The weekend was marked by the first swim of the season (well apart from Eric who went in a few days earlier). Now you would really need to have stayed here to understand the significance of this. Eric tends his pool lovingly for months before this auspicious occasion. If he disappears you know he'll be on the pool deck trawling leaves, filtering or back washing. That or he's waving a test kit in front of a window asking you if you think it's 8 or 9, .5 or .6 or x ppm of something. Everything is then thrown out of kilter when the kids jump in and their body chemicals mess up his numbers!!! Seriously though there is nothing more satisfying than hearing the kids laughing and having fun in the water, especially for Eric who worked so hard to install the pool in the first place. The next occasion will be me getting in. That does not occur until the temp reaches 24 degrees minimum and occured on Xmas Eve last year. At the moment it's just hitting 20.
I promised to relay something of Harriette's schools arts evening. Well it was an evening performance of speech (this terms 2 year winners), kapa haka and various music and singing events. The kapa haka was excellent but went on for rather too long. It was incredibly loud and the boys seem to have a competition to see who can draw blood from their chest!! Some suceeded. The musical events where good. It is amazing to see how far Harriette's band has progressed in 7 months. The year 7 choir was not brilliant (we found out that Harri was in the choir when she got up on the stage!), the Yr 8 one was smaller and much better. The school has a rock band which was excellent. One boy, on some sort of electric guitar looked incongruous in his school uniform (long shorts, long socks) and this huge guitar!
The weekend. Well Friday I went and paid for the piano and Eric took the trailer up to Hamilton to collect it. Poor guy almost got a hernia moving it - I was useless, couldn't lift a corner of it. Anyway with a few sheets of ply wood and lots of effort it was finally ensconced in the dining room. Not the prettiest thing in the world but it sounds a hundred times better than the one we had and Harriette and Alice are delighted with it. We are going to give our old one to Juliet and Kev. I made pizzas and we sat down to watch the rugby in the evening. Sadly Waikato lost to Wellington in the NPC rugby semi-final. No doubt about it, the better team won. Waikato made some terrible handling errors. It wasn't a walk over by any means and for awhile we were ahead. A disappointing result but we have had a very young and inexperienced team this season so they did well to get this far.
On Saturday Alice went in to the A and P show in town to do some fun races with her school. Bridget was there having shown some of her cows and kindly supported Alice (whilst I did some shopping), took photo's and brought Alice home. I hope giving her a couch for an afternoon doze and supper was a suitable reward (Bridget milked Sat am). I was busy cooking an Indian meal for The Scotts for that night and you know how long cooking Indian dishes takes! I did Rogan Josh, Pork Vindaloo (Alices favourite) and Eric did a duck in ginger. I had found some homemade chapatis at a greengrocers owned by an Indian family on Friday which I was delighted with as I cannot make them to save my life. I also made a wonderful sweet milk pudding and Robyn bought trifle and cheesecake so we did not go hungry!! Another pleasant evening. Poor Robyn is shattered at the moment. She left her job working in a kindie, sorry kindergarten (she is studying pre-school teaching) to work on their farm for a year as they have found it difficult to find a suitable farm worker. She reared all the calves through Jul, Aug and Sept and now is milking. Up at 4.30am at the moment as they are AB-ing at this time of year as well. Yes I know Richard also gets up that early but he's always done it so doesn't get the same degree of sympathy!!! Kathryn was at friends on Sat night so did not come but the famous Paige Gooch was staying overnight with Sarah so she did come. The 4 girls wanted to swim, but after dark!!
Sunday the weather was gorgeous, so warm. It was delightful. I tackled the garden bed around the dining room and Harris bedroom and again did some serious rationalisation of what's in the beds. It was so crowded. I am currently working out of the living room and as I sit at my computer to work I have been looking at a lot of weeds. It looks so much nicer now. I also cleared up a bit at the end of the drive on the road. In an attempt to avoid cooking we had left overs so no roast or BBQ. I took lots of photos of the piglets and will try to get some posted.
Eric went to R and R's to collect 200 litres of left over, 3 month old colostrum. I cannot tell you how disgusting it smells but the pigs love it! If Eric splashes some on himself when feeding it doesn't matter how well he scrubs himself it still smells. Boiler suit and leaving clothes outside time! He also fixed the taranaki gate (a Heath Robinson affair of a gate made of pig netting and posts), checked all the electric fencing, mowed lawns and sorted out the last of the silage bales. H and A swam and sunbathed!!!!
Last night (Monday) Bridget and I went to see Booke Fraser in concert at a chapel (remember this is NZ so don't think oldy worldy sort of chapel!) in a Hamilton high school. I enjoyed it and because I thought it started at 7.30pm (when actually it was 8pm) I got their early and got us seats in the 5th row. Ms Fraser is incredibly talented with excellent songwriting skills and a wide vocal range. And so mature for her age. I did feel that the music was rather loud for such a small venue and over-powered everything at times. The girl who did her backing vocals was excellent. I enjoyed most the ballardy songs with just her on keyboards or her and a guy both playing acoustic guitars. Does that make me sound old?
Well I think that just about brings everything up to speed. Wonder how H is getting on at camp? Oh and Alices cheeks don't look slapped any more.
No comments:
Post a Comment