Like Father, Like Son

I'm fighting a bit of a cold right now, so Rocky valiantly took on the lion's share of childcare this past weekend. On Sunday the boys went to one of our favorite places, Birdling's Flat, to play on the beach and collect agates and other cool rocks. Here they are inspecting their haul. Birds of a feather, I tell you.

Incidentally, unlike the past two years, during which all three of us were perpetually sick, this is our first real illness of 2012. I think The Squidd's immune system has finally matured enough that he can fight off a good number of the viruses that circulate at school. Hallelujah!

Rollin' with My Homies

OK, so it was just one homie (sp?), but rollin' we did go. To Garden City Bowling, that is. In an effort to give The Squidd some varied experiences, today I decided to take the kid to the lanes.

A couple of surprising things I discovered:

1) They rent shoes as small as children's size 6 (stinkin' cute), which incidentally is too small for The Squidd.
2) The Squidd can carry a 10 lb. bowling ball by himself.
3) This particular bowling alley can program bumpers for the gutters so they pop up only for certain bowlers. (Fancy!)

I wasn't sure how the experience would go, so we started off with a single game. I shouldn't have worried. We ended up playing two games, and The Squidd's best score of the two games was 113 (with bumper assistance). He was especially excited to score the "extra points" that came with the couple of spares he picked up. Needless to say, we had a blast and will be going back soon, hopefully with Rocky in tow.

Happy (Belated) Easter

For the second year in a row, we had a glorious Easter day: sunny and warm and spent in the company of good friends. And while The Squidd was more into the Easter egg hunt than he was last year, he was ALL about eating the chocolate eggs and jelly beans.

Incidentally, it turns out that jelly beans are not a traditional Easter treat in New Zealand. Chocolate bunnies do make an appearance, but Rocky's students informed him that the traditional Easter basket goody here is a chocolate and marshmallow egg. I bought one out of curiosity and found it was basically what I expected with one exception: in the center of the marshmallow bit, there's a firm candy "yolk."  Huh.

Falling Back

Yesterday marked the first day of our return to Standard Time in New Zealand, thus putting us 5 hours behind the U.S. West Coast (but still a day ahead).  With the official start of autumn only a week behind us, the weather continues to be beautiful and in the mid 60's to low 70's. 

We've been enjoying the change of seasons, and The Squidd is newly fascinated with kicking piles of fallen leaves, collecting acorns and chestnuts, and preparing for the Easter Bunny :)