Raglan isn't always bad...

Soon after we first arrived, we headed to Raglan to check it out - it was supposed to be a nice laid-back town with good beach and a great surf break. We were disappointed to find a wind-blown, freezing cold, rainy little place. I hadn't been back since. The only other time Mel had been back was a few weeks ago, and it rained then as well.
Anyway, the forecast for today was for sunshine and warm weather, so we thought we'd risk another trip to Raglan. And it was worth it. The sun was out, the wind stayed away, the water was beautifully clear and very very warm by NZ standards (must have been at least 22-23C - as warm as Qld water!). We all had a good time - the kids loved playing on the sand and splashing in the water. A few hours disappeared in no time at all before we had to get back to town to get some fish and chips for lunch at the harbour.

Part 5 - Auckland

OK, so this is now well and truly out of date... but anyway. New Year's weekend was spent up in Auckland with my parents before they left, flying out of Auckland. Some highlights:

• Going to Rangitoto Island (the kids walked most of the way, before getting carried)
• Caught a ferry across to Devonport and North Head
• The kids took a trip up the Sky Tower with Granny and Grandpa W
• Everyone except me went to One Tree Hill (I was on the way up from Hamilton)

Photos at the usual place...

More visitors...

My sister and family arrived early this morning to stay with us for the next 3 weeks. So we have finally got to meet our nephew/cousin Joshua in person for the first time. He looks big and chunky when we put him next to Naomi!

We've bought a house!

As of 5pm today we have gone unconditional on a 4 bedroom house in Hamilton. It has taken us 3.5 weeks from when we decided we could actually afford to buy a house, to get to this point. When I say it like that it sounds really quick, but it has been an eventful, stressful 3 weeks. It only took us 1 week of looking on the internet and 1 weekend of looking inside actual houses (we looked at 3 in total) for us to find a place we wanted to put an offer on. It has then been 2.5 weeks of trying to organise finance - which has had many ups and downs, twists and turns resulting in a lot of scrambling around by us (even if most of it has been in the virtual world of the internet). So if you have been wondering about the quietness of this blog for the past month, basically this has been the main reason why.

Part 4 - Waitomo

This is a slightly delayed update on what we got up to over Christmas/New Year time... part 4.
We headed down to Waitomo with Granny and Grandpa W to explore a cave or two. It's the sort of touristy thing that we haven't done a huge amount of, and the sort of thing that you don't do when you live here. Anyway, we went to Ruakuri Cave (very nice - cool formations, big shafts dropping down to the river below etc.) and the Glow-worm Caves - not quite as nice, but you do get to float along in a boat, looking at glow-worms in the pitch blackness.
If you have the money, it's recommended (it is a little pricey... as touristy things tend to be...)
More photos at the usual place, part 5 of 5 to come soon :)

Little fish...

Ben and Joanna started swimming lessons for the season today. I had been intending them to start lessons back in October/November, but with Naomi arriving early and then the steady stream of visitors, Christmas holidays etc...
I still have to get in the pool with Joanna, but Ben now goes on his own. I was a bit apprehensive about how he would react to it because when he went for a trial last summer (for them to work out which level class to put him in), he totally flipped out at the side of the pool and refused to get in. As it turned out he happily hopped in the pool and totally enjoyed himself the whole time - no tears, tantrums, or refusal to participate.

I'm back!

Went back to the gym for the first time since Naomi was born. There are a few reasons why it has taken me 12 weeks to get back into it (Naomi is 12 weeks old tomorrow!).

1. I couldn't go for the 1st 6 weeks as babies have to be 6 weeks old before they can be looked after in the creche.
2. Peter's parents arrived just after Naomi was 6 weeks old and so we were away on holidays.
3. Then it was Christmas/New Year so creche at the gym shuts down for a couple of weeks
4. My membership expired during this time, so I had to wait until the office girls got back from holidays (which was on Monday), so that they could figure out what to charge me (it gets complicated with the kids and creche and Ben starting morning kindy in a couple of months).

It was great to be back - everybody was excited about seeing Naomi (benefit of belonging to a small gym - the people (employees and fellow members) are all really friendly and familiar with each other. I'm looking forward to the exercise giving me more energy, making me less stressed and giving me a short break from the kids.

First day of summer!

I know that officially the first day of summer is the 1st of December, but that never really coincides with reality. Hamilton had it's first real day of summer yesterday - well that's Peter and my opinion (quite a few locals were commenting at church about how hot it has been the past week). It got to 27C and was humid - so it felt like a Brisbane summer day where you are slightly uncomfortably hot, when just sitting doing nothing and stinking hot if you are out in the direct sun! The good thing is that it still cools down nicely at night - we still pulled up our summer-weight doona during the night.

End of school holidays!

Tomorrow is Ben's first day back at kindy for the year. I am kind of feeling bittersweet about it.

Bitter - because it is the end of total flexibility of our daily timetable. It will make afternoons pretty busy 3 days a week again.

Sweet - because Ben (and the rest of us) is ready to go back - for the extra stimulation it provides, the interactions with peers, and other significant adults to talk to.

TradeMe money making

A week ago we finally got around to listing our old/no longer needed TV and VCR (we were kindly given a free widescreen TV and DVD player from one of Peter's work mates) on TradeMe (NZ ebay equivalent). So I decided to do a bit of a stocktake of other items around the house that we no longer use/have upgraded. This included our Breville coffee and spice grinder (I got a Breville conical burr grinder for my birthday just over a year ago), kitchen scales (I upgraded to digital kitchen scales over a year ago - which I bought cheap off ebay), and a dinner set (which we have never used). Everything sold except for the dinner set (which we have re-listed) and we made a total of $75! I'm tempted to try and find more surplus stuff around the house to sell (we just need to decide if Naomi is the last baby - because there is a lot of baby stuff I could sell for quite a bit of money).