Carrot

Back in January we successfully pulled down the plum tree in the garden.

In it's place we put a small vegetable garden. We didn't put in anything special this year, we were more interested to see if we could actually grow anything, plus we had a feeling we wouldn't be here.

We have tried to keep Ben interested in this at times, and he actually enjoyed helping daddy plant all the seeds.

So it was wonderful yesterday morning when he came running to find me with a baby carrot that they had just harvested.

Think this is probably the only thing we will get out of the little garden, not sure if anything else has actually grown, but hey 1 carrot is good.

Sick Car

So here we are running all over the house on Sunday morning, trying to get it looking ok for the open home. Our hearts are really not in it and the boys are driving us mad.
We have got the Real Estate people coming at 10.30 with the new owners who want to do their building inspection prior to the open home and at 9.30 I am ready to cancel the whole thing.
I have got ants running up the wall in the kitchen, seems there is something they like about the kitchen window which is attracting them in droves, wish I knew what it was as the place is spotless and they seem to be out looking for stuff rather than actually finding anything and sending out the troops.

I can't believe we manage to pull it off, but only just, I am still on my hands and knees cleaning the floor as they arrive to inspect the place.
So while I finish off Steve puts the boys in the car ready for us to just nip to the supermarket for the little things we have forgotten for the party today.
All ready and set to go, we say bye and jump in the car.
Real shame the car doesn't actually want to go anywhere!!!

So there we are, someone walking up the driveway to see the house and us sat in the garage cursing the car.
So plan 2 comes into action.
Again I jump into Grandma's car with a child and go to the supermarket and yet again Steve calls the Roadside Rescue and waits for them to come and visit us.

Out arrives the same man as last night, who then apologises for not checking properly the night before. Does the little check he should have done yesterday and annouces that sadly we need a new battery.
Funny thing is this doesn't shock us, as there is something about the car that hasn't seemed right for a week or 2, but with the service due next month we just thought it was getting ready for a good tune up.

All this and then it starts to rain! Wouldn't mind except we are meant to be going on a train ride this afternoon.

Disaster

I don't know so much that yesterday was a complete disaster, but everything sure as hell went hay wire if it could!!
It started late on Friday evening when the Real Estate Office called to confirm our Open Home for this weekend. I know what you are thinking, you have sold why run an open home? Well until it goes unconditional in 7 working days time, we still need to cover ourselves in case it all fell over. Not that we are too worried as the only things they had to sort was a builders report and a LIM report from the council. As mentioned before, we are not worried about the LIM and we are sure there is nothing they will find in a builders inspection.
Anyway, so they tell us everything is all set for the showing on SUNDAY at 11.
No I say, we have a 4 year old birthday party that day, we can't accomodate an open home as well. Luckily Jane calls a little later and apologises and smooths it all out. But the open home is still on the Sunday.

So on Saturday morning we go off and do our weekly shopping, but Alex just doesn't seem himself, a real handfull in the shop and half a sleep by the time we get home at 11, so I take him into bed and there is where he stayes for the next 3 hours!
This is the first thing to jump out at me, the next was the raging temp he had when he woke up! About 38.7, so we do the usual of stripping him off, juice and Panadol and I spend the next hour or so sitting with a clinging little boy.
As I am preparing dinner Steve thinks he should see a doctor, because he had only not long ago finished antibugs for an ear infection and if it was relapse we wanted to get on top of it straight away. Ok I say we will go after dinner.
Anyway, after dinner Ben kicks up a huge fuss and so we have to have a family trip out to the emergency medical centre otherwise we will never hear the end of it from Ben.

This was a good idea until we got to the garage where we happen to notice the light is on inside the car! Our first thought is that Ben, who had just been outside, had obviously been playing with the car door and not closed it properly, unfortunately when we try to go we find this to not be the case. ONE DEAD BATTERY.
Don't you just love little boys for playing, we think Ben must have switched the inside light to ON earlier in the day and we hadn't noticed and then it drained the battery, very weird, but hey seemed good idea at the time.
So Steve and Ben called the State Roadside Rescue and I take Alex to the doctors. Thank god for Grandma and Grandad's car, that is with us until they get back here in 2 weeks time.

One very high temp later but no other symptoms, they tell us to keep going with the Panadol and have a good night. Yea right, shall I call you at 3am when he is screaming the house down!?

We get home just in time to see the nice man start our car and laugh a long with us at what a delight little kids are.
Alex decides then that he is feeling alright and really wants to get in the bath, so I let him splash for 2 minutes, unfortunately I don't think it did him much good because 5 mintues after getting out he is shaking away and has a temp of 39.7!
All I can think about is "why does someone always have to be sick when there is a child's birthday in the family" can see Ben's party tomorrow being really great with Alex sick!

