November

At the beginning of November there is always so much going on, well there seems to be this year.

I know Halloween doesn't come in November, but my 2 had their first taste of it this year. They didn't dress up or anything like that, mainly because they went trick or treating around the small neighbourhood in Ngongotaha, Rotorua with their cousins, and seeing as mummy had just driven (1 hour) over there feeling like death warmed up I had total good reason for not getting in with the programme, plus they are only 2 and 4.

Steve says that Ben was a little hesitant at the first door, but once he realised that people gave you stuff then apparently he was in the front at the next house!

Of course after Halloween comes fireworks, New Zealand are very wary of fireworks, so much so that the government has put a threat out that all fireworks will be banned if people seriously don't start behaving with them. This year you could only buy them from the shop during a 4 day period.

We decided to go to a public display anyway.

After checking out the web I could find nothing actually happening in Hamilton so we drove the 20 minutes (27kms) to a small town called Morrinsville, right out in the the good old farming land country. Steve and I both actually like Morrinsville.

Anyway, we did the usual routine at home, dinner, bath & pyjamas and then we added socks and shoes and jumpers and climbed in the car.

This meant that we weren't at the display for hours on end with restless children.

The boys loved the entertainment and Alex spent a lot of time dancing away. If there is dancing at the wedding next week he will be just so cute in his tuxedo dancing.

Anyway, Ben spend most of the 2 hours we were there constantly asking me if it was dark yet?

Finally they did light the bonfire and the firework display went ahead.

Now do remember that we are in the southern hemisphere, so we are in our spring time with our clocks having gone forward for summer time, so sunset is usually about 8pm, thus the reason for it being a late night for the boys and the reason we had them in their pyjamas ready for bed when we got home late.

They both had glow stick bracelets to play with when it got dark and they had such fun with these. Waving them about watching them glow.

They sat with us during the display and were so cute oohing and aahing in all the right places.

As we left to go to the car you had to walk past the bonfire, "Hot" is what Alex said, and man it was too.

Ben was more fascinated by the fireman standing by with their truck just in case something went wrong. So we stood and had a little conversation about why they were there, what the water truck was for and why there was a huge pile of sand next to the bonfire.

All in all it was a fun night. The boys really loved it and Ben asked the next day if we could go again that day!