Christmas to New Years

This year we did not have any visitors for Christmas, as Andy's parents went back to England on 20th December, and my parents are not coming back until 10th February. Thankfully, Craig and Mel invited us over for Christmas, and seeing as Craig and Andy have known each other since they were children, they are the closest thing we have to family here on the Gold Coast.

On Christmas Eve Andy took the kids to Wet'n'Wild, meeting up with (the other) Andy and the twins. This gave me the chance to prep the salad and desserts I was planning on bringing to Craig and Mel's for Christmas. Christmas food looks very different in Australia compared to Canada and England - turkey and all the fixings wouldn't be suitable for the hot weather! For salad I made this Prawn and Mango Salad which was very easy to make and delicious, a definite winner for when mangos are in season. I made two desserts, a pavlova - a classic Australian Christmas dessert - following all the tips and tricks from the website recipetineats for the meringue, and a Double Chocolate Mousse Cheesecake, from the Canadian recipe book Yum and Yummer. I also managed to finish all the Christmas wrapping while they were out, with my favourite Christmas movie Love Actually playing in the background. 

As the kids were getting ready for bed we realised we did not have any cookies to leave out for Santa. Disaster! So even though I was pretty tired of cooking in the kitchen, I found a small batch recipe for chocolate chip cookies that didn't require a mixer or any chill time. A bonus was that I already had left over egg yolks from the pavlova. The recipe made seven good sized cookies, which meant we all had one before bed, and we left three for Santa - though Ella tried to reason very hard that Santa only needed two so her and Ollie should share one more!

Once the kids were asleep Andy and I put out the presents, finishing up by a very reasonable 10:30pm. And of course we managed to finish off those three cookies left for Santa ;)

The next morning our excited children were up at about 5:30am. Early, but not excessively early here in the Gold Coast to be fair. We get up around that time normally, though Ella usually sleeps a bit later. Hilariously, we found out that Ollie actually woke up in the middle of the night and then snuck out to check on the presents. I can't believe he went back to sleep after that and didn't wake anyone else up! 

 

Here's Andy, resigned to the 5:30am wake up - although when sending this photo to Craig and Mel to garner some sympathy, they let us know that their kids were up at 4:30am - so I guess we got off lucky!

Yes, Santa enjoyed his cookies:

We spent the morning at home, opening presents, playing with the new presents, and finishing off the final prep for food for Christmas lunch. We headed over to Craig and Mel's in the early afternoon and had a fantastic time celebrating Christmas with their family. We are so lucky that we have children similar ages - twins who are the same age as Ella (one boy and one girl) and a boy about a year younger than Ollie. They generally split into boys and girls and play together happily.  We basically ate and drank all day and it was just a really lovely day overall. 

Here's Craig preparing some Moreton Bay Bugs for us - these are a species of lobster. Moreton Bay is a bay just south of Brisbane.

Kids have gone to bed - adults are carrying on for a bit longer...

The next morning we headed to the beach - a dip in the sea is a great hangover cure. Craig and Mel live in a fantastic location a short walk to the beach... no, I'm not jealous at all! 

A few days after Christmas it was our friend Andy's birthday, so we met him and his family at the beach in Surfer's Paradise. It was incredibly windy and the sea was pretty rough, but that didn't stop Ella and Andy's kids from wanting to swim. Ollie preferred to play football on the beach.

After that we headed to the Q1 Tower, which is the tallest building in Australia. You can take the elevator up 77 floors to SkyPoint, which has 360 degree views. We'd never been here before, and found out that it's free entry if you have passes to Dreamworld (which, we do!). There is a restaurant/cafe where you can get a casual drink or more of a meal if you wish, and I liked that the restaurant wasn't super fancy or exclusive - it looked like you didn't even need reservations, you could just take any table that was free. 

While we were hanging out there we managed to get some nice photos of us all:

We went for dinner at TGIFridays in Surfers, which had the advantage of being 1) overlooking the water, 2) loud and kid friendly and 3) reasonably priced. The food was ok, kind of what you'd expect, and the service also just ok - the place is run by backpackers, but hey, we had fun with our friends so that's what mattered!

After dinner Surfer's was buzzing, this a main place for both tourists and backpackers to stay, and recently the council has been trialling making the road in front of the beach car free. It was so nice to wander around there without the worry of the usual traffic. Ella and Ollie joined two guys playing handball along the beach before we went home. They love playing handball, although they figured out that they'd been playing with some rules that have been made up at their respective schools!

We got an inflatable kayak as a family Christmas present, so the kids tried it out in the pool. Of course it ended up upside down, used as a little shelter the kids could swim under and hide.

On New Years Eve we went to Main Beach with another family, who's daughter has become one of Ella's good friends this year. We had a great morning at the beach, with even Ollie happily splashing in the waves.

We all went home for some down time in the afternoon, before meeting back up at Main Beach to watch some fireworks. There were about 5-6 different locations for fireworks, with the early "family" fireworks set for 8pm. Unfortunately it was lightly raining, starting around 7:30pm, so although we stuck around for the fireworks, we left shortly after. I realised later I didn't take any pictures that day, except this blurry one of Ella and her friend on the (rainy) beach.

On New Years Day we decided to actually use our kayak, and headed to the Hinze Dam, about a 25 minute drive from our house. The dam is the main drinking water supply for the Gold Coast, and as such you are not allowed to swim in it, however electric boats and kayaks, paddle boards, canoes etc are permitted. 

Ella and Andy went first, while Ollie and I stayed ashore and resorted to his favourite childhood pastime: throwing rocks into water. We upped the anti and had a competition to see who could hit one of the tall sticks coming out of the water. I am proud to say I actually hit the stick (which was probably about 8-10 meters away) twice, thank you very much!

Next Andy and I went out (Ollie declined) while the kids stayed ashore. They found some tiny frogs which kept them very amused.

After our kayaking we went to explore the dam wall, which was very cool. It's about 2km long and leads to mountain biking tracks on the other side. There is also a cafe there, called 'The View" with yes, an impressive view over the dam and the Gold Coast hinterland. You can bike or walk across the bridge, which we went back to later the same week. Ella had her hoverboard with her, and this flat track provided the perfect spot for her to ride it.

We stopped at the Beechmont Hotel on the way home. It has a classic country pub feel, with a smokehouse BBQ and plenty of outdoor seating. There was a guy playing live music, and as the sun went down the fairy lights combined with the music created a very cosy atmosphere. There was a large playarea outside for kids to run around in, and Ollie ended up playing a version of tag with a group of them. The area in front of the stage was also quite big, and it wasn't super busy so Ella could practice more on her hoverboard. Andy and I actually had time to have a drink and a proper conversation while the kids played, and then we played a few card games all together. It was a lovely evening out, and a good start to 2026!