Scarborough Beach

While some of us were working and at school, others of us were being whisked off to Pleasant Point by Joan and John for a custard slice!  Pleasant Point is a small country town 19kms inland from Timaru, famous for its little heritage railway.  They all had a jolly good time.  Early afternoon when I was home from work we went on an outing to the in-use Timaru Railway Station.  It didn't inspire a desire to travel anywhere by train - somewhat shabby and dirty; in keeping with the worst picture one would have of dodgy train stations! 

Popped in at the i-Site and examined the statue of Captain Henry Cain, mayor of Timaru in 1860 and later poisoned by his son-in-law!  Did a bit of shopping and walking about town.  Had to collect the boys from the pool at 3 pm but we arrived super early so could see both boys swimming.  I didn't recognize Caleb at first, swimming freestyle in the deep-end with quite some style.  Went directly home after swimming so I could get a chicken pie in the oven; also steamed the last of the purple cauliflower along with yellow cauli and broccoli - it was a colourful plate of food!  (For the record, steaming is a better way to go with these ridiculously tinted veggies - they maintained their deep shades). 

After tea we drove down to Scarborough Beach, a few kms south of Timaru - with my parents leaving in a few days, we don't want to let things simply wind down; there are still things to see and do, and since it was a calm and non-cold evening, it was perfect to do a beach excursion.  Scarborough Beach is particularly lovely if you enjoy beach-combing and treasure-hunting - today we were particularly looking for Paua shells for Mom and Dad to take back with them.  I also collected treasures by way of photographs - I love to bring them out and look at them again and again.  We were especially blessed to happen across a lone juvenile Shag who eyed me with much interest but apparently no fear - we seemed to edge nearer to each other until he was within reach although that hooked beak looked like it might have been dangerous.  Caleb and Mom waited near our starting point, not venturing far as the tide was high and we weren't sure if it was coming or going.  The rest of us went far in our exploring, finding five or six big shells.  The skies were gently clouded over; the sea was rough and the air heavy with salt-water spray.  I came away deeply satisfied with the expedition.  There is something soothing about the pounding of waves on a rocky shore and the joyful noise they make as they pull little pebbles back into the tide with them, followed by a sudden drop in the noise during a lull in big waves.  You want to take a deep breath and run and shout and sit quietly and gather yourself. 

We finished the evening with ice-creams at Burger King.  It was already past the boys' bedtime so we figured an extra half-hour and a sugar rush couldn't do much harm!

Fudged canary job

Wednesday: in which we nearly lost the school pet, Joseph the canary who might turn out to be a Sandy the Female Canary if he doesn't start singing soon, when the cage was opened to put in a mirror and seed bells.  The bird made a dash for it; fortunately the outside doors were shut and we closed the hall doors before it found a way in there!  Had to procure a butterfly net to catch the little thing before it shed all its cute orange feathers in fright.

Mom and Dad spent a quiet day at home, largely missing us, and making a batch of fudge which didn't exactly work out - I and my NZ butter are vindicated!  I was more sorry for Dad's sake than relieved for my own at my inability to produce proper confectionary.  It's still highly edible though for any Timaruvians who want to sample a bit! 

Scatterlings of Africa

After the very relaxed long-weekend, it was sooooo tough to get up early again and go to work - I confess that as much as I love my job, just for this week I'd rather be at home!  Had a good day though especially as I got to see a bit of Caleb at a cricket practice - the first of the season. 

At lunch time I popped back home to collect Mom and Dad and deliver them to Kurt and Shirley Kempf for lunch (I mean, to share lunch with them).  By all accounts they had a very interesting and enjoyable afternoon, with an excursion around the Kempf farm with its miniature pony, rabbits, and 70 varieties of fruits and vegetables! 

We had a tea engagement with Mark and Pam Cvitanich, along with Mark Jnr, Kath, Tayla and Brad - a fabulous gathering of lovely people over much animated conversation and a beautiful roast. 

Another 4-day week

Waitangi Day rolls around on the 6th Feb every year in NZ, to commemorate the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi (NZ's founding document) in 1840.  Whatever the occasion, it means a public holiday for us and the timing couldn't have been better what with Mumsie and Popsie only having one more week with us.  It was lovely to let the day unfold in whatever form it took; today we did some spontaneous gardening which ended up being quite a drastic trim of several bushes.  Caleb took the photos.  At lunchtime we reckoned that we'd earned some sort of reward so went to McDonalds, then there was a bit of Farmers and PaknSave shopping to do.  Mom and I made biscotti in the afternoon (that last batch disappeared way too quickly) and Dad and I went to Harvey Norman to get some photos developed.  We had to go twice because the first time we went with an empty flash drive to the machines - doh!  Slow-cooked soup and bread for tea, and the sun finally came out for the first time during our evening devotions.  We might even get a sunset tonight!

