The second Part of Christmas translated into english! Thanks again Brett for correcting !

Friday, 25/12/2015 Christmas day

In the Flowers family, it’s tradition on Christmas day for everyone to get up early, because the children are awake early. After just 4 hours of sleep I was already awake at 5am and waited for the kids. Whoever isn’t awake yet is woken up via the kids tipping water over the sleeping persons. Luckily I was awake already! The others were shocked when they had water tipped on them. I had to laugh and the kids had fun. The little boy Riley provided biscuits and milk for Santa. Santa wrote a letter back which was on the table and Riley was really grateful and happy to get a letter from Santa.

Everyone looked what was in their Christmas stocking. That’s a sock which is normally hung on the chimney. Everyone got one and this is from Santa.
The highlight for the kids was the presents. In Australia they get it on the 25th in the morning. It lasted a while until all the presents were unpacked and everyone was happy. I also got presents. Yummy chocolate and perfume. I thought it was really nice that the Aussies think of me and that I got presents as well.

The weather was good and even if thought it was still wet, the sun was shining. We played in the garden with the kids, jumped on the trampoline and had fun like kids with the bubbles.

I skyped my family again because they celebrated the holy evening. They had secret Santa and it was funny to be live with them.

At already 7:30 am, Chris had Sausages and bacon on the BBQ. There were Hash-Browns, fried Tomatoes, Fruit salad, Croissants, fried egg and Toast aswell. A typical Aussie-Brekkie. It was a great, delicious breakfast.

I gave Renae a hand with the salads and chopped a few things and then we drove to the cotton farm of Brett’s Uncle and Aunt. The landscape on the one hour-drive was beautiful.
The farm is huge and they also have a big house. The four cousins between the ages 16 and 24 gave me warm welcomes. Brett’s Aunt Judy was dressed in Christmas-clothes and decorated everything really nice and Christmas like.
On the farm it was really hot and the sun was shining.
I felt like we just had breakfast as the lunch was ready. Judy gave a speech and we all sang “Happy Birthday“ to Jesus. They also said Grace which everyone could say. That was funny.
Because it’s so warm at Christmas, the Aussies have cold lunch. That means that there was cold meat like chicken, turkey and also prawns. I was happy with the big choice of salads which were delicious. And the choice of the deserts was huge as well.
At each table place there were “Bon-Bons“. Your neighbor pulls on the other end, it makes a bang and you can find little presents, a paper crown (hat) and a joke. I was the only one who had a pink hat (my favorite color). Everyone had to wear the hats and that looked really cool. All of us read their jokes out loud and we had to laugh a lot.

After lunch the kids got presents again. There were a lot of kids and in total there was more than 25 people. The little ones had to wear reindeer antlers to get their presents. Everyone was happy with their presents again.

The big advantage of Christmas in Australia is the weather. All members of the family played cricket in the backyard. This sports is really common here. First I just watched it but none could escape to play. I got a short instruction and then the fun began. You have to watch your wickets that the ball is not coming there. We had a tennis ball and the player on the opposite side had to throw the ball on to the wickets. My goal was to hit the ball and run to the other side before someone threw the ball at the wickets. That was so much fun and everyone was standing there and tried to catch the ball. On my first try Brett forgot to tell me that I have to run and all were lying on the floor laughing as I watched the ball flying back.

The highlight was as we drove to the dam with two Utes. We all jumped in and the water was warm. The strong guys prepared the waterslide. They put posts into the ground and rolled a big plastic sheet out. With a firehose and dishwashing-liquid the waterslide was perfect.

The boys wanted to let me have a go first but I refused and let them try it. There wwas endless number of air mattresses, boats, inflatables and so on. I was fascinated and said a hundred times how cool this was what the boys built. Every year for Christmas they build this slide. The dogs were swimming in the dam as well.
It was so much fun to slide down the dam. In all possible combinations the whole family slid down and sometimes four strong boys sat in a small boat and did it backwards. I also found myself in such combinations. Even Lyn and Judy had fun with the slide. Until the twilight we played and it was a great family adventure. The que for the shower afterwards was really long.
It was already dinner time and we ate the same as for lunch which was good. We all had nice conversations and I felt like it was my family. Everyone asked me about Christmas in Germany and none could believe that we don’t have Santa Claus and we celebrate it totally different.
The boys prepared a nice camp fire and we sat down with a couple of beers and everyone told stories. First we played a card game which nobody understood. The entire time we all laughed because the rules weren’t clear. One guy didn’t understand it at all. That was funny and we laughed the more we played. After that, Jarrod brought his card game up. They read the questions and one after the other had to answer one. Examples were: If you would win 1 Million how would you spend it, Where would you beam yourself if it was possible? What do you prefer: Bathing or showering? And so on. That was funny as well and everyone laughed lots.

It was late as, so we went to our dormitory in the living room. With ten people we slept there. Most of the people slept on the farm and the entire house was a huge dormitory. Even the 83 year old Grandma slept there.
The couch looked comfy and I decided to sleep there. Judy said I can’t do that because I’ll have a sore back tomorrow. I told her I’m young and I want to sleep there. Before I could think of anything I felt asleep as the first one.

That was the greatest, best Christmas-day I could have ever imagined.

Aussie-Christmas-greetings
Nadine

Brett, me, Jarrod, Cameron, Lachlan