Waihi

Last month my sister asked if we would like to come with them to Waihi Beach for a weekend.  They were going for a wedding and wanted us to come so we could watch the kids while they went to the reception.  I take every opportunity to show Tui some new part of his new home so off we went.

Although it's only 1 1/2 hour drive away, we took our time, stopping at every insignificant place along the way.

We stopped for lunch and a swim in Te Aroha.

We visited the gold mines in Waihi.  The boys looooooooooooved it; a big hole with dirt, trucks and diggers, what's not to love? When they're bigger we might fork out the $25 each for the actual tour.....

We rode on a historical train.  So much fun.  There was an inside an an outside carrige, which of course our boys moved between every 2 minutes.

Waihi Beach itself was a bit of a disaster.  It was the worst possible weather, gale force winds, flooding, and my niece was throwing up the whole time so we didn't even end up babysitting for my sister.  And we didn't ever get to even look at the beach. But other then that it was a great little weekend getaway.

Model Trains

So down the road from us the Hamilton Miniture Engineers club.  Basicly it's train obsessed people who build these miniture trains and take people for rides on this miniture track that they've built.  Unfortunately they only run of Sundays, so we've never actually been.  Until now. (No, I didn't break the sabath for the sake of a train ride).  Twice a year they have an open day on a SATURDAY.  Yey!!! It was so awesome.  These things are like ligitimate trains, only smaller.  One of the guys I talked to, who had a steam train, said it had cost him about $100, 000 to build.  My sons who love Thomas the Tank Engine, loved that the train blew steam, that we had to stop and get coal, and that we had to stop to switch the points (Malachi even asked the driver "are we switching the points?" and the guy was over the moon that Malachi knew what that was).  There were petrol and electric trains there too, but the steam trains were by far the coolest.  I'm only sad that I ran out of coins and we couldn't ride more.  We'll just have to wait for the next open day.

 

Vili and his ticket, that he carried around for days afterwards.

Grandma and Grandad's house

Last weekend we took a trip to Auckland to stay with my parents for a night.  It was so weird being back on an Airforce base after all these years, but oh so nice.  I loved that Tui could finally see for himself just the sort of childhood I had - that it's so safe you wouldn't know where the key to the front door is coz it's never been locked, that you put your car windows up when you park, not because someone might break in, but incase it rains, that despite the fact that you could probably look every parked car and find the keys in the ignition, there's never been a car theft.  Every house is modest, with huge backyards, big fruit trees, and a garden.  Within 2 minutes walking distance is a free swimming pool, a gym, a playground, a fish n chip shop, and a dairy.  The only noise you ever hear, other then birds or kids playing, is aircraft coming and going. That if you walk past someone you don't know, they work or have worked with your Dad at some point, so they know who you are.

How I wish my boys could have the same upbringing.  The kind of lifestyle that encouraged and nurtured childhood adventures and imagination.  We never knew about stranger danger, coz there wasn't any.  Now I can't even let my son check the mail by himself for fear of something happening.  Gone are the days I guess.

So, now that I've gotten all that sentimental stuff out of the way, we had such a good time.  Dad took the boys for rides on his motorbikes, he took them to look through a bunch of different planes (they got to sit in the pilots seat and everything), I took Tui on a history tour, showing him my old houses, my kindy, my school etc.  And of course we got to be with my parents.  It was a short and sweet visit.  We're trying to make the most of the time we have to do things with the boys, things that will be so much harder when there's a new boss in town who's needs will come before anyone elses.

No (no points for guessing who dressed them that day....)

This plan took off right after we moved out of the way, headed for Afganistan.  The boys cheered and screamed and waved their little hearts out, thrilled to have a plane they'd just been in take off a few meters away.

This plane was the reason my parents lived in the states for a few years.  Dad ran the project to have them modified to do something that I'm sure is important.  They were the first in the world to do it.  My Dad even got a special recognition and medal from the Queen for his work on them.

We have a photo identical to this, except I'm 5 years old on my first day of school. My how I've grown....

