Woo Hoo!

Today in the mail we received our official permission to continue homeschooling the girls!

Of Mice and (Wo)Men

So, as I mentioned in an earlier blog, I worked with my friend Alison to clean up our front garden. Yesterday dawned bright and sunny again so the girls and I decided to finish the work of preparing the soil and then plant some winter vegetables. Part of preparing the soil was adding in the compost from our handy dandy compost container in the corner of the yard. As I was reaching in for the fifth or sixth time to get some with my spade suddenly I saw movement. Not being particularly fond of critters I quickly and quietly got the cat and set her in there to do her thing. However, before she could successfully catch the moving prey, my animal-loving children came to see what the fuss was about . . . and here is what they saw:

Ok, Ok, I know he is really tiny and really very cute. In my defense, I wasn't sure what he was when I sent the cat in after him, it was only later discovered that he was a cute, tiny, furry little mouse. . . and he had a friend! Two for the price of one!

Of course everyone wanted a turn holding one of them, so each girl got a chance and we took these lovely photos. The girls named them Melchisedec (after the rat in "A Little Princess") and Mickey. One of them was quite active and kept trying to get away, the other (shown below) kept trying to play dead. He was a believable actor too until he was accidently dropped at which point he did his best to scurry away.

After lots of photos and cuddles I made the girls return the mice to the compost bin and closed it all up, thinking the little wee things would be safe from the cat.

After all, the girls had practically claimed them as pets. They weren't safe however, later that evening while we were eating supper Willow burst through the cat door with the prize in her mouth, so sad. This morning we found, unbeknownest to the girls, that Willow had successfully hunted the other one as well. Sniff.

I don't want to leave you with such a sad tale, so here is a picture of some of the tomatoes we picked. We're going to let the green ones ripen and then make some tomato sauce. We've had a banner crop of tomatoes, we've been eating them in some way, shape or form since we've arrived and still there are more to be had. Yum!

This is the cleaned up garden prior to planting - there is passionfruit growing on the trellis, parsley, still some tomatoes and pumpkin but then we added spinach, carrots, beans, lettuce and cabbage. Hopefully we'll be enjoying the fruits of our labor later this season.

School Holidays

This week and next are school holidays here, the kids get a two week break between each of the four terms. The Morrison Family school is not on holiday though because we got quite a bit behind during the transition from the U.S. to here. However, we have tried to take advantage of our friends being out of school to have some play dates. On Tuesday my friend Janine and her daughter Alicia came over in the afternoon for a few hours. Alicia is 11 and she has a younger sister who is 9, but her sister had gymnastics and couldn't come. The girls all played together really well and I enjoyed having a friend over for coffee. Then yesterday Katie's friend Pippa and her mom and brother came by for the morning. Pippa's mom, Alison, brought her gardening tools and we cleaned up my organic veggie patch in the front garden. We had a really nice time together working and chatting and the children all played together perfectly. We stopped at noon and walked down to the bakery together and grabbed some lunch.
The girls are doing very well with their schooling, but I still haven't heard from the Ministry of Education as to whether we can continue to homeschool or not. I am hoping to hear soon. We finished reading "A Little Princess" yesterday - a precious story and the girls loved it - so as a treat we rented the movie from the library. Sadly we were all quite disappointed at how much it differed from the book, but I was encouraged that they noticed all the differences and it allowed us to have a good discussion about why we liked the original better.

Since last Saturday, which was a terribly cold, wet depressing day, the sun has shone quite a bit and I am grateful!! Dugald has also conceded that the house was a bit cold and therefore we are pushing the temperature up a few degrees on the central heating. It is discouraging that most of the heat goes out the windows, but it still every little bit helps.

Life continues to be busy - the dog is a very early riser, much to our dismay! He starts whining for breakfast a little before 6 am. We finally bought and set up his kennel and run outside, but he's not a huge fan of being out there in the dark! He was quite good in it yesterday as we had to put him in while Pippa and Monty were here because Monty is a bit frightened of big dogs, but he has become quite accustomed to living inside at night and howled like nobody's business when we tried "tucking him in" to his kennel last night. So he still sleeps indoors. And wakes early. He and I usually take a walk around 6:30 which is a good thing for both of us, but I feel like I am training a newborn to sleep through the night! The cat has also kept us busy, she got in a fight and had to go to the vet and get stitches so now I have to give her antibiotics every morning and night. I just keep telling myself that it's only a season, though a busy one, and all too soon the dog will no longer be a puppy, the cat will no longer be a kitten and my beautiful babies will actually be older and self-sufficient and I will miss these days.

