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i had breakfast with english chum neil this morning.  he was a bit late so i sat outside the house in a deckchair as the sun came up which wasn’t too bad, although a little chilly.

after breakfast we drove by both our new houses as he’s moving to greenhithe so that was good fun.

jane’s been feeling a bit down in the dumps, probably about the oncoming winter, which is shame.  you can send her emails etc to cheer her up if you like (last time i put that i don’t think she got any emails and felt even worse!)

and esther started her tennis again now our life has got a bit less busy with visitors and we’ve got a better gauge on her home work.

this evening i went to our church men’s group.  it was very intellectual and as a result i didn’t understand much of it.  but it was nice to have a bit of a sit down.

the dinner above was made by kezia.  it’s bacon and egg pie.

(picture at the top is from mangere bridge from sunday)

our annual work health challenge is underway and we’ve each been set four challenges.  mine is to use the car less and walk more (related!), do more prioritisation of important things at work and … stop eating chocolate. 

i walked to the park and ride bus stop this morning and decided to get the bus back which would take me by our new house to see how that would go.  unfortunately it didn’t turn up so i ended up standing at the bus stop for 45 minutes until the next one came.  when it did it was good though

jane had a good day at work it think, as did the girls.

we heard today we’ve got to keep on having open homes in our house for the foreseeable future which is a right pain as it means we have to keep things very tidy and be out of the house most of saturday and sunday.  such a shame.

i mentioned the novelty had worn off to the estate agent today and he said ‘well, you want to move out early’, which of course we do.  but he doesn’t know we decided to buy the house because we knew the landlords were going to sell the house.  ho hum.

that wasp on the map at the top is an indian paper wasp and this is me fiddling with my phone whilst having lunch with buzz.

mum made it to hong kong (honkers) safely and is in a hotel where they remember her from last time.  that’s never a good sign in my case, but for her it’s a bonus!

after 6 fun packed weeks, mum left us today.  we took her to the airport and made sure she was all checked in ok, had a last cuppa (the non-deity version of the last supper), had some quick photos and then she was gone.

these last two pictures were deliberately posed before you think my mum was having a very miserable time

we then headed over to mangere bridge which is not too far away from where we went yesterday, although it’s on the other side of the water and in land a bit.

we started by doing 10 geocaches down the side of a stinky sewage pond

then had lunch by a non-stinky beach before looking round a farm and having a fab walk in the barmy autumn freaky hot temperatures (still warmer than 20degC in the sun)

 

here’s a swallow flying at me

and a flock of oyster catchers

this evening it’s back to music practice, school preparation and various domestic paperwork. 

(both weekend days we had open homes too, so it’s been rather hectic)

 

and of course it was mother’s day, so happy mother’s day jane (if she reads this)

today was mum’s last full day with us so esther, kezia and I took her over to the waitakere rain forest

despite the dodgy rain forecast, and the rain as we drove there, we were treated with great weather at the arataki visitor’s centre.  and it stayed dry all day

we went on a little walk in the rain forest

here’s a snail esther found

then we went down to titirangi for lunch

then we drove over to huia where we stopped at a lookout.  (there was a very strange chap up there who’d tied his steering wheel to the roof of his car and had wedged his accelerator down so his car was going round in circles with him videoing it from the outside.   as it went round each time it got a bit closer to where i’d parked, so that added a certain excitement to our brief visit!

after that we had ice creams in mugs at a cafe

then it was back home for some final packing for mum and some excessive form filling for me

then this evening we took mum out to aubergine’s for her mother’s day / good bye meal

 

only kezia had enough room for dessert! 

 

to finish the day we watched an episode of masterchef new zealand which mum has got hooked on, but won’t get to see the end of.  but at least she now knows who is in the final 3.

i went to work.  the girls went to school.  jane and mum went for coffee with our chum mara (probably spelt her name wrong).  then there was swimming for the girls who both really impressed their teachers. 

then this evening we ate the raclette cheese i walked across auckland to buy yesterday

apparently tornados are more likely tomorrow than today. we’ll see what happens

it was a real pea souper today and the fog sat around pretty much all day around auckland which is very rare.

mum and jane had coffee with the gang then various shops today i think.  the girls had school

this evening jane and mum went to crafty chicks and built necklaces.  and mum said goodbye to our church friends

(you can normally see a great view of the harbour from where that chap is standing in the picture above)

   

the weather forecast is looking pretty dodgy for tomorrow afternoon and evening with the possibility of more tornados, although i suspect that’s the weather people covering their back after tuesday.

