Home Again

Well it was a long journey back, after making a special stop to meet up with Department of Health man - other end sample for him....... He said he will let us know, good job as India was ill again the day after getting home, poor thing. Oh well a mountain of washing to do and cleaning all cooking items, airing outer tent, cleaning rabbits and guinea pig, collecting Molly, Pebbles and Thomas and oh yes, more washing!!!!
Back to school next week, best find Josh some new shoes!!! friday is turning into a manic day - cricket and swimming now!!!! chippie tea after I should think! Josh has decided to drop Karate but keep up the cubs. India wants horse riding lessons, ouch $50 a lesson. Saffron starts school in term 2 so all go. Plus a load of birthday invites over the coming weeks! busy busy term time again already!

Holiday part 6 - Pupu Springs & salmon fishing

India was ill again this morning....... ho hum. By lunch time she had cleared herself out so we went out to Pupu springs and Salmon fishing. Pupu springs is a great geological spring of clear water. its protected so you can not contact the water due to a large amount of rock snot in the local area. After this we went Salmon fishing, and mum caught a whopping 1.89kg beast! Landed excellently by Josh who then chickened out on spiking it through the brain, so did Andy come to think of it.. Oh well mum got to do that and dad got the hook out. The place will fillet and smoke your Salmon for you while you wait. So we got to take a lovely smoked salmon back to the campsite for tea. Unfortunatly India was ill from the other end! Luckily the public health man was on site and eagily took samples....?????!!!!!!

Holiday part 5 - Farewell Spit

Ok I admit it, I conned the kids. The were winging far far too much, so ended up on a 5km hike!!! the best bit was undoubtedly the dunes and rolling down them!

Got back to the camp site to find out its been shut, since wed apparently, now monday - great communication..... Anyway turns out there is E-coli in all drinking water, including the filtered stuff.......

Holiday part 4 - pony club and Radar!

Sunday - mum was still a little fragile, but we had got tickets to the Golden Bay food and wine festival, so we went...... Kept bumping into some bloke called Radar!???? NZ version of Hugh F-W.... The charged for everything, not quiet what we expected after having to pay to get in too..... Oh well the Pony rides and ice cream saved the day! Back to the campsite for a play on the beach. By this point the campsite was more like the Marie Celeste!!! Luckily another family from Christchurch were there and the kids played with them loads. With so few families around seagull baiting started to become regular and successful pasttime!

Holiday part 3 - Saturday

Saturday....... It started well, we went back to Takaka to get the girls their hair braids done they requested..... from there mum was starting to feel a little woozy! But we managed to get to Bencarri nature park and feed the eels before we went home for mum to pass out with the BUG........

Holiday part 2 Wainaui falls and The Grove

24 hours later and all were feeling better, despite an early use of the bucket by India! We decided to make the most of the dry patch and head out.... We went to explore the Grove - Bush walk among limestone features and Rata roots growing between the rocks. From there we went to Wainiu falls for a walk, it was going good till we got to the swing bridge, it took a couple of goes for Josh to get across. Fearless mountain goat saffron was well away showing how its done! Back to Pohura for lunch at the Penguain cafe and got back to Takaka just has the rain started. So we had a look around the town and Saffron found a very pretty dress....

Journey to Golden Bay

It was an early start off to the ferry for 6.50am check in. We were one of the first on so got a good spot in the sun lounge. We got great views going into the sounds. The kids had a lot of fun exploring the boat and being entertained with clowns! From there we headed down to Blenheim, Havlock and then over the coast route to Nelson. It looks a lovely place and some great beaches there. We then followed the coast up to Motuaka where we had a pit stop before heading over the Takaka Hill and on to the campsite. It went down a bit from there!!!! The campsite readily took the money and said not a word about anything....... Within 30 mins of setting up the tent on our pitch, we had been warned by 4 different families there is a very contagious D & V bug doing the rounds and to wash hands and use on the filtered water. ........ Tent up, camp tea and an expore of the beach at low tide, looks a lot better at high tide! After a busy day we hit the sack early! only to be woken at 1am, 3am, 5am by multiple sounds of vomitting all around the site....... some bug! the next few days were spend hiding from the rain in the tent, stocking up on buckets and hand sanitiser and waiting the bug to appear. Appear it did, thursday saw India, saffron and Andy all sick!

Saffron's new Bike

After very suddenly loosing her trainer wheels, the small learner bike is too small, especially as she is pinching India's bike and flying around. A quick search on trade me revealed the usual plentiful supply of old bikes once santa has delivered new ones! A bargain was acquired......... $30 and very pink with doll carrier and basket - perfect. Saffron took to it like a duck to water!!!

Wairarapa Trip to Waikuku Lodge

A New Style photo slide show from our trip over the last few days

More Knitting

These are Kate's Christmas socks, hopefully the parcel arrives back in NZ and can be re-posted after the address label was torn off the parcel! poor kate got the label only!

Blueberry picking and car washing

Saturday saw the opening of the blueberry PYO fruit farm up the road, so we took advantage of the sunshine and went picking blueberries. Plenty to be had and it didn't take long to collect a large tub full (approx 1.25kg) even with all the eating going on! We then tried the blueberry ice blocks as the ice cream wasn't ready while watching the emus. Saffron was looking like a vampire with all the blueberry juice round her mouth! Even some car washing and hose pipe spraying couldn't get ride of it!

Garden in January

The Pohutukawa's that Jason and Michelle gave us money for last Christmas have flowered this year and are looking gorgeous. We also have a few swan plants that got stripped very early by Monarch caterpillars - a distinctive bright yellow and black striped caterpillar. Their chrysalis are a lovely green with a distinctive gold pattern on them - well they are Monarch's and all Monarch's need some bling!! Especially after all that effort they live for just 2-8 weeks.

Bucket head

Molly after her op, she can not be trusted not to nag at stitches, so bucket head for her! The girls and their hair cuts, getting closer to the same length............