Lucky for us though he finally settled and crashed for the whole night, which was good.

Moon Eclipse

Last Tuesday (28th) the Southern Hemisphere had the wonderful pleasure of a total eclipse of the moon at about 9 in the evening.

It was quite spectacular in between the odd bit of fast moving cloud that kept coming over.

Now I thought I would try and capture some pictures of this on the digital, of course I had a feeling I wouldn't get much with just our little camera, and also I had never really taken any nights shots before.

So I was well impressed with what I actually got, although I did learn alot along the way, like you have to give the camera time to actually register the picture before you move, although the results I got from moving are actually way cool.

So this little collection of snaps shows you some of my more spectacular shots I managed to create (moving by accident of course) and also the one or two that actually show you the eclipse.

No this is not cloud around the moon, this is what happens when you move before the picture is complete.

Waitakere Tramline

Because we have been spending so much time sorting the house out, we decided to pre plan something special for the boys as they have been so good during our house selling time.

So last weekend we went on this little adventure because it was a train of sorts and trains go down very nicely in this house. It was nice to see the dam at the end but not our main reason for taking the trip.

Nestled in the beautiful Waitakere Ranges, approximately 30 minutes from Auckland's CBD is the Waitakere Tramline.
Built in the early 1900's for the construction of the Waitakere Dam, this 2-foot gauge tramline is a working piece of history.
The upper 2.5 km portion of the line has been retained by Watercare for maintenance of the pipeline. The lower 3.5 km portion, was removed around 1927.
This tramline takes you on the 2.5 km portion so you can visit the dam at the end.

During the journey, we past through two tunnels, one was very long, about 1 km, can't say the boys were too thrilled with this small dark tunnel that seemed to go on for ever, but they liked the small amount of glowworms that we got to see just before the end of the tunnel, Alex said they looked like stars. They did enjoy going over the small bridges and viaducts though.
When we stop at the end of the line you had the opportunity to walk up the steps and onto the top of the dam. There was a lot of steps, a little steep and seemed to go up and up.

Once at the top it was just 20m to the edge of the dam, which looked so nice on one side all that water, the other side took a bit of getting use to, because it just dropped down to the bottom and believe me it was a long way down!

Can you spot the train in the trees?

Where were you?

I can not believe that it has been 10 years since the unfortunate death of Lady Diana.
I think it will always be one of those topics that people will always say 'Where were you when...?" just like 9/11.

So where was I 10 years ago....?

I was in England. It was a public holiday weekend and mum and I had some family friends visiting for the weekend.
I remember mum kept coming into my room really early in the morning, but I couldn't be bothered to turn over and see what she wanted, so I ignored her, although on about the 3rd visit I finally turned over and asked her what she wanted? (It was a public holiday so why did I need to wake up early?)
That is when she said "Lady Diana has died!"
So after informing me of what she knew, we woke our visitors up, mainly because Sky was hooked up in the room they were sleeping in and we needed to turn it on and see what was happening.
And that is pretty much how we spent the rest of the day, with the tv on watching the unfolding events as we learnt she was hurt, to she was critical to she had died, to when she would come back to England to whether Charles would go and fetch her!
You have to remember that England woke to this news, as it had all happened during the night. So spending the day was probably what most of England did that day.

The rest of that following week was quite a blur, so much news coverage, so much planning going on.
I actually worked on the day of the funeral and I was scrubbed in a case right up until the start of the funeral, but then I got to watch the last part and the procession up the motorway to her final resting place on the tv in the tea room.

The whole week was so surreal and something I will never forget, a little like 9/11 (I was in Hong Kong and London, but that is another story!)

So if you have 2 minutes, take the time to remember where you were, what you were doing and look at where you are now?

Me, in 10 years I have moved to New Zealand, had several different jobs within the same company, met Steve, brought a house and sold one too! Had my parents move to NZ and almost my brother (2 1/2 weeks till they get here) had 2 gorgeous sons, Ben, 4 next week and Alex 2 1/4 and now we are about to commence a new part of our family's journey by moving to Hamilton.
So compared to where I was 10 years ago and what I am doing now, a lot has happened.

The House

You can read the whole story here, but in a nut shell it will tell you that

WE HAVE SOLD OUR HOUSE !!

Blogging

I have just been surfing back through my own blog!!
I have been blogging for just over 2 years now.
It is quite fun going back and seeing what I wrote, what pictures I put on there and what everyone looks like. This is particularly interesting as I started blogging when Alex was only 9 weeks old and he is now 2, so lots of changes in the pictures for the boys.
If you have your own blog, then take the time sometime to revisit it and see what was happening to you this time last year or even the year before.

You will have quite a laugh.