Dugald is very busy at work but he is really enjoying the challenges of his job. We miss having him around as much as we used to, but again I keep thinking this is just the season we are in at the moment.

After visiting many churches in the area I think we have finally decided to become members at St. Mary's, the church just up the road. I am glad to have made a decision and now we can really get involved with home groups and serving at church and hopefully make some more friends in the neighborhood. We've been quite blessed already with so many friends and family members inviting us to things, our social calendar is staying active which helps us when we might start to feel a bit homesick.

Thanks again to everyone who sends us emails, it is so nice to hear from you!!!

Various Bits of Whatnot

Greetings again from the land of the long white cloud!! We've seen a lot of the long (grey) cloud lately, only it's been dumping rain on us. This past week we had one sunny day, now I know why New Zealand is so green. It's getting colder too, winter is coming, if it isn't here already - I think the official winter months are June, July and August but we're already quite chilly. I put up a thermometer in the house to see if we really are as cold as we think we are and it says it's 61 degrees farenheit today which doesn't sound cold to me, but I'm used to the temperature inside my house being in the 70's, so this is taking some adjustment.
I just wanted to throw this picture of Josie and Ellie in because it's so cute, but it was taken months ago when it was actually warmer. Below is a picture of a "fluffy" which is a yummy chocolate drink you get the kids when you are in a cafe to escape the rain. The girls think they are fabulous! It's basically just frothed chocolate milk, but it's presented so well!

Ellie and Josie model their rain ponchos from Aunt Liz in the photos below.

All the girls went to this dentist recently but it was Ellie's first time ever, so we had to take some photos. Our dentist is a very nice lady named Mary and she made Ellie feel right at home.

Unfortunately Meggie had a cavity so we had to go back and get it filled, but I found it a bit disconcerting that they took her x-ray without a lead vest. When I mentioned that we always put on the vest for x-rays the tech told me that they only put them on pregnant women here - pregnant women!!! I went for years without getting x-rays at home because I was always pregnant. Ayiyiyi.

One of our FAVORITE New Zealand habits is having morning tea. The girls help me make some sort of muffin or cookie (called biscuit here) and we take a break from school and have tea and a snack. We all love it, especially now that it is getting colder. The girls actually drink real tea - Ellie loves it more than anyone! We started with green or fruit tea but they now prefer black tea with milk and sugar. Such Kiwis we are raising!!!

Meg had her first soccer game last Saturday - she is on a Karori team called the Corvettes. She has one other girl on the team, but she had to miss the first game so it was just Meg. It took her awhile to really get in there and go for it, but in the end she scored two of the four goals for her team and they won the game!!!

That's really all that's happening here - hope you Americans are enjoying your Spring, I'm a bit jealous :). Especially you Texans as this was my favorite time of year there!!! We love hearing from all of you - thanks for the emails.

Happy Birthday Ellie Rose!

Our baby turned three today!!! Meggie prayed that she would be potty trained by the time she is four. I'm praying that it happens sooner.

Our fiery littlest keeps us on our toes, but we love her to bits anyway. She's had a lovely day - the usual donuts for breakfast, a beautiful sunny day, lots of presents, play time at the park and made from scratch cupcakes with made from scratch icing for dessert. I was a little surprised when I went to the grocery store and realized there were no box cake mixes and no icing in a can. So, for the first time in my life, I made them all from scratch and the family raved. Yay me.

How can you resist the cuteness?

The opposite of driving. . .

. . . is walking?

I finally got the information I needed from Texas so that I could go and get my New Zealand driver's licence. As you may recall, when I went to get it earlier this year (while Sarah was still here) I was not allowed to take the test because my Texas driver's licence did not have an issue date, so there was no way to prove I've been driving for at least three years. Now I could have gone ahead and gotten a Kiwi licence by taking a driving test and a written test, but if I waited for the paperwork that proved I've been driving more than three years then I only had to take the written test.

