Long post for the long weekend

So, did the good people of Tom Price take the opportunity of a very long weekend to leave town and enjoy themselves? No, they stayed in town and developed cardiac arrhythmias.
And did Easter visitors to the spectacular Karijini National Park stay safe and soak up the glorious  scenery? No, they threw themselves into gorges and broke bones.
A crazy few days at TP Hospital, looking forward to my holidays!
On a brighter note, Freya has developed a love of Scrabble. We don't have the Junior version so she plays grown-up scrabble with me. Here is our first game:

My "QUIET" on a triple word score was the game winner (Q on double letter score!). Do I sound inappropriately competitive? Ade thought so! We played again the next night and she beat me; well, I was helping her at every turn! Yeah, I know, inappropriately competitive.

So, while I was putting in the hours at TPHosp, Ade and the girls went off exploring...But first Esther needed to dress and pack for an afternoon in the bush...

Two bags of Littlest Petshop toys

They went out to Coppin Pool, a 58km drive which took a couple of hours.

Coppin Pool Reflections by Freya

Glorious!!

There are some Aboriginal carvings on the rocks

Creek bed, seven to cross on the way to Coppin Pool, pretty tricky in the wet!

It was a long day for the youngest Jonker fashionista:

 Today the intrepid 3 climbed Mount Sheila:

The kind of sign that gladdens Ade's heart :)

Bitumen-ised! My favourite kind of 4wd track :)

F & E at the summit of Mt Sheila (there is a Mt Bruce not far from TP too, I kid you not!)

Views from the top:

Spotted on the way home:

2.5km long train

Burgers

Happy Easter xxxx

Car, shop, dinos and dog

LFE are delighted to have A back in the Pilbara after his vehicle buying mission in Perth.

Mission accomplished. NB not a Saab or LRover!

 

While the women of Australia's Eastern states have been surrendering their credit cards in Zara, the women (and children) of Tom Price were treated to similar commercial temptations...

Clearly I am suffering from the lack of spending opportunities in TP because, despite selling an enormous amount of c*@p, I (assisted by F & E) managed to spend $14 at the travelling Two Buck Shop!

Best buy...the fart putty

Today the girls engaged in some dinosaur petting, it started well...

Esther bonding with a baby Dryosaur

 

 

Juvenile T-Rex, Esther was terrified at this point, there were tears

 

As Freya has already mentioned, in her inaugural post, we are dog feeder-walkers. So far (2 days), so good; Spike has not been bitten by a snake or run off :)

On the oval near our house

Grandma and G are now in the same country as us!! 6 more sleeps until their arrival in TP :))

Rest in peace Little Nan xo

Freya's part of the blog

all these plants are beautiful this plant is a nasturtium and I planted it and it's mine

and this is lettuce,I had a taste test yesterday and it was great!!!

this is coriander and that will go nicely with salad

we get to walk spike every day he's cute but really aggressive with other dog's but he's still learning
we are looking after him because his owners sarah and jay are having a baby!!!here is my friend lara at the dinosaur petting zoo with me,we had a sleepover last night and we stayed up really late.

freya signing off

Week Wednesday

Penultimate day of term 1 and the entire Jonker family are just a little bit excited...MUCH!!
Today was Esther's Pre-Primary Easter bonnet parade and party, which neither of her parents were able to attend. I further cemented my rotten-mother status by forgetting to make the Hawaiian Pizza I had recklessly promised as Esther's contribution to festivities. In my favour, I had supervised the decoration of the Easter bonnet a week ago so, regarding the millinery, we were good to go...

Available to hire for royal wedding street parties

Strike a pose

Easter bonnet parade photos courtesy of Jo, a kind and thoughtful mum...who probably made muffins that were nutritious and delicious

 

Because I like to post pictures of food...

Fantastic dinner and company at Mary Mary's

F & E make new friends

Esther is always happy to try new things, today she tried a green felt tip

Busy, lovely hospital shift today. Great nurses, top doc. Motor bike accident with a bunch of fractures and then a baby! Beautiful birth and then I went home with my wonderful girls :)

Tiffin

A man was brought into our emergency department today after injecting himself with curry...
...he was in a korma*
In real life Micky the Radiographer and Early Shirley are both moving on (sniff), so we had a curry lunch on the veranda.

It was delicious :)

 There were no other children in attendance but the girls managed to occupy themselves:

 Freya took some photos of Kozzie and Max:

Esther had a cuddle with Mary Mary:

*Credit where credit is due, this is Shirl's joke (top gal, top nurse xo)

Getting out of TP!

Phew, I'll be glad when this week is over. Too much work and lots of tricky stuff, today was day 5 of a 7 day stretch :(. This morning I shoved the girls out of the hospital and off to school just as an ambulance arrived with a very poorly chap (who'd arrested in transit) and required the immediate attention of some health professionals. Happily there were some health professionals on hand...I was working with the exceptional Barb, Jacinta stayed on after her night shift and Early Shirley joined the party a bit later on. There was also an authority in wound care (yours truly) but sadly Mr Cardiac Event had no wounds that needed expert attention. I felt very inadequate and very grateful for the expertise in the resus room. Oh for the security of a tertiary hospital!!!
On call last night and called in to transfer an abdo pain (?peritonitis) to the airport for RFDS to Port Hedland. Fabulous and friendly flight nurse who invited me up the steps to take photies inside the plane. Only had m'iphone with me so poor quality (need a mk IV!!), but here I am in an RFDS ambulance:

Cockpit!!!

Here's Esther on the swings today waiting for Freya to finish gymnastics:

Finally, here are some pics from the Pilbara courtesy of Ade:

Sunrise on the way to Newman, Newman has a Chicken Treat (Ahh, Chicken Treat!)

Natural spring on the way to API Elvira, 200km SE of Pannawonica

Cathedral termite mound

PIAF in TP

Say what you will about Rio Tinto (I will refrain, it's not a company town but it would be rude to gnaw the hand that incidentally feeds us), but they are not shy about flashing the cash and entertaining the residents of Tom Price.
Rio were a Perth International Arts Festival Children and Young People's Programme partner this year and used their PIAF contacts to bring 2 of the festival films to the North West. So TP residents were treated to another Saturday night double bill, this time at the Tom Price Performing Arts Centre.

TP Performing Arts Centre (where F will make her stage debut later this year as Hedgehog #1 in the school production of Wind in the Willows- more of that at a later date!)

 

 

My date for the evening was Shirley from Horndean (Horndean is a hop and skip from Stubbington, home of Grandma and G). Shirl and I endured the hard, plastic chairs to watch 2 very gentle and pleasing movies. First up, Anthony Hopkins in the City of Your Final Destination, a Merchant Ivory production set predominantly in Uruguay (which probably wasn't Uruguay but made me want to go there anyway!). After an interval spent outside thawing after 2 hours in vigorous air-conditioning we braved the icy hall again for Summer Coda, an Aussie flick set in...Mildura. 

Not enough Jacki Weaver

I was conscious that I had rather dull photos with which to illustrate this post so I made the lovely Shirl pose with F & E in order to brighten every one's day...

In other news...Adam has a new car and since it is a (Land)Rover it gets a mention and a pic on this blog:

Ade muttered, "expensive to fix" (the Ade'n'Lou garage has only ever contained cars that need constant 'fixing'); I sighed, "it's so pretty". We both agreed it would look out of place in TP and wondered when Adam will be brave enough to take it off road...

Ade continues to enjoy his job, here is a boot tree at one of the camps he visited last week:

Only 3 weeks until Grandma and G arrive in TP, we are soooo excited!!!