Kid Pics

Some Pics of the kids lately...

A picture we took to put on Ayla's birthday card that we made
Maia giving Nathan a double on the bike - or Nathan holding Maia onto the bike?

On Toy Library duty means playing with all the cool toys!

We had a visit last week from Erin, Lani and Luca

Nice and clean after our bath!

Bike Ride

I wanted to take Nathan back to a park we went to a while back with his trike as it's got a good flat wide path he can have a good ride on. First stop was to feed the ducks, which either got too close and freaked Maia out or while my back was turned nipped her toe thinking it was bread as she let out a bit loud cry. It all went well until Nathan wanted to go one way and I wanted to go the other, so a battle of wills ensued and he stayed put for quite some time before another little boy came along on his bike and got him moving with a little race challenge. I'd like to think I would have won in the end had we not been rescued by the lil racer boy.

Queens Birthday Weekend

Well I'm having to catch up on my posts as I haven't checked in for over a week now. For Queens birthday weekend the kids and I headed back down to Taupo to my Nana's house for a family meeting that had been organised. As Dean had to work over the weekend we were able to leave on the Friday and cruise our way down. We did a big trek, saving our stop for Tokoroa which is nearly a 3 hour run, the kids were great though. We stopped at McDonalds as although Nathan had his lunch in the car he was able to have a play on their playground and I ate his happy meal while he enjoyed the toy. We met up with my good friend Kylee and her youngest daughter Shayla who is the same age as Maia, and they crawled around the place while we had a quick catch up.

Before heading on to Taupo I had to do a quick tour of the town I was born and lived the first 13 years of my life in. I haven't done so in a long while. I drove through town, past the two shops that we owned, the first one a hardware store and the second a sports shop, of course they are something else now. I drove past my old schools and then did a driveby past the house we lived in. I have heaps of cool memories growing up in Tok and am still in contact with many good friends from there. It was an awesome place to to grow up in.

Anyway we arrived in Taupo in the afternoon and from there most of the other family members trickled in. Saturday we had our family meeting in regards to some work my Grandfather and others have done in tracing our Whakapapa (lineage, family tree) to the Ngati Tuwharetoa (Taupo) and Ngai Tahu (South Island) area's. As well as those tribes, on my Grandmothers side we Whakapapa back to Whakatohea and Te Whanau-A-Apanui on the East Coast of the North Island. So for a white girl I've got some strong Maori links going on :) Anyways, we got to know my Pa's brothers families a bit better and enjoyed a big feed together later that day.

The house I grew up in. The Green was originally a nice mustardy colour and then later in life my Dad painted it a real nice darky pinky, purply colour, lovely.

Meeting in full swing

These modern day kids entertaining themselves

My Cuzzie's Matiu with Jamie and Tane in the background

Me and my beautiful Cuz, Dani

The boys were about to go on a mission in the freezing cold to get some fresh watercress from some creek somewhere but were rescued just in time by Jamie's mate who dropped some off

Enjoying a beautiful Watercress and Pork Bone boil up and some roast chooks

Nathan Happy as, Maia not so??