What a gorgeous day.  One of the best Wellington offers up.  And more of the same tomorrow.  What?  The same weather two days running?  Are we entering a settled period?

 

Nothing much on for the weekend.  Toby has soccer after school today and swimming tomorrow morning.  Mum and Dad have a party to go to tomorrow night.  The rugby is on Sunday morning (All Blacks v England ) and we will look after Benjamin and Ramble on Sunday while Vivienne and John dive in the sea.  The weather is supposed to be nice so we might go and find Vivienne and John and watch for a bit.

 

Tonight Dad and Mum will drive into town with Toby and we ’ll look at the Christmas windows at Kirks and then have dinner out.  Café Neo might be an option.

 

What a beautiful, calm morning.   It is overcast but warm and not a breath of wind on my ride in.   It was such a lovely ride in (until I yelled ‘idiot ’ at a van driver and he heard me – I was sure I said it under my breath – how did that happen?   He gave me a fright by pulling out of a street and pulling over onto yellow lines immediately so I think it was surprise more than anything.   I see loads more dumb drivers than that most days!).   And I enjoyed my ride home last night with Mike.   We don ’t often ride home together so it was very nice.

 

Oooo.   My tea is superb this morning.

 

Last night I never saw Vivienne as she was on the dive course.   But I did catch up briefly with John when he got home from the scout meeting (he ’s chairman).   They seem to be enjoying the diving and I hope the weather kicks in for them at the weekend for their open water dives (Vivienne will have an exam dive at some stage over the weekend – she ’ll be fine.   It ’s amazing how survival kicks in and you remember all the things you need to do so you don ’t drown!).   We ’ll see Benjamin and Ramble on Sunday.   Toby can ’t wait to come as he ’s cross I get to babysit and he doesn ’t.   “Can I come and babysit tonight with you? ”.   I think babysitting the Sampson children has conditioned him.

 

Toby now has a cool soccer ball to practise with Gramps.   A sports store is closing down near work and we bought a few things.   Toby also has shorts to wear to the soccer too.   His team is called Little Phoenix (the Wellington A league team is called Phoenix ).   I ’m hoping to go and watch them next week (I ’ll probably have a release Thursday night so should have some hours owed me).

 

My bike computer is working again.   It got into a muddle and only read speed and not distance.   Very strange.   I re-booted it and now it works but I have lost all my data.   1200kms and maximum speed of 51.5 km/h.   I ’ll have to set all my goals again!

We had a pleasant evening scoffing fish n chips at Sally and Andrew ’s place.   Mike got into Wellington just as we left Woburn pretty much.   So it was perfect timing.

 

Tonight I have Lewis duties to perform – but from 1930 tonight.   The late shift.   ;-)   And I think Sunday we ’ll be at the Lewis household for the day.   If it ’s nice and the diving is close by to Wellington , we ’ll put everyone in the car and go and check it out.   We can be official photographers.   I can imagine the entertainment now.   Picnic on the beach.   Dog walking.   SCUBA diver spotting.

 

That ’s about it really.   Time for Weetbix and tea.

I have to declare summer weather finally here.   Mike and I slept without the duvet last night – just a sheet.   Bring it on!   In saying this you could be forgiven for thinking we ’re having great weather.   No – we ’re having odd weather.   Windy, rainy and warm.   Bizarre.   My recently planted renga renga is taking a hammering from the wind.   They ’ve gone all floppy.   I hope they survive.   More rain and less wind please.   At least for this week.

 

Mike left this morning at about 5.15am.     Very early.   But I have to say I hardly woke – although I do remember a goodbye kiss.   Toby and I had a fabulous morning.   We enjoyed our walk to school.   Toby “played ” with a banana gun most of the way (shooting things and turning them into bananas) until he ate it.

 

Mum and Dad will collect wee Toby this afternoon and may wait patiently at home till I finish work.   Then they can drive down the hill and I can drive out to 40WLW for fish n chips.   I think the lounge room at Woburn is most likely given the weather conditions.   Although it is supposed to improve this afternoon.

