Mish and her bro, her class reunion, and her birthday

 Mish flew to Hobart for a few days to see Jase (via Melbourne, no direct flights from Wellington). They did a bunch of things in cool weather, from hiking in snow to buying kitchen appliances and visiting a bonsai specialist.

Dave, Mish and Jase in Hartz Mountains National Park, going for a walk on a very cold day - but looking cheerful.

Then she shot up to Sydney for a school reunion - it is 50 years since her year finished high school - and she had a fab time reconnecting with her pals and some family too, walking around the school going ooh aah didn't have THAT in my day.

Constructing the party area:

It was a short trip. The day she flew back to Wellington was her birthday. As it was the midnight arrival  (we're very familiar with that one) we decided to stay at the airport hotel and do birthday things in the city the next day.

And those birthday things began with an art shop, picking up some special Japanese kozo paper (embedded with mulberry fibres) for the next Mish project. 

Then, onto the Maranui cafe at Lyall Bay:

Always good, especially on a nice morning tucked out of a cool spring breeze.

Then the zoo, for a delightful otter experience. We went behind the public area and prepped their food while we learnt about their idiosyncrasies. They are Asian short clawed otters - old boys but very lively.

 

End of the tour, heading back in for more prawns, crab and fish. 

 

Good heavens she's finished the letterbox

 How it began, months ago:

How it has ended:

Our letterbox is a yellow house (same colour as the house up the drive) sitting on the upended woodfire that died with a spectacular roaring noise in our first winter here. Mish has broadened the corner, so we can see little kids on trikes a bit better when we leave, and built a retaining wall to plant behind, and steps for the mail to ascend.

There has been a lot of concrete mixing, drilling, hammering, digging, and of course, measuring.

Next project -just across the drive at the bin area. To tidy this up there will be a small amount of concreting for posts. Apparently. There's quite a list of Mish projects...

Phone shots

We are blessed with cycle paths around us, this one goes from our place to Coastlands shopping centre. Early spring, a little new leaf action.

From the living room, a complicated reflection off the library window.

At the bottom of the drive, Letterbox City is still under construction. Mish deep into securing a board while my foot (right at the bottom) assists.

Lime retrieval

Spiky tree. We are cautious reaching in to pick them up- this is Mish gathering round the back. The lime has been dropping more fruit than we can use, as has the lemon next to it. Citrus ice cubes!

We now have two lime trees and four lemon trees, various sizes and all producing. Delicious.

Last week one of the community fruit collectors came up and took some  lemons and the rest of the Seville orange crop to make jam. They were delighted with the Seville and we were delighted to see them used before they got older and drier inside.

Dog minding

Goldie the greyhound came to stay for a week.

 NZ has now banned greyhound racing so we have many up for adoption as pets. My sister picked up an ex racer so we looked after Goldie last week. Apart from ripping a nail and bleeding all over the place on the first day we had her, we had an easy week. Totally calm and relaxed, walking beautifully on the lead - mostly she just lazed around and then slept all night.

They are a shape weird though, so long and tall, such skeletal dogs.

Letterbox empire works continue

 Michelle is on a mission to improve the letterbox corner at the bottom of the drive. We've concreted a pad for the firebox and then posts to support panels, making a cohesive surround for our old firebox. Much measuring - note the plans on top.

Michelle gets another maple

Because she REALLY wanted one, even though it will probably get wind pruned and look a bit scrappy when the leaves get battered by a  storm.

So today when we were out investigating a natural burial site (not natural enough for us) we stopped at a couple of nurseries looking for a particular fern (nope), and sage (nah), hellebores (score), and something for a problematic pot (not found). 

We did come home with several plants we didn't go out for - what a surprise.

The smallest are pots of thyme emerald carpet, and they are now in the ground as part of a new landscaping project. There's a couple of tree fuchsia which we'll mix with flax on the lower drive, and the red barked Senkaki maple, seen here leaving the nursery.

Night in the city

Mish got an online deal so off we went for a night in the city. Drove to mum's and caught the train in from there. Did some city things walking around, especially bookshops and cafes.

Next day we caught the cable car up to the botanic gardens and walked back down to the city from there.

Kaka tucking into kowhai in the gardens.

 And a sleeping bumble bee.

It was a warmish day/night in town and we had a relaxed time walking around having a city moment.

In a tiny cafe on a weird patch of triangular ground on The Terrace, enjoying a triple cheese scone mmmm.

Shovelling

One of the veg bins had subsided into the crushed limestone surround - just enough of an angle to notice and cause discontent. The solution was to empty it and level it.

So we did.

Phew. Between showers we got out enough soil to jiggle the container up, and shift bricks and timber under the edge. I said we could level it by eye and got shouted down.

Hence:

And then we shovelled it all back in. Now the veg box is much more satisfactory to look at.

Family lunch mid winter Christmas style

We had a wintry Christmas lunch here on the weekend, and it was wintry! When the weather comes from the south it's off the Antarctic and that's what we have this week. Brrr.

Sue and Phil flew up from Blenheim and Phil gave our grapes their annual prune.

Our oven has cooked itself and has been out of action for nearly two months as Electrolux has been rowing the two parts we need over from Australia. Mish has had words with them and demanded a new oven - and we have one - and it should have arrived but Electrolux doesn't know where it is. Boy is she pinged off.

So, we delivered the Christmas ham to the experts and the Hewitts arrived with one hot delicious free range ham mmmmm.  Lizzie cutting her creation under close supervision from highly expectant diners:

Mish on baked potato duty.

