Christmas Craft Night

We had a lovely relaxing night sitting around with each other getting into the Christmas spirit!  Some of us made some really beautiful cards using things like the Cuttlebug & Stamping equipment - made us look like professionals!  Others of us were busy decorating balls and other shapes into sweet little christmas decorations.  They looked awesome!

In keeping with tradition, supper was really scrummy too (cheesecake, strawberries, chocolate etc!).

If you'd like to see a few more photos, you can view the album here.

Merry Christmas everyone!

Welcome Baby Tyla!

Yay!  Little Tyla safely arrived at 2.32pm on the 14th October 2011 via C-section.  Mum and baby have been resting up and are recovering nicely.

Tyla weighed in at 4020g (8lb 13oz) and was 56cm long.  She's a little honey.  Mikayla is a very adoring big sister, and enjoying doting on Tyla.

We look forward to having cuddles at WM.

A huge congratulations to you, Vivienne, Paul and Mikayla!

Think Pink!

Today we kicked off the term with a LOVELY morning tea to raise some money for the Breast Cancer Foundation.

Lamington, White Chocolate Brownie with a pink ganache, Dark Chocolate & Berry Brownie, Marshmallows, Sprinkle Biscuits, Pink Grapefuit Juice & Julia's fab coffees!

Yummy!

Congratulations girls, today we raised $40!!!  It is such a good thing to be able to give to charities that effect women in our community!

Click on this link if you would like to know more about the Breast Cancer Foundation.

Welcome Baby Rawiri!

Amba had her little baby boy on the 7th of October at 11.50am.  Everything went really well, and Amba is recovering great.  We even got to cuddle this little newbie at WM today.  He's adorable.

Rawiri (or Arjay) Komene weighed in at a decent 7lb 14oz!

Congratulations, Amba & family!

Cool Cupcakes

What fun!  The kids loved playing with the icing - it was just like playdough afterall!  We (the children) decorated lovely cupcakes to take home for our dads and significant men in our lives to celebrate Fathers Day. 

I was quite surprised with how well they did, and really didn't need much help at all!  Check out the photo album here.

Welcome Baby Liana!

Little Liana Joy Fransham was born to Nicole on the 17th July at 5.12am.

She weighed in at a lovely 7lb 13oz (3530grams), and was 52cm long.

By now most of you will have a had a chance to oogle this little cutie, and perhaps even have a cuddle!
 
A huge congratuations to you and your family, Nicole!

Cupcake Decorating Night

Wow - we had so much fun labouring over these little beauties for a couple of hours!

Emma came and showed us the basic tricks of the trade to get started and she was so helpful!  Even learning little things like how high your cupcake should rise in it's case while cooking makes all the difference to the icing.

We experimented with a butter cream icing, a ganache icing and a cream cheese icing as the bases under our top layer of fondant icing.  They were yum!  If you would like the icing recipes, download them here.

We were amazed at the creativity that was evident in everyone's cupcakes.  They looked really cool!  A HUGE thanks to Emma for a really fun night!  (See the album for more photos.)

Welcome Baby Danika!

She's so lovely!

Danika was born on the 27th June, 2011.

She weighed in at 6lb 10oz (3.005kg).

A huge congratulations to you, Sumeko & Mark!  We all look forward to meeting her!

Welcome Baby Makennan!

(This photo was taken by Amy Cope www.amycope.co.nz)

What a lovely little boy!

Makennan was born at 11.50pm on the 25th June 2011, weighing in at a nice 8lb 3oz (3.713kg).

A huge congratulations to you, Sara & Dylan, he is gorgeous!

Butterfly Creek Visit

 

 

Even though it was pretty wet, we still had a great time at Butterfly Creek.  The children enjoyed the chance to be outside, and us Mum's indulged in food and nice coffee's....  YUM!  We finished it all off with the obligatory train ride.  It's so cute how the kids always are itching to get on it, then once seated, they pretty much take it in their stride!

For a few more photos, check out the photo album.

Franklin Zoo Visit

Our visit to the Franklin Zoo was really neat!

