Quick Hello

We had a fabulous Halloween and I'll post pictures soon - I'm getting most of them from my good buddy Matt, so that will be Friday's post. In the meantime, last night at sewing I sat next to a dancer in The Nutcracker which the girls and I are going to see on Thursday. Also at sewing I discovered some new music - LOVE!! I'll be taking the girls to see this group perform soon - enjoy.

Oh and by the way - I hope all you Americans exercised your right to vote. xx

Random Links

So all the ballet lessons are just so the girls can one day dance a performance like this from the Royal New Zealand ballet:

I've been browsing real estate listings since our return because I am SO sick. of. renting! My fellow Americans would be surprised at how little there is on offer and how quickly the houses with decent sun exposure (VERY important) get snatched up. Anyway, today after dropping Meggie off at girls' club and heading to netball with Katie and Josie I passed this (click on pink word) and got very excited. It gets great sun, has five bedrooms and three bathrooms and is in a fantastic location (and I love how the listing agent wrote "Even Jacqueline Kennedy would approve). I knew such extravagance would come at a price, but sadly my husband just confirmed my suspicions. Looking on the bright side, we don't even know how long we are here and perhaps at the right time and in the right place the perfect dwelling place will become available - meanwhile we are free to dream!

In happier news, we got to spend the day with Kate yesterday. She is in town from Auckland for a class reunion and it was such a treat to see her and have her hang out with us. We had lunch here at the house then went to our favorite bookstore, Marsden Books, because Kate is friends with Anna who owns the shop. We also ventured over to Seatoun to have a quick look in Liz's boutique, but sadly she was out of town so we didn't get to see her. Wellington put on a beautiful show - the sun was out and it was a balmy 18 degrees, just perfect. Today it was a windy 11 degrees while I shivered on the sidelines of the netball. And they call it "summer netball". I scoff.

That's all from here - two posts in two days, I'm on a roll! xx

More Ballet Exams

Hello dear friends and family! Meggie and Katie had a great time taking their ballet exams last week, we were at the studio from 8:30 am until lunch time, but a good time was had by all.

Meggie and her sweet friend Olivia. These two are going to ride the bus into town together for ballet beginning in February and they are so excited about it!

Olivia, Georgia, Miriam and Meggie.

I'm so sad Meggie's eyes are closed in this! Ms. Tarrant has made ballet an absolute joy for all the girls this year, but she's been especially wonderful for our newest ballerina.

Katie, Pippa, Maia, Scarlett

Dugald and I had a fantastic anniversary weekend - we didn't make any plans other than to spend the entire day together Saturday without children thanks to our good friends Matt and Alison offering to take them for the day. They had fun and we had a fantastic time just taking the day as it came, relaxing, eating, shopping, connecting. Oh for more days like that!

Hugs to all. xx

Island Bay Marine Center

Our visit to the Island Bay Marine Center last week was better than expected! The girls had kind of gone off field trips after last year's trip to the local landfill, due to the smell, but I think this surpassed their expectations. Mind you there was still a smell.

The couple who run the center did a great job - we were all gathered in a big room overlooking the sea and while they talked with the children the parents gathered for coffee and tea in the kitchen. After a time of instruction and questions, they handed out "safety equipment" which turned out to be funny hats for the adults. I was given a big red crab which Ellie thought was hilarious, I was happy to have it as it helped keep me a bit warmer! Then we all walked down to the building where the sea creatures are actually kept.

The favorite thing for the children was the hands-on pool where they could gently reach in and touch or hold the sea creatures - things like sea anemones, starfish, snails and whatnot - but they also enjoyed feeding the turtles and the fish.

Then yesterday we began our first of three ballet exams - Josie had her Grade One presentation. I wasn't allowed in to watch her this year but she sure looked pretty and I know she did a great job!! Meggie and Katie have their exams on Thursday.

We were instructed to arrive quite early so I told the other girls to bring something to do - this is what they were doing while Josie was getting ready. Again I apologize for the iphone pictures, I forgot my camera!! I'm glad the phone does as well as it does given that I can't seem to remember my nice camera half the time.

Lots of love to all!!

A Little This and That

Hi everyone! It's officially spring here and the weather is completely whacky. On Tuesday it sleeted and hailed and the day was bitterly cold. On Wednesday the sun came out and we were so warm the girls wore short sleeves all day. Crazy.

Anyway, life is good here in our little corner of the world. I got to have a "date" with Katie a few weekends ago. One-on-one time with the girls is understandably scarce so it was a joy to spend time with just Katie doing what she wanted to do. We were joined by our good friends Pippa and Alison and we had lunch together at a cafe, got pedicures and shopped.

Last week was killer with all the ballet - every day at 1pm for Katie and 3 pm for Meggie as they prepare for their exams. Thankfully we had a bit of help in the form of some carpooling with friends. One of the days I drove to Katie's class the little girls and I went to the waterfront and Daddy met us for ice cream. Meggie was at a friend's house.

Today we are off for a field trip to the Marine Education Center. Or Centre. Anyhoo - we are studying marine animals in science so when the homeschool group planned this trip I signed us up. The girls have been once before with Hamish and Delaney but I've never visited so I'm looking forward to it.

Dugald is keeping busy with work and we are still plugging away at our school work. The girls started back at gymnastics yesterday and they loved it! All four take at the same time - the little girls in one class while the big girls are in another so I don't have to be there for too long. We had to take a break from horseback riding to have a day free to try gymnastics so next term it looks like there will be some hard decisions about which activities to continue and which to drop. If only I had a driver. . .

