Kiwiagogoland

  We moved into our new house last weekend. All went well, with the help of a number of fantastic friends from both Nicki and I's work. Pictures of the new house, are now up in the Family 2 photo album, for those that have the password.

We managed to get everything over in 2 runs. Although the truck was by no means full on either load, it saved us having to worry about stacking things correctly.

From the open home to moving in was completed inside a month! Not bad going eh?

I found a picture of our two girls to share with you. They are Barred Rock hens. They came with a free rooster, but we had him for tea one night.....yummy! The one on the right is our current champion layer, but she has gone broody and is sitting on 16 eggs! Not quite sure how she covers them all, but we think some may hatch in a few weeks.

Hello everyone. Thanks for all your messages.
Its seems odd to be getting lots of anniversary wishes, as I have always associated the 28th as being our anniversary. You guys naturally pick the day we left whilst I pick the day we arrived - lol

But does that mean I have lost 2 days or does that mean we have 2 anniversaries? Perhaps not, the kids will be wanting to go to Monkey Spices on the one day and Corrianders on the next.... ;)

I have just finished uploading another 7 videos. They include daytrips to Orana Wildlife park, the Christchurch Gondola, birthdays, Easter and more, so get your comments coming in ;)

In a major new tourism venture, Kiwi's are being given the chance to invite friends and family who live abroad to New Zealand.

The ‘Great Kiwi Invite’ campaign, run by Tourism New Zealand, aims to increase the number of visitors to the country at a time when global economic conditions mean fewer people are travelling the world.

New Zealanders will be able to go on-line and send a personal animated invitation to someone overseas. When the invitation is accepted, the person will go into a draw to win one of 15 trips for two to New Zealand, flying from any Air New Zealand port.

Keep an eye on your inbox!

I've updated some videos over the weekend. Only 98 to wade through edit an upload! I think I've done about 6 or 7 so far, including a couple of Alex rock climbing and some of Abi opening Birthday presents. More to come but its a bit of a chore shortening 10 to 15 mins of video into 2 or 3 mins to make it upload to google.

Nope the earth didn't move for us!

Despite reports of New Zealand's biggest earthquake since 1931 being felt in Christchurch, we didn't feel a thing. The shallow 7.8 quake in the lower area of South Island (several hundred km away) sparked a confirmed tsunami, but there are currently no reports of injury. There was also a 6.1 aftershock. You can follow the latest news on at www.nzweather.net or checkout the usual online media.

Winter is usually the time of year for holiday adverts on the TV, well in New Zealand its no exception. This series from Malaysian Tourism was on when we first arrived. It was hauntingly spiritual and the music still makes my spine tingle when I hear it. Well worth a watch, although I wish the sound was better on this example.

We have a new family ablum. This is because we have reached the 500 photo limit in the first one. Please email grant if you want the URL for access for Family 2.

  What a find! We had spotted some pictures on the facebook page of one of Nicki's work colleagues and vowed to make the effort to go for ourselves. It was a great Saturday afternoon, shortly after the first sprinkling of snow for the season. The boulder formation is just outside the Porters Pass ski resort and is about an hours drive away, so we slipped out after dropping Georgia off and finishing the morning grocery shop.

We had a picnic when we arrived of hot soup and crusty bread, with fruit and biscuits and watched teh small groups of people bouldering before we set off. The soup was welcoming as there was a chill to the air out of the sun. We spent a couple of hours there, walking and climbing the different formations. We'll definately go again. Pictures can be found on the Castle Rock Ablum

We've had some problems with email this week. Email has been getting through to the server, but was not being delivered to us. I did some testing with the UK email addresses and found the problem.

As a result our NZ email is back to normal. Nothing here has been lost, although there was a delay in us getting your email.

The UK addresses however, will be offline for around 5 days. This is because I have to wait for google to purge the information from the testing account I created, before I can add them back into normal service. True, I could put more time and effort into this and transfer the server to get them running, before transferrring them back again next week, but seeing as its only a historic account, I'm going to wait the 5 days.

During March there was a junior fishing event aimed at getting younger people into the sport. Bait, rods and equipment were provided along with a freshly stocked pool.

It was a great day, with celebrities from the TV fishing programs and competitions, although there were times when having 3 kids present knotted lies to you simultaneously was a bit frustrating! We didn't catch anything but saw others who did - Salmon and Trout!

Some laid back pics are in the Family Album of the boys and girls having a go for themselves. Oh and we did get a little perk.... everyone packed up and went, leaving us with 3 kids rods that we weren't able to hand back... oh well!

