Australian translations and Rosie's camp.

Thank you so much everyone who has stopped by and left me a comment. It's exciting, especially to know that people all the way over in the USA are looking at my blog. And for those American tourists, you will notice that I have put a translator on the side of my blog. I knew about the differences like fairy floss and cotton candy, but it never occured to me that "chook" might be a word that only Australians would use. It is, Susan, a chicken. If I use any other words that you don't know the meaning of, just let me know and I'll put it on my translator.

I got the name Pineconeprim, because pine trees are my favourite trees and I like primitive decorating. It actually comes from a label I made up few years ago when I was planning to make things to sell at the weekly markets. I thought a name would make a nice touch and actually chose Pinecone County, which I also use as my email address. When I joined ebay, I changed it to pineconeprim so I wouldn't get it confused with my email address, and I thought it had a nice ring to it, so I chose it for my blog name too. To me, it encapsulates a simple life, in the countryside, close to nature, without all the fussings of modern life.

I have a backlog of posts and photos to show you, but today I'll just tell you about Rosie's camp that she went on 2 weeks ago. It was held at Mapleton, in the mountains behind the Sunshine Coast, and the weather was just gorgeous. Blue sky with enough of a chill in the air to make it cosy. We had the fireplace in the common room going all day. I went as a Mum rather than a Teacher Aide, which although meant no pay, also meant that I didn't have all the responsibilties that went with it. I could just enjoy spending Mum and daughter time with Rosie (and 59 other kids :) ) AND all of us Mums got a cabin away from the little darlings so we didn't have to do night patrol, or break up girls' arguments or clean up vomit (yes, one girl threw up all over her bed in the middle of the night.)

Instead Rosie and I got to canoe...

and do archery (which Rosie said was boring at first but THEN she got 50 points in the competition for shooting an arrow through a swinging plastic milk bottle)....

and orienteering and a giant swing (which for me was a low-light of the camp because the harness gave you a giant wedgie. OUCH!) Rosie's favourite was the rock-climbing wall.

Here's me going up.

I never quite made it to the top because I would get near and then look down (that's a no-no) and also the kids were holding my ropes, and even though they were meant to pull them tight as I climbed, they were more often than not, sagging, and as you climbed up the handholds got smaller and smaller, and I wasn't entrusting my life to two 10 year old kids.

Rosie however showed her usual determination. There was one wall that jutted out, meaning you had to hang there just by your hands while trying to hoist your leg up. No one could do it. A few tried and failed. But Rosie...when she gets her mind set on something, she doesn't give up. She hung there for about 5 minutes, trying and trying, with the whole group cheering her on...until she did it...and climbed the rest of the 10 metres up. Here's a photo of her, past the outcrop...

and a photo of her at the bottom, feeling very proud of herself.

Well, that's all for today. I'm actually having a sick day off work, and have spent far too long at the computer now. It's easy to do. All the best.