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Monday, 19 Apr 2010

Staglands with Great Friends

Yesterday (as today) was a glorious autumnal day. Which was perfect as we'd planned a day out with our great friends to go to Staglands, a stunning country park estate set in the most beautiful valley. The sun shone all day and as we meandered our way through various areas of the park, the kids chased each other around and fed all the animals (in between us feeding them and ourselves a number of cakes and milkshakes along with the usual brunch - that adds up to a lot of food!) the animals were so tame and well mannered too which made it all the more enjoyable.

It was such a great day to share with our good friends Sandi,Sean, Keely and Amber. Keely and Myles adore each other and just spend all their time chatting away and basically having fun. Little Amber is growing so fast and we've seen her go from crawling to racing around getting involved and having so much fun with Keely and Myles and the three of them had a ball with plenty of space to explore.

It was just one of those perfect sunday family days out and we'll sure miss these folks when we go for our big move up north. I know we'll keep in touch though as we've spoken many times of this. One of the most special things of travelling somewhere new to live is how you come to meet such great people that have travelled too and are on the same life adventure with their own stories to share. And those moments and stories that you have together and hear about hold a special place in your heart

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Saturday, 17 Apr 2010

Myles at Whale Bay - Tutukaka Northland

Whilst on our Easter hols 'up north' we ventured along the east coast of the Northland to find a stunning beach - we'd not heard of it although it is very well known amongst the beach lovers of NZ - Although we went during the week prior to the main Easter holidays and had the place to ourselves - totally amazing - a stunning paradise of a place that you have a stunning walk to get to through native bush and pohutakawa trees which lean precariously off the cliff edge and then cascade down onto the shore itself offering perfect shade and a place to hang your togs following a wonderful swim. Crystal clear calm waters top off this stunning (yes I know I've said stunning 4 times!) beach and today as ever M was in his element so what more can we do than take the boy's pic over and over - Times like this are to cherish and when you see your child being in the moment - free like he was in these shots you just have to record them forever - enjoy :-D

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Saturday, 17 Apr 2010

Solar Power At The Ray House

Well since we don't have a house of our own to experiment with eco power, we thought that our recycled copper water feature would be a good place to start. Use the power of the sun to drive the water pump. Leaving all the techy stuff to Craig and his trusty assistant Myles - I stood back to watch the marvel unfold! It was pretty amazing I have to say - and OK the sun was shining brightly on us today - but all the same it's a start and with thoughts coming ever closer of us building our own eco friendly home it's something that we're determined to pursue - oh and mother nature must have liked it as our resident tree Weta came to see what all the fuss was about too! Yes he is pretty scary looking especially as we don't have anything like that in the UK but we're happy we have a native insect in our midst!

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Saturday, 17 Apr 2010

Thanks to Friends - Capital E Show

Our wonderful friends in the UK - Francesca, Howard, Kai and Cybele, sent us a surprise gift for Easter - tickets to see The Farm at The End of the Road - children's theatre performance at Capital E in Wellington

So we set of this morning into town grabbed a quick coffee and entered into the magical world of kids theatre! I have to say the performance was brilliant and funny even for us oldies! The quality of the actors and puppets was sooo good, and we all really enjoyed ourselves

Here's just a few pics of M pre-performance - he loves anything to do with 'being on stage' or puppets shows etc...and so he was able to do a little show of his own before the show proper began! Also a few pics of the actual show - shame I couldn't video it - it was a wonderful way to spend a family saturday morning and head off for brunch afterwards - so thank you so much guys for thinking of us all - we had a blast :-D

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Friday, 16 Apr 2010

The Life of Myles

We've been sooo busy these kindy hols, just getting up to so much at Ray HQ. M has been the busiest of them all and we've a bundle of pics to portray this!

From the end of last term at the kindy fare as a pirate to visiting Lindale Farm and sitting on a tractor! And then all the usual fun of making stuff, playing sports, play dates and visiting Te Papa to travelling up north to see our friends for Easter. It seems our pace of life here is slower but we do more?

