Productivity

Thanks to my lovely husband taking the kids away for a night (and a hoarded pseudoephedrine tablet from a sinus infection a few months back) I have had the most awesomely productive weekend.  Which I will boast about anon.  But, first, here's what the littlie got up to on his mini-break at Tahunanui!

Well actually this one was a couple of days ago.  He went down to the river and befriended a wandering dog, christening him "Spookboots".  If we ever do get another dog, that, my friends, will be his name.

You might think, looking at this next picture, that Seb was a weaselly wuss the whole weekend.  Wah! The bumper boats were splashy!!!

But seriously, look at what he did next.  Can you spot him, hurtling down those hills on his balance bike, aka "my motorbike"?  How can this little dude have emerged from my loins, eh?

There's an outdoor icerink at Tahuna for the summer.  Pinky had a go, so she, too, is braver than me.  Urrr, I can't even think about ice skating without being seized by an image of falling over, spreading out my hands to stop the fall, and having someone skate over my fingers and slice them off.  No, I don't know why, but there you have it.  She has come home with all her digits, so I guess it's not a premonition.

But mostly it was just good beach fun.

And while they were away I finished the first draft of my book!  And sealed the gib on the new wardrobe in the studio!  And gave it two coats of paint!  And did a goodly lump of my Christmas shopping!!!

If sudomyl was freely available I could RULE THE WORLD.  But I would still not go down a BMX track on a balance bike.  So Sebby wins.

In the Pink (Again)

Well, guys, it's that time of year again: end of term four. In our house, that means UNLEASH THE BLEACH.  Behold stage one:

Which unfortunately meant that Molls had to go to an all night Lord of the Rings marathon looking like Queen of the Gingers.  But today she is pink!  Well, crazy fuschia with a candy stripe, anyway.

We have some leftover turquoise from another year... I'm so keen to turn that front bit blue!

But in the meantime the ravages of double bleaching mean that tomorrow night I'm going to slather her in egg yolk and olive oil.  Her long fringe feels a bit like toetoe.

I love having a big girl to play with.

Deja Vu

Oh my Lord.  Look who fits into my wedding dress.

Admittedly, it was a bit long.  Otherwise... dude, I was skinny.  I won't be encasing myself in that sucker any time soon.

We've been sorting Historical Tat as part of the Great Cupboard Restock -- that immense pile of stuff in the corner of the studio has had a home built for it.  Of course we are making an attempt not to just chuck it all back in.  Amongst other memorabilia (skool photo of seventeen year old Liam, aww!  Molly's baby teeth, awwww!) we found Molly's Plunket book.

Guess how old she was when she weighed nineteen kilos, which is just over Seb's current weight?

Go on, guess.  Look, I'll even give you a scrolldown...
















SIX AND A HALF.

Summer's coming!

Ooh, I've been a bit slack haven't I?  Didn't document last weekend.  Well, Seb and I went to the saddest Santa parade ever.  Dead feeble.  BUT, Seb got a blow up sword and reindeer ears, so he was pretty happy.

Santa turned off the main street before he even got to us.  I think he was a bit nervous after last year's Reindeer Decapitation Incident. Wuss.

It's been ever so summery.  There have been icecreams.  Sebby is a fan.

He's also a big fan of his birthday bathtime paint from Aunty Fuf.  I am protecting him from his future Googlers by restraining myself to a picture of his face, but it was hard.  GREEN WINKLE was awesome.

Birthday, in Detail

So I know I already did one birthday post, but here's one with more pics!

A happy birthday boy:

And a really happy birthday boy, with his birthday chair and party hats and streamers...

And three star candles for my three-star three year old.

(Just after the effort of blowing out the candles he threw up massively, but we'll try to forget about that aspect of the birthday.  Of the whole week, actually.)

Next day, he got to be a CAT!

Today we went to the river.  Nothing special.  Just a cute picture of my three darling darlings.

All in all it was quite a week... but at the heart of it we have a three year old sweetie pie who just couldn't be dearer.  Can't believe he's three already... half way to being able to read, HURRAY!!!!

Happy Birthday, Mr Three!

It was a funny old birthday.  Thank goodness we'd undercooked it, because Seb's been pretty unwell the last couple of days and was only just coming right.  As it was he still managed to hurl after only two mouthfuls of dinner and a half a cup of heavily watered-down L&P, and his birthday cake's untouched.

But for all that I think he had a nice day.  I got to spend it with him, which was a super-special treat.  We did lots of garden time and playing with water and generally pottering about; the tractor came and cut the grass in the meadow behind us, which is always fun; and he had a lovely time playing with all his new toys.  We watched Toy Story snuggled up under his new Buzz Lightyear blanket and he was happy and charming and dear.  I had several moments today when I teared up from sheer weight of love.

I have more pictures but they'll wait till Sunday.  For now, this one's for Will!

Last Day

We will miss you guys so much.

Thank you, from all of us.  We love you to bits.

Also, you are lucky that fire truck's siren is relatively quiet because there has been PLENTY OF IT this afternoon!

(PS Finished my chapter, Mutti. Corsets!  So freaky!)

Love and Lots of It

Daddy came home!  Guess how Sebby felt about that?

And guess how Molls felt about it?

Okay, so maybe I felt that way about it too, only there isn't a picture to prove it :)

Meanwhile, we still have the pleasure of grandparents with us.  Grandparents who show us pictures of Europe.  Hmmmm thought-provoking.

And Rhu loves having her Mutti here too.  The love comes off her in waves.