Alex the super man (or should that be the spider man?) has taken up rock climbing. He has just completed a 10 week course aimed at teaching him how to "top rope belay". This means he is now licensed to climb with others of his own age. He will be joining the Flying Gecko's climbing club in the new term and he is now the very proud owner of his very own chalk bag, which he bought with some of his birthday money.

Again there are some pics in the family gallery and videos to follow.

Georgia started horse riding a little while back. She goes to a place that teaches natural horsemanship, which is a really big thing here in New Zealand. She seems to be really into it at the moment, and stays for the day to help out and learn handling skills and preparing tack, grooming etc. The owner is off to the US in a couple of weeks for a 6 week holiday/conference so Georgia and the girls are looking after the Saturday people who want to keep thier hand in with some riding.

Soon after she started, she tapped Nanny up for some money towards a helmet. She was very lucky in that prices are a little cheaper for equipment here, so she was able to get boots and jods into the bargain. Her "little fashion shoot" pictures are in the family album - you can't miss them ;)

Happy Easter everyone! It's been a really busy time for me of late, not helped by a proposed merger at work, which will see us going from the smallest University in NZ to the 5th largest land based University in the world! How's that for aspirations? LOL

I've got some time off now the Eater Bunny has been, so that will help me to catch up with the latest news and post some pics and videos for everyone. I'll also try and respond to some emails :)

Love to all

  Busy, is the word I would best use to describe this event. Don't get me wrong, we had a good time and the lanterns were great; the park was covered in them, it made for a great spectical. The entertainment was also good, if you could find a suitable vantage point, but the queue for food and even just trying to move around on occasions was too much like being in the UK - lol.

It's amazing how quickly you get used to the lack of people (and traffic). If we had done this event straight after arriving, we would have been fine about it. Nothing worse than being down at St.Andrews on derby day, but it was a shock to the system this time around. I still can't get used to the fact that "Asian" here, is a term used to describe people of Chinese or similar origin. It's caught me out more than once.

Wow these things are noisy. We had a picnic, one hot summer weekend during February and were frankly deafened by the noise. At this point, not having a clue what they were, I was told by a friend that they were crickets!

As you can see, we got some video and some still pictures of the bug like skins that crawl out of the ground (having lived there for 14 years). Eventually we also tracked down a drying out adult on a low branch, so we were able to do some research on the internet, see Chrous Cicada or this one for more information. We've youtubed our video so that you can see it here, but its also in the video album.

Georgia has started riding and horsemanship lessons on a Saturday. We went to see the lady a couple of weeks back and found out all about the layout of the lessons and what is expected. The lesson itself lasts for 30 mins, but Georgia has asked if she can stop on to help out and learn more about working with animals and horses. She now has an 8:30 start every Saturday, going through to mid afternoon, when we pick her up.

I'm pretty sure she is enjoying herself, but I will let her tell you all about it :)

Alex has joined the local cub scouts! He seems to be really enjoying himself, and its really cute to watch the pack closing ceremony when I pick him up.

From what I can gather a new lady has taken over (I think she started the same time as Alex). She is clearly very experienced with cubs and is introducing a lot of things that cubs should be doing....like lowering and raising the flag, tying knots, having Sixers and Seconders and knowing the cub scout law. The strange thing is that non of the existing cubs seems to have come across this before and they all look very bewildered.

  Set over 10 days during February, the streets and parks of Christchurch were filled with street entertainers from all over the world during the World Buskers Festival. SOme of the shows were pretty spectacular, espcially in the Aerial Park. There was also a section with acts especially for Kids. I think we have some video somewhere in the ever growing video section of the albums (don't worry they are all short clips or around 2 mins) but in the mean time, you can check out Christchurch

  On our recent trip to Old Chorlton Hall we stopped off at Okains Bay, which was a couple of km's around the headland, down an unsealed road. Having just cleaned the car the day before, the once sparkling Fiesta looked as though it had been on a trip to the jungle, but the beacj was fantastic and the kids really enjoyed themselves. Pics of the kids are in the family album. More views from the area can be seen in the Banks Peninsula Views Album

  The Queen Victoria found its way to Lyttelton a week or so ago. We went along to see her in the knowledge that Shaun and Jane would be aboard later in the year, having a trip in "the med".

