Camping

The school holidays are drawing to a close. One week left. I don't look forward to the rush around in the morning before school routines, making school lunches, nagging at the kids to get dressed, have they got everything in their bags, etc etc.  I am going to miss the sleep ins, the flexibility of the holidays, the relaxed days of mucking about doing not much at all. I am looking forward to some quiet child free time, crafting on my own, the food in the pantry lasting longer and not hearing "what are we going to do?" every 1/2 hour or so.

These holidays have gone quite fast for me. Normally the summer holidays drag on and the kids get scratchy and bored and tired of each other. I think that we have had a really good balance of doing stuff and not doing stuff to make the kids have a good time enough to not get overly bored or frustrated.

Our highlight of the holidays was going camping for the first time as a family.
Our friend Danielle asked us and came up with a solution for us not having a tent so I said, heck why not! And it was the best decision ever!!

I must admit I was a bit apprehensive about how the kids would be, since this was their first time camping. It was also the first time since I had been camping since I was a teenager so I was a little worried about how I would like it too!!

So on Dec 27th we headed off to Parakai Springs Camping Ground. Undecided how long we would stay and going with a fully flexible mind.

There was between 3 and 8 tents in our group the whole time. Loads of kids and adults to keep all of us busy and entertained. We stayed until Jan 2nd.

Sleeping in a tent was such a great novelty! The kids really loved it. Plus it's fun to play with torches when it gets dark!!

Watergun fights were a daily occurrence. There were a few ice fights in there as well!

Camp fires were a must have, even though on night three were were told by camp management that we weren't allowed any more. I sorta became un-official fire starter. We didn't have any paper so the kids were sent on dry leaf and stick collecting explorations. Just so you guys know ... eucalyptus leaves burn really well and smell nice too!!

With camp fires comes marshmellow toasting! mmmmm YUMMY!

And then there was the swimming! I am pretty nervous when it comes to water and my kids. Camping at the beach would have been a stressful horrible time for me I think. Camping at Parakai was AWESOME. When we went swimming EVERYONE went to the pool together. It was so much fun. The kids loved it. Much better than freaking out about the kids with the beach near by!!

One of the last days we drove out to the Macadamia Nut Farm - Mac Nut Farms. The Macadamia ice cream and milkshakes were soooo yummy!! There is a little walk where you can head down to this amazing Lily Pond. It was just really cool there. And lovely to head away from camp for the day.

Of course we also had lots of just chillin' and relaxing time. I don't think I did half as much reading as I would have liked (and probably drank a bit too much cider!)

All in all it was a fabulous holiday. We loved it so much we are looking into getting our own tent and everything for next year!!!

Holiday In Christchurch

Man where oh where do I begin?!?!

Well a long long time ago My friend Nicola convinced me that I needed to go down to her home town of Christchurch to attend the Scrappin' Patch Retreat in September. I though hmm well ok why not. So I booked my spot paid my deposit and didn't think too much about it.

After all that, Christchurch was devastated by some pretty horrific earthquakes, destroying many iconic buildings, losing many lives and turning the lives of many upside down. {read about it HERE} So when September suddenly appeared I was quite excited (as well as a little nervous) about heading down to Christchurch, and the South Island, for the first time.

So on Wednesday, 6 nights after I moved into my new house, I was heading to Christchurch on an airplane!


I have never flown on my own before so that was a new experience for me. But once I stepped out of the airport to see my lovely friend Nicola waiting for me I was completely at ease and totally happy to be there.

I spent 2 nights with Nicola and her family. I got to have a little look around Christchurch and witness some of the earthquake damage. It was common sight to see bricks piled up against broken walls, curbs with humps and cracks everywhere from the roads to the houses. Thankfully (for me!) there was no after shocks while I was there but the people of Christchurch have to continue to live with these constantly. I really feel for them.



Something else I got to do while in Christchurch was to visit the Scrap It Simple store that my friend Hilary owns. If you remember I helped Hilary out with her stall at SENZ in June. It was really nice to be able to see the 'real' shop and catch up with Hilary as well.



Friday afternoon Hilary picked Nic and I up and we headed to Glentui for Scrap Camp!! It was a lovely drive out there and I was very excited to see Snow on the Southern Alps!



