Josh turns 13

Today Josh turned 13, he is now officially a teenager and has not lost motorskills or vocab!  Yeah!

He was also out of bed before 10am! 

He has been kitted out with a Kathmandu jacket, Hunting and fishing cameo gear (nice and warm for tramps), ipod shuffle, Imagine dragons CD, Commando comics, Guitar pick maker, hand knitted merino socks, IOM TT T-shirt and loads of money.  He spend $75 on X-box games and a little at the dairy.  He hopes to put the money towards his xmas money and get a new guitar..............

We also got him some tramping boots, when we discovered not only is he now as tall as his dad, but also same shoe size (UK 9).  And still a few more years of growing to go!

Its been a good week, he had his interview at Rathkeale College and was offered a place to start in January 2014.  He is still a little unsure but knows it is the best option and we have a party on the 1st November to meet with other new students and parents.  We also need to make an appointment to get him kitted out for his school uniform (ouch $$! I should think).

 

Shakes and shopping

Well another Huge quake hit wellington on friday afternoon.  A massive 6.6, at only 8kms deep and bigger than the 6.5 in July.  The worst case senerio too with mum stuck at work with all public transport suspended, kids at school and dad at work in Lower Hutt trying to get in contact with mum who was trying to get in touch with dad, but all phone lines were jammed......

All worked out fine, text messages went through eventually and girls and Josh were collected by dad while mum set out on foot to walk back to the Hutt Valley.  Luckily mum soon encountered 1000's of workers waiting for buses and car drivers stopping and offering lifts to various locations.  A quick decision to grab a lift back to the Hutt with a lovely lady called Angela turned out to be a blessing as it turned out she also lived in Silverstream.  We were early enough to have missed most of the gridlock too.  It was amazing to see the considerate drivers offering lifts to as many as could fit in their cars as the 1000's of workers were fleeing the city as office buildings were evacuated and shut pending engineer safety checks....again!  Angela is a lovely lady, having come to New Zealand after surviving massive injuries in the 7.2 Bucharest Earthquake in 1977.  She was very glad to have company on her journey home.

Aftershocks continued for a good 6-7 hours with the largest being 6.0.  This time round the quakes had subsided to a level that the girls eventually slept through them all but one, with everyone awake at 3am but getting back to sleep till 7.

I keep thinking we have missed a bullet still.... it was still some distance away and only a 6.6!  And a good job these wooded houses take the energy and sway but stay up!

Saturday was horse riding - you can not feel quakes when moving !!! then a bit of clothes shopping at Savemart as India has rugby on Tuesday (broken bones anticipated!!!).  As usual Saffron ends up finding the lovely fashion clothes and India is happy with rugby boots, shirt and shorts!