 

Mum is going to do my lunch duty at Toby ’s school today.   That makes my life much easier today.

 

I supervised (ha!) Benjamin and Ramble last night while Vivienne and John did their diving course work.   They have 4 open water dives this weekend so we may be staying at the Lewis household a lot this weekend.

 

I think that ’s it …

 

Marvellous stuff.

The weekend passed by a little too fast for my liking.   Mike and I had a night out at a work colleague ’s party on Friday night.   Mum and Dad collected Toby from school, took him to soccer (Dad is now Toby ’s coach and they will be playing soccer after school from time to time now!) and then took him to their place.

 

Swimming the next morning was a non starter.   Toby was too tired for that so back they came.   I went shopping with Mum to Harvey Norman to look at furniture for Mum and Dad ’s place.   Malcolm arrived and sorted out the alarm system at home (I wonder if Mike has set it for today?) and we looked at his ideas for replacing a paper trail at his work with a database application.   A very good idea.

 

Sunday was supposed to be a model train extravaganza for Mike and Toby (with Vivienne and Benjamin) but Toby took exception at the idea for some reason and was adamant all the model trains he wanted to see were Christmas ones.   No – I didn ’t understand him either.   Apparently we have been to see them at some stage in the past and he wanted to see them again.   But not whatever the models were at Porirua.

 

Very odd.

 

Mum and Dad came round for Sunday roast (but Mike went to work!) and the Sampson children popped in to play with Toby for the afternoon.   Andrew dropped of some renga renga so I   planted them yesterday.   No idea if they will survive or now.

 

And now I ’m back at work.   All too soon.

 

Have a great week.

What a beautiful morning out there today.   Mike and I have a night on the town at a work colleague ’s party.   Mum and Dad will:

Collect Toby at 3pm

Take him to his soccer match (pitch 5, Ian Galloway park, 3.30pm)

Take him home

Let him play computer games

Feed him yummy food

Let him stay up late

Generally pamper him

 

Meanwhile Mike and I will go to this party. Hopefully have a good time.   Come home and collapse.   Get up and collect Toby for swimming tomorrow morning.   I ’m hoping I can stay at home and tidy then take Mum shopping for furniture.

 

I think Vivienne will take Toby to the model railway exhibition on Sunday morning.   Mike may be very tempted.

 

That ’s it!   Nothing on.   I ’ll watch the rugby Sunday morning!   Go the All Blacks!

I had a pleasant evening looking after Benjamin (that involved eating yummy food with him and briefly discussing World of Warcraft and watching TV) and Ramble (that involved lots of patting and occasional opening and closing doors for him).   Vivienne and John got wet at the SCUBA course from 1800 – 2200.   I think I would have drowned when I fell asleep underwater!   And I got choc chip muffins for my trouble (Mum – there is one left on the bench at our house for a nice cup of tea!).   Roll on Monday night where I do it again.   The ride up to their place went surprisingly well.   40 minutes from my bike at work to their driveway.   Not bad for the first time (and only second time or so up the gorge – Mike and I have been using Old Porirua Road to go to my parents place – quite a different prospect).

I enjoyed the Munster v All Blacks game.   Munster were gutted not to get that win.

I need to keep track of my social schedule.   For some reason I feel like I ’m losing grip on my life.   Here is the immediate schedule so everyone can remind me.   And fill in any gaps.
 
Tonight:   bake pikelets with my mother.   Possibly take my parents shopping for furniture (is Harvey Norman open Thursday night?)

Friday morning:   make sure Toby takes pikelets for morning tea.   It ’s grandparent day at Toby ’s school

Friday night:   Mike and Toby bond over Speed Racer (Dad – you can watch the drivel too if you want).   I relax with a book.

Saturday morning:   swimming.  Now I think swimming is the only thing on so far this weekend.   I will also go shopping with my parents.

Mon evening:   Vivienne's house for supervising and couch sitting

Tues:   fish n chip night at Petone beach or 40WLW (Mike in Auckland for the day).
I think that ’s it.   But I still feel uneasy.   I wonder what I have forgotten!   ;-)

Anyhow a cup of tea will fix everything.   Have a great day! 