 

here’s what our current house looks like in case you are interested (when photoed by a professional photo man with a telescopic tripod and a wide angle lens):

http://www.realestate.co.nz/1541509

it’s funny to see our flourishes on the house.  see if you can see our bunting, the bird in the office, my ice cream photo, family portraits etc.

the day started for me with coffee with my chum gareth from church.  he’s a northern pom who has been living in NZ for a decade or so.  we had some phone mix ups (which is ironic seeing as we both work for major telecoms companies) but coordinated ourselves in the end.

i also met up with abbie at lunchtime to discuss life and that was good.  plus work was really busy.

and to add to my  winning streak, i got a $40 movie voucher from my boss for winning a competition for our team.  the competition was to use a business process template. it was only me and my desk-neighbour sasha who entered so we both won. there were some questions about whether i had insider knowledge as I created the template we had to use, and forced sasha to use it to enter the competition!

we’ll go to the cinema once they’ve put the roof back on (another victim of yesterday’s tornado!)

mum had a day at home just chilling (not literally, it’s been quite warm).  i think that’s her first day of doing nothing since she landed 5 weeks ago!  she’s flying to hong kong (honkers) on sunday so she’s starting to think about packing etc and got a lot of washing done today.  she’s also been doing sterling work taking kez to and from school.

the girls had violin after school.  esther now has her 45 minutes which makes the trip to and from kezia’s swimming lesson during esther’s violin lesson easier.  And jane had a good day at school.

 

well, big news today is a tornado landed just over a kilometre from our house. sadly there has been some injuries and at least one fatality.  it was pretty close to our house though.

we live at the green blob and the big damage happened at the red blob. 

you can read plenty more on the nzherald website  Jane was there this morning, but other than getting a bit soggy as the rain passed they didn’t have any problems.  there’s a video here which is nice to hear some kiwi accents. When i got home there was a police car driving round the neighbourhood just checking on people which was nice.

actually, if you want to hear how real kiwis deal with it, listen to this from 1:15.  The chap called Adam’s comments are classic kiwi.

Anyway …

i had lunch with buzz today.  i was also going to have a coffee this afternoon with abbie, but we cancelled that when we heard that albany had blown away.  at that point there were rumours that the tornado was heading for the harbour bridge, or my office so it seemed to make sense not to venture out!

my mum had a good day with jenine and tracey.  they went to cornwall park and jenine’s house before the rain kicked in. here are some of her photos:

this is kezia scootering to school yesterday morning i think

this evening we went to home group.  it was the first one since shirley’s passing which was a little sad.  we did have cake though, despite the subject being ‘fasting’. 

it’s really warm and calm outside.  we tried to drive back from home group via the mall to see which roads were closed and found they all were so that was a quick trip!

anyway, hopefully tomorrow life will be a little less adventuresome!

the girls went back to school today.  kezia has been picked for the extension reading class and esther had her trombone and orchestra today.  jane also went back to school. 

mum walked kezia to and from school.  it was dry in the morning trip but rather wet on the return trip this evening.

then this evening i went out with my mum to get some petrol for the car.it doesn’t get more exciting than this!

photos are from my mum (from last thursday’s trip in to auckland)

i was kept awake with bad wind last night – it seemed like our bedroom roof might blow off.  but it didn’t. so that’s good news.

it kept winding throughout the day though, so after church we came back home to work out what to do.  i did a quick search on the internet and found the Auckland Symphony Orchestra were doing a free concert in the town hall.  so we went to that.  we got excellent seats and it was excellent

then we came home for back to school readying and music practising.  we’ll watch a bit more of the South dvd this evening then it’ll be early beds for all.