VISITING

Last night we spent a good hour visiting our immediate neighbours, handing out a Christmas Gift to each family.

It was fun... and a lovely way to connect with them all.  We ended up taking way longer than expected as we got invited into a couple of their homes for a yak.  And in one home we got a tour of their home and section too.

And Keera has been invited to visit and swim at one neighbour's home too.  They have two young kids, so we shall definitely do that sometime over the summer.

I'm going to enjoy today.  All the prep is done for Christmas. The kids are home, so no more to'ing and fro'ing from school and kindy for weeks.

And I got to sleep IN MY BED last night!
The couch is very comfy, but nothing beats your own bed!

Slugging back the Gees Linctus is certainly keeping the cough under control.... well as much as it can be anyway.

I'm going to fluff around the house today, catch up on lots of housework and general tidying up.
It's been a bit neglected the past week while I've felt so Ikkkk.

I look around and honestly, the house is starting to feel cluttered again!  I don't know how it happens?

I'm just a magpie I think.  

Yeah and I just remembered something else I need to do too... ring our insurance company and get some advice on our Britto collection.  A few people have said we really should get it added to our insurance policy as a separate 'collection', so I will do that today.  

So, so looking forward to having the kids arrive for Christmas!  It's going to be a wonderful day... with most of our kids here!

ONWARD...

This will sound cryptic to most everybody... but... TODAY I CHOOSE HAPPINESS.  I'm letting go of a big issue in my life and moving on.  Stew and I are better off and will be so much happier in the long run for it.  

And it's a GORGEOUS DAY... the perfect day for a new start.  

And I might have told a little wee lie today!
I had no intention of staying home and doing bloody housework!

I won a slide on TradeMe last night, very late and most unexpectedly!
So the kids and I took off for Rotorua bright and early this morning... I packed us a picnic lunch too.

We had a look around town for half an hour, then picked up the slide.
Decided not to have our picnic on the shore of Lake Rotorua, instead we drove out to the Blue Lake.

It's GORGEOUS out there!

Some photos:

 ABOVE:  Our lunch site.  Beautiful.  Home made ham and chicken buns.  Yum!

 ABOVE:  We watched two of these amphibian vehicles...

 ABOVE:  the Blue Lake has two designated areas, boating, where the boats were, and this area for swimming.

 ABOVE:  As it was rather overcast, with a few showers passing overhead, the lake wasn't that blue.  But still very pretty.

 ABOVE:  I'm thinking it was still quite cold as these two girls were the only swimmers!
I'd love to go back there over summer for a swim.  NO SHARKS.  hee hee.  😄😏

ABOVE:  Oh yeah, the reason for our day trip! The slide... it's lovely... and I hope all our little grandkids get lots of use out of it.

Another little job for our 'Bob the Builder' Steve!  A small platform for it to attach to and a ladder.  Sorry Steve, no rest for the wicked.

Something else that happened today:

 ABOVE:  Archer got his first ever haircut all over!  Awwww, all his flyaway baby hair is gone!  His brother and Daddy got haircuts too.  So they will all look swish on Christmas Day.

Well what a lovely day it's been.
We had a short, sharp thunder storm this afternoon.  It lasted about an hour, heaps of lightening and thunder.  I loved it!  And heaps of torrential rain, so good for the gardens!

Time to sign off for the day.