Miracles

A little girl went to her bedroom and pulled a glass jar from its hiding place in the closet.
She poured the change out on the floor and counted it carefully. Three times, even.
The total had to be exactly perfect. No chance here for mistakes.
Carefully placing the coins back in the jar and twisting on the cap, she slipped out the back door and made her way 6 blocks to Rexall's Drug Store with the big red Indian Chief sign above the door.
She waited patiently for the pharmacist to give her some attention, but he was too busy at this moment. Tess twisted her feet to make a scuffing noise. Nothing.
She cleared her throat with the most disgusting sound she could muster.
No good.
Finally she took a quarter from her jar and banged it on the glass counter. That did it!
"And what do you want?" the pharmacist asked in an annoyed tone of voice. I'm talking to my brother from Chicago whom I haven't seen in ages," he said without waiting for a reply to his question
"Well, I want to talk to you about my brother," Tess answered back in the same annoyed tone. "He's really, really sick..and I want to buy a miracle."
"I beg your pardon?" said the pharmacist.
"His name is Andrew and he has something bad growing inside his head and my Daddy says only a miracle can save him now. So how much does a miracle cost?"
"We don't sell miracles here, little girl. I'm sorry but I can't help you," the pharmacist said, softening a little.
"Listen, I have the money to pay for it. If it isn't enough, I will get the rest. Just tell me how much it costs?"

The pharmacist's brother was a well dressed man. He stooped down and asked the little girl, "What kind of a miracle does your brother need?"
" I don't know," Tess replied with her eyes welling up. I just know he's really sick and Mommy says he needs an operation. But my Daddy can't pay for it, so I want to use my money."
"How much do you have?" asked the man from Chicago .
"One dollar and eleven cents," Tess answered barely audibly.
"And it's all the money I have, but I can get some more if I need to."
"Well, what a coincidence," smiled the man.
"A dollar and eleven cents.....the exact price of a miracle for little brothers."
He took her money in one hand and with the other hand he grasped her mitten and said "Take me to where you live. I want to see your brother and meet your parents. Let's see if I have the miracle you need."
That well dressed man was Dr. Carlton Armstrong, a surgeon, specializing in neuro-surgery.

The operation was completed free of charge and it wasn't long until Andrew was home again and doing well.
Mom and Dad were happily talking about the chain of events that had led them to this place. "That surgery," her Mom whispered, "was a real miracle. I wonder how much it would have cost?"
Tess smiled.
She knew exactly how much a miracle cost...one dollar and eleven cents....plus the faith of a little child.

In our lives, we never know how many miracles we will need.
A miracle is not the suspension of natural law, but the operation of a higher law.
I know you'll keep the ball moving!
Here it goes.
Throw it back to someone who means something to you!

A ball is a circle, no beginning, no end.
It keeps us together like our Circle of Friends.
But the treasure inside for you to see is the treasure of friendship you've granted to me.
Today I pass the friendship ball to you.
Pass it on to someone who is a friend to you.

MY OATH TO YOU...
When you are sad.....I will dry your tears.
When you are scared.....I will comfort your fears.
When you are worried.....I will give you hope.
When you are confused.....I will help you cope.
And when you are lost....And can't see the light, I shall be your beacon.....Shining ever so bright.

This is my oath.....I pledge till the end.
Why you may ask?

Because you're my friend.

Alex

Yesterday Alex managed to be very cute, not so cute and back to really cute, but hey that is the life of a typical 2 year old

He started off by being so cute sitting and reading to himself from his favourite book of the moment "Little Bear Lost"
You could hear him telling himself the story of how Little Bear was found in the picnic basket. So cute.
Unfortunately this didn't last too long....whilst cleaning for the open home, Alex decided to draw in pencil all over the wall (must be something in the water, as Ben did exactly the same thing at Daycare on Friday. That is another story and I will fill you in when I get the pictures!)

So we made him help us clean it off the wall.

Then later in the day, when he had woken from his afternoon nap, he snuggled up with daddy and ate a big plate of fruit. He just loves Kiwi fruit and grapes.

Independent Alex

The following is a Teacher story sent to us from Alex's Daycare.

A Learning and Teaching Story for Alex Trotter
Teacher: Glenda
Date: 23 August 2007

Alex you really impress me with your perseverance and independence.
For several days now I have noticed that when you get out of bed in the afternoon you sit on the mat and try very hard to put on your own socks and shoes.
This is a very complex business and I have known you to sit for at least ten minutes trying to get it right. I showed you how the heel part of the sock has to go around the back and you have nearly mastered that.
Next the shoes have a tongue inside them that make it hard to push your foot down inside. Luckily once we get that bit right you can do the Velcro fastening yourself. Today you even had them on the correct feet

Well done Alex. I love the way you don’t sit around expecting an adult to do everything for you. Most other two year olds would just wander off bare footed.

