This update is long overdue. The months of June and July were fairly busy around here with lots of visitors from all sides of the family. It's calmed down a little since then but we still haven't managed to find the time to sit down and sort through all the photos yet. I like to have all my photos uploaded to Flickr before I blog, so that I can add lots of pics to my posts. But we have two months worth of photos from four different cameras to sort through, duplicates to delete, blurry photos to delete, and photos to be named and uploaded. So I'm blogging without photos for now.
Lots has been going on around here ... where to start.
Peter's mum and family all came to visit at the beginning of June. That seems so long ago now. We all enjoyed seeing them and having them here ... among other things they provided some babysitting for us, and Patrick laid new tiles down in the bathroom and kitchen for us. While I'm sure they didn't fly halfway around the world to do DIY work, we sure appreciated it. And admit it, you love doing that stuff really ;-)
Peter's sister Gayle arrived at the beginning of July, staying for five weeks. We all flew up to Auckland to meet her there, and also to catch up with old friends there. We picked up a rental car/van and drove down to Wellington over the next five days, stopping at Rotorua, Napier and Palmerston North.
Took Gayle to see Auckland Museum, Kelly Tarltons, the Agrodome, Rainbow Springs, Hells Gate, Tamaki Maori Village, Napier Museum, Tui Brewery, and the Tararua Windfarm.
Then we had a week or two at home in Wellington, which was actually pretty busy spent packing up stuff in boxes so that it could be taken away into storage until we move house (trying to declutter the house to make it more attractive for sale). More on that later.
Then Gayle, the girls and I did a trip around the top of the South Island (Peter was working). We caught the InterIslander ferry to Picton, and stayed in Nelson, Greymouth, Christchurch and Blenheim. We saw the Pancake Rocks on the West Coast, drove through the snow in Arthurs Pass, took the tram around Christchurch, and visited a winery in Blenheim.
We finished her visit off with a week at home, seeing things around Wellington, like Te Papa, Parliament, the Cable Car, and the Karori Wildlife Sanctuary.
It was really lovely having Gayle here. So nice to have the company, and within a couple of days it felt like she belonged here. We all miss you Aunty Gayle. I'll admit it was great to have an extra pair of hands around here ... but also the funny things you brought into our lives, "that's what she said", and your teenage dramas :-) Don't take that the wrong way, BTW.
Since then I won't say that life has returned to some normalcy, because it hasn't.
PETER
Peter has started work at Massey University. Which means that he is away working in Palmerston North all or part of each week. He'll drive up (2 hours) early in the morning one day, and come home after work three days later. Or as was the case this week, five days later. The girls and I miss him very much.
HOUSE
Our house is not for sale yet, but will be soon. We've been waiting for spring - to be able to paint the outside first, to market it when the flowers are blooming, and to catch the spring house-buyers as nothing really happens over winter. But in about 3-4 weeks it goes on the market, ready or not. I'm not particularly looking forward to it. There is SO MUCH to do first, and SO LITTLE time.
VICTORIA
The biggest change on the children front is that Victoria has started crawling. She actually took her first crawling steps while we were away on holiday in Greymouth. And by the next night she was trying to climb the stairs. No kidding. She is now getting good at it and will sometimes follow me around the house (and at other times just cry until I come back). She is constantly pulling herself up to stand on furniture and everything that's even slightly above floor level. I'm sure she'd be cruising the furniture if there was furniture to cruise on, but we spend most of our time in the dining room as it has the warmest heater, so the only furniture is individual chairs.
Victoria has slept through the night for the last week, which is a record. Before now she has only slept through the night maybe once a fortnight, occasionally two nights in a row. Which is wonderful because being away on holiday unsettled her so much that she went back to waking 2-3 times a night and I just couldn't handle it.
What has coincided with her sleeping through is that she has finally begun eating solids. She hasn't shown any interest in the food I've been giving her, having one or two teaspoons then closing her mouth and refusing any more. She ate better on holiday, eating tinned food. So I finally gave in and bought tinned food, and she loves it. So much for mum's puree's that are still filling up the freezer. She's also started sharing my meals at dinner time.
Victoria also now has eight teeth.
KATHLEEN
Further to previous posts, I would say that Kathleen is offially potty trained. We have had the odd accident but since I last wrote on the subject she has worn knickers every day, no more nappies. (Apart from when we were travelling we got her Pull Ups for just in case). She usually tells me when she needs to go, although sometimes it's a little too late.
We have started going to Playcentre one afternoon a week. All three of us go along and I work as part of the team. Next term Kathleen may get a drop off session one other day a week. Kathleen enjoys it at Playcentre, and all the different things they have to experience. It's good for her to be able to mix with older children, and sometimes she comes home and wants to play the same games the older girls were playing. Although her favourite activities are still the dolls house and the puzzles. Victoria enjoys it too, although sometimes it conflicts with her nap which is difficult.