We were the last to arrive and after taking our bags up to our room, unpacking our totes and getting settled in we were straight into our first class with our International Tutor, Steph Devlin.



Our first class was an Off the Page project on a canvas.



I really enjoyed making the little canvas and was pretty pleased with how it turned out. It was amazing how we all did the same thing but every ones looked different. It was a great night.

I shared a table with Nicola and Hilary and we were so lucky to be sat with the two most fun and lovely ladies ever! Jo and Anne. They were a blast and we have decided next retreat we are all going to bunk in together! So cool to make new friends!!



Our table was right next to the fire place and the AMAZING view out the HUGE windows.



Glentui was an amazing venue. The food was plentiful and delicious. The grounds were spectacular. It is certainly a place I would recommend to anyone!

After the class we stayed up and did some scrapping of our own and then toddled off to bed. Nothing Quite like scrapping in your PJs!!!



Saturday was an early morning and a great day filled with another class with Steph, lots of kits and free scrapping, laughs, food photo taking and snacks. Another late night (1.30) and then talking until who knows when!



Sunday came with another early start a bit of scrapping, and packing up. We had planned to have lunch and head home. While we were packing up we heard news there was a 4.5 Aftershock in Christchurch. The only quake while I was there and we didn't even feel it out at camp!!

Hilary drove us back to Nicola's place after lots of farewells and then off to the airport to head home.


It was sad to say goodbye but also really great to be heading home to my kiddies who I missed a lot!! And by their reactions to seeing me I think they missed me too!!

Such an AWESOME weekend with some AWESOME ladies. I can't wait to do it all again!!

The Auckland Sky Tower

My kids LOVE the sky tower ... every time we drive through Auckland they get excited to see it and for the longest time I have been promising to take them up it. Well the Easter holidays I finally made true of my promise.



We met up with our good friend Taryn and her kids Adam and Madison, and away we went.
First you had to go down a BIG escalator to get to where you buy the tickets and go up the Lift. Children under 5yrs are Free so we were pleasantly surprised by that! Plus if you pay an extra $2 each Adult ticket you can go up again during the day so we did that since we were only an hour away from our booked lunch date.

The lift goes up FAST and has a bit of glass floor, plus seeing out the sides every so often. The Kids LOVED looking out the glass floor to watch the Lift go up and down.



We were lucky enough to get a spectacular day with beautiful blue skies and the view at the top was AMAZING. I've been up the tower a few times but I don't think I'd ever get bored of the views! Stunning!

The kids wandered around, looking out windows, standing and walking on the glass, I took as many photos as possible!!







We went back down the tower for lunch at the Fortuna Buffet Restaurant, which I HIGHLY recommend by the way!



I have had the pleasure of going to the Fortuna three times now, once with the wonderful Jenny and once with Beautiful Nic. All three times the food was amazing and the prices for the kids was amazing! Abbey cost $3.50 and Riley only $6 - totally worth it for the amount they ate!! (after looking for a link to this restaurant I see it has closed while they build a bigger better one!! Opening In August 2011! How exciting!)

After lunch we went back up the tower for another browse around and more photo opportunities





All in all it was a great day out! I wouldn't be doing it again in a hurry because Adult prices are $28 but you can get a years pass which is totally worth it if you were in Auckland alot or lived there. The kids had fun and so did I!!

The Boredom Box

It's school holidays .. and while so far the kids have been pretty good there is still the odd occassion where you ask what they want to do and get the standard answer of "I don't know". So I decided to do something about that!! I came up with The Boredom Box idea. Now how it works is you give the box a big shake and the kids pick out a chip. On each of the 50 chips that are in the box is an activity that the kids can do. Things like bike riding, puzzles, blocks, trampoline, movies etc etc. On the top of the box is a spinner. Now depending on what they pull out of the box they might have to spin the arrow on the spinner e.g. they pull the ice cream chip out of the box. On the Spinner it says HOME GMA YOU OUT so if the arrow lands on GMA we go have ice cream with Grandma, or OUT we go have ice cream somewhere out etc.



I used poker chips a wooden treasure chest box and lots of Mod Podge for this project! And I am totally stoked at how it turned out!!






Now I know Riley is just dying to try this one out tomorrow!!!