My parents arrived safe and sound yesterday, minutes ahead of a fantastic southerly storm.   The storm head cloud formations looked fantastic.   But they at least could tell it was a good day up till then.   We collected Toby on the way home and he was very pleased to see his Grandy and Gramps.   We had a relaxing dinner and then Mike took them home at about 7pm (they were very tired by then and itching to get home).   They were pleased with the Trade Me action Mike has been getting.   Now my mother wants to buy furniture to replace the gaping holes made by the auctions!

 

We have booked our flight to Sydney for Christmas.   Mike, Toby and I fly out Dec 20 (Sat) from Wellington to Sydney at 6am!     We get into Sydney at 8.30am or something.   We are more than happy to catch the train into Blacktown .   But if someone could collect us from there, that ’d be grand!

 

We think we should fly to Christchurch on Dec 29 (cheapest flight we found – JetStar A$329) and hire either a people mover or two smaller cars.   So we haven ’t yet booked our flight back.   Queenstown flights are more expensive for us.   This part of the journey still needs a bit of work in defining the parameters.   ;-)   Stay tuned.   However, we are definitely in Sydney for Christmas.

 

The website we found useful to compare prices and flights was www.webjet.co.nz .  Careful as these are in AUD.   But we hopped onto www.airnewzealand.co.nz to actually book as Mike thinks webjet add their fees on the end.

 

Tonight I will be riding like the wind to the Lewis house to look after Ramble and Benjamin.   Vivienne and John are off on the scuba diving course.   It goes from 1800-2200 (I ’ll be shattered just sitting on the couch let alone swimming around a pool trying on bits of gear!!!) so I ’ll be there at 1730, if I make it up their hill.   I suggested my parents come round so see me there. But that only adds to logistics so the rest of them can stay in Ngaio and Mike can take Toby home early from there.   1900 into the bedroom, 1930 lights out.   Toby did well last night under the new regime.   I ’ll get a lift home from the least exhausted SCUBA diver at 2230 or so!

 

Busy day!   I drove in as I ’m collecting Mum and Dad from the airport.   Their flight is delayed by 20 mins so I ’ll leave here about 1430 to get there in tine to see them walking through customs.   Mike is busy at work too, so he probably hasn ’t noticed the missing daily email.

 

The weather is holding here.   It looks glorious out there, but is supposed to turn to custard at some stage today.   We shall see.   I had to stake my broccoli last night as the wind yesterday toppled one of them over.   Where does this weird weather come from?

 

So, I am excited at my parents return.   I have cooked up a batch of spag bol sauce in preparation of their arrival.

 

My wee sister Karen won $900 on an Aussie radio station the other day answering 9 questions out of 10 correctly.   She is renovating her house so it is very timely and has already been spent on door knobs.   And the 10 ^th questions he couldn ’t answer?   Right up my alley.   Couldn ’t she have phoned a friend?   ;-)   Who makes Xbox?   Well, she won ’t forget that in a hurry now.   But $900, $1000?   Why quibble!   Smart girl.   I ’m chuffed.

 

Toby and I had a three day weekend because he was sick on Friday.   I had just got to work after dropping him at school and we got a phone call.   So we had a day in bed reading books.   We both slept around lunchtime so perhaps he was a bit sick after all.   He started complaining more about his sore ear in the afternoon so I took him to the doctor.   She said it was just a viral thing and he had wax in his right ear.

 

Toby declared he was having a day off on Saturday.   We thought it ’d be better not to go swimming with him complaining about earache.   So he stayed in his pyjamas for ages.   At about 11.30 I suggested getting dressed and he said he was having a day off and staying in his pyjamas all day!   However he got dressed for us to go out for dinner at Barry and Kath ’s house that evening.   We had a very pleasant time out there with wonderful food.   Toby enjoyed himself playing on Barry ’s Playstation.

 

Sunday was a lazy start to the day and a great BBQ at Sally and Andrew ’s house to celebrate Vivienne ’s birthday!   The weather was good – a bit windy but nice and warm.   Toby enjoyed playing with Anthony and Benjamin – and Ramble!

