Christmas day at Hawea Flat

And there was plenty more food too, including 5 different types of puddings. Sue and Sara were busy.

Lennox eating his birthday dinner.


Lennox eating chocolate cake, his defence mechanism ready for action accordingly.

Stina singing Happy Birthday in her language from Sweden.

Georgie.


Birthday bubbles.

I read this excellent speech:
http://moreintelligentlife.com/story/david-foster-wallace-in-his-own-words

Getting rid of old stuff in a dramatic and effective way.

Caoimhe gets down to the business of printing on fabric. She printed a human over the humans that already existed on her t-shirt (she didn't like the look of the pre-existing humans).

Caoimhe's painting above from this afternoon's session.

Caoimhe making a guacamole.

One of Jeremy's talents: making dishes like this outside.

It didn't matter that it started to rain.



Eating the goods straight from the pan.

pics from yesterday

Industrious, making cakes, biscuits and muffins.

First go at pavers. We had 6 children and 2 adults including me carrying Lennox and in the persisting down rain. It was not that fun for me but the kids seem to have good time.

Trying new season nectarines, not very sweet actually. This was just after we went for an explore in the bush behind our friend's (we have a few different friends around who have properties like this) paradisical coastal property south of Westport. We had a look at one of their penguin burrows which had a chick and a parent in there, we thought it was the Dad as he seemed pretty (and understandably) cranky for opening up their safe home, a mother would be too no doubt. They were stinky! Caoimhe thought. It felt pretty special to be able to have a look at these guys, they are pretty rare the Blue Penguins, on the West Coast and in NZ numbers are declining overall but numbers have increased locally this year. Timo and Reuben found no rats or stoats in the 42 traps they checked last week.

This photo below is taken from about 1m away from their couch in their living room. Nice eh! Timo and Caoimhe had a good play in the sea with body boards, about the third dip so far this year. It's great living so close to beaches.

2 in a few days.

Lenny has been reading the Mixed Up Chameleon by Erice Carle lately and maybe it inspired him to go part monkey, part spider man, part dinosaur.

Gun practice. Not me.


Our first froglet which we will return to Granity soon where Timo found it. We're not sure but looking at its habitat and where the tadpole came from, we currently think it could be a Brown Tree Frog - Litoria ewingii.

We found some Oyster Catcher eggs randomly spread at the beach near dog and weka prints and found another nest nearby so added them to it, no idea how they are doing but Oyster Catchers lay a max of about 3 eggs in their nest and the one we added the eggs to already had 3 in it, we didn't know this until after, but maybe the mother and father are looking after them...

Timo is going stoat trapping with Reuben today at the stretch of beach with penguin burrows at Tauranga Bay (in between a birthday party and a human circus).

Paver update: we have created a craft group with parents and children to work here so the plan is to do pavers one day this coming week with the group.

A success in the world outside Martins Creek - we received funding for the SPACE group I facilitate that has been up and running again this term, here is a picture of some of the mothers and their babies and the NW owner operators presenting the cheque. It is the second lot of funding received, totalling about $3000 from me simply writing 2 letters, the first to fund a laptop for Playcentre and the second for resources for SPACE - the Foodstuffs (New World) community grant is a good source to apply for if you have a group you would like funding for. This picture with a blurb was on the front of the local newspaper.

Broad bean harvest. Lennox set up this operation, he is a boy of form.



We have discovered who the strawberry thief is. It is not a blackbird.

The littlest Prince, and the cow.


Timo mounded his potatoes while the other two were as happy as two little piggies in stinky muck.


Princess Caoimhe:


And the poor pest that Timo caught in this box trap that doesn't instantly kill things. It was put to an end in the most humane way possible involving a gun, yes, that's right, a gun. I personally am feeling a little uneasy about the fact that we now have a gun in the house. However, Timo is getting plenty of education in safety and target practice with Jeremy. He's building skills to go rabbit shooting in Hawea to continue his good pest control work for the environment.

Post-breakfast, "cheese".


The weather has been mostly raining lately, this was a morning of writing books of silly nonsense:

Loves to draw:


The great walnut shell boat race:

Helping a sparrow out:


Caoimhe's drawing of 'Pinky Pie' a toy pony with lots of wild hair on loan to her from a friend


Timo's trapping in the bush at the back of the property is proving successful: Rattus rattus, and a big one, body 17cm, tail 18cm. Another small one caught this morn.


self-drawn pirates:

Timo and Caoimhe listening to Frank (our wwoofer who has been with us for a long time and this is his 3rd time here) on guitar, and Granity Playcentre children and Years 1,2,3 and maybe 4 from Granity School.

Caoimhe and her good friend Riley.

Windy Sunday

Making samosas for tea which we are now eating with Lolo's chutney.

I was too tired to take them to the park to fly the kite so we decided to make our own smaller versions.
It was more fun for them than flying the one big kite high in the sky.
Lenny was happy to run around pulling a piece of string attached to a serviette:

7am this morning checking the eel net: There was an eel in there at this point and moments later it managed (with Timo's help) to escape. Timo was pretty upset about it but now he knows to listen to instructions about not messing with the net.