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 :)

Fruits of Summer

Summer continues for us, and we've been enjoying the slower pace and the long, warm days. School is still out for summer for Rocky, so we've also enjoyed having him around more in the daytime. He'll usually spend the morning working on writing or whatever, and then be home to play once The Squidd is waking up from his nap (around 2:30).

Summer here also means backyard barbeques, and it's been fun to visit friends' houses and to play in backyards, grass under bare feet and all. Our small concrete patio, though shaded and ringed with plants, seems monumentally less in comparison, and Rocky's gardening genes itch to resurface every time we return home from an evening's backyard entertainment.

An interesting thing to note: here in New Zealand, and I suspect here in The Garden City especially, gardening is an equal opportunity pastime. I guess what I mean to say is that dudes enjoy it, too, and it's considered a manly activity. And I don't mean the generic "yardwork" that American men discuss (that of mowing the lawn and raking leaves and maybe lopping branches in tall trees). I mean flowers and borders and pruning and veggie patches. Everyone 'round here seems to have a backyard vegetable garden, partly constructed of bought seedlings, but many also nurtured from seeds. It's remarkable and so cool to see. Broccoli, lettuce, chard, zucchini, tomatoes, green onions, broad beans . . . love it. Should we ever decide to move to a house with a yard, I have a project for Rocky and his little sidekick to start straight away.

So in the absence of our own produce-producing yard, we're venturing around Christchurch to pick the fruits of others. Peas a few weeks back, blueberries today. Hopefully apricots and other stonefruit next weekend.

Here are a few pix of the start to our new year. Welcome, 2012!

Digging for new potatoes

Cheers! Happy New Year!

Acceptable versus Not Acceptable

Acceptable:  I like tramping in Cashmere's bush. 

Not Acceptable:  Nice pants.

Translations

I like hiking in Cashmere's forest.

Nice thong.

A Merry Christmas

Our second year into the Christmas-during-summer thing, and we're learning to embrace it for the novelty it is (for now).

With temps in the mid-70's, we had a picnic brunch with friends on Christmas Eve, complete with strawberry shortcakes that Rocky made from scratch with freshly picked berries.

We had another brunch on Christmas day with a different group of friends (and introduced them to the glory that is Ro-Tel dip), featuring pancakes, crispy potatoes, and bacon cooked on the grill. And The Squidd tried his hand at cricket. In the evening, we went to the park and splashed around in the wading pools there. All in all, a nice weekend. Hope yours was, too.

Next up: New Year's!

The Squidd's favorite part about Christmas: Santa ate the cookies and only left crumbs!

Typical kiwi hiking wear

Rocky has been playing Risk and drinking scotch with the fellas once every few months. Now he can host at our place.

5.9

Lest we get too comfortable with stillness beneath our feet, we just had a 5.9 earthquake (around 2:pm) followed by a series of smaller ones. After nothing of note for months, this was a surprise.

We're fine, and The Squidd--our champion sleeper--slept through them again, as has been his way since the first quake September last year.