). The town is now open to the public and we
ate lunch near the missile and rocket public display area.

More Missiles and Rockets

Kindergym

Painting Masterpieces at the Dingoden

Delenn and Elora enjoyed time painting yesterday,
Monday Nov. 16th.

Crafts and Fun

Last week Logan and Delenn made dream
catchers and built things out of wood (a
starfighter and a dog).

We've been having lots of fun in the pool and
playing outside. Logan was really cute with
Elora and kept lifting her up so she could
swing on the rings.

Summer's Here

Summer has truly arrived. Last week it was in the high
36-38C (high 90s), but this week it really became hot.
The thermometer today read 42C or 107F.

These pictures were taken last week. Notice that the kids
have spray bottles! We played spray bottle tag to help
beat the heat.

Resting at the Playground

Halloween Party

Logan just loved the haunted house and went
through again and again! Delenn was more
interested in getting her arm painted (a unicorn)
and playing the games.

Happy Halloween!!

Visiting a Scientist's Lab

Today we were very fortunate to have the
opportunity to visit a scientist and see the lab
where he works. It was really interesting
(though I'm very sad the pictures are so
blury. Our regular camera broke when Logan dumped
black paint on top of it.)