She is quite a big ship and dwarfed the containers that were unloading further up the wharf. Some pictures are in the Port of Lyttelton Albums and there is also some video too

We've had such a lot on over the last few weeks, that I've not been able to keep up on the blog. I was hoping to use today to catch up as this weekend was scheduled for rain, but alas the sun is out again (lol) so we have a date with the "summer festival of relaxing weekends" in the Botanical Gardens. Nicki has a tenuous link to one of todays musical performers, so we'll see how she does....and I'll tell you all about it in 4 or 5 weeks time - lol :)

Last week we had our first visitors from the UK. Chris and Gloria had a couple of weeks on a whirlwind tour of New Zealand, and had roughly an 8 hour stop over in Christchurch (primarily to sleep I hasten to add!) Forutnately, we were able to meet up and join them for "room service".

A couple of pics have made it through to the "new" family album. I hope you guys enjoyed the rest of your tour!

Georgia has a work day to arrange for Thursday for a school fundraiser. She was hoping to get into a local vets, but none of the local one's are happy to entertain the idea. So she will try a couple of petshops and the local "cookie factory" (I can't think of the incentive for working there!)

Hopefully, something will come of it, but time is running out and at this rate, she could be in school for the day :(

  We dropped down to Little River A&P show (think Canwell Show) last week on a gloriously sunny but extremely hot day. There were sheep trials, horse events and demonstrations by the fire brigade, as well as a marching band complete with bagpipes. We took the dogs too due to the heat, and they seemed to get on well with the chickens that were on show. More is at the Little River Gallery

  Another bank holiday in the summer sun ;) (Although, I understand some of you joined us in a day off, due to snow). This time we went to Willow Bank Wildlife Reserve.

They had a special open day with activities including Maori music and feeding the eels. It was good to go and you get to see some great animals, including the obligatory Kiwi's but I don't think I'd pay full price to get in with a family of 5. You can see some pics at Willowbank Gallery

There is a long list of what the kids got up to while off with Nicki the week or two before they went back to school. We know about the bluberry picking because you saw the chick clip, but they also did some Raspberry picking and eventually got to see Jellie Park (however I think that was a disappointment, due to the strange layout where kids rund from mud and dirt to pool and the ducks poo in the water).

Then there were trips to the library as well as shopping for uniform and books. Alex got taken to the beach for the day with some mates and Georgia and Abi went to see Twilight.

Held in Hagley Park in Christchurch, a pleasant night of entertainment with the Christchurch Symphony Orchestra and a range of medeley's from musicals including Abba, Miss Saigon and Sweeney Todd. The night concluded with an amazing firework display to the William Tell Overture. We thought you might like to see a clip below.

Everyone is back to school today after goodness knows how long off for summer holidays. We got some bits of uniform over the weekend and purchased everyones books and stationery last week. I have to go in today to get some of the excersie books that can only be purchased from school.

Alex is currently getting dressed and organising his PE kit. Georgia has left for the bus - there is a new company doing it this year and they seem to be disorganised. Abi however, was ready hours ago in an effort to get her latest book finished before leaving! (only 6 pages left and she is not moving until its finished.)

During last week Nicki and the kids went blueberry picking. If you take a look at the Picassa video gallery, you can see how they got on - there is a great clip with Alex doing a guided tour!

They also came across this little chick in a nest, which was such a great moment, I thought I would put it on youtube for everyone to see.

January and February are traditionally the bargain times to book tickets for NZ, even if you fly out later in the year. Currently Emirates will take you from Birmingham to Christchurch for 750 GBP RETURN. That's door to door!

Cheaper offers are available from other airports (549 Heathrow/Auckland fly April to June or during November), but there seems little point at that price. Book by the 31 January and fly out between 10 April and 10 July.

Not sure where it went, really. Saturday morning Georgia and I did the shopping run....Pak N Save for supermarket shopping, Countdown (which also trades as Woolworths - yes we still have one;) ) for the rest of the stuff that we like (mayo that tastes like UK salad cream and a nice tomato sauce). Pacific Catch for the 'fush' and Raewards for the fruit, veg and meat.

We dropped off Sherbet for a haircut before we left and picked her up on the way back at the same place Toffee was done, shortly after they arrived from the UK.

Saturday night, Alex had a friend over for the night and Sunday we went raspberry picking and dodged the hail and storms, before collecting Nicki's car ready for work.

Our BBQ today had 2 new items, never before cooked in our household. Homemade burgers (made by Georgia) that were beyond fantastic and come highly recommended and a local fish called Warehou. It's a firm flesh and has fantastic flavour and went down really well with a nice little cous cous salad Nicki knocked up. Remind me when you visit and we will get you sampling the delights of what is my favourite fish so far.