I guess it's what comes from having so much to explore and we sure make the most of our time! Since moving here we've just done so much I guess Myles' growing up will have lots more in store for us and I do think to the time very soon when school will take a lot of his time, but we'll always have to school holidays to treasure and I know he'll always be fond of hanging out with mom and dad whenever he can - we are The Rays!!! - and we love our time with each other - there's nothing like it - just looking forward to hanging out together more and our visit to UK to see our folks will be awesome this year as M gets older we are just more in tune with each other - I have ideas of us never being uncool!!! - I know parents always think that but I'd like to think we can keep up! - Let's hope so as these days I'm loving being part of the Ray trio :-))

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Friday, 16 Apr 2010

Easter Treats from the Nans

Having been away for Easter - blog post to be written!!! - Myles arrived back to not one but two parcels of goodies from Nanny June and Nanny Pat!

He was sooo excited and spent no time in tearing open the parcels to discover a bumper of presents and choccies!!! In his own words - "Cool!" lots of times over and it's been a great end to his half term holidays by having even more treats and toys to keep him busy!

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Thursday, 11 Mar 2010

Myles week of fun

This week the sun has been with us and it's been perfect weather for playing games outdoors, visiting the beach with friends and just chillin' out enjoying the would you believe autumn. At the Ray house we've been working hard but have also made the most of the warm weather

So a few pics to show off how much fun M has been having - he's also dressed as a tiger this week at kindy - this shot was taken at 9am! just as we'd arrived Myles didn't hesitate to dress up and whizz down the slide at break neck speed owing to the furry tiger dress up!

We also went to the zoo last sunday as it was children's day - so some pics of M meeting the Wot Wots!

The last couple of shots were on wednesday at Scorching Bay - with our wonderful friends - Sandi and her daughter's Keely and Amber - the weather was gorgeous and the littlies had not hesitation of running in and out of the sea - even dunking themselves a couple of times to get properly wet!

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Tuesday, 2 Mar 2010

Holiday Highlights

I can't begin to say how amazing it was to have my mom and her friend Marj visit us before Christmas. We had the best of times and look forward to another trip next year from the ladies! I'll let these pics speak for us - we have tons more and some videos but as ever it takes us an age to update this blog - I am very all or nothing and have done 5 blog posts this evening in an attempt to bring up to date what we've been up to this last quarter!!! - Enjoy
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Thursday, 21 Jan 2010

Matakana Hols

Following a wonderful Christmas with mom and Marj and a quiet New Year at Ray HQ we were headed 'up North' where it is far from grim! Our destination Matakana is a village that has been brought into the 21st century but still retains it's charm. We have fallen for this area which consists of a rolling rural landscape, and stunning coastline, dotted with attractive vineyards, olive and fruit orchards and organic farms who sell their produce at the weekly farmer's market. A great blend of country slow vibe mixed with a community of like minded people whose aim is to produce quality food and drink mixed with the odd artist group,galleries and a number of gelato makers just to cover the pudding!

Whilst here we visited Rainbow Valley Farm a farm with a emphasis on permaculture - a movement which began in Australia in the 1970's. It's ethos is based upon asking the question 'Are we allowing our culture to develop in a permanent way by how we are interacting with the land?' - So do we live in harmony with our planet or use and abuse it?

We also visited Brick Bay Vineyard an established vineyard and with an amazing sculpture trail and restaurant. Possibly the fanciest place you could sip a Pino Gris in the area!

We spent 10 days in this area so many more pics to follow and it is somewhere that we would like to move to if all our plans go right in the next 12 months - watch this space!

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Monday, 11 Jan 2010

Kindy's out n the summer hols roll

We're just into week 2 of school/kindy for M's summer hols at the moment, at the family Ray we have been super busy and me n M have been up to our usual Blue Peter specials - maybe all that TV watching and 4 years at Art & Design school may not have been in vane after all! And how can we not go for a free pottery lesson at our fave haunt Te Papa too to start off our second week of creativity!



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