Far out brussel sprout, it feels like the last few weeks of this year are rushing toward us at the speed of light.
It's a busy time of the year anyway with lots of end of term activities - athletics day, hip hop dance recitals, Christmas parades, cricket practices and games, and Cubs badges to be achieved. Then there's baby showers, guests coming to stay on several weekends and my photography sales which have gone better than I could possibly have imagined with over 20 calendars sold and some prints as well - I'd like to know all these sales were last year when I so desperately wanted sales when I was launching the Meghan Maloney Photography site and trying to sell at the Thorndon market which was such a disaster - ha ha - ah well I'm not complaining really!
And when you throw in the mix a looming house move that's right around the corner - it's less than 3 weeks away now and the added inevitable craziness of the lead up to Christmas sourcing gifts for friends and family - it's a sure fire recipe for high blood pressure and more than a few fraught moments as we also try to deal with slack phone/fibre providers who can't pull finger to organise an installation date and an online furniture company who cannot seem to provide good service and products despite our patience in trying to sort some issues out with them for the past few months.
Add to that it's the busiest time of the year at work too and I find all I can do is *sigh*......................
Oh and then our 13 year-old fridge decides to pack it in the last few days and it's taken to freezing everything inside - what utterly impeccable timing!
So that aside........ what else have we been up to?
For a start enjoying the warmth that is the Waikato - we have already had a few mid twenties temperatures and it's only just officially summer this week! The boys got a taste of just how hot the sun is after getting rather sun burnt at the local pool on the weekend - oops - Mark was left a bit red faced after that experience (not to mention a red body too!)
Noah's sunburnt face after the afternoon at Cambridge pool :-/
Loving these stunning red roses in the garden of our rental - we will miss the awesome big backyard and all the established garden when we move to our new place - we'll be lucky to even get grass to grow moving in the height of summer.
Loving finding the gem that is Fast Flavours - a local dairy free and gluten free takeaway option in the heart of Cambridge - it's been my Friday night go-to when the boys have had their $5 Dominoes Pizza during Friday night cricket games - this was their yummy seafood paella.
Loving recognition of playing so well at his first game of cricket - even if he was pretty peaky the next day when this photo was taken, poor poppet.
Not loving long road trips that have to be made within a single day - but loving the reason for it - so we could all celebrate my gran's 90th birthday in Taranaki with her - at least we all went together in the shuttle - it made the time pass quick enough - the boys are enjoying a quick stop at Pio Pio to stretch their legs here.
And I even got to drive the shuttle partway home again - my first time in all the years Dad has been a super shuttle driver that I've even sat in the drivers seat!
Loving being able to sneak away for an hour to watch the kids on athletics day at school.
Loving (well that might be a stretch) that I got to sleep over at school one Thursday night with Mylo and 30 other kids on the floor of his classroom. I was dreading it (I'll happily admit that) but it was actually pretty fun. I got a few hours sleep which was more than I'd bargained on - plus it was a great way to meet a few more of the parents in his class too. I was pretty tired come Friday afternoon though.....yawn.......
Tickling the kids on the Burma trail that night was pretty fun - and watching their shrieks as they came up against things they didn't recognise with their masks on!
Loving that we got an unexpected sneaky visit into the house when our good friend Jules was staying for the weekend. It felt so much lighter and brighter than just a few days earlier when Mark and I had our official visit with the builders.
Not loving that they put the wrong colour bench top on our bench - it is meant to be black - but loving that we realised pretty much straight away and it's since been fixed - an expensive error on someone's part - just glad it wasn't ours!
Loving 22 pieces of snail mail arriving from Noah's classmates back in Wellington - he enjoyed reading every single one and we must must must write an email back before the term ends in the next 2 weeks!
Loving that I made it home safely after a flying day trip (AGAIN!) to New Plymouth via the bus to drive my gran's car back home as we are buying it off her for Mark's parents to use when they arrive in January for six weeks. And loving the company of Charlie (Charlotte) to make the journey back whizz by in the blink of an eye!
Loving having dinner cooked for us by Charlie while she stayed - what a rare treat for us not to have to cook on a weeknight!
Loving that hubby's Saturday morning coffees rival anything you might get served up at a cafe...I think I'll keep him on!
Loving this indoors temperature one day last week - ah yes I feel summer right down into my bones!
Loving being able to get to assembly to watch Noah get his Principals award in the final assembly of the year.
Loving drinking bubbly from Batman cups at Friday night cricket and that the rain held off (just!) till the end of the game.
Loving having Charlie to stay so we could enjoy a rainy Saturday in putting up the Christmas tree, making and consuming mulled wine, painting Christmas nails (red and green) and helping Nana and Poppa choose their Christmas tree...
Might need to wait another year or two for that one though Mylo!
Loving that I live close enough to family now to be able to take part in my lovely sister-in-law Alesha's baby shower, and loving that it's only six weeks or so till I get to be an aunty again to a precious new babe in the family!
This weekend it's Noah's hip hop performance, plus we have tickets to the UCI world track cycling champs at the velodrome, the Cubs (and therefore Noah) will be parading in the Christmas parade and we have friends coming for a BBQ as well.
The garden desperately needs a tidy, the windows need washing and we are really struggling to find the time to get any packing done...I know there will come a day (very soon) where we will just have to knuckle down and get to it if we ever want to move out at all!