We had a guided tour with the resident vet, and she was really interesting.  She has a real love of conservation, and of rehabilition for animals.  It was very interesting hearing her talking about her passion in relation to the various animals that Franklin Zoo is currently involved in rehabilitating, including their gorgeous ex-circus elephant.


Our guide was very skilled in making her talk interesting for us Mums, but also stopping periodically and talking on our children's level so they remained interested.

The kids had the opportunity to feed the Zebra, some sheep and a goat.  And of course the ducks.  :o)

This zoo is definitely well worth the visit if you are looking for something a little outside of the normal 'zoo box'.

Check out the album for more photos.

 

Photo Book Craft Night

So we tried our hands at a different sort of scrap-booking.  We made these little accordian style albums up from scratch.  They turned out pretty cool!  You girls are truly so creative!

For more photos, check out the album.

Morning Tea at the Gardens and Kindy Talk from Liz

The Gardens

We enjoyed some beautiful weather and as well as each others company 2 weeks ago at the Botanic Gardens Cafe Miko. The kids enjoyed riding around on bikes, playing with diggers (thanks Josh) and a ball (thanks Joe) while us mums sat around for a nice chat and coffee.

Check out a few pics of our gorgeous kids at WM!

Kindy Talk

This week we were priviliged to have Liz from Kiddywinks kindy answer our many questions about what to expect when our kids are about to go to kindy! This is especially near and dear to me, as my Lucy is turning 3 on Thursday and will start at Kiddywinks on her birthday. It definitely creeps up fast! Thank you Liz for sharing your wealth of knowledge with us.

Christchurch Earthquake Fundraising!

We are so thrilled with last weeks response and generosity from the mums who came to WM last Tuesday! We managed to raise $100 to give to a very worthy recipient from Christchurch for the newborn "care package." This was all lovingly put together by The Sleep Store (http://www.thesleepstore.co.nz/) with the funds we raised.

We have been given permission to share with you the story of Jenny Payne who wrote in to The Sleep Store, in the hopes of being considered for a care package.

Jenny writes:

"2 days after the earthquake and 26 weeks pregnant, I had bleeding and contractions and was air ambulanced out to Dunedin hospital as the NICU in Christchurch wouldn't be able to cope.

Luckily, they managed to stop the labour and I am now nearly 30 weeks! Such a miracle! We lost our last baby at 3 days old as he had Posterior Urethral Valves and was born at 32 weeks so the whole experience was like reliving the nightmare.

We have to stay in Dunedin now until the babies born (which could be at any moment as I'm such high risk) and am unable to travel back to CHCH and the NICU is still unable to cope.

We hadn't finished getting all of our baby things ready and are finding it hard to remember what we need and also trying to cover the costs of being down here inDunedin with our 5 year old and still paying the mortage and bills up in Christchurch.

My husband works in the CBD and his building was destroyed, thankfully he is still getting payed for now, but his job future is very uncertain.

If we could be considered for the care package, that would be amazing."

Jenny and her family has (and is) truly going through some hard times, and we hope that her story can encourage you, knowing that you have blessed her in this way. We will be praying that this little baby remains safe inside her until a safe time to be born, and that they are healthy and a real source of joy to the Payne family. Please see the picture below of the items she will receive from The Sleep Store.

Ambury Farm Park Visit

With the forecast for showers, we wondered what we were going to be in for, but it quickly turned out to be a stunner of a day! We were charmed by cows, sheep, goats, a grumpy looking turkey, and some VERY eager chickens....


Some of our group got to see a sheep being shorn; and we learned some weird words naming those wobbly bits on a turkey! (Carbuncles & snoods!) Did you know that when it's red, it's not a happy camper? When they're blue, they're relaxed. As you can see, this guy was TOTALLY enjoying our visit!

Our morning tea/lunch was enjoyed in some lovely shade outside the kitchen. Yay for the shade! Ambury Farm Park is a wonderful facility for getting up close and personal to the animals, and the best bit is it's free! There's a bit more info on the website (www.arc.govt.nz/parks). I noticed there is also some walks along the shoreline there...