Gail Dickson .. my blog from Down Under

Have now started my treatment at the Chiropractor …. ouch! Same thing happened when I attended after Kyle was born … had quite a bit of aching for a couple of days after the adjustments. Feel like a little old woman hobbling about but if it’s anything like the last time, it’ll be well worth it. Only went to the chiropractor in Edinburgh 4 times and then didn’t have any reoccurrence until Regan was on the way. This one definitely has a different method and uses what they call a drop table to do the adjustments … bit strange but as I said, if it works again I don’t care how strange it is.

Also experiencing the ouch factor were Kyle and Regan who finally had their second phase of top up jags (they’ve had one cold or another constantly since the first so haven’t been able to take them). Much better performance from Kyle this time with only a little whimper … so the nurse didn’t call him a drama queen.

Kyle has taken an interest in the planets so we bought him a model planetarium thing which he had to build and paint … he seemed to really enjoy it and now tells everyone about Saturn, Mars etc. We have Caylen coming for a play day tomorrow so Kyle is really looking forward to it. Caylen is as mad on trains as Kyle is so I think it may be a Thomas day and our house may end up covered in train track!

Regan is getting more and more mobile .. She now crawls at a very fast pace and she is a lot more confident and stable while walking around the furniture. I really don’t think it will be long before she’s up and walking.

We didn’t make it out last Monday (Labour Day) as the weather wasn’t very nice so we stayed in the house and Kyle and Regan ended up racing each other along the deck on scooter/BMW car. Regan loved it and kept her feet up while Bobby or I pushed her along … There are some pictures of it on Flickr.

Talking of racing … the tickets went on sale for A1GP on Thursday so have now bought the tickets. Looking forward to the weekend as it should be nice weather too since it’s in the middle of January.

Work is getting busier … I’m now doing both jobs so I spend all day long in meetings and there is no time to do any real work (sound familiar?). The new PM starts on Monday for my old job so after a weeks handover, hopefully I’ll be able to move over completely. I’m enjoying the new stuff and am beginning to understand what they are talking about a bit more .. We are currently trying to organise an offsite day for the new team and it’s down to a wine tasting tour of Waiheke Island, karting or golf … hmm wonder which one I’d like to do!

On the house front, we’ve made our decision on the heat pumps and they are being installed next week and the carpet for the upstairs is being fitted the week after. Hopefully, we’ll be able to move upstairs the weekend after that which will mean that Kyle and Regan can have a toy room on the middle floor and we can clear the gym out of boxes and start to get fit. Although there is enough room for all of us on the middle floor, I really want to move upstairs as it’s such a nice space (I’ll post some photos of it once it’s finished).

Bobby had already warned me about it but it still came as a bit of a surprise when it happened today …. We got back around 5pm and it was warm inside the house so we opened the ranch sliders (French doors to you!) ….. The sun was going down and the light in the valley was starting to get dim and suddenly the air was full of the sound of bagpipes! Whoever it is is very good too … it was a very weird experience!

Finally starting getting involved in my new role this week (although still only on an adhoc basis) and will be handing two of my projects over next week and hopefully the new PM will be starting the week after. New project is really interesting although I think it may bring some challenges with it ….

Thursday night was our first parents evening at the new nursery. As expected they didn’t say too much about Regan other than she’s great … which we know anyway. Our ten minute chat on Kyle however lasted about half an hour! They think he’s great and kept going on about what a great vocabulary he’s got … we don’t notice anymore because we live with it every day but I guess he does have an extended vocabulary for a four year old. One thing they did say which was hilarious was that he talked constantly and they were glad when he went to sleep at lunchtime as it gave them a bit of peace and quiet from all his questions! The older of the two actually asked us how we cope with him 24*7 as it must be exhausting! I laughed and told her we don’t cope … we send him to her!
It was our wedding anniversary on Friday (and my brother Stephen’s birthday … Happy Birthday Bruv!). We’ve now been married for 12 years … although we’ve been together for 18!!!!! Since we were both working, we decided just to go out for dinner at night so the four of us went to the local Italian for an early dinner. Both Kyle and Regan ate loads (Regan ate her first piece of garlic bread and loved it!). It was a nice evening ….

Today, we went to the Thomas Show at the theatre. Wasn’t sure what to expect but it was quite good. They had Thomas, Percy and Diesel moving about on stage which was quite good. Kyle seemed to enjoy it and thanked me for taking him at the end …

This is the Labour Day weekend so we’re off on holiday tomorrow … haven’t decided what to do yet … may go down to the Targa rally or may just go to Piha or KareKare for a walk. We’ll wait and see what the weather is like tomorrow. Had a look on the web to see what Labour Day is all about and it says …. Labour Day commemorates the struggle for an eight-hour working day. New Zealand workers were among the first in the world to claim this right when, in 1840, the carpenter Samuel Parnell won an eight-hour day in Wellington. Labour Day was first celebrated in New Zealand on 28 October 1890, when several thousand trade union members and supporters attended parades in the main centres. Government employees were given the day off to attend the parades. They struggled for an 8 hour day?!?! I can’t get used to this 8 hour day thing … they need to struggle for a 7 hour day like I’m used to!

Think I said in an earlier blog that this weekend is when everyone gets the garden ready for summer and gets the barbie out for the summer … Bobby was obviously getting in the swing of things as he attacked the carport today … the previous owners had put a storage unit in half of the carport so it was only a single. He spent this afternoon demolishing it and we now have a double car port. It actually lets a lot of light into the front of the house too which is good.