Violining Victoria

Sunday - much the same as usual, with church twice and some time at home in between and after.  We had our monthly fellowship lunch at the church which always means lots of chatting and great food (and Jeremiah's cheesecake is becoming an anticipated favourite).  I invited one of our young ladies, Victoria, to come home with us to play violin - this was the first time I've heard her play and by extension the first time we'd played together.  It was fantastic!!  We could play all manner of hymns together with harmonies, and so as the afternoon progressed and it got towards 4 pm and time to be back at the church for the afternoon practice with Bronwyn, Victoria came along and joined in, and played in church as well.  Yay - then no-one could really tell who was making any mistakes :) 

Park picnic

I think we were all just a little bit glad that weekend had rolled around, for more or less the same reason. Spent most of the morning at home after just popping out with Nick (leaving the boys with the grandparents) to PaknSave for some weekend supplies. I baked biscotti which has been on my to-do list since before my parents arrived, and then we packed up a picnic of American hotdogs for lunch at Centennial Park.  It wasn't raining or cold - good-weather days have been few and far between lately so we're having to take advantage of them when they come.  

We had some spare bread for feeding the ducks, one magpie, a few LBJs and one or two of these cute things, whatever they are:

Mom got in on the action with some soccer;

and the boys nearly lost their lunch on a spinning tire (thanks to Nick who wound it up and spun it around - we could hear their screams from across the park).

From there we went to the Warehouse (where everyone...), looking for some .....  I found two huge photo albums on a super-ultra-special clearance and Dad found more ways to fill his luggage with two huge Sistema containers for biscuits, despite Mom's insistence that he doesn't need them.  Bargain hunting won over logic (they WERE on special).  Late afternoon I had a music practice which was fun with my violin teacher joining in for the practice, and then we had a quiet evening at home playing Rummikub or reading etc. 

Salons, sevens, strawberries and sales

Had another busy and productive day at school; saw the boys briefly to give them their pot-noodles at break before I left for the afternoon.  Shot home, collected the parents, and exited Timaru by the south to go to Nyree for haircuts.  Dad and Lindsay stayed in the lounge chatting about surgeries and rugby sevens (Lindsay had no choice but to stay with a bad foot - nasty gout) while us ladies occupied the bathroom.  Nyree was fabulous as always and gave Mom a bit of a make-over. 

Ta-da!  Below - siamese strawberries from the Moore's garden.

Left there in time to get back to school to collect the boys; stopped in at Briscoes on the way home as their weekend sale had now started with 20% off storewide - TODAY was the day for placemats!  When Nick came home from work we started our Friday Family Fun with Johnny Engish (which some of us thought was funny and some didn't) and pizza.

In which Dad nearly buys placemats

One thing by way of souvenir that Dad really wants to buy is placemats - he and Mom have collected a set of placemats from nearly all the exotic locations they've visited (St Helena being one).  We've been looking at placemats in every souvenir shop we've visited from Cape Reinga to the Bluff (just about), but either prices have been too high or they haven't been quite the right thing.  I've been saying all along that Briscoes is bound to add a sale to their already-better prices, but it was Farmers who ended up being the price winner.  Today was a half-day for me at school and although I still have piles of work to get through, I figured it was more important to spend time with my parents!  We went to town...literally.  Dad had a set in his hands at Farmers and got as far as the pay point before deciding that perhaps they weren't right enough after all...so back they went.  I picked up a cute hands-free tin opener and a set of bright pink baking measuring cups, and Mom found exactly what she was looking for.  Shortly before 3 pm we had to collect the boys from the swimming pool where they had their first lesson of the year - all the kids were excited about swimming starting up again!  It's been super cold here again today - let's hope the weather cheers up before the long weekend coming.

I managed to persuade Caleb to play a violin duet with me (he said on condition that I said "Caleb's awesome and I'm a nerd", so having announced that to everyone, he had to uphold his end of the deal). We scraped and screeched through a few pieces and actually sounded quite passable (despite that he never practices). Got Aaron in on the act too with Supercalfragilisticexpialadocious - glad that Dad thought to bring out the camera!

Generation V

School 2012 started yesterday in full force. It was great to be back properly with all the kids about - feels like a ghost town when I'm there in the holidays.  Caleb and Aaron slotted right back into it like they'd never been away.  Caleb is in Year 6 this year and has been moved into Room 5 with the seniors (Years 7 and 8) while Aaron is in Year 5 and remains with Mrs Nareki in Room 4.  Had a pretty productive day although at points all I seemed to be doing was shuffling papers from one spot on my desk to another!

Meanwhile, Mumsie and Popsie were off gallivanting - yesterday John and Joan Leevers took them out Geraldine way for a picnic...

...and coffee on the way home...

...and today they were in the Fairlie area for lunch with Les and Marg, having no end of conversations on both occasions.