ME
Overall I think things are looking a lot better. Getting full nights of sleep definitely helps a lot. However now that Victoria is crawling, the fighting has begun. Kathleen is having trouble sometimes with Victoria wanting to play with her and her toys. I've started applying the same rules to Victoria that we apply to Kathleen - "No Victoria, it's Kathleen's turn with it now, you will have to wait till she's finished, how about this other toy instead". Victoria doesn't notice what's happening, but hopefully Kathleen feels vindicated that she's not the only one who has to share. The other day Kathleen left her juice on the floor and Victoria spilled it everywhere. A meltdown ensued because "IT WAS MINE". All I could think was "how many more times am I going to hear this argument over the next 18 years"!!! LOL.
-Megz
28 August 2008
16 June 2008
Buying the Farm
I have big news to tell ... Peter and I have bought a 'lifestyle property' just outside of Levin and we will be moving there by the end of the year. Not only that, but Peter has got a new job at Massey University in Palmerston North and will be starting work there next month.
We have been talking for a long time about buying some land and trying to live as sustainably and self-sufficiently as possible. We started talking about this before these concepts hit the mainstream media. I think it was probably 2004 or 2005 when Peter first introduced me to the concept of peak oil via the documentary The End of Suburbia. Since then it's been in the back of our mind the need to start looking after ourselves because the cost of petrol, groceries and living is just going to continue to rise. However, with Kathleen coming along and us wanting to move to Wellington to be nearer to family, this idea was put on the backburner. We started talking about it again about a year ago, but with Victoria now on the way I said I wanted to wait until she turned one before moving (having only just moved with Kathleen then 10 months old and knowing I didn't want to be raising a new baby out in the 'wop wops' with no support nearby).
However. About two months ago I happened to be browsing on TradeMe and happened to see a place I really liked. So I flicked it on to Peter and we went to look at it the next weekend. We really fell in love with the place. We went back to look again and then put in an offer. The offer went unconditional last week. The vendor is selling because they're moving to Australia, however they're not moving till the end of the year. So we arranged a settlement date of mid-December - this we thought would give us plenty of time to sell our current house in Island Bay, and for Peter to find a job. I didn't really expect him to get the very first job he applied for, but he has.
The place we've bought is on 11 acres of land which is approximately 4 or 5 paddocks, one of which is entirely planted out in lavender and which provides a supplemental income. The house is approximately 400 square metres (4300 square foot?). It has 5 bedrooms, 4 bathrooms and 3 living areas. There will be HEAPS of room for our family to expand (not in the way of more children, but in the way of more stuff). We are already finding our current house way too small and as the girls get older and accumulate more stuff (as little girls tend to do), it's only going to get more and more cluttered.
The house was built in the 1930's and moved to its present site approx 15 years ago. At that time it had a basement/games room and garage added underneath and a self contained unit added upstairs. We just fell in love with the house. It's got old style charm. Sure it needs some work done to it and some maintenance brought up to standard. But it feels like a HOME rather than just a house.
The land is pretty much exactly what we were looking for. It's the size we wanted. It's not flat, but it's not steep either. The house is situated on the highest point of the land, therefore not a flooding risk. There is a creek at the back of the property. There are trees for shelter and trees for firewood. There are established fruit trees. There is a large lawn for the girls to run around on. There is ample space for a vege garden.
It is only a five minute drive to the centre of Levin and the main highway & railway. There is a school bus that stops outside to take the girls to school. And just a couple of properties down the road is a cafe/restaurant.
Peter's new job involves Network Security (sorry don't know the job title) at Massey University. He'll be starting there on July 22nd. They've been very flexible about his start date and hours of work, which is great. He'll have to spend the first couple of weeks there while he learns the ropes, but after that they've said he can work from Wellington a couple of days a week, and Palmerston North 3 days a week. So he will be home as much as possible until we sell the house and all move there permanently. During this time Peter will be staying with our wonderful friends Lou and Caliope in Palmerston North.
About the only downside to all this is that our new property is actually a half hour drive away from Palmerston North. So Peter will be facing a half hour commute each way. And with rising petrol prices, that's almost defeating the purpose of why we wanted to move to the country. However, where he is working at the moment he currently has either a half hour drive or one hour bus/train commute each way, so it will be no worse and possibly better than we have now. There is a bus from Levin to Palmy, but it would see him away from home from 6.30am till 6.30pm, so is not ideal.
So the next step for us is to spruce up our current house and list it for sale. I don't really want to but it's the only way. It's really, really hard to have to sell the house I grew up in. Our plans for renovating the house have been put aside. It was a bit of a shame because I had put a lot of effort into choosing the right benchtops, cabinets and vinyl floor for the kitchen, and the carpets and curtains for the rest of the house. It was a fun project, although sometimes difficult to be dragging the girls from store to store all the time.