Teachers Response:
Alex is patient and keen to be responsible for himself.
He is showing a desire to be independent and keeps trying without showing frustration.
Keep encouraging and praising Alex for his efforts in self care.

Paul Potts

WOW
To anyone in England, I do realise that this is an old name to you, to everyone else around the world, this name is just beginning to mean something.
We found out about this guy here in NZ at the end of July, when they covered the promotion of his first album.
Suddenly on the tv screens you had Paul's first audition video being shown, the one where he walks on stage, in a wrinkled suit, very nervous and announced he would sing opera. The one where the judges just looked at each other as if to say 'oh great, 2 minutes of pain' and ended in tears, smiling at each other and nodding. The one where the judges tell him his days of selling mobile phones is numbered because he is about to become a megastar!

It gives me shivers just thinking about it. It was amazing, it can make me all choked up just watching it, and believe me I have watched it on the official website several times. On there you will find his semi final performance, his final performance and everything he has been doing since that magical week in June.


It is one of those feel good stories that everyone always wishes for, always hopes would happen to them and always makes them say 'they deserved it' when it happens to someone else.

Paul Potts, you deserved this. Well done.

Jokes

Now I like jokes just as much as the next guy, so to come across a blog site that just lists jokes is the best.
Sometimes I find them not so funny, but others days they really make me smile :)

Seeing as I think you should smile and laugh often, then this site is just what everyone needs.

Family Blogging

Seems I have started something within my own family. In the last week my little brother and my mother have both got into blogging, my brother in a serious way and my mum is just starting out.

So let me tell you a little about my family.
Well you have me, Kathryn, nearly 37 years old, Registered Nurse who lives in New Zealand after moving here, on my own just under 10 years ago. I am the partner of Steve, for almost 8 years now, wow where does the time go?
He is the one that has just secured a new job in Hamilton, about 1 1/2 hours south of Auckland, thus the reason why we are moving in October to Hamilton (you can check out our moving status here).
We met at work, of all places! And actually worked in the same department (Operating Theatres) for nearly 2 years before I finally agreed to go out with him, much to the happiness of the whole theatre department who were sick of us not actually getting our act together. Don't you just love doctors and nurses for match making!

We are lucky enough to have 2 lovely little rascals called Ben and Alex. Ben is just turning 4 and Alex is 2 1/4. You could never ask for 2 children so different, but then if they were the same life would be so boring!

Then you have my baby brother, Iain. He has just turned 35 and emigrates to New Zealand on 14th September with his wife Claire and their 2 little rascals Ellis(6) and Harvey(3)
They are going to be living in Rotorua, about an hour away from us in Hamilton, so I am sure we will get to see them often, especially as our boys are all about the same age, it will be so cool for the 4 cousins to get to know each other etc.
You can check out what Iain and crew are doing here.

Then you have our parents, who at present are in Dubai, UAE. They also live in Rotorua (emigrated out here in 2001) but are currently in Dubai for a little while. You can check out what they are up to here.

So that is us, at present.
My baby brother has actually challenged me to a "blog off" He is a head of me in the design stakes, but I think I am a head with hands down as I am keeping 2 blogs going at once and he only has 1.
Be interesting to see what he comes up with on his blog.

Spelling Test for Bloggers

Found this small spelling test on another blog I follow.

Go and have a look, only 15 questions on spelling. I got 2 wrong, which was good, especially as I always try to make sure everything is spelt correctly

I Scored a 87%!

Mingle² - Free Online Dating

Pictures

The middle of August in New Zealand is winter, and yes we have our fair share of crap weather, but then slipped into the middle of it all you get a day like today. The sky is so blue, the sun is warm and your spirit gets raised at least 200%.

This is what makes it so nice living here over the UK, you don't get days like this in the middle of winter in England. As our front deck gets all the sun all day, then it was silly not to have a bench or 2 out there to enjoy the sunshine with. We regularly have lunch out there. Show me a child that can resist bubbles. Ben and Alex love them, but then so does mummy.Ben decided to help me with the washing. How could I not let him help me hang things up? At least they were pegged up, I can work on the straightness another time(I know picky picky at least he is helping) This is what I like to see....a man on his knees working!

Toilet Training

Our biggest fight with Ben at present is getting toilet training sorted. We have only been going at this since January!

He is dry during the day with the exception of #2's. Try as we might we can not get him to use the toilet or to even register with us that he needs to go or has even been.

So imagine our delight this morning when he came running through the house saying he needed to go toilet.

And that is exactly what he did, sat on the toilet and did his business.

Of course there were huge cheers, lots of Hi 5's and the promise of a big reward from the toy shop.