Thanks to Dad for the photos!

A whole spectrum of goodness

Last day of our school holidays...I had to go to the office though and nearly fainted at the piles of work sitting on my desk - it didn't look like that when last I was there early January!  Nick was out at the church office and the boys were happy to be at home with granny and grandpa (actually granny and grandpa were also happy to be at 'home' - after the last two weeks of country-trotting).  We all met up at home for lunch, and then when Nick went back to work the rest of us went grocery shopping - the cupboards were looking decidedly bare (tomato sauce was on the list).  We found an array of interesting veggies - cauliflowers in shades of bright purple and orange, as well as yams, kumaras, courgettes and mini sweet capsicums.  What a spread for roasting!!

Mom and Dad have been most excellent at finding things to do and ways to be of use in our home, apart from the obvious pleasure of their company.  I turn my back for five minutes and the dishes are done - not only washed, but dried and packed away - the washing gets hung outside and brought back in when it's dry; clothes are quietly ironed, and the boys get to have Rummikub companions.  Caught Popsie ironing his jeans - when the camera flash fired he thought he'd tripped the electricity :)

Reflecting on holidays

Very much a day of sleeping in, going to church, meeting new friends, catching up on washing and unpacking and chilling.  It was great that Nick wasn't preaching today so could also rest after the hours and hours of driving.  We had a speaker from the Gideons' International Society who shared a very encouraging and challenging message from and about the bible - very interesting indeed to hear about the origins of the society who now go about distributing bibles in hotels, motels, hospitals and schools et al.  Grant was our preacher in the evening and again, an encouraging word from the Word about our citizenship in heaven.  After church and much chatting, we had the Phillipses around for a long-overdue catch-up after their holiday in SA.  Fabulous to laugh together over hot chips and peanut sauce, mango sauce, plum sauce and BBQ sauce (only the tomato was missing), cake, and Trevor Noah.

Ugh, look at all that clutter on the coffee table - all the boys' back-to-school stationery still needing sorting and labelling!

Dunedin to Timaru (home sweet home)

'Twas the the earliest start of the whole week this morning with a great enthusiasm on the folks' part to be out of the tree house. There was a vintage book shop just around the corner which Nick wanted to see; although the sign outside said 'open', we had to wait a few minutes for the owner to get out of bed and get dressed. Vintage books seem to be very expensive.

Onward to Larnach's castle on the Otago Peninsula where the very friendly gate-keeper asked us where we're from and what we do. The answers of 'Timaru' and 'Baptist Pastor' led him to ask if perhaps we know his daughter - who turned out to be none other than Bethany Rentoul! We just couldn't believe the connection. The Castle and grounds were spectacular and the history interesting  if not rather sordid and sad. Mom started feeling faint about five minutes into the viewing so emergency scones and coffee in the Ballroom Cafe were necessary.

There was a strict ban on any indoor photography of the castle, but the Ballroom Cafe was without restriction - yay!

A climb up a seemingly-endless spiral of stairs (although Dad counted and said there were 29) in the turret brought you to a balcony overlooking the castle grounds.

Took the higher road over the ridge of the peninsula on the way to Dunedin city which afforded grand views over the bay and cit - Nick stopped a few times on the way so I didn't have to do ootw shots!

Got into town, found a parking and walked to the museum (which my iPhone map indicated was a 2-minute walk but that only applies if you can speed-walk...methinks I made a mistake somewhere as it turned into at least a 20-minute expedition). Ah well, the best way to see a city is on foot, right? The appearance of a live jazz musician in a corner of the museum was a bonus and the whispering domes were intriguing as always.

Made our way to the Octagon via Knox Church and McDonalds, peered in at St Paul's Cathedral which had all manner of plaques commemorating long-dead people...just no mention of Jesus Christ. 

Knox Church, above and below.

St Paul's Cathedral, above and below.

All glad to get into car (the third location we'd parked it because of max. 1-hour parking) but a 10 minute drive took us to Baldwin Street for more punishment. First bought a small bag of giant jaffas at the tourist shop at a giant price, then huffed and puffed to the top of the world's steepest street, as recorded in the Guiness Book of World Records.  Phew! 

Those jaffas were not for eating, but for rolling a-la the annual event in which some 30,000 jaffas are rolled down Baldwin Street.

And it had turned hot...drinks and muffins from New World were enjoyed in the car on the way to our final holiday stop, Moeraki Boulders. These huge boulders lie scattered on Koekohe Beach like long-forgotten bowling balls, ranging in size from half a metre to over two metres in diameter.

Pizza from our friendly Timaru Dominoes for tea...home at last after a fantastic week of seeing more of our amazing country. The route itself maps out as 1490 kms...that's not counting the in-between driving we did.  Well done to Nick for being the sole driver, and thanks to Andreas and Danielle for the loan of their bus!