We are all moved and there are boxes everywhere! Bobby took last Friday off work to start moving some stuff in the back of the car (I didn’t have any holidays as you have to earn them to take them over here … ). As he’s got another Legacy Estate, you can actually fit quite a lot in the back so we managed to get Kyle’s bed, Regan’s cot and quite a lot of Kyle’s toys and some of the kitchen stuff up on the Friday. As I mentioned in the earlier blog, we had decided to camp out in the new house on the Friday so we managed to clean some more and start unpacking before the real removals were done on the Saturday.

Saturday came and all the heavy stuff was moved here … the old house still had bits and bobs in it and still needed cleaned out so spent most of Sunday there finishing up. The rental manager is really picky cleanliness wise so had to spend quite a bit of time polishing stuff so it was all shiny so she didn’t complain (when we moved in, she threatened to call the previous tenants back to clean something that she thought was not clean enough!). Due to two very tired and bored children, we didn’t quite finish it on the Sunday and we had to go back on the Monday too … much to Kyle’s annoyance!

Anyway, done now … keys handed back for the old place and full time in new place.

Due to new carpet being required on the top floor, we are all living on the middle floor (bottom floor is full of furniture for top floor!) and it’s actually big enough to live in that way … so it’ll be really good when we can use all three floors! Definitely enough space for visitors.

Still haven’t moved over to my new role … have been attending meetings etc to try to get up to speed with the projects/strategy and even ended up standing in for my new manager last week. This week, I attended my first offsite and ended up with a rather fetching black shirt with VF all over it. I would have liked it better if it had said VF McLaren or something but I guess VF are maybe not advertising the fact that they are associated with McLaren quite so much now. Don’t get me started on that subject ….

Met a new PM on my new programme this week and she is off co-driving for her husband in the Targa rally next week so children and weather dependent, we may pop down on the Monday holiday (Labour Day) to check it out. Although there are a lot of Holdens and Fords, there are also some interesting cars in the line up … Bobby is especially interested in the Mark 1 Escorts … me, I’m more interested in the Pug 205 Gti, the Skylines & Evos and the Esprit. We’ll see how it goes on Labour weekend … NZ say that Labour weekend is the unofficial start of summer where everyone gets the barbie out of winter storage and tidies the garden up. Guess we’ll have to start looking about for a barbie!

It was my mum’s birthday on Tuesday so bought a couple of bunches of lilies which were her favourite flowers … strangely enough, I never liked them before she died and used to think the smell was horrible. Now they bring a kind of comfort … Kyle picked a flower out of the garden at pre-school to add to them as well which was nice. I talk to him about his Gran all the time to try and make sure that he doesn’t forget her … it’s sad to think that he might.

VF had a free spinal check for permanent employees last week which I attended as my back has been bothering me a bit recently. They did an initial check at work then if you needed it they offered a “much reduced in price” full check up later. I obviously needed the full check up and I think all are agreed that I am falling apart … it‘s actually just a reoccurrence of what I had after Kyle was born. Am waiting to hear back from the chiropractor on when he can start my treatment.

Managed to track down Kyle’s Maori song (which is actually not all sung in Maori). It’s called Taniwha and is (as I reported earlier) about a mythical sea creature. It’s a song that most pre-schools teach NZ kids as there are lots of actions and some Maori … I have included the words.

‘One Day a Taniwha’

One day a taniwha, went swimming in the moana.
He whispered in my taringa,
“Won’t you come with me?
There’s such a lot to see,
Underneath the deep blue sea.”
I said, “Kaore, kaore, kaore,
I’ve to haere, haere, haere.
Although I know we could be friends,
My mother waits for me
Underneath the kowhai tree.
Taniwha, haere ra.”

The words Kyle has learned are slightly different and this one doesn’t have the haka type bit at the end which is the bit that Kyle really likes. Kyle’s best friend seemingly does the full haka thing with no shirt on with his dad to this song which must be quite amusing. Talking of Caylen, Kyle went on his first play day to Caylen’s a couple of weeks ago and loved it … Caylen is 3 days older than Kyle and they get on so well … We’ve offered to have him here for a return play day once we’re a bit more settled.

Regan is getting much faster and is starting to try and walk round furniture … she’s still a bit unsteady and has had a couple of bumps so far but she’s learning. Teeth numbers 7,8 and 9 are now on their way so she’s a bit unhappy at times just now but overall still the happy girl we all know and love. Handed her a sandwich the other day to a “ta” so the words are starting to come too ….

Think that’s it for now .. Will blog a bit more frequently now that we’re more settled.

Apologies for not blogging for so long … we’ve been a bit busy over the last week and a bit. Last Thursday, we went for our pre-inspection visit to the house and found it to be very grubby (probably an under-exaggeration if anything) so before we were even the rightful owners, we had booked a carpet cleaner to come and clean the middle and bottom floor carpets. We had looked at the top floor carpets with no furniture around and had decided that they were way past saving so they are being ripped out and new carpet laid.

Everything went well on settlement day and we now own the house. We have spent the last week painting and cleaning in preparation for moving in this weekend. Bobby and I are both exhausted going between houses and are looking forward to staying put tonight as we’re going to camp in the new house in preparation for the movers tomorrow.

Kyle now has a blue room and Regan a pink one … who would have thought that I’d fall for the stereotypical colour schemes?? Certainly not me …. Regan looks sooo cute in pink though, I can’t help myself.

For all it’s been hard work over the last week, it’s definitely worth it as we all like the house and will love living there. Kyle gets really excited every time we go up there and gets very depressed when we go back to the old house … which is a great sign for the move.

The next week holds more of the same with the addition of people coming to quote for carpets and heat pumps etc so it’ll be another busy one. May not have broadband for a few days either so I will only be picking up mails while at work (have access to webmail from there though) but won’t be blogging during that time.

It’s a quick post … will catch up with all our other news once we’re back online in the new house.