We are not going to mention it to him again, maybe if we just get on with things he will go again tomorrow all by himself? I do hope so, as at the rate we are going Alex is going to be ready to be trained and we won't have finished with Ben!

Whilst the Open Home was on we took the boys to the aformentioned toy shop. Ben is into Dora and Thomas the Train. Seeing as there was nothing little in the Thomas range that he needed, he came away with a Dora jigsaw puzzle as his big reward for todays efforts.

Mowing

When we got home from work today, Steve went and finished mowing the remaining little sections in the garden ready for the Open Home tomorrow.

He had a little helper in this project, one who seems to love the mower!

So there is Alex with his own little mower, assisting daddy to the best of his ability, just such a shame his mower doesn't actually cut anything! Would be so helpful if it did.

It was so funny watching him help daddy, as everytime Steve turned the mower off to empty the catcher bin, Alex would stop as well and turn the knob on his mower, at the same time as announcing to daddy 'I turn mower off too' then he would help empty the bin into the bag and then help put the catcher back on the mower.

He helped daddy do the whole lawn out the back.

New Word

Ben has a new word, well he gets them occassionally.
The new word of the moment is 'but'!
It is used in just about every conversation you have with him now, he always manages to answer you with 'but mum' or 'but I' or even 'but this'

His other favorite word at present is 'just'
You ask him to do something and you will be greated with 'I just' as in 'I just do this' or 'I just got to'

Sometimes it is cute, othertimes it is so annoying, but then that is the life with a 4 year old.

Blogging

Everynow and then when I have finished posting, I will click the button at the top of the blog page that says 'next blog'
I have found some wonderful blogs by doing this.

My favourite would have to be The McNulty Quads, a wonderful couple who had quads May 2006, 3 girls and a boy. Their whole story is on the blog, so if you have the time it is a wonderful read.
Through keeping up to date with what the McNulty's are up to I came across another blog of a couple in Texas who has just had quads, The Steece's, although these little darlings were only born Aug 1, 2007, so at present are only 2 weeks old.
They have 3 boys and a girl. Again their whole story is on the blog and if you have the time is lovely to read.

So the next time you have nothing to do (yea right!) why not use the 'next blog' button at the top of the page and see where it takes you and what you might find.

Brushing Teeth

It seems to have taken forever to get the boys to really be into brushing their teeth.

Now I do realise that this will be an ongoing battle for the rest of their born life, whilst they live at home. I will always be nagging them about it, well, until they get girlfriends and then I will be for ever complaining that I can't get anytime in the bathroom!

Anyway, we are still having trouble getting them to brush their teeth twice a day, but at least we seem to have conquered bedtimes.

Photographer

On Tuesday the photographer came to the house from the Real Estate Agent.
I had of course spent the last 2 days running around trying to make the place look nice. Now I didn't want the place to look perfect (impossible) but I at least wanted it to look nice and welcoming. Seeing as people would look at these pictures to decide if they wanted to attend the Open Home.

I got a little stressed as the man arrived, but then I lost it completely when Steve pointed out to me that I didn't want to go into the boys room?! In the 5 minutes before the man got there they had decided to play Hide & Seek in their room! Consequently mummy had a momentary breakdown, threw Alex out the door and just sobbed.
I recovered quite quickly, but I was still not a happy person, so I followed the photographer around the house making sure he got some good shots of our house.

On Friday they let us know that it was now listed on the website. It was really weird listening to someone else promote your house.

Sick Boy!!!

Late Saturday night I went and checked the boys before going to bed myself.

And what do I find....a little man (Alex) with a raging temperature, 39.5 deg. So a quick whip out of bed, strip him off, give him panadol and lots of juice.

An hour later the temperature hadn't broken but he was nicely asleep in his bed and in fact that is where he stayed until about 4am, when he came to find mummy.

He snuggled in with me and then about 6am he was running a temp again, back up there in the 39's, so more stripping off, more panadol, more juice and more sitting with him.

He stayed quite active during the day, even though his temp never came down below about 38.2 deg. He even took a really nice nap in the afternoon.

But when he woke up he was not a happy chappy, and for 2 hours was grizzly, moaning and crying. He already had a lovely cough, which the doctor had said was viral and would just have to do its course on its own, but I had a feeling something else was bubbling in there somewhere. So I eventually decided to take him to the emergency doctor.

Now every mother will tell you, you don't take your child to the emergency doctor at 5pm on a Sunday night. Worst time of the week to go, but in fact it was really not bad, only about 3 other people waiting and when we had finished there was no one waiting!

Wish I could have said the same for the Chemist, seems it was the only open Chemist in the area and so everyone was going there to get their scripts filled.

But with raging ear infections in both ears, we had to be there. Needed those antibiotics!

