Squishy sushi

Aaron and I thought we'd try our hands at making sushi.  It was a great learning experience;

...as in, we've learned not to try it again.

Beach Season has begun

Today was a beautiful enough day to warrant a picnic lunch and beach visit. We got a group together at church and, after an unexpected rendezvous at PaknSave (quite the popular post-church hang-out), we met up at the Port Loop Circle picnic area. We've only been there once or twice before for BBQs, at the tail end of last summer, and it's actually a great spot - large, flat, fairly protected from easterly breezes, and grassy.

After lunch, and a bit of cricket, rugby, soccer, and cubb, we wandered over to the beach. We ourselves were a fairly large group and provided a good cheering section for some race which was happening in the opposite direction.

Found this poor fellow not looking very happy. 

Mainly males make mailbox

The postbox at 22 Our Street has not been looking so flash lately;  in strong winds it wobbles terribly, and someone living at Number 2* somewhere must have needed the other sticker some time ago.

Nick and the boys tackled the making of a replacement.  First though, they needed some tools, and a handy rebate from IRD financed the purchase of a table saw.

Ta-da!  Fabulous job - it's huge, stable, and looks tidy.  We comment on it every time we drive past it now.

My contribution was to attach the brass numbers.  It took a bit more time to line the screws up neatly, but could anyone imagine leaving such a detail undone?

Lunar Eclipse

Tonight the Lord put on a grand display of His creation, as the earth passed in front of the moon.  The red colour (a blood moon) is caused by some light from the sun filtering through the earth's dusty atmosphere - pollution can be a little bit pretty then!  I snapped this photo with a 300mm lens around 11 pm, after first rousing Aaron to see the event.  All I got from Caleb was a big hand in front of his face and "NOOOOO" to my question, "do you want to see the eclipse?". 

All Breakers

On the third day of our spring holidays I took the boys to watch the NZ Breakers run a practice at the local stadium. I suppose I would have been more excited about the event had I known in advance who these Breakers are; I had to actually ask a school mum sitting in front of me if this team is to basketball what the All Blacks are to rugby. Yes, the answer was confirmed!