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??

Looking after Monty

Today we went to chipmunks for Ayla's birthday. Nathan took Monty as well (see Rat that features in the pictures). He was given the responsibility of looking after Monty for a few days by his Pre-School. The first night he took Monty to his Nana's house. They watched a DVD while Nana cooked Nathans dinner. Nana wanted to put Monty in the bath as he looked like he could do with a bit of a wash after going home to the different kids houses :) but Nathan said he would get too cold. The next day while Nathan went to Pre-School he gave Monty to Ayla to look after. She took Monty to Gymnastics with her. Man Monty gets around alright. So yep he got to go to Chipmunks and we took a few pics of him to put in the book that chronicles his adventures at the kids houses.

I guess giving him to the kids to take home is suppose to nuture responsibility and empathy etc etc. Don't tell his Pre-School but truth be told, I don't think Nathan was too overly fussed about ol Monty, he left him in some random places at Chipmunks and when I told him maybe he should let Monty sit on the couch instead of the floor he said 'nah'. When we got home he said Monty could just stay in his bag instead of coming out to watch a bit of T.V. I'm not sure if I need to be worried that he wasn't too fussed about taking special care of Monty, I wonder if he thought he is just a stuffed animal and why should he get any special treatment over all the other ones we have in the house???? I guess I could have made a bit more of a lesson out of the exercise about taking extra care of certain things.

Anyway here are some pics from Ayla's birthday at Chipmunks

Ayla opening her presents, Monty looking on
Lucas, Nathan, Ayla and Monty

I raced Monty over to the Merry go Round to get a photo with Nathan to put into the 'What did Monty get up to?' book

Ayla's birthday cake

Look out Robbers!

Maia had fun too :)

Chipmunks trip 1

Yesterday we met up with Talei, Cadence and Rico at Chipmunks. The boys had a great time racing around the place and the the little girls hung out together while we big girls had a good catch up. Keep an eye out for more Chipmunk fun, we're going again on Thursday for Ayla's birthday, Yay :)

Maia and Rico, they'll be racing round like the boys soon enough

Nathan and Cadence having fun

What to do with ourselves??

We had arranged for the kids to stay at their Nana and Poppy's house for the weekend as we thought we were going back to Taupo to do some work around my Nana's house. But as we are going down there next weekend also my Nana cancelled the trip as petrol had hit $2 a litre and she didn't want all the cousins to have to travel two weekends in a row.
Miriam offered to have the kids anyway so Dean and I thought we better make the most of it. So Friday night we went and had dinner with Carsten and Michelle before they headed back to Brisbane. We chatted till late and got home around 1.30am which is very late for me :)
Saturday I slept in until 10.30am which is an absolute record for me, well it hasn't been done in a looong time! Later that afternoon Dean and I went into the city and did some shopping, some looking around and then we went to the IMAX theatre to watch U2 in 3D. Neither of us are major U2 fans, we do like most of their music I guess, but it was just cool seeing the whole thing in 3D - pretty amazing. We were pretty full on popcorn, Ice Cream and Coke but went and got some dinner anyway.
Sunday morning we had another little sleep in before zooming over to see the kids that we had actually really missed.

Scott Dickson look out
The best thing about 3D is the groovy glasses you get to wear!

Seeing the City Lights

Sunny Saturday

Saturday was a lovely day with lots of things going on. It was my day to sleep in, YAY! I slept till 9am, wow! The boys (Moses included) started their day with a bit of Rugby action over in the reserve. This was my chance to whip round and tidy the house. While Maia was having her morning nap I got together a bit of lunch to take out with us and see where the road would take us while we were on our nursery hopping adventure (we really only ended up going to one). Even though I had a sleep in I was kinda pooped when we got home!

Saturday morning hairdo, Maia's wild mane before it gets tied up.

This family were nice enough to share their bread with Nathan so he could feed the ducks with them

A spot near the water in Greenhithe, somewhere to sit in the sun for a while and have some lunch


At a local nursery checking out what plants and trees we want around the house. A mission we've been meaning to do for ages. We are definately not greenthumbs but do want to get more plants around preferably ones that don't need much looking after.

Next mission was operation haircut. I've been letting Nathans hair grow back hoping the curls would kick back in, but they haven't, so off it goes again.

The reward for enduring having his haircut, his favourite, gingerbread man.

Meeting up with the Klint-Pedersons

On Sunday we met up with Carsten and Michelle and their beautiful girls Emma and Annabelle. They are over from Brisbane with Carsten working here in Auckland for the week and Michelle and the girls driving down to New Plymouth to visit her family. We had lunch at the house they're staying at before venturing out to show them some sights later in the afternoon.

Nathan and Emma becoming good buddies straight away

Lunching out in the Sun, better than braving a cafe with two toddlers and two bubbas

Bastion Point

Nathan and Emma scrapping over the rugby ball

Down at Mission Bay, the sun was still shining but man it was getting cold! Us locals only had our T.Shirts on and should have known better!

Maia and Annabelle all rugged up, they've got it sussed!!

Back on Track

Well on our return home we had a bad week with the kids taking turns with high temperatures. Nathan had one night of it, then came right, and then a day later was back. With Maia it was nights, arrgh a temp of 39 and crying all night Wednesday night and then sweet as Thursday, then Friday night again!!! So I have only started to catch up on sleep and feel normal this week. Needless to say I didn't want any presents for Mothers Day on Sunday, just a nice sleep in, which I managed to sleep till 8.30am woo hoo!! I did get to go out for lunch too, with Miriam and Lisa.

Monday rolled around and with high temps behind us and the sun shining we headed out to Western Springs park to feed the birds and have a play. We bumped into Jamie, Semu and little Tipene who is only a few weeks younger than Maia but well ahead in the teeth growing and crawling departments.