St Patrick's Day with the Natives.

When you are Irish living abroad, St Patrick's Day has extra special meaning. It's a time to celebrate your heritage, be proud of your country of origin, but also to be thankful of your new life. Australia has been wonderful to us, and we decided to spend St Patrick's Day with some natives at Ballarat Wildlife Park.

The park has over eighty free roaming Kangaroo Island Kangaroos. These are the perfect kangaroo for an interactive space like this. They are very placid, having evolved on an island, Kangaroo Island, with no predators.

They don't flinch when you approach them.

"Hurry up with the food already, you slow humans!!!"

"Too slow, I'll just help myself then."

While we were having lunch the park's dog introduced herself. An Irish Setter named Malley. You couldn't get a better breed or named dog for the day that's in it. The boys thought she was vicious at first because she was showing her teeth, but turned out she has an under bite. She was a sweetheart, but boy did she stink. The staff told me she has the habit of rolling in kangaroo poo. My dogs roll in poo when they get the chance too. Must be a dog thing.

After lunch we fed some more kangaroos. "Some of mine."

"And some of yours!"

My boys love coming here, but not for the kangaroos, but for The Canyon. That's what they named it years ago. They love to climb up and down the sides, and run wild. We spent more time at this park playing in the canyon than actually looking at the animals.

"Hey Mum, we got something to show you."

"I got some red muck, can I keep it?"

"I got some marble, can I keep it?"  No matter where we go, my boys find some 'treasure'.

I was thrilled and delighted to see the my first ever wild Kookaburra.  I was all excited taking pictures, boys were like...it's only a bird. I swear those boys were swapped at birth.

You can always tell when my boys have had a good day, their clothes get dirty. Sometimes I wonder why I put clean clothes on them?

The last time we were here the kangaroos came to us for food. Today they must be full, as we need to go over and practically beg most of them to eat.

A perfect day. Hope your St Patrick's Day was perfect too.