Taotaoroa Tattler
I must be getting kiwi-ised. I don't ever remember getting excited about rain in the UK, S.Africa yes (after we had seen none for 7 months), the UK no. But here, getting anxious about lack of grass is a pastime we seem to have engaged in. Our summer has actually happened (thank heavens) and come rather late. We are seeing signs of autumn now with the trees (ooops I meant leaves!) falling (and as a consequence the pool filling with the damned things) but the temperatures remain warm. That makes months of good weather now. We went to The Mount recently and the sea was incredibly warm.
Easter weekend and, at the children's request, we have just been to church. Now, Eric is playing with his fishing tackle (a new pastime since he and Richard planned a fishing trip when we were at The Mount). He 'discovered' a new knot last night and got sooo excited about it. Somehow I couldn't get as excited! Alice is sorting her photo's taken on camp. I have given her an IKEA frame to use and she is decorating the border. Harriette is sulking in her room having been reprimanded about her 'me me' attitude following their Easter Egg hunt. Big strop when the Easter bunny had not been by 7.30am!! Amazingly she was so good yesterday. She washed my car (had to really, I had gone halves on a dress for her and she was $5 short so offered to wash my car) but them she came and helped me weeding the garden AND she made the pizzas for supper. AND, and this you won't believe.......she cleared up afterwards!!!!! She obviously was not well.
Juliet and Kev came down on Thursday evening for one night. They are so much more relaxed now even though they are weeks away from a pay packet and will be months recovering from the finacial repercissions of this period in their lives, but knowing Kev now has a job is just brilliant. They bought their 3 labs (one of each colour) and so we had 5 of them here. They all just managed to sleep in the kennel but the Stokes dogs, or one of them, barks much of the night!! Thank heavens that is never been a problem with ours. They left on Friday and it rained... and rained... and rained. And do you know what I did, absolutely nothing! It was wonderful. I sat down and read Harry Potter, all afternoon. I cannot tell you what a pleasure that was. We seem to have run around constantly since Eric started Uni. and were desperate for the break this weekend offered. With our student gone on Thursday the atmosphere in the house has been a lot lighter as well. We have the first 3 HP books on audio cassette and I have listened to those stories so often that I could almost recite them, but the 4th and 5th books I had forgotten most of so am reading them again in anticipation of the 6th due out in July. I love them as much as I did on the first reading! In NZ the books are released at 11am so they do not have the sleep in's that they have in the northern hemisphere. Still there is always much anticipation and in this house 3 people trying to get the book to read.
Yesterday was the usual into Matamata for the library and bits and pieces and then another lazy day. After lunch I was feeling particuarly unmotivated (it's no good having time to relax!) and really had to force myself outside by mid afternoon. I felt much better after a few hours weeding though. In the evening I made my traditional Simnel cake. I asked Alice, at one point, to put a piece of greaseproof paper over it half way through cooking to prevent it burning. What Alice failed to tell me was that is was already heading in that direction and another hour later is was positively charred! I am therefore baking another one now, at a much lower temperature!
Before church I phoned Louise and had a great chat. Louise is one of my oldest friends, we met the first day we started out nurse training (28 years ago!!!!!) and she has been through a rough patch of late. I was worried about her and relieved to hear that things are much better now. Lu is a regular reader of blog but an irregular commentor! I have tried to chivvy her along after explaining who D-Man was (do I know myself?!) and filling her in on a few other gaps.
Well I guess I had better get outside as the sun is shining at the moment. Eric was casting off the deck when I last saw him and by the sound of things he has the water blater out. Perhaps he is mimicking the seas waves and gettinng in the mood for a sea trip. Richard, please take him away soooooon!!!
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