Some photos and a little bit of news!

Hope you like the photos. I don’t want to worry anyone unduly but I think Anton is about to resign. He reckons he has work from the UK guaranteed and his manager in the Dept of corrections thinks he may be able to work on a particular program or two.

It’ll be good to have my happy hubby back.

Watch this space!!!!

Another day on the beach ( imagine doing this in October in UK)

Three beaches, a dog, a carrot and a new haircut

Netball fever

Next term sees netball season begin at Laingholm. Unlike many teams here, the netball teams are arranged by age and not ability. Jo is coaching the Year 6 team including Caitlin on Monday nights. Luckily she has a great manager who can organise all the organising stuff and leave Jo with the fun part, coaching the kids. Our matches are played on Saturday mornings at Te Pai Place. There are about 20 courts all in one small space. Very intimidating!

We passed there yesterday on the way to the Trust Stadium to watch the local team Northern Mystics play in the Transtasman league. The Mystics have a few really good players ( Temepara George who just won Dancing with the Stars, Sheryl Scanlon ( a current Silver Fern) and Davu, who for a netball player is a BIG girl...there is hope for us all). Unfortunately Perth Fever were a better team, always about a metre ahead of our players. Our allegiances were torn as their WA plays for the English team and was Fantastic!!!

The kids enjoyed the match, or was that just the chips? Roo caught a cap thrown out at half time (for his sister) and C got everyone's autographs.

Cookie time

Today, or rather yesterday, was the day when theory was turned into practice- The cookie mixture, or at least some of it, has been tested on willing friends, and given the thumbs up, but today was the first time that Caitlin's Cookies was unleashed onto an unsuspecting public. The event was Lactic Turkey- a walking/running/orienteering event company. The day was windy and wet- Not an auspicious start- But 250 people were registered to be there. The family arrived at 12.00 to set up the stall- And quite professional it looked in the end, and the proprietor, namely Caitlin herself, was there to add a touch of class to the proceedings.

Within an hour, we had sold about two thirds of the cookies we had cooked- Making about 150 dollars profit overall-Caitlin's Cookies was deemed to be a success!

The guy running the event also liked the cookies, and we have tentatively agreed to cook 400 for him in June

So we only now have about fifty cookies left to get through at home!!

Walking with animals.

Last year in Kendal we saw a family walking their dog, with a cat in tow. Unusual we thought! We think this no longer. Everytime we go for a walk with Molly, we have the accompaniment of Tabitha's ringing collar and Teddy's mews. In fact Molly will not walk without them and this morning we had to get Teddy out of the house before she would stop whining!

So far they have followed us to the tennis courts and nearly to the beach, with Teddy only once getting lost in the mangroves and getting covered in mud. Tabs tends to stick close to the bridge though she is becoming more adventurous as she sees Teddy surviving his travels.


The children competed in their first school cross country today. They both did really well on the three lap course. I am so proud of them. C then serenaded her class mates over lunch time on the guitar with Mr Davidson joining in. The ethos at this school is so good!

Big Trip!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

On the 5th of April me and my mum went on a big walk in the Coromandel Peninsula. It was sooooooooooooooooooo cool. We went with some other mums and some of my friends came to (yes granny Ruby came) .It was a really steep and long walk to say the least but there seemed to be two groups the ‘we are really strong and we will reach the top before you’ and then there was us “the plodders’ It was not all flowers and sunshine though because a little girl of five came with us called Lee. When we stopped to have lunch Lee played by the river, fell and hit her head. When we set of again the fast group went ahead leaving us with Lee who by this time was throwing up. We may have had Lee but I think we had a better time and enjoyed the our surroundings more because we took more time (but we did get back to the cars first!) When we finally got to the hut the doctor in our party (who was in the fast group) took one look at her and said she can’t stay here. So in came the air ambulance! It was a bit exiting!!!! All we had to eat and drink was cold pizza cold sausage rolls and water and hot chocolate …… very healthy. I really enjoyed this game of UNO the whole group played and we all had hot chocolate!!!!!!! We got no sleep mind you because of about 14 teenagers and their drunken fathers who just would not go to sleep. In the morning we had breakfast (pizza and sausage rolls) and set off back down sadly Lees sister Taylor was sick so again I don’t know why the fast group and the doctor said we want to go down the long way so the fast group went the long way and the plodders went the short way with the sick Taylor. On the way down we stopped of for lunch in the same place we had the day before. When we got to the bottom Taylor felt better and we were all very happy to be down. When the rest of the group got down we went and had a coffee and a cake. Now despite what you may be thinking we had an awesome time and I would do it again.


By Caitlin