We dosed him up at 6 when we got home and we woke him up at midnight to get more into him, by 7am today he was a different person, thank god for the power of antibiotics. Luckily that meant he was fine to go to Daycare. What a cruel mother I am.

Sleeping

I can't say that we did anything really wild yesterday. Ben had an unexpected play date with his little friend Kaitlyn, but that was about all.

So after dinner, whilst watching the news, Ben snuggled with me and consequently fell a sleep.

Kindergarten

In New Zealand kids can go to Kindergarten sometime after they turn 3, now the age that they actually get to go can vary varstly between suburbs within one town, just by how many children in the area are registered for Kindy.
You can register children at 2, and so we did with Ben. We just have with Alex as well.

Now we always knew that the chances of Ben ever actually attending a Kindy in Auckland was very slim as I currently work 3 days a week and they like you to commit to at least 3 afternoons, usually between 12.15 and 2.45.
Thus the problem, because of the times and with me working, he was never going to go because it was not convenient, but with moving to Hamilton we are pretty sure that he will attend down there because I won't be working to begin with and therefore he won't be attending daycare, and I really want him to have something to do, mainly for my sanity, I don't think I will survive with both of them at home 24/7!

Well the Kindy that we have been registered at, has changed the age, due to huge numbers enrolling and Ben is still not in there yet, YET being the word.
Here we are, just under 10 weeks until we are all totally moved and now the Kindy have got in touch to say would we like Ben to go 3 afternoons a week? As of next week!
Talk about notice, they call on Friday and ask if I would like him to go on Tuesday.

Of course we have had to decline the position, but considering we have been waiting since January for a place, I just knew it would come up just as we moved!

Hamilton

So it is all go for our wild expedition to Hamilton. The house is listed with a Real Estate, link coming soon.
Steve has been fixing the house ready for the photographer to visit next week.
I have been checking out Hamilton and you can too right here

So if you find anything interesting on the site, then let me know so I can check it out when I am there.

Ben's New Friends

Steve's brother, Pete came down today to help Steve change some weather boards on the house.

Of course that meant his 2 little companions came with him.Jamie and Tilly

Alex was none too pleased at this, as when they arrived he wasn't prepared for the 2 little monsters to come running in the door, and I think this spooked him for the rest of the day! He was not a happy chappy when they were around, although by the time bedtime came round, he was a little calmer with them and they didn't seem to bother him so much.

Ben on the other hand thought this was great and kept wanting them to come into his bedroom and play with him, which of course they wouldn't! But that didn't stop him talking to them all day and constantly looking after them. He had a ball with them and thought the dogs were great. Was always asking where Tilly and Jamie were if he couldn't see them.

This is Jamie. She is 10 and a lovely placid dog

This is Tilly, she is 2, Jamie is her mum. She is just like her mother, but very mischievious just like a little child, into everything, wants to see everything and definitely thinks she is missing something the whole time.

Looks like we might have to think about a pet when we get to Hamilton, or at least when we buy our own place down there. We had thought of a new pet, ever since Ferris passed in May 05, but what with Alex arriving 4 weeks after Ferris left us, we decided that 2 small kids under 2 was enough for now, but that we would look at it again perhaps when they were a little older to appreciate a pet.

Looks like that time may have arrived.

Friendship

This came through to me in an email. Have read it before but as I am a firm believer in keeping in touch, and reaching out to people, I felt it was appropriate to post this.

One day, when I was in high school, I saw a kid from my class walking home from school.
His name was Kyle. It looked like he was carrying all of his books. I thought to myself, "Why would anyone bring home all his books on a Friday? He must really be a nerd."
As I was walking, I saw a bunch of kids running toward him, knocking all his books out of his arms and tripping him so he landed in the dirt. His glasses went flying, and I saw them land in the grass about three metres from him. He looked up and I saw this terrible sadness in his eyes My heart went out to him.

I jogged over to him as he crawled around looking for his glasses, and I saw a tear in his eye. As I handed him his glasses I said, "Those guys are jerks. They really should get lives." He looked at me and said, "Thanks." There was a big smile on his face.
It was one of those smiles that showed real gratitude. I helped him pick up his books and asked him where he lived. As it turned out he lived near me, so I asked him why I had never seen him before. He said he had gone to a private school before now.

I would have never hung out with a private school kid before.We talked all the way home, and I carried some of his books. He turned out to be a pretty cool kid. I asked him if he wanted to play a little football with my friends. We hung out all weekend and the more I got to know Kyle, the more I liked him, and my friends thought the same of him.
Monday morning came and there was Kyle with the huge stack of books again. I stopped him and said, "Boy, you are gonna really build some serious muscles with this pile of books everyday!" He just laughed and handed me half the books.

