25 June 2008

Back Patio project commences....

Simultaneous to the driveway project is the back patio..... here is stage 1.....



Growing a few herbs ('erbs as they are pronounced here!) at the back door. The barrels are actually a resin polymer so they don't smell like wine as the real ones tend to and are a lot lighter to move! The herbs in the left barrel are 5 different kinds of basil.


There is a gate through the fence to our neighbours house and at the moment there isn't actually a gate in it so there are a lot of comings and goings by two little people when anyone is outside....
Here are CJ & Bella on Sunday afternoon when their Mothers were hard at work with shovels in their respective 'yards'. Check out Bella's hands.... Cooper's feet were a similar colour when we got inside (he had his Crocs on so his feet were dotted with black mud!).



At one point Bella was lying on the ground (yes in the dirt) and Cooper was being an 'upside-down boy' with his head and feet on the ground looking across at her.

Today we got a driveway!

The last few days have seen a lot of action out the front of the house. Here we are at 9am this morning with Cooper's enthusiastic face all ready for action and me not yet ready for the day (dressed but sans make-up and pre-coffee both of which never eventuated due to all the excitement to follow!)

Here are some pics which culminated in us finally having a driveway up to the new garage! We can't drive on it for a week, but we are enjoying looking at it!!



Watch this space for when the doors go in and the front of the garage looses it's "ghetto" look....












Cooper was thrilled to have not just the usual one but TWO concrete trucks here at the same time (it actually took 3 truckloads of concrete as one truck came back again). BTW cool pic including my hanging baskets for those not so into concrete trucks!
Here is a pic of the wee man helping out with his concrete tool and another of him being very interested with one of the trowels (he did actually get to use it in the wet concrete at one point!). We spent close to 6 hours outside and it was almost impossible to get him to stop and eat or drink as it was all so exciting! I finally put him in his buggy (stroller) around 4pm as he was exhausted but not wanting to miss any action (plus they were cutting the concrete - prevents it cracking in the Winter for those who wonder why on earth they would do such a thing to such a beautiful piece of work!) and we went for a walk to post Oskar's birthday presents and he fell asleep on the way home. As I type this it is around 6pm and no sounds are emitting from upstairs as yet!

15 June 2008

Houdini's great escape


Last week, we had an escape artist in our house. Cooper managed to climb out of his bed. Thankfully Mother was in the room next door and heard him calling "Nonna, Nooooonnnnnna!!!" and raced in to find him in this situation. She rescued him, put him back in bed and he did it again. When I got home, we put him back in his bed as a test and stood by with the camera and sure enough, within 5 seconds, here he is. We are not ready for him to have a big bed just yet (not to mention that the gate to the stairs is significantly lower than his bed rails were) so we have dismantled his bed and it is currently propped up on pieces of wood. Before Mother & Dad leave Dad is going to secure it so that (hopefully) Houdini can't strike again for a year or so.

Only in America!


I've been waiting for a while to get a paparazzi shot of the man who sometimes mows the lawn across the road from us. Every week since April the camera is upstairs or I'm out or miss the moment. But this week, I captured the shot!! In New Zealand, people walk behind pushing their lawn-mowers and it is considered a form of exercise to mow your own lawn. But Americans think of everything to make life easier....

08 June 2008

Congratulations!

Here is a special entry dedicated to our most avid (daily!) blog checker-inerer - Rick R!

Rick & Camille got married today so here is a link to the photos that Jamie took.

04 June 2008

Friday 31st May

Check out how fast the bricks went up!!



Sunday 2nd June

Monday 3rd June

Tuesday 4th June