Dale is:

Hiding inside from all the rain and wind outside.....

Giving the boys marmite and chip sandwiches for lunch....

Cleaning the house before Jamie gets home tonight.....

Hello!!



Well, I must say that I have been pretty slack at posting on here since the beginning of the year. I think it must been down to my new love affair with Facebook....
Apart from rambling about the weather, I have not too much to post about right now. Maybe I should make a list.....

1 Lachie went to bed last night without a nappy on, and stayed dry all night. He has been toilet trained for a year, but I could never figure out quite how to get him dry at night. I was waiting for his nappies to be dry in the morning, but I guess he was just waiting for a good excuse not to pee all night!! So we shall see how he goes tonight. He has already woken up to go to the toilet about half an hour ago.

2 I bought a dress for my sister's wedding yesterday! It is a fabulous green colour and hopefully a picture of me wearing it on Nicole's big day will make it on her at some stage!! It only took me half an hour. Now I just need to get some shoes!

3 I had a great day today, we didn't go in the car anywhere! We went for a walk in the morning (after the rain cleared) and in the afternoon I took Lachie to preschool. On the way home from preschool we stopped at the playground.

4 Fletcher has eaten dinner every night this week!! I was especially pleased how much he enjoyed his chicken stirfry tonight. (Easy on the vegetables and chicken, more into the rice!)

And, there you go, after a bit of effort, 4 items of interest on my list.

Looking forward to Friday tomorrow, maybe doing some jobs in town and reading the Friday newspaper tomorrow. I always look forward to the Friday Beacon!!!

I am sitting at my lovely dining room table and listening to Maree & Diane from Curtains & More install my lovely new roman blinds throughout the house. They look fabulous. I will try to post a picture soon.

This morning the boys had their first morning at their new pre-school. Their last day care was called "Starlights" - nice & easy to say. However, they are now at "Coastlands Early Childhood Learning Centre", so I just call it pre-school!

Lachlan pretty much disappeared to play as soon as we got there. He is in the four year olds room, but at certain periods of the day they can play wherever - which was the case at 8.30am this morning. It was very quiet when I got there - I think many of the kids come at 9am or later. Maybe their mums don't work, just send the kids in a few mornings a week? It is also much bigger (space wise) than their last centre so it just seems roomy and quieter and lots of different activities for the kids.

Fletcher had a bit of trouble calming down after I left, but then by all accounts had a fabulous time playing outside. And Lachie was very settled, chatting with the other kids and the teachers. When we collected Lachie he was working on a name tag for his cubbyhole. Me and Jamie are very pleased with the centre.

Still enjoying lots of hot weather here - you will be pleased to hear that I have been swimming every day lately!! The water is lovely. I went down at nearly 6pm last night and it was still fabulous - Jamie went down about 7.30pm.

A new house has started going up at the end of the street. And bits and bobs happening at our place - fences going up, blinds going in, levelling the section and watering to let the beach grass grow....

Yesterday and today we have had some guys in with a bobcat to level out our section and take away a couple of huge sand piles. They finished off this afternoon putting down 50ml of topsoil.



Its been a bit of a dustbowl around here the last two days because of that. No fun. Its almost worse than what we had before!! It will be really nice when there is some grass around here!!!

Also yesterday, we took the boys for a visit to their new pre-school. It is much handier because it is around the corner from our new house. It went well, and we have another visit in the pipeline tomorrow.

This afternoon, Penny from Prestige Cleaning (or some such place) came around and cleaned our shower doors for us. You know how they get all water stained and soap scummy? Well, Penny has a way of cleaning the doors (she used this big sander thingee), and then putting a special seal on them. She says I should never have to use cleaner on the doors ever again. I just need to rinse the door, squeagee and dry it after the final use of the day, and buff it up with a microfibre cloth once a week!!! You would be amazed what built up on the door after only 2 weeks of use. Anyway, it looks like brand new again.

Here are the boys after their dinner tonight, having a bit of band practice...

A few days at Whangamata

Last Thursday we went to Whangamata to spend a few days with our friends John & Moana. Fletcher enjoyed the water (yay!), Lachlan, not so much, but he did enjoy splashing in the puddles at the estuary. Here they are after Dad has bathed them after an afternoon in the water....

There was no bath, so rather than showering them, they had outdoor baths in this wee bucket!!

I spoke to Tracy quickly yesterday, and she asked me to post a few photos of the house.


I took a few of the kitchen, before we moved in. Here they are. The floors are quite dusty though, its before they had their final polish.



The orange lines are tape, to protect the skirting boards from the concrete polisher.

Things are going great. We got the washing line up on Friday, with a little help from Grandad Kerr. Not so nice going out there thought, with so much sand. Hopefully all that will be dug out this week.


Back to normal this week - work on Monday & Chelsea on Tuesday.

And hopefully I will post some more pictures soon.

Hi there!! It is my first post from Omega Place! Hmmm....looks like I need to change my blog title.


Got the phone on this morning, which means at last I can get online.


Its another amazing day here, the boys are (supposedly) sleeping and I am staying out of the sun.


I spent the morning in town yesterday and today - doing jobs. This morning I also caught up with a few friends at the beach playground.


Finally got the showers in yesterday morning and we will be able to use them tomorrow morning. Yay! The painter is also here finishing up - he says he should be done by the end of the week.


Also, as you know I look after my niece Chelsea on Tuesdays - have had last week and today off. I have told the organisation that I get paid through, that I have moved. They want to come and do a safety check!! And I have no fences!!! They were muttering something about temporary fencing......sigh........

I'm Loving it...!

Hello hello!!