Over the years Kyle and I became best friends.

Kyle was dux of our school. I teased him all the time about being a nerd.
He had to prepare a speech. I was so glad it wasn't me having to get up there and speak. He was one of those guys that really found himself during high school. He filled out and actually looked good in glasses. He had more dates than I had and all the girls loved him. Boy, sometimes I was jealous!
Today was one of those days. I could see that he was nervous about his speech. So I smacked him on the back and said, "Hey, big guy, you'll be great!" He looked at me with one of those looks (the really grateful one) and smiled. "Thanks," he said.

As he started his speech, he cleared his throat, and began: "Graduation is a time to thank those who helped you make it through those tough years. Your parents, your teachers, your siblings, but mostly your friends. I am here to tell all of you that being a friend to someone is the best gift you can give them. I am going to tell you a story."

I just looked at my friend with disbelief as he told the story of the first day we met. He had planned to kill himself over the weekend. He talked of how he had cleaned out his locker so his Mum wouldn't have to do it later and was carrying his stuff home. He looked hard at me and gave me a little smile. "Thankfully, I was saved. My friend saved me from doing the unspeakable."
I heard the gasp go through the crowd as this handsome, popular boy told us all about his weakest moment.

I saw his Mum and Dad looking at me and smiling that same grateful smile.
Not until that moment did I realise it's depth.

Never underestimate the power of your actions.
With one small gesture you can change a person's life.
For better or for worse.

Share this with a friend, pass it on.

I never realised how much a small gesture can change a persons life.
Send that email, birthday card or make that call. It may have been months since you last spoke or got in touch, but you never know how important your reaching out may be to someone.

I have recently got in touch with some people from way back and the feeling of memories that I have been having in the last week or two have been wonderful.
I even made friends with someone I didn't even know, but our connection........we went to the same school for at least 1 year and now we live in the same town.

New Life

Steve has got a new job with Hamilton Hospital. He has known about the job for about 18 months, but it has only just now become available.
So we are on the move, he starts his new job on Monday 1st October.
I will join him there at the end of October as I have a contract for a project until 19th October and can't really skip out on the last 3 weeks of the project.
So we are putting are house on the market and move lock stock and barrel about 120 kms south of Auckland.
Hamilton is a nice town, with a population of about 132,000. So much smaller than Auckland, but then that is what I like about it.
You can keep up to date with our move as it is happening, just click here

Alex Knows His Name

Both the boys have placemats at the table with their name on it.
Yesterday whilst having lunch, we asked Alex if he knew what his name was? He replied "Alex" well it actually sounded like "Alis" but hey he has the gist of it.

Ben on the other hand with tell you his name is Benjamin Twotter, which is pretty good too.

Lessons on Life

There was a man who had four sons.
He wanted his sons to learn not to judge things too quickly.
So he sent them each on a quest, in turn, to go and look at a pear tree that was a great distance away.

The first son went in the winter, the second in the spring, the third in summer, and the youngest son in the fall.
When they had all gone and come back, he called them together to describe what they had seen.
The first son said that the tree was ugly, bent, and twisted.
The second son said no it was covered with green buds and full of promise.
The third son disagreed; he said it was laden with blossoms that smelled so sweet and looked so
beautiful, it was the most graceful thing he had ever seen.
The last son disagreed with all of them; he said it was ripe and drooping with fruit,
full of life and fulfillment.

The man then explained to his sons that they were all right, because they had each seen but only one season in the tree's Life.

He told them that you cannot judge a tree, or a person, by only one season, and that the essence of who they are and the pleasure, joy, and love that can come from that life can only be measured at the end, when all the seasons are up.

If you give up when it's winter, you will miss the promise of your spring, the beauty of your summer, fulfillment of your fall.

Moral: Don't let the pain of one season destroy the joy of all the rest.
Don't judge life by one difficult season.
Persevere through the difficult patches and better times are sure to come some time or later.

Be sensitive to the feelings of others.

I got sent this at work, don't know where it came from, but I liked it, so wanted to share it around.

The Price of Milk

A current affairs programme here in NZ covered a story last night about the cost of milk.

Seems that in many countries the price of 2 litres of milk has risen more than anyone predicted.

Why is this so controversial, the goverment here have just started a campaign aimed at parents called "Feeding our Future" giving everyday tips on how to build happier healthy children.

One of their campaigns is that you do not need to give children sugary drinks, water and milk is sufficient.

This is great, but as a family of 5 showed, the price of the shopping bill was way beyond their means when mum allowed their kids to drink more than a glass of milk a day including breakfast cereal.

Her arguement was why does 2 litres of Coke cost nearly half as less as 2 litres of milk?