For the following reasons I decided to wait for the paperwork - these sights used to terrify me when I was behind the wheel:

This pic is taken from the passenger side, the driver (me) sits on the right side of the car. The first few days here I always walked to the wrong side of the car.

This is a one-way bridge, of which there are many. Don't be scared, just take turns. The trick is to know who gets to go first.

However, now that I have been here, and been driving a few months, I am no longer frightened of such things, nor do I sit and wait at roundabouts for the cars on my left to go. I now know from experience that I only wait for the cars on my right to go, the cars to my left must wait for me. Sweet freedom. So, yesterday, paperwork in hand, the girls and I went down to the AA and I took the written test, and I got them all right. Sniff, sigh. Now our insurance prices should go down. . . (no comments please from the parents, I've been a very good driver since having children, note the pics below)

Our house, in the middle of the street

We've met a few more kind Kiwis! This morning after Dugald left for work and while I was in the shower an alarm suddenly went off in the house - very loud, insistent and unremitting. I jumped out and made sure there wasn't a fire, then dressed as quickly as possible and herded the kids outside in their pajamas - and the dog and the cat. For the next ten minutes, which felt like an eternity, I frantically searched for a ladder so I could get up to the alarm and pull out the battery. Sadly the only ladder I could find wasn't tall enough. Not only was the alarm frightfully loud inside the house, there is another speaker outside blasting for all the neighborhood to hear. Soon there were people gathered outside the gate checking to see if we were alright, which we were, but we were feeling a bit stupid. I wasn't sure which alarm was going off - the burglar alarm or fire alarm. I called Dugald, but he could barely hear me over the din, not to mention the fact that he was on a loud bus, so that call didn't help much. My sweet neighbor Bronwyn showed up and we worked out it was the burglar alarm and found the code and finally got it turned off. We hadn't been using the alarm at all since we arrived, so it is a complete mystery to me why it went off. Once it was quiet I stood outside, dripping wet hair, and chatted (as the Kiwis do) for quite awhile with the gathered crew of people. I have to say they were all extremely kind, but as Meggie pointed out, the entire thing was a bit embarassing. Now I have to sort out with our landlord's father why it went off and what we are to do about it . . .but I will say it was not the reaction we would have had to our alarm going off in Texas! Sarah and her brother accidently set of the alarm at our house there once and the neighbors just glanced over, but nobody really bothered about it and it wasn't nearly as loud as what we experienced here.

Katie lost her wiggly tooth last week after having it dangle for ages. Now she's working on the next one.

Last night we had Hamish and his girlfriend Delaney over for dinner and a heated game of Scrabble. They managed to win by using some made-up words, but we're taking them down next time! Hamish is our nephew who is living here in Wellington at the moment. It was really nice to have a catch-up and the girls enjoyed it too.

We had a fun weekend packed with family time! We went to an amazing party at Rob and Liz's on Friday night along with hundreds of their dearest friends:). The house looks fabulous and it was such a treat to have a grown-up night out at such a lovely party. Maddie from next door babysat the girls and that went really well, so Dugald and I are thrilled to now know we can reinstitute date night. The "Beat Girls" played at the party so there was lots of dancing, champagne, mingling and good food catered by one of Wellington's best chefs. I met some really neat people - one of them, the former Ambassador to China and now with the Ministry of Defense, we also saw at church on Sunday.

On Saturday Dugald's cousin Jo and her son Sasha came over for tea. They have just moved to Wellington from Canada so we North Americans compared notes. It was a lovely afternoon and Sasha very kindly played several board games with the girls and watch the beginning of the movie "Snow Buddies" so the adults could have some uninterrupted conversation.

I better post this as I have to walk down to the post office and bakery with the girls and Rico. He and I have been discovering some very fun walks in the mornings now that we have "Fallen Back" for daylight savings time. I was a bit afraid to go off the beaten path when it was still dark in the mornings, but now that we have light we've been exploring and the views can be simply amazing.

Hope all are well - we love to hear from you so email! I know the comments board on blogger can be a bit hard for some to leave messages.