Hi all,
Wow, the
last few weeks have just flown past. I hope all is going well for all of you
:-)
Jan had a
great time at the Rugby Sevens, and didn't get too wet in the rain on Friday
night. He was very tired when he got home though! We also went to the Sarau
fair at Upper Moutere on Sunday, but didn't stay that long as it was soooo hot
that we were wilting. We did swing by the land, as our neighbour - who has been
grazing his rams on our place - had left the water tap on in the trough and had
drained 25,000 litres of water down the hill. Needless to say, we were dropping
over a few litres of water to water the trees.
Luckily
we have since had a wee bit of rain, so the tank is now 100mm full from the
bottom, which means that the irrigation system will now work. And at least autumn
is coming!
On
Waitangi Day a group of us went up Mount Arthur, which was great. I took the
new camera, and then on our return, discovered a funky little piece of freeware
by two guys at the University of British Columbia called Autostitch which painlessly
created some wonderful panoramas for us from the photos we had taken.
We had
Karen, Merrill & Colin all staying with us for Sealord Opera in the Park
with Dame Kiri this past weekend. We had a great night out. Karen, Jan & I
sold programmes for the Cancer Society in the gold seating area. The sound
system was great, people were really well behaved, the weather couldn't have
been better, the fireworks were fab. However, for those who were picnicking, I
understand that the infrastructure needed some more work; they needed more
toilets and food stalls, and the existing access to what there was of both was
inadequate. There's always something that can be improved in all these events
:-)
Hui-Ping
stayed with Julie & Murray, so we all caught up for breakfast on Sunday
morning at our place - and Jan's waffles; yum. We also had breakfast out on
Thursday for Karen's birthday & caught up with Nicki, Dawn, Tiffany, Julie,
Gilbert & his wee boys.
Karen
& I had a great time together and it was wonderful to see her. She is
thinking about working her way up to competing in a half Ironman. That will be
a fantastic thing for her to do. She is coming down to Nelson again for the
Taylor's Triathlon at the end of March, so we will get a good catch up then
too.
Thanks for
those of you who have sponsored either Jan or myself for the NZ Cancer
Society's Relay for Life. We really appreciate it. I had a mammogram done in
January, and just got called back for a more in-depth set of x-rays and
ultrasound as they had found a mass which they felt needed further
investigation. Luckily the mass in question is purely a cyst. However, in going
through the ultrasound, they have also discovered a much larger cyst which
hadn't shown up at all on the mammogram, so that is now documented as well.
Jan &
I had a chat last week about our lack of progress on building plans. We thought
that the road block was partly that we thought that we wanted to build a house
somewhat like the house we currently have, but then all the designs that we
liked were very modern. It made it very hard to work out what we wanted to do.
Then last
week we went to an open home on Kina Peninsular, at PureStyle, and we think we
might now have house plans. Amazing, I know. We got some very basic floor plans
from the developers, and now have to investigate price; ie how much to (a) buy
the plans from PureStyle & get a draughtsperson to make the changes we want
and contract a builder to build it (b) get a quote from PureStyle to make the
changes we want, build it it using our timber & project manage the build
for us (c) get a quote from PureStyle for the plans, get a draughtsperson to
make the changes we want & find out how much it would cost to use their
builders/sub-contractors to do the work for us using our timber. It is all
double-glazed, wool block insulated etc etc. The developer, Alan Trent, said
that he has doubled the required code on all aspects of the build, which we
both liked. So anyway, we will see where we get to on negotiation. The house we
liked cost $700,000 to build. Ouch. If you are interested in the
over-indulgence of it all, check out http://www.purestyle.com (however, I find
these photos a bit too much of a 'production' - I would never have gone to see
the place if we had seen these beforehand).
This weekend
we are heading over to Marlborough to see where Magda is living. It will be
good to catch up with her. We also plan to get a day over at the land to do
some spraying now we have some water again, and to see how the eucalypts have
cut up & how many railway sleepers and floorboards we now have.
Take
care, lots of hugs & more next time. Alles liebe :-)
Sam & Jan
