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here’s what we got up to at the rugby yesterday (in pictures)

 

 

can you see the where’s wally in the picture above?  he was on our bus on the way home too

 

 

kezia and i have just got back from the rugby so i’ll do a proper update tomorrow

here’s tim the lodger.  he’s gone back to blighty now.  but he was a good lodger.  so we might have him back one day (perhaps even end of next month)

i had a busy day and lunch with buzz

the girls went to bowling Fleur and her girls, and to a new shopping mall which jane very much enjoyed.

then they went to her school chum gaynor’s farm and enjoyed the animals

this evening we went to Aubergines for our 2 year anniversary meal

 

no work for me until tuesday now as i’m on leave tomorrow and it’s a public holiday on monday.  hoorah

there was a final draw at work for tickets to the rugby – this time to the bronze final between Wales and Australia.  I managed to get 2 tickets, so Kezia and I will be watching the penultimate match at Eden Park on Friday night.  hoorah.

i saw Adam Jones,  big haired Welsh rugby player, wandering around town at lunch so that was exciting.

kezia had a swimming competition this afternoon and beat her best time for one of her races

meanwhile esther went to a party in a massive house and played sardines.  they also went bowling but didn’t put the lane bumpers up in the gutters so esther ended up scoring 27 !

here’s are some signs stuck on some other signs in the streets of auckland.

tim the lodger leaves tomorrow.

i was feeling a bit peaky this morning so i drove in to work to pick up my laptop and was back home again by 7.45am.  I got plenty done today though so it wasn’t a wasted day

jane and the girls went to the opticians.  esther’s eyes are the same as they were last year so that’s good.  and kezia can have some off the shelf reading glasses if she likes which might help her avoid getting bad eyes later.  of course there were none funky enough for a fashionable girl like her in the shops as they are mostly bought by older people.

this afternoon esther had her friend Sunny over to play whilst Kezia went to a 6 hour long part in Orewa.

esther’s new bed was also delivered so that’s good too.

the video above is of a mobile toilet whizzing (bad choice of word) down an empty street (to avoid the lift up bridge i think) round the viaduct to entertain people in the wynyard quarter.  just in case you wondered where this video was taken.

one of jane’s colleagues from work came round with her family this morning and that was good.

then jane took esther to the doctors for an ear ache she’s had for a few days (just in time as it turned out as esther went all weirdy ill before they went) so she’s got some antibiotics which is good.

i didn’t sleep at all last night so was exhausted today so i’ll try and have an early night.

jane has gone out to a church music practice.

fantastic weather today.  lovely and sunny, although a bit of a breeze making it slightly chilly at time.  but you don’t tune in every day for a weather forecast

church this morning was good.  here’s some blossom esther and i saw on the way home

usual sunday pool fiddling (man coming next friday morning to get it all fit for swimming – although the temperature of the water has dropped due to the lack of sunshine last week, and the additional cold rain water which meant we had to flush some out again this week)

kezia had a friend over all afternoon, and esther and i attempted to do her maths homework.  much too tricky for me which is a shame as i did engineering maths as part of my degree.  and then when kezia’s friend went home we went for a walk down long bay

before heading home for a quick dinner before the rugby kicked off.  what a great game!

Tim the lodger was at work today then went in to town to watch the game in the fanzone.  he’s just got back now

 

the girls are still on holiday but it’s back to work for me tomorrow.   see ya

 

after jane got back her run we headed in to auckland to go and inspect ‘the cloud’ and the fanzone and see what else was going on.

there was plenty going on actually as you can see from these various pictures.  i didn’t take a picture of our movenpick ice cream stop, so you’ll just have to imagine that.

i’ve got some video footage of these guys i’ll share with you tomorrow.

 

 

we watched a paddle board charity race from the lifty bridge which was excellent.

then we headed home for lunch before heading off to muriwai with Tim.  the gannet colony is in full swing at the moment which is good fun

On the way back we stopped at the Riverhead historic tavern for a drink and hot chips

then this evening it was jigsawing then the rugby.  poor wales.

   

there were three cruise ships parked up in auckland today which was quite impressive.  and they were particularly massive ones too

 

i blame the rugby

i took our passports in to the immigration office today to get our returning residents visas upgraded to permanent as they’ve expired.  as of yesterday if we left the country we’d be unable to get back to our lives here so it makes sense to address that.  it should be a formality though as we meet all the criteria to be allowed to come and go as we please.

once we get these back our next UK visa application will be for residency in three years time.  we’re 2/5 of the way there already.

here’s a lovely apology from a shop i saw today.  it’s to their beloved customers.  have a bright lovely day

and here’s a chap sitting next to a giant box of tea which appeared next to him as he was sitting drinking L&P as i walked past him.  he looked at it a bit confused but carried on sitting there

 

and this lady was an undercover canadian doing some busking

this evening we popped open some champagne to celebrate our two-th anniversary in NZ (a day later, but we can blame belated jet lag)

and then we had a game of the great mammoth hunt which esther won as she knows everything about the world

 

sorry if that didn’t make much sense – i think i may have passed my optimum champagne intake

today is our two year anniversary of arriving in New Zealand.  The time has flown by.  But at the same time it feels like we’ve been here forever!

we had planned to go out for a meal to celebrate but then we decided not to as we thought we’d wait until Tim the lodger has left (and we were too tired this evening and the restaurant was all booked up).

(kezia’s tidy bedroom)

i had a really busy day at work, head stuck in a spreadsheet which the person who was working on it sent me at 11pm as she’d taken it home to finish it.

jane and the girls went to visit a friend and then did some more jigsawing.