I took my sewing machine to be serviced last week in anticipation of the sewing class I start TONIGHT!! I dropped it off with an adapter since it is an American machine and the guy servicing it called to say that it was just blinking when he plugged it in and had I used it here? Um. . . . no. . . So he said it should theoretically work if he just plugged it in since it said on the back of the machine that it could work on both voltages, but he said sometimes the Americans modify the machines so they will only work on our voltage and if that were the case then when he plugged it in it would most likely blow the circuit board and that would cost me $400 and was I willing to take the risk? So, my choices were a machine that doesn't work or possibly a $400 repair bill on top of the $140 service charge. I took a deep breath and told him to plug it in. Thankfully it all worked so now he's replacing the cord for me so I can just plug it straight in without an adapter. All well and good except that it won't be ready for my first class tonight. I'll let you know how that goes.

Finally - I just read this article about the cost of living in New Zealand, there's a debate but in our experience the cost of living is an absolute ton more than it was in good ole East Texas. It's the main reason I came back here with 11 pieces of luggage after our time in the US and would have liked to have brought back more. Two years later I still find the prices here hard to get over.

Lots of love from all of us! xx

Father's Day

Dugald is the best dad ever. Seriously. We are so grateful God blessed us with him and I love him even more when I see him interacting with the girls. So, even though he said he doesn't mind not celebrating Father's Day, we had to at least acknowledge it. New Zealand celebrates Father's Day on the first Sunday in September, unlike the American celebrations in June.

We presented our gifts to Daddy before church - Josie made him some sort of feather crown out of pipe cleaners, Meggie wrote him a poem and Katie and Ellie gave him a tie.

I can't really put into words the powerful emotions I feel when I think of what a great daddy Dugald is to our girls. He has sacrificed much for us, he has chosen family over work time and time again, he has lovingly participated in homeschooling the girls, he leads us by serving us, he requires excellence out of the children in behavior and school work, he loves them unconditionally and willingly spends time with them when he could so easily choose to pursue his own hobbies instead and much, much more. I didn't realize that I was SO getting the total package when we married because I had no idea that this man who is such a great husband would also turn into a father that is better than my highest dreams for my children. So, even though we kind of don't make a big deal out of Father's Day it doesn't mean we aren't grateful for the Daddy you are Dugald Morrison! We love you!!

Hello everyone!! This is what we woke up to the day of the "storm the size of Australia". A better morning than most actually!

Things did eventually get wet and it lasted awhile, but as I've said on here many times before that isn't too unusual for Wellington. Other parts of the North Island lost electricity and had it a bit worse than we did, but we are used to ferocious winds.

The big news in the Morrison household this week is that we finally broke down and got the girls some bikes. Gulp, I still can't believe the price but seeing as I was the one who left all of them in Texas I needed to get over it. Now that we are having the occasional nice day the girls have been desperate to ride and only Meggie and Katie had bikes. Meg got a new one for her birthday two years ago and I bought Katie a hand-me-down on Trade Me (similar to ebay but not as many choices) for her 8th birthday. Katie's bike was a bit of a disappointment but it was also more than $200 cheaper so we made it work. Meggie is growing like a weed and while she could have kept her bike another year we decided to go ahead and get her a new, bigger bike and give Katie Meggie's old bike. Then we bought Ellie and Josie each one and a rack for the car. They love me at Penny Farthing (the bike store). Dugald and I are still bikeless but that's next on the list.

Josie was not yet riding without training wheels so we took her out to the park and had her start to learn on Katie's bike to see if it was within the realm of possibility to get her a bike without them. Dugald taught Meggie to ride a two-wheeler in about three hours and Katie took about five-minutes to learn, so I was hoping Josie would be more like the latter. There is a reason Dugald is the bike instructor and it has to do with the required amount of patience. However, sunny days are rare and I knew I had to get out there and take advantage of the sunshine so off we went to the park and day one of "Mommy Riding School". My back quickly complained so Meggie stepped up and we took it in turns to help Jo.

After about two hours, one coffee, two hot chocolates and two juice bottles, Josie could ride a few meters without me holding on to her. We decided that was enough of a victory and we headed to the bike store to make our purchases - we had gone a few days before to look at and price bikes with Daddy but we hadn't actually bought anything.

Three days of rain followed our purchase. So much for the nice weather. Finally today we had more sunshine so we headed on back down to Karori Park for day two of "Mommy, Meggie and Katie Riding School," this time with two students, Ellie and Josie. Meggie and Katie took turns helping Ellie learn to peddle and steer while I worked with Josie again. Jo liked her new bike so much better, it was more her size and didn't have as many sharp edges when she took a tumble. I'm proud of her for her persistence, she kept at it for a long time and I think after an hour or so with Daddy tomorrow she'll have it nailed. Here's praying the weather service is right and we have a sunny Saturday!

(Please excuse the quality of these photos - I took them with my iphone and it was obviously quite sunny thus all the squinting and shadows and whatnot.)

The sad irony is that as soon as we gave in and decided on this rather big expense the girls' school computer died. Grr.

We have also celebrated Father's Day since I last posted and I have a few pictures of Dugald with his gifts - some of which were homemade - so I'll post those later. School work and life have been keeping us from posting more often but I think we've finally found our feet and I hope to post more frequently. Lots of love!!