Wow it’s been ages since I’ve put anything on here! In truth it’s been ages since I’ve done very much in the garden, it’s just been too darn hot! When it’s hot I have limited motivation for doing anything. I have been quite busy too-family staying and then going to New Zealand with Jodie, Matt and the boys. I was going along to help out with the boys as both Jodie and Matt were part of the bridal party at their friends wedding. Definitely a different sort of holiday with a 1 and 2 year old, they sure wore me out, but it was nice getting to spend so much time with them. We flew into Wellington, and then drove around 1.5 hours to Greytown where we were staying. The drive there took us through a long winding mountain range, which I thought was very pretty. Jodie gets car sick, so didn’t enjoy it very much at all. We stayed at Taraview Cottage, it was fairly newly built, but designed to look like an older style rural cottage. It was on a busy main road, but surrounded by farm land and established gardens including a pear and apple tree….and some sort of plum tree maybe. There weren’t any fruit on the trees for us to identify, but the old sun dried squished fruits that looked like huge sultanas were a delicious temptation to Ryan-if we took our eyes off him there was one in his mouth. I liked my room up on the mezzanine level, the A frame roof and little window made it seem like an attic. The window looked out across the road at the field of a farm and was like a picture frame. The stairs were very steep, so we convinced Jeremy he couldn’t go up there. Not seeing what was in the room he would exclaim that there were mice up there whenever I moved about or went in my bag. Or he thought ‘The Lady’ was up there….we’d told him if he was rough with certain things in the house ‘the lady’ who owned it wouldn’t be happy. We didn’t get a whole lot of sightseeing in, the first day Jeremy had a bit of a tummy bug, so we took it easy and just went to a children’s playground. It was really well build and had some farm machinery Jeremy loved playing on. I got the tummy bug that night, so didn’t get much sleep and still felt a bit queasy the next day. We went to a park that had some kiwi birds, including a white one. We didn’t see much else in the park-the drizzling rain may have kept the other birds hidden. We stopped at a pretty fruit stall on the way back, the boys were all asleep (Matt included) so Jodie and I bought some fruit, and then picked some apples from the trees growing in the courtyard beside. We were giggling the whole time and stuffing them in my bag cause we weren’t sure if we were allowed to pick them….but they were too tempting to resist. On Thursday we went to Castlepoint Lighthouse, it was really lovely. Windy, overcast and freezing when we got there, but then it cleared up when we got to the top of the cliffs, which showed off the views. Jeremy liked the tractors they used to tow the boats around….Ryan liked the rocks (to try to eat) and they both liked the seagulls. I took a bunch of pics, so check out my gallery page-ice put more there. The drive through the farmland to get there was very pretty too. I loved all the pine trees that were about. They had them planted in rows out front of many houses and cut off the tops of them to form huge hedges-I’d LOVE to have one of those! It was quite dry everywhere, Matt kept commenting on how he thought NZ was meant to be green. They said they’ve been 3 weeks without rain, which is drought to them. Friday was the set up for the wedding. Jeremy untying the bows on the chairs as fast as we could tie them up decided it was Daddy Day Care time for a bit while we got table cloths on and stuff.. And then Saturday was the wedding. The boys and I went looking at the cows and a dozer while the formal part of the reception was on, and then went back to the tent. Ryan loved getting up on the dance floor with the music. Sunday we packed up the house-putting back in place all the breakables we’d hidden from the boys. Then we went to stay at Jodie and Matt’s friends place closer to Wellington, so it’d make it easier to get to airport early the next morning. On the way we stopped at Lake Ferry where they have a little holiday cabin. The beaches there are very different. Their sand is grey pebbles…I liked them, they were very comfy to sit on! We then stopped at the look out down the windy mountain road into Wellington-it really is very high up!
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![]() "And this, our life, exempt from public haunt, finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, sermons in stones, and good in everything." William Shakespeare Archives
February 2017
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