 

Toby went home to play with Benjamin while Mike and I went to Ngaio to make sure the house was fine for my parents.   They arrive back on Tuesday (around 2.45pm or so) so we stocked the fridge with milk and bread.   The lounge really does look empty with all the things we have sold in their absence!

 

I wasn ’t feeling well at this stage, so Mike dropped me home and he went to take Toby to Maccas for some dinner.

 

Monday morning has kicked in with some yucky weather.   Wind and rain.   But it isn ’t cold.   I think the warmer weather has arrived finally.   Although I saw a forecast for a southerly change for tomorrow – just in time for my parents arrival.   Nice.

 

Mike ’s parents should have their new Jazz by now and be wandering their way back to Dunedin .   I hope they have loads of fun.   Vivienne and John and enjoying the old Jazz – Benjamin seemed especially pleased with it!

 

Have a marvellous week!

I am such a proud mother today – I really enjoyed Toby ’s musical performance last night.   He was so cute in his rabbit ears.   When his class was up there, they started holding up Austrian flags in a circle but Toby craned his neck to turn around to see where we were sitting.   The rest of the class put their flags down but Toby remained holding his up as he grinned at me.   It got a chuckle from the audience.   Then the children all held hands in a circle and started their dance.   When they let their hands go, Toby blew me a kiss and the audience loved it (I think they thought it was a scripted kiss to everyone) and I was so happy!   Toby was very good during his class item, but at the end when all the children were on the stage to sing the last items, his attention was really wandering.   I think he was fascinated by the stage and the lights.

 

Tonight can ’t be too late (we ’re all going round to Vivienne ’s place for dinner – Mike ’s parents and us) as Mike just texted me and Toby is still asleep!   But I ’m looking forward to popping over to the Lewis household.   I especially want to see Ramble as he ’s had a haircut.   Sounds like he has short hair on his body, but a gorgeous mop on his head (and tail!).   I imagine he ’ll look a bit like a surfie dog.   Give him some board shorts and you ’d never know he was a dog!

 

Mike will pop into my parents place as the coffee tables are getting collected tonight.

 

I just heard from my mother and my parents will be back in Wellington on Tuesday.   I hope the nice weather stays (yesterday was absolutely gorgeous!) and they get a taste of what Wellington can be like on nice days.   There may even be room to park a new car in their garage now with a few things gone from their place.   We need to sell a few more things in Trade Me for them though.

 

I ’d better get stuck in.   After half a day off yesterday it is getting busy!

Remembrance Day.  

 

It was a good ride in despite the mist surrounding the hills this morning.     The weather was all bark and no bite.   Mike has invited some friends of his for dinner tonight so we ’ll be heading home to get dinner on.   I think Toby needs another early night so we ’ll sort out getting him to bed at 7-7.30 rather than 8-8.30 as it has been lately.

 

We might also see if we can get a half day off tomorrow.   Toby has a musical production and we have strict instructions from the school (let him rest up before the production, give him dinner beforehand and get him there in plenty of time in his costume).

 

We headed round to Sally and Andrew ’s place for dinner last night and enjoyed a good curry from their Indian takeaway.   Yummo.   Toby seemed a bit fragile though.

 

Ok.   Time to get stuck in.   On my course again today.   Our case study involves a MoH project that seems destined for failure unless I (the project manager) can formulate a rescue plan.

Well, our weekend was so jam packed I ’d have to write an essay to convey the fullness of our activities.   I don ’t have time for that as I ’m on a course here at work for the next two days.   So, here is the short summary.

 

Saturday I took Toby swimming.   We bought a present on the way home for wee Aidan ’s birthday on Sunday morning.   Mike took off as soon as we got home with a trailer load of green waste to Sally and Andrew ’s place to collect some of their stuff and grab Andrew ’s brawn.   They dumped waste at Seaview and collected a trailer load of mulch.   I started weeding the top garden and presently got covered in a 15 cm layer of mulch.   The top garden looks great now.  

