Today (Saturday 25th May)

We've spent most of today shopping for our new house.

We went down to IKEA first thing, arriving for opening time at 9am. The IKEA in Brisbane is the largest in the Southern Hemisphere and is absolutely huge. What's more it was pretty quiet and quite an enjoyable experience, unlike the last time I visited the Leeds IKEA!

We managed to pick up a bed for Lauren (which she chose herself) along with decent mattresses for us all (no good buying a cheap matress if you value your sleep!), a coffee table and other bits and bobs.

We got back to our new house at lunchtime to await the delivery of our new bed, which arrived on time just as they had said.

We then went to Cannon Hill Shopping Centre in Brisbane to look for a fridge/freezer and washing machine. We managed to pick these up at what I think is a really good price after a bit of haggling. The Salesman welcomed us with open arms and quickly told us he is Welsh, from Cardiff, even though he has lived here for 25 years!

We also bagged ourselves a real bargain. We had no intentions of getting a Dining Table set yet but we saw one we loved on a Manager's Special. It's a dark wood table with 6 dining chairs with Suede back, and what's more the whole lot only cost us $499 (2 hundred British pounds (I'm going to have to work out how to input the British Pound symbol from these Ozzy keyboards)).

We returned at 5pm to our new house to await delivery of the Sofas which again turned up on time.

So far, touch wood, everything in Australia has been a breeze. The people are fantastic. Everyone is friendly and can't do enough to help you. It must be the sun. It's so uplifting waking up to clear blue skies and glorious sunshine every morning.

It's quite funny really. It has been about 25 degrees each day while we've been here but the ozzies have been moaning that it's cool while we've been sweltering. Some are even wearing coats!

Anyway, this looks like being our last night at Cath's. She's been great letting us stay her (again) and I know Lauren's loved it playing with Bonnie and their dog Lucy.

Tomorrow's going to be another busy day building our bed and other flat pack furniture, while we're awaiting our IKEA delivery. We're also going to have a look for a telly. I very nearly bought a 40 inch Plasma with built in HD tuner today but I decided to be sensible. We may have made quick decisions so far with everything else but I'm not taking any chances with a telly, I'm going to have a good look round.

I suppose I also ought to think about looking for a job so I can pay the rent on our new house in the coming weeks!