Our new house is just AWESOME. We are loving it.

Unfortunately we are not yet set up for the ole phone or broadband. At the moment I am checking the email etc at King St.

Anyway, I'm sure by the end of next week it will all be up and running.


Happy New Year!!

Move it!

We are in the middle of moving house!!


We got the bulk of the furniture moved yesterday afternoon. And, thank God for that, because it is raining today!!


This morning Jamie has just been moving outside stuff like the dog kennels, and then we will call it a day.


There is still lots of small stuff here at King Street that we need to move - lots that we don't want to take because we don't want to clutter up our lovely new house with rubbish!!


Moving is SOOO not fun!!!

Christmas Eve

Well, for now, the rain has gone.

The town is jam packed with people doing last minute Christmas shopping & grocery shopping.

The supermarket I go to opened at 8am this morning. I arrived at 8.10am and it was absolutely jam packed. Why do we do it to ourselves?!!

I had to go and get some last minute gifts too, but fortunately I had in mind what I wanted to get, so it didn't take long at all, and there were no crowds in that particular store.

Just a quiet Christmas Eve for us, Jamie is working. He doesn't know that I am getting him to wrap the gifts once he gets home, as I am a lousy gift wrapper.

Have a great Christmas Eve!

Another Day Whizzes By.

Tuesday today, Chelsea today. Our last day with her before Christmas.


I decided to start the day off early with a trip to feed the ducks, and then around to the playground. It was a beautiful morning, just a little colder than normal.



There didn't seem to be many ducks around this morning. But after walking a little further around, we found these little cuties... some of them are very bold, they walk right up to your feet.



Lachie & Fletcher then found some sticks to use as fishing rods...

Unfortunately Fletcher threw his into the lake.

I think Lachie is showing me an eel he has caught...

We finished off at the playground. And after a busy morning such as this, its time to go home for morning tea!

I put our fake Christmas tree up this afternoon. I foolishly thought the boys would enjoy putting it up with me, but no. And now I can't find the decorations, so its looking rather bare....

Christmas Eve tomorrow! And many jobs to do in the morning. I'm not sure I'll be able to avoid the crowds :(

House status

So, basically, our house is finished. Just a few more things to do before we can move in:

1 CLEAN!

2 Carpet!!

Yes, the electricity is on, the plumbing is A OK, the kitchen is in... It was so cool, last night I went out to the house at MIDNIGHT because we had forgotten to turn the sprinklers off on the driveway....and the sensor lights came on!!

Well, there are a few other things - like the odd door handle missing, the shower glass needs to go in, and the heat pump.

The kicker is the carpet. A friend is laying it for us - carpet laying is a side job for him, so we can't put the pressure on - and of course he is working really hard at his real job at the moment.


Sigh....


I will of course try to keep you informed. Otherwise I might just turn up in my next post at the new house!

Lachie agrees to have a few photos taken..

Fletcher loves playing with the lawnmower. Here he is after I mowed the lawns last week.

I suggested that he needed his "Bob the Builder" safety goggles, which he happily wore.

He is a very strong boy!!

Boys playing in the garden a week or so ago..

I went out to the house this afternoon. We had rain today, so that has turned a few things in our favour....


The concrete polisher phoned this morning. He can come tomorrow to start polishing the floors.

The electrician phoned this morning. He started there today too!!

The shower liners have gone in.

More work is being done on the deck!

As the concrete polisher is starting earlier, we are bringing forward the kitchen installation to next Tuesday the 16th (instead of Friday the 19th)!!

Yay!

Worked (at work) yesterday and today at home with Chelsea & the boys. Had a bit of rain, but its been so long, we don't mind!!

We had a night without the boys last night!! Last night was my work Christmas dinner. And the kind people who looked after our children offered to have them overnight!!

Fletcher went up to his Nana & Grandad's about lunchtime yesterday. They went into Rotorua and went to Rainbow & Ferry Springs. And at about 6pm last night we dropped Lachie off to John & Moana's.

It was nice not to be the first people to leave the party last night! Although it certainly wasn't a late one. And, while we did not have a sleep in, it was nice to wake at 7.2oam, rather than 6am something.

Another beautiful day here in Whakatane...

Quiet Friday

Had a bit of a nothing day today. We went for a walk first thing, but other than that, we were at home.

Went out to the house, but forgot to take some pictures to chart progress! Anyway, there's not much progress to see ('oh look! the painter's done some more painting....)

Here's some pictures from the day.

I managed to snap Lachlan while he was watching a movie!

Some Overdue Pictures

Rather than wasting away the evening, say, playing Word Challenge on Facebook, I have decided to finally upload some pictures to my blog! I downloaded a program called "pixresizer" so I can easily upload them onto Blogger. Enjoy.



ps. there are no photos of Lachlan. Lachlan does not like having his picture taken, so I only have ones of him poking his tongue or trying to hide.





Here is Fletcher on his birthday. I got him some Bob the Builder gear.


He is such a funny boy!! He often pops up with a funny hat on, or the kitchen gloves!!

Here he is, opening his Mario Andretti car from Grandma.

Doesn't he look like such a big boy in this photo?

Summer seems to be here...

One fabulous thing about the last couple of weeks is that summer seems to be arriving!! I've been trooping around in my grey sweater for so long but lately I've been wearing tank tops, shorts & skirts!!

The jet ski got its first decent outing on Saturday. Nathan & Jasmine and their friends came up to the lake to have some fun. Unfortunately I didn't have a turn on the ski biscuit, but I did have a lap around the lake. Then me & Jamie both felt incredibly tired, so we went back to the in-laws for a rest and left Nath & Jas to it.