Halloween 2011

Halloween in NZ is a totally different ball game to in the states.  In most areas they just dont do it. Period. There aren't any shops decorated, no haunted houses down the street. Nothing.  It's actually kinda refreshing.  I mean, I know the dressing up part is fun, but the more I thought about it, the more I felt like it was just a comerical excuse for kids to be greedy and eat alot of candy.  And all the demon, scarey stuff is not exactly kid friendly.  Of course when I lived in the states I was all for it, but now that I'm out of the motherland, I guess I feel differently.
Anyway.
My SIL and I were talking about it all and we decided that we never wanted our children to feel like they were missing out.  And so we started a new family tradition.  Of having a non-scary Halloween party.  The kids dress up, we play games, they get some lollies.  All the best parts of a 'traditional' Halloween without any of the spooky stuff.
And it was awesome.  It was exactly what we wanted it to be, and everyone had a blast.

Malachi was "...a builder man like uncle matt!", and Vili was a cowboy (not a boy cow, as i had to keep explaining to his cousins).





Then we had some princesses, fairies, a superhero, an elephant, an ewok, and spiderman.



We did bowling, apple bobbing, egg and spooon race, balloon race, digging in slime, wrap a granny, and a treasure hunt for the kids to find their treats. Vili of course participated in none of the games because he was crying the whole time, darn you blasted teeth!!!



















Last minute I decided to dress up too.



Happy Halloween everyone!

Malachi's prayers

Malachi says the funniest prayers ever.  I think he uses prayer time as a soapbox, to kind of just talk about whatever he wants.  So long as he puts "thank you for..." or "please bless..." in front, it's pretty much ok to say. 

Take yesterday mornings as an example.

"Dear Heavenly Father.
Thank you for this day.
Thank you for our great sleep.
Thank you that I can go to school.
Thank you that rug rat and cookie are dead and their spirits go to heavenly father and jesus and so they can help and tell the prophet to go to the temple with the spire and jesus lives at the temple, behind the temple, not behind the temple, that's where the boss of the temple lives, jesus lives at the front and down the stairs and he talks and tells us to go to church, the church of jesus christ of latter day saints, and we go to church and learn about jesus and heavenly father and they tell us to go to the temple.
In the name of jesus christ, amen."

Meanwhile, I'm sitting there shaking with laughter, trying not to let him see.  What a ripper.

(You kinda have to be familiar with the layout of the nz temple and visitors center and temple presidents house to understand what he's talking about, sort of. lol.)

Tala'i

Introducing our new paycheck.

Tala'i is half samoan, half maori, tri-lingual, just turned 2, has the longest eye lashes and eye brows in the world, and is super cruisey.

He's been coming for a month or so now and we haven't had any problems.  He idolises Malachi, calls Tui Uncle, and is so careful with Vili.

He's been through a lot in his 2 short years of life, with illness and custody issues, so all things considered, he really is an amazing kid, so well behaved.  We love having him around.

So he'll be the new random kid in our pictures. :)

RIP Cookie

Poor cookie, he lasted a week.  The same dog, THE SAME FREAKING DOG, came back, flipped the cage and cookie got out.  Tui was there, chased the dog away, then chased Cookie and caught him, only to have the poor thing die of fright in his hands (I guess you really can die of fright!).

Needless to say, no more Guinea Pigs.  Not that this house anyway.
I've promised Malachi that after we get back from Tonga we will get a fish.

A very LOOOOOOOONG Saturday

Last weekend was one of the longest saturdays that I can remember.  That's what I get for trying to jam so much stuff into one day. 

It started out with getting up at 6am to drive to the markets in Otara (not nice after staying up til midnight to do an airport run the night before).  We were in search of some Tongan T-shirts for the boys.  Turns out only asians, maoris and samoans sell t-shirts, so that was an early wake up for nothing. We got one for Malachi, which he was super excited about.  He's been really obsessed with Tonga lately, but that's another post.

Then it was onto my Grandfather's 80th birthday Party.  Pop is on his last legs (in fact we've been up a few times to say our last goodbyes in hospital, but he always manages to pull through), so it was really nice to be able to celebrate something with him, something happy.  Andrew flew up from Wellington, Dad's sister and sons flew down from up North, it was really nice.  We missed a few family members, which was sad.  There was great food, and of course, with any Brunton gathering, a ton of mocking and laughing.



The birthday boy himself.



1 of the 30 pictures we took of everyone. This is as good as it gets.



The Brunton grandchildren, minus 2.



Dad and his family, minus one sister.



Pop cutting his cake, closely monitored by some of his great-grandchildren.



My sweet baby brother. oxo



Me and my Nana.

Pop was a bit worn out and went to bed before I could get a picture with him.

Then we drove to the Hot pools, that turned out to be crusty as and way the heck out in the middle of the country.  The boys loved it, Malachi was a trooper, going down any slide he could find.  That kids a fish!  And Vili is following suit, paddling around in his floaties.  Afterwards we had a BBQ, while I got attacked by bugs (I counted a total of 38 bites). 







The slide king.

And then after all of that we were meant to go bowling, us 6 siblings, but we were all so hammered we gave up.  BUT Malachi and his elephant memory remembered that I'd promised him that we would bring the matresses into the lounge and watch and movie and eat icecream and sleep in there - are you kidding me kid?!!! So it was back off to the shops to find the exact icecream I'd promised (note to self, don't promise this kid anything!), and then watching Kung Fu Panda, and then trying to get to sleep with Malachi kicking me constantly.

What a long day.
But an awesome one.  If every saturday could be filled with that much family and food,  I would be one happy person.  Grossly obsese, but very very happy. :)

Guinea Pig #2

So Rugrat, sadly, was dog-napped a few weeks ago. (It was so annoying, the same dog came back 5 different time during the night, I got up and chased it away 4 times, on the 5th time I was too tired and the blasted thing flipped the cage and in the morning we found fluff all over the grass.)  Malachi was pretty sad.  And so this weekend we went and got another one.  Only cost $12, I can live with that. 

Introducing "Cookie".



He's cute.  A little insane though, I'm wondering if it's a petshop thing, coz he'll like litterally run around in circles sometimes.  But the boys love him.  Vili even asked to hold him the other day, which he's never done before.  Malachi makes sure that he's ok every time he's outside, sits and talks to him.  It's so sweet.




(Malachi had his facepainted at the petshop. He ALWAYS asks to be a tiger, he's never been anything else, although this is the worst tiger i've ever seen.)
Let's hope he lasts longer then the last one....