Do you believe in fate? I think I do. Twice now we have come to the point of signing on the dotted line to begin renovating the house, and twice now we have pulled out at the last minute. The first time we were ready to go then they came back and said it would cost twice our budget and be finished the day before Victoria was due. The second time we'd drawn up all the plans for the kitchen and were just about ready to go when I found the farm online and we stopped to rethink. I think it must be fate saying that we're not meant to mess with it. We are currently in the process of doing a few little things to tart it up, but nothing major. I'll blog that in a separate post.
So now Peter is in his last couple of weeks working at IBM. At the beginning of July his sister Gayle arrives from the States and he'll take a couple of weeks off to spend with her (and show her some of the country). Then on 22nd July he starts work in Palmerston North and will be gone for three days a week. And that will go on until we sell this house. However long that will take. Hopefully not too long.
Ironically we did the same thing when we moved from Auckland to Wellington. Peter went on ahead and I stayed behind with Kathleen to sell the house. Kathleen was at that time 9-10 months old. And this time it'll be me with Kathleen and Victoria. And Victoria will be 8 months old.
But it is an exciting time. Much as I'm sad to be leaving Island Bay and my childhood home, I'm excited about the new life and the new challenges we are going to have.
-Megz
PS: Full credit for all the photos goes to Les Tilbury from LJ Hooker Levin
We have been talking for a long time about buying some land and trying to live as sustainably and self-sufficiently as possible. We started talking about this before these concepts hit the mainstream media. I think it was probably 2004 or 2005 when Peter first introduced me to the concept of peak oil via the documentary The End of Suburbia. Since then it's been in the back of our mind the need to start looking after ourselves because the cost of petrol, groceries and living is just going to continue to rise. However, with Kathleen coming along and us wanting to move to Wellington to be nearer to family, this idea was put on the backburner. We started talking about it again about a year ago, but with Victoria now on the way I said I wanted to wait until she turned one before moving (having only just moved with Kathleen then 10 months old and knowing I didn't want to be raising a new baby out in the 'wop wops' with no support nearby).
However. About two months ago I happened to be browsing on TradeMe and happened to see a place I really liked. So I flicked it on to Peter and we went to look at it the next weekend. We really fell in love with the place. We went back to look again and then put in an offer. The offer went unconditional last week. The vendor is selling because they're moving to Australia, however they're not moving till the end of the year. So we arranged a settlement date of mid-December - this we thought would give us plenty of time to sell our current house in Island Bay, and for Peter to find a job. I didn't really expect him to get the very first job he applied for, but he has.
The place we've bought is on 11 acres of land which is approximately 4 or 5 paddocks, one of which is entirely planted out in lavender and which provides a supplemental income. The house is approximately 400 square metres (4300 square foot?). It has 5 bedrooms, 4 bathrooms and 3 living areas. There will be HEAPS of room for our family to expand (not in the way of more children, but in the way of more stuff). We are already finding our current house way too small and as the girls get older and accumulate more stuff (as little girls tend to do), it's only going to get more and more cluttered. The house was built in the 1930's and moved to its present site approx 15 years ago. At that time it had a basement/games room and garage added underneath and a self contained unit added upstairs. We just fell in love with the house. It's got old style charm. Sure it needs some work done to it and some maintenance brought up to standard. But it feels like a HOME rather than just a house.
The land is pretty much exactly what we were looking for. It's the size we wanted. It's not flat, but it's not steep either. The house is situated on the highest point of the land, therefore not a flooding risk. There is a creek at the back of the property. There are trees for shelter and trees for firewood. There are established fruit trees. There is a large lawn for the girls to run around on. There is ample space for a vege garden. It is only a five minute drive to the centre of Levin and the main highway & railway. There is a school bus that stops outside to take the girls to school. And just a couple of properties down the road is a cafe/restaurant.
Peter's new job involves Network Security (sorry don't know the job title) at Massey University. He'll be starting there on July 22nd. They've been very flexible about his start date and hours of work, which is great. He'll have to spend the first couple of weeks there while he learns the ropes, but after that they've said he can work from Wellington a couple of days a week, and Palmerston North 3 days a week. So he will be home as much as possible until we sell the house and all move there permanently. During this time Peter will be staying with our wonderful friends Lou and Caliope in Palmerston North. 
About the only downside to all this is that our new property is actually a half hour drive away from Palmerston North. So Peter will be facing a half hour commute each way. And with rising petrol prices, that's almost defeating the purpose of why we wanted to move to the country. However, where he is working at the moment he currently has either a half hour drive or one hour bus/train commute each way, so it will be no worse and possibly better than we have now. There is a bus from Levin to Palmy, but it would see him away from home from 6.30am till 6.30pm, so is not ideal.
