New Growth

 There are all sorts of things coming out in the garden now that it's spring.  We have taken out a lot of trees and shrubs, but we decided to leave the Rhododendrons until we found out what they looked like.

 So far we have 3 different colours.  The first to flower was Christmas Cheer, pink - 2 separate plants

Then, a plain red one, 2 plants,

and another very spindly plant produced a red with a white middle.
Most recently we have a yellow one, which looks very attractive when first opening because the buds are slightly orange/peach, but a it's bit boring once the flowers are all open.

 This wee thing was a pleasant surprise

And this flowering cherry (?) is beautiful

 Mum gave me a bit of Rhubarb - I thought I'd killed it by letting it dry out too much but it has bounced back.

 

There is a rose jungle up the back, Bryony found this in it.  It's due to be cut down though as we'd rather have fruit trees than roses.

We've made some progress in cutting them down,

and have huge piles to be mulched.

 There was a hedge right up this fence but now we have apple trees, 6 planted, 3 to go.  Hopefully I have a couple of weeks before they start to wake up.

Dad cut down a tall conifer here and has taken a slice off each side of the trunk so we can use it for part of a retaining wall or maybe a seat or something.

Lots of work done, lots to go!

Garden shots

Before:

6 weeks later

Today

Embroidery

Last week Renee and Hannah got their embroideries back from New Plymouth.  They had entered the primary section of the National Embroidery conference, which was held in New Plymouth.  Unfortunately it was a few weeks after we left town so we didn't get to see the exhibition, but the embroidery teachers, Glenys and Delwn, sent down a couple of exhibition programmes with photos of the entries.
Hannah got first in her section which she was very happy about, and also got a nice big cheque for her prize, which she was also happy about!  Renee didn't place, but she did get first last year in the Taranaki exhibition, with her embroidered box.

We are very grateful to Glenys and Delwyn for teaching the girls, and also for doing the lovely backgrounds which really set off the girls' work.
We have been along to the Dunedin Guild and plan to join, the girls loved it and I don't mind an excuse to sit and stitch for a morning every now and then.

Haircut

Petra cut her hair yesterday...

Snow!

One of the main things the kids were looking forward to in Dunedin was snow.  Last week they got their wish - only an inch, but still enough to transform the garden.  There were snowballs and 3 snow/hail-men and cold fingers, until we tried using gardening gloves which keep the fingers a bit drier and not so frozen.

It wasn't cold enough for the snow to stay, and it was all gone by the next morning, but it's just started snowing again today so there may be more!

Moving in

We finally moved into our new house on Saturday the 28th and are settling in bit by bit.  There are still boxes everywhere but we're getting rid of them one at a time, as we organise new bookshelves, drawers, and cupboards.  There's not a great amount of storage here but I have picked up some bits of furniture from the local op-shops and second-hand merchants and we're getting it all under control.  There have been a few annoying things, like the shower head that was broken and taped up, and the patches of carpet nailed over holes, and the oven which was always heated to 50 C above the dial reading, even when the knob was turned off, but these are more than compensated for by the lovely ceiling mouldings,

the amazing view

and the great big section (1357sqm).  The back yard is pretty jungly,

but we have a mulcher and Dad has a chainsaw.

The girls have been having a go at it with the loppers, and coming back inside pink-cheeked and happy.  The air is cold and fresh after mild New Plymouth.  We're going to clear most of the shrubs and trees from the back yard, but we're leaving the Rhododendrons until we find out what colour they are.  There are 2 lovely pink ones flowering already.

Leaving

On the 18th of June we packed up and left New Plymouth.  The movers arrived about 8:30am and by 12 everything was on the truck.  Some friends came round to help with the last-minute packing, which was a great help, we couldn't have done it otherwise.  (Thankyou everyone!)I glanced in the back of the truck at one point and the back wall was boxes, right up to the ceiling, neatly stacked.  The weight limit for the truck was 10 tonnes, and one of the moving men told Dad while unloading that they were only 40 kg under that limit.  They left one of their guys behind so as not to go over.  We drove out about 12:45, after getting lunch and counting the kids and making sure all the rabbits were fed.  There were lovely rainbows as we drove through Taranaki.

We stopped off in Otaki to see Uncle Andy and Aunty Chris and have afternoon tea (at about 4:30!) then stayed the night in Paraparaumu Beach with Uncle John, who is always remarkably relaxed about having a family of 9 descend upon him.  We headed off early in the morning to catch the ferry - just as well we left early as the last 11 kms took over half an hour - I'm glad I don't have to drive through that traffic every day!

 The sailing (on the Kaitaki, the biggest ferry) was very smooth and I didn't feel queasy at all, even though we didn't go outside (too cold).  Lunch was KFC in Blenheim, and we were upgraded, free, from 12 pieces of chicken to 15.  That's the second time that has happened to us at KFC Blenheim, maybe they cooked too much for the lunchtime rush.

We had a trouble-free drive to Christchurch along the beautiful Kaikoura coast, where there were lots of seals sleeping along the side of the road and down on the rocks.  In Christchurch we had a very yummy tea with the Thomsons and stayed at 219 on Johns Motel, excellent place to stay if you have a large family.  It's nice to be able to fit everyone in the same unit for a change.   The kids were very excited about the frost the next morning and brought in bits of frozen grass to show us. We headed off to Dunedin as soon as we could, arriving about 4:30 pm.  We had a quick look around the new house, unloaded the trailers, then went off to Mum and Dad's for the night.
We listened to Watership Down on CD while we were driving.  It is a 16-hr audiobook, and it finished about 1 1/2 hours out of Dunedin, so we probably drove for about 17 1/2 hours to get from New Plymouth to Dunedin.  Although it was a remarkably trouble-free trip, I don't want to do it again for a while.