Summer Fun

I love summer.

Warm days, cool nights, just the way I like it.
Pity it's all but over.

We've been back to Cook's Beach a few more times in the last month, as well as Raglan.  So we've been having some serious summer fun.

Malachi busting to go toilet, like always, and us on our way to cooks beach.


My oldest child.


Dinner with the cousins at the campsite.

Malachi is a hawaiian baby through and through, so at the beach he's in his zone.  Vili is really warming up to it the more we go (I may or may not have been doing some exposure therapy on him....unethical, I know.).   But their Tongan blood (and lack of body fat) just isn't OK with our south pacific water temperatures.  So their wetsuits have been a heaven send.  Without them, they're done after 20mins, but with them, hours on end.

Gotta love that black sand beach.

We got the kayacks out a few times up at the beach.  Malachi loves them. We go out on little adventures, in caves, up and down the coastline.  Vili will only go with my Dad for some reason (I'd consider myself waaaaaaay safer then him but whatever).

One day we went over to Whitianga and rode in the pedal cars. So much fun!! The boys thought they were just fantastic.  Lucky I had Tui to pick up the pedaling slack, coz man it was hard!!  Fun though.  We've been meaning to do it for ages and I'm glad we finallly did. Before we have too many kids to fit.

We've done a few hikes.  One was to Whitianga Rock, only about 30min up.  The boys are such troopers, they walked the whole way.  We also walked/hiked to Cathedral Cove.  Now that was a mission for a 6month pregnant person, especially carrying an 18month old at the same time.  But again, Malachi walked/ran the whole way on his own.  That kid is gunna be a long distance runner. 

At the top of Whitianga Rock.


At Cathedral cove.




After the hike back up. Can you tell they're ready for a nap?

Malachi went fishing with his Grandad to catch us some dinner.  He was so proud of the little fish that he caught, carried the dead things around for an hour after he got back.  And then he kindly shared his dead fish with Vili, who took great pleasure in playing with it's eyes.  When I told him we needed to bury them (so they wouldn't stink out the rubbish) he told me "I know mum. Coz their spirits already went to Heavenly Father, that's why their bodies go in the ground." Lol.

We've also been doing lots of water play at home.  I'll fill up some buckets with soapy water, give them some spoons and cups, and they're good for a couple of hours.

And of course we go to the pools.  Malachi is an absolute fish.  He can hold his breath underwater for about 10 seconds now, picks things up from the bottom, kicks and does his arms.  I put it all down to pure exposure.  I made a point of taking them to the pools once a week or every other week.  And it's paid off.  Vili is getting braver every day.  He's using his arm floaties now and won't let me hold him.  And he just wants to jump in, go under, and float back to the top.  He dips his face in the water, trying to swim like Malachi.  2 hours is never long enough for these boys.

 

But their absolutely favourite summer fun activity is riding their bikes.  They will do it from sun up to sun down and then some.  We made sure when we moved that we had somewhere that they could safely ride their bikes.  And because it's all fenced in, I can just let them go for it and wait for the screams.  They race, do trains, do bumper cars.  They just love their bikes.

Oh summer, how we will miss you when you're gone.

Catch up

I'm trying to play catch up with everything before this baby comes and consumes not only all my time and energy but my thinking space too (what's left of it that is, I think most of it's turned into grey matter.).  But trying to catch up months worth of blogging and journal writing with my brain in it's current state is horrific.  Not to mention I'm also trying to finish the boys 2011 photo books before my coupon expires in 2 weeks.   But all of the above tasks require me first to edit all the photos I've taken in the last couple of months (curse you Sarah for taking so many pictures!!!!).

However I'm determined to do it.  So you better be prepared for some serious blogging!!

And maybe after all of that is over I can start thinking about getting stuff ready for this baby before she comes in 39days(!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!).  I'm sure she's gunna need clothes or nappies or a bed or something like that. Maybe that's why my babies always come late, coz they know I procrastinate and take too much on and need the extra time to prepare.....