So the next step for us is to spruce up our current house and list it for sale. I don't really want to but it's the only way. It's really, really hard to have to sell the house I grew up in. Our plans for renovating the house have been put aside. It was a bit of a shame because I had put a lot of effort into choosing the right benchtops, cabinets and vinyl floor for the kitchen, and the carpets and curtains for the rest of the house. It was a fun project, although sometimes difficult to be dragging the girls from store to store all the time. 
Do you believe in fate? I think I do. Twice now we have come to the point of signing on the dotted line to begin renovating the house, and twice now we have pulled out at the last minute. The first time we were ready to go then they came back and said it would cost twice our budget and be finished the day before Victoria was due. The second time we'd drawn up all the plans for the kitchen and were just about ready to go when I found the farm online and we stopped to rethink. I think it must be fate saying that we're not meant to mess with it. We are currently in the process of doing a few little things to tart it up, but nothing major. I'll blog that in a separate post.
So now Peter is in his last couple of weeks working at IBM. At the beginning of July his sister Gayle arrives from the States and he'll take a couple of weeks off to spend with her (and show her some of the country). Then on 22nd July he starts work in Palmerston North and will be gone for three days a week. And that will go on until we sell this house. However long that will take. Hopefully not too long.Ironically we did the same thing when we moved from Auckland to Wellington. Peter went on ahead and I stayed behind with Kathleen to sell the house. Kathleen was at that time 9-10 months old. And this time it'll be me with Kathleen and Victoria. And Victoria will be 8 months old.
But it is an exciting time. Much as I'm sad to be leaving Island Bay and my childhood home, I'm excited about the new life and the new challenges we are going to have.
-Megz
PS: Full credit for all the photos goes to Les Tilbury from LJ Hooker Levin
07 June 2008
Visitors
Over the next couple of months we will be busy with two sets of visitors arriving from the United States (co-inciding with the summer holidays over there).
Peter's mum and Mardie arrived safely this morning, with Poppa and Richard due to arrive in a few days time. They'll be here for two weeks.
Then 10 days after they leave, Peter's sister Gayle arrives for her first visit to New Zealand. She'll be here for a month so there will be lots of time to show her the country.
We are really looking forward to all our guests, and Kathleen is very excited to see everyone again. The moment Mimi and Mardie walked in the door this morning it was like they'd never left.
-Megz
Peter's mum and Mardie arrived safely this morning, with Poppa and Richard due to arrive in a few days time. They'll be here for two weeks.
Then 10 days after they leave, Peter's sister Gayle arrives for her first visit to New Zealand. She'll be here for a month so there will be lots of time to show her the country.
We are really looking forward to all our guests, and Kathleen is very excited to see everyone again. The moment Mimi and Mardie walked in the door this morning it was like they'd never left.
-Megz
04 June 2008
Potty Training Part II
I think I may have made a big mistake with Kathleen's potty training. She's been refusing to use the potty and I have slipped into the habit of asking her if she wanted to wear nappies or knickers each morning, rather than get into a fight about using the potty and scaring her off it. Lately she chooses nappies every time. On the few occasions recently when she has worn knickers, I think she has forgotten she's not wearing nappies and has had accidents. All this has not been helped by a suspected urine infection last week.
So I'm wondering if she's still not ready and I should just give up and go back to nappies full time, or if I should persevere and stop offering the nappy option. Obviously using both is not working.
The other complicating factor is that Kathleen is wearing cloth nappies designed for 7-14kgs. She's only about 13kg and they fit her fine. But Victoria is nearing, if not already at, 7kg and needs to be wearing the large size now too. It's great that Victoria has been able to reuse all of Kathleen's old cloth nappies, but not so easy now that they're in the same size range. Especially given how many Vicky is going through each day. I am so sick of doing laundry!!!
-Megz
So I'm wondering if she's still not ready and I should just give up and go back to nappies full time, or if I should persevere and stop offering the nappy option. Obviously using both is not working.
The other complicating factor is that Kathleen is wearing cloth nappies designed for 7-14kgs. She's only about 13kg and they fit her fine. But Victoria is nearing, if not already at, 7kg and needs to be wearing the large size now too. It's great that Victoria has been able to reuse all of Kathleen's old cloth nappies, but not so easy now that they're in the same size range. Especially given how many Vicky is going through each day. I am so sick of doing laundry!!!
-Megz
24 May 2008
MAMA
Victoria said her first word today, or her first syllables of any kind really. Wanna know what she said? MAMA. Or "muhmuhmuhmuh" to be precise.
And once she started, she just kept going. Probably because she got such a big reaction from me. She spent the evening tonight grinning and talking.
Uh oh. If she's anything like her big sister, now that she's started talking SHE WON'T STOP. Arrgh, my dreams of a quiet life are now well and truely shattered.
Cheers,
Megz
PS: Victoria has been blogging too
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