 

Mike and Andrew dropped off the couch and table from Ngaio, and TradeMe has been successful for my parents (all three things have sold we put on for higher than the reserve).   I “looked ” after Sampson children for the afternoon (well, I gardened and they looked after themselves).

 

We watched the election results unfolding during the evening.   It never looked in doubt …

 

Sunday was an earlier start than I thought.   I watched the All Black v Scotland game that started at 6am – but it was only me watching.     Wee Aidan ’s party started at 9.30am!   So Toby did that while I tidied the house.   Mike ’s parents arrived and went straight to the birthday girl ’s place to celebrate.   We had lunch and wandered over to Vivienne and John ’s place for some socialising.   The sun was out for the most part and it was very pleasant.   The food was superb (as usual) and I enjoyed chatting to everyone.

 

Our plant order had also arrived so when I left I had a huge box of plants.   I can ’t wait to get them into the garden.   Vivienne had planted out her renge renge and they did look very good.

 

We went to Thanksgiving dinner after Vivienne ’s birthday bash and I tried to stuff myself with turkey and cranberries.   I think I may have damaged my stomach in the attempt.

 

Now I ’m back at work hoping for a relaxing week.   I have a project management course on today and tomorrow.

 

I hope it all goes well with the boys this morning.   Toby woke at 5.50am because he couldn ’t find the toy he was sleeping with.   He has to be ready on time today as Mike has to be at work ready for action by 9am.   I am away at a seminar all day so hopefully things go ok.

 

Mike worked late last night (he has a huge two day meeting about IT strategy) and Toby and I had loads of fun.   I have dug out my guitar after having a hankering for it again and I played for a while (my fingers couldn ’t take much as they are very soft) while Toby went to sleep.   Toby said I sang beautifully and I should make a CD.   Heheheheh.   He made my night saying that!

 

We have a release on Thursday night so I ’ll be late home that night.   I imagine McDonalds might be involved somewhere if those boys are left to their own devices.   And the weekend looks like being fun with election night, the All Blacks v Scotland, and birthdays galore (especially Vivienne ’s!).   Toby has a party to attend on Sunday (I think from 11 – 1pm) but that should fit in nicely into the day ’s activities.

 

Speaking of the rugby match (I must find out what time it is on), I have the words to Flower of Scotland and I will be teaching them to Toby this week.   I gave a rousing rendition in the shower at work this morning.   I hope the sound proofing is up to scratch!

 

 

What a weird weekend for the weather.   Saturday was absolutely dire – very strong southerlies and a torrential downpour in the afternoon.   And then Sunday was magnificent.   A truly gorgeous day.

 

Friday night was Hallowe ’en and we went round to Christine, John and wee Tom ’s place for a BBQ.   There were quite a few kids there (one naughty one from Toby ’s class) and Toby had a ball.   We got back home quite late (after 8) and only had one trick or treat visit (apparently we were lucky no one else arrived as we only has dried fruit after this lot).   Although Toby did grab a bag twice and went outside and knocked on our door!

 

Saturday we all went to the swimming then we drove to H2O in Upper Hutt and the boys swam more (the slides are a huge attraction) while I went and bought a present for William.   We drove back to Wellington and got to the party exactly on time.   They were all going to a movie and the weather was just kicking into rubbish mode about then.

 

Mike and I went back home and tidied and watched some TV until Toby came back.

 

Saturday night was the rugby between Australia and the All Blacks.   An odd game but the All Blacks won.

 

Sunday Mike and I started the day nice and lazily with TV and breakfast.   Toby spent the whole day lazing around claiming he was tired.   Mike and I kicked into clean up mode and Mike did a tip run.   We also sold Mum and Dad ’s corner unit within 2 minutes of it going on Trade Me.   I have pruned (severely) some trees in the backyard but I think I need a chainsaw to deal to some of the rest of them.   And we need to borrow the chipper from Sally and Andrew and get rid of the rubbish down the bank somewhere …   I want to thin out some of the   trees down the back and put paths through.   And one day build a fort for Toby.   Great fun.

 

We went round to the Bichan ’s for dinner last night for the first time in ages.   It was great to catch up with everyone.

 

Have a great week!