No-Labour Day

Now, before I get to the weekend away, I have to show you this mad impressive confection.  And yes, it tasted as good as it looked.  Know what's really impressive?  While Mutti was baking it THE POWER WENT OFF.  And yet it was perfection incarnate.  Mmmm.

So anyway, after all Mutti's hard work this week we went away for the long weekend.  Molls went to Westport with friends; Daddy is still up in Bream Bay; we snuck off to Marahau.  These pictures are all out of order but the truth is I am too darn lazy to fix it.  Here, have some scattered snapshots!

Here is Mutti at Split Apple Rock beach.  I didn't even know you could get there without a boat!  But you can, it's a fifteen minute bush walk down a lovely headland which we found by accident, and the beach was just glorious.  Pure Abel Tasman with none of the tramping.

With bonus rock pools!  And caves too.  Urrrr caves.

Here are the team at our Holiday House, which was a little cottage on a farm a couple of ks up the road from Marahau.  There was an orchard, and fields, and goats, and it was totally perfect for an adventuresome nearly-three-year-old.

And the flowers were gorgie.  So is Seb.

Hey, surprise, we've back at Split Apple Rock!

And now we're back to Marahau!

Seb was helping a dear little Piggy (aka Mutti) wet his little pink trotters on his first ever trip to the beach.  Long story.  Kept Seb entertained on a long and meandering swamp trek in search of a non-existent beach, till we gave up and came back to this one, which was actually great, so why we drove past it in the first place I don't know.  It was my fault.

Today there was a bit of a nippy wind going on, but nothing stops a Southern Man intent on beach time.  Just whip off your pants and rug up on top.  Done.

Awesome weekend.  Love ya, Mutti!

We Love Mutti

First off, Seb took some pics this week.  How scary is it to see yourself the way your kids do?  Wah!  That is one scary old broad!

But more importantly, MUTTI arrived yesterday!  In a swirl of wind and rain she managed to touch down, even arriving before Air New Zealand said she would.  We were so happy to see her.  Three days this week without Daddy, just me and my kidlets, was hard going.  She is a total lifesaver.  Oh daddy-pie, how we are going to miss you while you're up in Bream Bay!

And what's more she brought beautiful presents with her!  Here's an angel opening an angel...

And here he is with his very favourite pressie, a water pen that does magic colouring-in.  He was riveted.  And this morning it was the first thing he did when he got up!  On the other hand his picker-upper-claw was a major hit too.

The absolute, undisputed king of the beautiful presents was these shoes.  How gorgeous are these? (Shoes, feet, and ankles!)  Watching her stagger round like a newborn colt is too lovely.  A total caprice, just like the saleslady said.  So beautiful.

And so happy when faced with a giant icecream and sunny day.

This face is also a very happy face, believe it or not!

We are all happy.  Love having you here so much, Mutti.  Thanks for lending her, Buncie, and we can't wait to have you here with us next week!

Spring Spring Springetty Spring

I love spring so much.  The blossoms!  The blue sky!  The asparagus, growing so fast that you go out in the morning and think there isn't enough for dinner, but by lunchtime, there it is!

Not to mention the tigers.

We went out to Jester House for coffee and cake and eel-feeding.  It's fab out there, and even fabber if you're Nearly Three.

There is climbing!  You might think you couldn't beat tame eels and a tiger, but a ladder apparently comes close.

Oh you adventuresome tyke.

And there's a magical fairy wood with carved pterodactyls, who have gold chains round their necks, so you can fly them around.

You know what's even better than that?

They have a house shaped like a shoe THAT YOU CAN STAY IN.

Sunny Picton is Our Town

Hey guyz gess what?  It's me SEB!

It has stopped RANEING at last so life is back to orsum.  I can go and pla in the sun and run round and round and go to the beech and all that good stuff.  This weekend it was so full of SUN that my mum said rite that's it we are going on a mini holiday.  Momo was werking and Dad was 2 so me and my mum said we dont care we're going anyway.  Heh heh heh.  We went to SUNNY PICTON.

SUNNY PICTON IS CHOICE!  I had a icecream.

And I was brave as a brave ashtronort and went in a space ship.

My mum says she's not going to put the viddeo up because in the viddeo you can hear me squeaking ITS TOOO FAAAAAST and I don't sound quite so brave.  Cheers ma.

We had fish and chips for dinner in the nearly dark!  I arst everyboddy in the fish and chip shop wot they were having for their dinner but my dinner was the best.

And this was the best bit of SUNNY PICTON it was my BOTE wot I sailed and sailed and sailed and I dint want to do nuffink else, not the train even, not the quarium not the playground not nuffink just me and my BOTE.

Plus I got to go and pla wiv my frend KEVIN who is totally excellent.  And he doesnt fib like my ma.  I wanted more joose, it was the best joose ever but ma said, "No it's all gone."  But my frend KEVIN said no it's not there's heeps more.  Can you believe my ma is such a feendish liar???!!!!

Also Momo did some big play fing but as ushual I got left at home.  Ma says she was fab and grate but wot do I know?

(She was indeed fab and great.  The drama class production was Our Town.  It takes a special five foot two seventeen-year-old girl to pull off a middle-aged, turn-of-the-century American newspaper editor but she did a top job.  And showed great presence of mind when faced with unexpected interjections from the audience.  "What do you do if your town is ATTACKED?" chirped a small chap at the end of a question-and-answer session, in which all other questions had been from scripted plants in the audience; Molly, having the stage to herself and being the target of the question, solemnly informed him: "Why, that's why we have the Grovers' Corners Army.  Practice every weekend.  Got any OTHER questions?" she added, giving the audience a glare that quite succinctly informed them that they had better not, if they wanted to hang on to their spleens.)