I can see her point, the amount of shopping trolleys I see at the supermarket ladened with Fizzy drinks because it is on 99c special for 1.5lt, compared to nearly $4 for 2lt of milk is huge.

With my two little monsters I have just got into the milk issue, Ben wasn't much of a milk drinker, like me, but Alex thinks milk is great and wants to try and help himself to milk when ever the opportunity arises.

So as you can see, my shopping bill is going to start rising significantly if Alex keeps on the way he is going.

Manners

Tonight after dinner Ben and Alex sat at the table eating mandarins whilst mummy and daddy cleared up the kitchen.
I commented to them that "They were very good for sitting there so quietly eating" to which I got the reply "you're welcome" from Ben.

Don't know where he got that from, but so cute :)

Breakfast on Sunday

What better way to start Sunday morning than with a nice breakfast in bed with daddy. Mummy made eggs for daddy and the boys decided they wanted to sit with him and eat their toast.

Winter Time is Here

If you are lucky enough to live in the southern hemisphere, then you will know that winter has finally got here.

Well at least the rain and wind has got here to the North Island of New Zealand, if you are in the South Island then you have got the rain, the wind and unfortunately the snow as well.

So what do you do with 2 small boys when the weather is so awful outside..........?

You give them a cardboard box to play with.......

Or get daddy to pretend to be a horse!

Dummy Connoisseur

We have in our mids a person with such a fine nose for dummies! He knows the colour, shape and smell of each one and even knows all the pictures on them.

After his bath each night he gets a clean one and he even tells you which one he would like today. Maybe the lion one, the giraffe one or even go all out and have the teddy bear one.

Who knows, but his most wonderful moment is when he manages to get 2 at the same time, then he is in dummy heaven!!

2nd Birthday

Alex has just had his 2nd birthday. What a big boy he is now. We had a lovely day with presents in the morning, a trip to see the butterflies at lunchtime and a small party in the afternoon for cake and drinks.

Alex was lucky enough to have a Barney cake, mummy was very lucky to find a cake that had Alex's favourite character on it.
Alex was very lucky to get a new car for his birthday. Every little boy dreams of a new car.
We had a family outing for Alex's birthday to Butterfly Creek wonderful place full of butterflies and fish, a petting zoo for the children and a small train to ride on. As you can see Ben loved the guinea pigs, but he also liked the little baby rabbits as well.

Ben

Our oldest son is nearly 4 and has come a long way in the last 6 - 8 months. At 3 he wasn't really saying much, but now he has such a huge vocabulary that he can talk to you about anything.

He has also grasped the concept of dressing himself in the last few weeks, and even though it can be a little slow, all items of clothing now get put on with ease.

He is remembering things now as well, understands when we say maybe later, because later he will remind you. Likes us to tell him when things are going to happen because he is slowly grasping the time concept, which is a good thing but can also back fire on us.

The Zoo

Our family still really enjoys a good day out at the zoo.

These birds are so colourful

Ben and Alex just love this place, they know where they want to go and what they want to see.

They both love the giraffes, and have had the pleasure of feeding them.

Mummy, as taken by Ben. (the picture above, not the rhino below!!)

Alex

Our youngest has just started coming out with so much to say. His favorite thing at the moment is to tell us "Me do it" He wants to help with anything and everything, and he wants to do it on his own.

Guess with him turning 2 in a couple of weeks, it is to be expected. Although he is still the baby, although he had a hair cut yesterday and he really looks like a little boy now, no more baby!

Oh and did I mention that he likes chocolate ice cream?

Mother's Day

Today in New Zealand is Mother's Day.

My lovely family gave me lots of hugs and kisses and 2 CD's, and the biggest box of chocolates!

Here are the cool men in my life.

Boys

The boys are continuing to grow right before my eyes!
Ben has just blossomed into a little boy and Alex who is nearly 2 has started coming out with words that even Ben won't say.

They both want to help with things, they want to do things and Ben is always looking after his brother, even if it is a little hug and cuddle after he has hit him.

With the odd moment, they are actually a delight to have a round.
Ben is for ever singing nursery rhymes. Baa Baa Black Sheep, Row Row Your Boat and unfortunately all the theme songs to the programmes he watches regularly. Maybe he has been watching them too much if he knows the words to the songs!

Regardless of what is happening out there in the big world, I still appreciate them and count myself very lucky for the 2 wonderous little boys that I have helped create.

So my heart goes out to all those families at Virginia Tech this last week. Especially the family of the young man who caused all this trouble. They may have known that he was in pain and having trouble, but to suddenly see him portrayed over the television in such a dreadful way must have been a terrible shock. They may have been trying hard to help him and know that has all failed.
I just hope they, like all the other families affected can rebuild their lives over the next couple of years to some level that works for them.

They are all in my thoughts and prayers.