Nicki has been on holiday this week and from what I can gather her and the kids have had great fun while I've been at work. So much so that none of them have had time to update the blog! I will try and summarise their week with a few posts over the coming days.

At the moment I'm uploading several more videos that they took during their escapades. It looks like they had fun on their adventures. Let me know what you think.

Not us.... the theme of the weekend activity! Friday night, as usual was shopping night. I collected Nicki from work afterwards (she was on a late) and decided that I had better fill up with petrol (the computer was showing 9km remaining!).

Saturday was mix of cleaning and cooking. Georgia did a nice pudding, Nicki a great quiche.

Sunday we took a day trip to Christchurch for one of the "Lazy Weekend" concerts. There are a series of 16 free concerts over 8 weeks, in the botanical gardens.

More in the Christchurch album and the video gallery

Roads have melted, offices have closed and people are down on the beach having a party! Why? Well Christchurch has topped (unofficially anyway) its highest ever January temperature, with highs of 40C recorded by some personal weather stations.

The MetService measured air temperature "officially" up to 35.7C at Christchurch Airport yesterday afternoon, close to the January record high of 35.9C in 1979. But the airport is out of the city, so its cooler due to the fields and airflow. City temperatures recorded 42 in one instance.

The "feels like" factor woudl have been higher too as this takes into account humidity and the effect of hot tarseal, high density housing and metal roofs, which all make us feel hotter.

Of course we really appreciate your comments on our blog post (so if you've you've not done so for a while, or have yet to comment at all, then get your finger out!)

You should know though, that we cannot reply to your comments directly, such is the nature of the system. If you want a reply, you will either have to check back on the comments at a later date, or send us an email!

  You may remember that shortly after we arrived, we found Bottle Lake Forest. Well this time we headed for the beach beyond the forest, during a swealtering day last week. Again the dogs went with us, but Nicki, this time, was working. It was nice to cool off in the surf and even Toffee had her first attempt at swimming in the sea. More pics are in the BLFP and the family galleries.

After a few days of struggle trying to get the Google servers to accept our video uploads, we finally have a small collection on offer! They cover a little bit of our Christmas and New Year holidays. So, if you want the link to the video gallery, please email me and I will send you all you need to know to get access.

Of course, now that we know it works, we'll be taking time out to video some more events to keep you up-to-date with the latest happenings.

  This weekend has seen our first NZ thunderstorm. We had torrential rain, hail and some localised flash flooding. Most of the lightning was sheet, but there were a couple of nice cloud to ground strikes locally. The image is from the Rolleston Gallery and shows Mammatus cloud after the storm had passed.

We found a PYO last week and decided to give Cherry picking a go. It was $3 each to get in, so everyone was under strict orders to each as much as they could! We picked dark cherries and white cherries and saw some huge apple cherries, which were literally apple sized. We had a great time and Alex enjoyed climbing the tripod ladders to get the highest cherries!

We brought home a large bag and if that wasn't enough we also stopped by the farm shop and bought some apricots, strawberries, plums and peaches. It still didn't last more than a couple of days.

Now we've had so many works Christmas events that they all merge into one. It's certainly a time for celebrations and get togethers in this part of the world. Things kicked off with the official Christmas meal, which I mentioned at Busy Weekends. It was a very successful evening and one I would do again. Everyone was very pleasent and welcoming to Nicki and I, the food was great and even better, the wine was free - lol.

Then came the staff BBQ afternoon on the lawn with beers, followed by the morning tea event with Christmas nibbles and a host of goodies from suppliers, oh and don't forget the social "end of year" evening bbq organised by my manager, then there was Nicki's colleagues Christmas bbq last weekend, which we all thoroughly enjoyed too.

Now perhaps you can understand why it went a bit quiet on the blog on the run up to Christmas - lol

Yes, we are the first ones again ;) It has its advantages!

We would all like to wish our avid readers, friends and family a super New Year. It's going to be hard to top 2008, in terms of what we've done. Moved house, moved country, changed jobs, schools, cars, shops, banks ....... the list is endless.

Hopefully 2009 will be a bit quieter and allow for some relaxation and perhaps it will be an opportunity for a few of you to escape the UK depression and pop in to say hello. Well, you never know.

The kids start off the year in style (they still have 4 weeks holiday). I'm back to work, while Nicki gets a week off next week, which will be good.

Don't forget to keep in touch, whether it's by phone, email, skype, msn or good old fashioned letter!