Everyone bought one present and we drew scrabble letters to establish order of selection. Then it was Michelle's  steamed plum pudding and Rowan's trifle and ping pong in the rather cool garage.

Playing real scrabble, shame about the letters.

A bit different from a summer Christmas.

Seville marmalade time (or is it?)

 The oranges are plentiful on the tree so we gave it a go. 

It's ok but not as gutsy as I'd like. Will make another batch in a few weeks. We now know when not to use the fruit, when it is too old it goes dry. When it's too young it lacks the oomph that Seville oranges have. There's more fine tuning with Seville than with other citrus marmalades. 

Not sure if we are past frosty mornings but we are getting some beautiful warm winter days now. Spring is in the air!

Winter walk on Mt Taranaki

Had a couple of days away 300km north of here at the base of Mt Taranaki. We had a tiny cabin in a paddock, which, given the icy conditions throughout the country last week, was not great timing. Even Wellington had snow.

The wind she howled and the heat pump stopped working and the cabin door leaked air and rain and it rattled and shook like a 7.3 earthquake both nights and the mountain was in cloud the entire time. 

Here's our morning view of the snow covered volcano on the backyard. Aw.

Headed out for a walk anyway, cause it's great to have the gear, and went to our favourite walk in this part of the world - Wilkies Pools. Drove in through the national park, which is a beautiful drive through a tunnel of dense native bush, and up to the end of the road at the base of the mountain.

Wilkies Pools are a series of pools in lava rocks, fed by a long waterfall. There's a swing bridge over the big pools and we walked through the smaller bits of water. So glad we remembered the poles this time.

On the swing bridge, catching snow and looking up the waterfall.

 

The tree fuchsias (NZ has the biggest and smallest fuchsia in the world) were glorious in the snow.

And the flax with snow on was pretty cool too.

We've done this 90 minute walk in all weathers and it is superb rain or shine. The cabin would be better in summer!

Back home and it was still cold. We've had more frosts this winter than any other time since we got here in 2021.

Winter works

Winter, and we've had some frosty mornings. Not the best time for concreting but the Mish construction industry rolls on.

The mailbox (the old wood burner upended, with an actual letterbox house on top) is tired. The area around it is also getting a renovation. Mish has excavated the corner, bricked, and built the framing for a new platform.

 

So yesterday, before the rain, we concreted her new platform in preparation for moving the whole (heavy!) letterbox back. Will require assistance for that job. When we were putting it there originally, and struggling, a car pulled up and a lovely neighbour, a solid bloke, asked if we needed a hand. He took charge and into position she went. 

More construction around the back needed, then planting, paving, and painting etc. 

The neighbour's kowhai tree split in a high wind. The arborists had to work from our side so we scored the mulch when the tree had to come down. Tui loved that tree and one day when it was in full flower we counted 24 feasting. Ah well.

After the concreting there was mulch spreading under the plum tree, over a little cardboard that had been stacked up in the shed.

Then a nice cup of tea. The rain didn't arrive until the wee hours.

King protea

They grow well in this area, so we got one. And, wow. They're almost a foot wide and gloriously white in these grey winter days.

Watching the World Cup

Watching the World Cup. Australia and New Zealand just holding on - but so great they are both there. We've watched their games live at 7am, which is a nice bonus for us at the bottom of the world on antipodean time.

Our professional opinion, watching so many games back to back, is that both countries need to get better at short fast passes and fancy footwork in close quarters, to approach the level of the world's best teams. 

Australia ranked 26 in the world and NZ ranked last at the World Cup tournament.

We've had rain!

 It's been a dry couple of years, and it's now looking like this winter will be even drier thanks to el nino. So the recent rain has been great.

A warm winter's day, with rainbow.

Down on the beach

High tide at the northern end of our beach.

 

Kowhai felling

The neighbour's kowhai tree split in two on a recent high wind day, and today the arborists came to take the whole thing down. The tui and us will miss that beautiful yellow tree that hung over our car park area.

Almost gone.

Mosaic making

 Making a concrete slab and laying on a broken pottery mosaic on a cold day. Mixing the bag of concrete. It's going into the basic frame of cardboard and tape.

We laid out the pieces into the Mish design, then pushed them one by one into the wet concrete. It's setting in the garage now for about a week to get to full strength for moving into the yard.

Views from the house

 Out the front door looking over to the island at sunset.

Out the kitchen window looking south to Mt Wainui on a rainy day.

The same rainy day, in heavy rain, sparrows sheltering on the passionfruit vine over the garage doors.

Wellington waterfront

Went into town to see a one woman play called Julia, about Julia Gillard's powerful  'I will not' speech to the Australian parliament. Twas well done in the small Circa theatre on the waterfront. Came out in the early afternoon and it was still a warmish winter evening.

Whipped out the phone - that's Circa on the left and the current sculptures outside Te Papa (they'll be there two years). 

Pleasant stroll through waterfront park spaces, past the skateboarders and the boule players and the marina and artworks.

Winter at the bus cafe Te Horo beach

Not so many people at one of our favourite cafes this morning, and most were in the huts by the fire. We like to sit in the ramshackle garden.

The cafe sells local walnuts so we always get a bag. They made a handy do it yourself tripod too.

Southern black backed gulls

These are the big seagulls in NZ. The black and white adult and its browny grey chick flying north over low surf late on an autumn afternoon.