Some more stuff we've made

Babies are such a nice way for people to start

Spending this time with Emily as she starts to get used to living in this strange big world has been so special.

I found this quote:
A baby will make love stronger, days shorter, nights longer, bankroll smaller, home happier, clothes shabbier, the past forgotten, and the future worth living for”

She makes love stronger - my love for her is just overwhelming, but so is my love for my other grand child, Kev, as I relive his babyhood; for our special son-in-law, Ray and his parents, Rita and Graham as they just gaze at her in awe; for Sarah, as I remember what it was like being a first time Mom - nervous and unsure and so aware of the responsibility of raising her; and especially my love for Nicky - my baby with her baby.  I admire her so much as she grits her teeth and lets Emily latch on to her sore nipples, I feel so helpless when she is sad and anxious, I feel so sad when she cries because we are going home and won't see Em growing up, I feel so warm when she kisses us both when I'm holding Em and whispers to her "You have the best granny and grampa."  I feel like we are living in a bubble of love - and she is the centre of it all.

She makes the days shorter - there is lots to do, but lots of each day is spent looking at her, holding her, tickling her, loving her.  She is an absolute time-waster - and it's wonderful.  But when I can tear myself away from her, I'm busy cooking so Nic won't have to when we go home, baking so she has nutritious snacks, washing the mounds of washing Em creates each day - pee, poo and puke means a lot of clothes are used!

She makes the nights longer - right now we are having special "Granny and Grampa Time" - Nic and Ray go to bed about 9.30 and we get to hold, watch and love Emily till her middle of the night feed.  Delicious!  Pete is having his turn at the moment and then I will have mine when he goes to shower.  But it means we go to bed later and sometimes get up earlier if Nic needs to sleep.  The nights are drawing in - and our older bodies are adjusting to sleeping at different times and with one ear open.

She makes the bankroll smaller - we would buy things for her every time we go to the shop - I want to buy every cute outfit I can see at Farmers, Pumpkin Patch, JK Kids .... you name it, I want to buy it.  But even more than that, we need to save so we can travel to new Zealand often to see her.  Nic said the other night that as soon as she is big enough to travel alone, they will send her to visit us - because 1 ticket will be more affordable.  We know Nic and Ray did the right thing settling in Tauranga, but being long distance grandparents is the downside.

She makes the home happier - seeing ray's face as he comes in from school and swoops his beloved daughter up, reminds me of how Pete would do exactly the same when Sarah and Nic were tiny.  The home revolves around a tiny, quiet (for the moment) little girl but it is a home that sings with happiness.

She makes clothes shabbier - well, none of us really have time to worry too much about how we look, but my goodness, does she have an un-shabby wardrobe.  Beautiful clothes - all types and styles.  She is a real fashion plate - but even more beautiful when she's naked on her mat or in her bath.

She makes the past forgotten and the future worth living for - our beautiful Emily seems to wipe us clean and give us great hope for the future. 

I love you, Little Em.  You have started off so nicely, and I know you will get even better.

Welcome to the family

Our precious granddaughter, Emily Catherine Hodson has arrived!  Her coming has been keenly awaited for a couple of weeks.  While she was only due on 17 February, we all hoped for an earlier arrival - Nic because she was uncomfortable, we because we wanted as many days with her on the outside as possible before we needed to go home.  Every night we'd say "Goodnight" and hope it would start to happen in the middle of the night - but every morning we'd wake up to find her still inside.

But she came when she was ready!  On Sunday, 19th February she started to make her presence known with her mom's waters breaking and weak contractions starting.  We all thought this was it!  Ray would have a birthday baby after all.  We even gave him his birthday presents at midnight.  But the night wore on with contractions coming and going, and at 8, Nic saw the midwife who sent her home to get some sleep.  At 5, she went back to the hospital to see the midwife and obstetrician, who said they'd admit her overnight in case of infection, and would induce labour properly in the morning.  So the "birthday baby" option seemed to slip away.  But little Em knew what she wanted - and that was to give us all a surprise.  No sooner had the midwife left the hospital, than contractions started in earnest, and she was born at 9.10pm - on 20 February - exactly 29 years after her dad!

Nic had a few problems post partum with a hemorrhage, and Ray didn't even get to let us know till after 10.30 - but with amazing staff at the hospital, she was fine and although she needed blood and was kept in the delivery ward for nearly 24 hrs, she was soon stronger and ready to take on this challenge.

Em was 8lb 7 oz or 3.825kg when she was born and is 47cm long,  She has lots of dark hair and deep blue eyes,  fat little cheeks and a mouth like a little raspberry.  She has long fingers and skinny little feet.  She is adorable!

It's more than 14 years since Kev was born, so I wondered if I'd feel the same about Em's birth.  I was there when Kev was born and held him as soon as he was born.  I didn't get to hold Em for 12 hours, but the wave of love was just the same.  How wonderful to hold a little baby, flesh of your flesh - and know that the circle of love just gets bigger and bigger.  Pete didn't get to hold Kev until he came home - he described how his arms felt empty until he had cuddled him.  I felt the same as we waited for Ray to come home on Monday night and tell us all about it - and yet, once I had held her, my arms felt full of love.

Seeing Ray and Nic with her is just so awesome - they just gaze at her in awe.  Ray is like a kid with the best present ever - he just giggles with delight - and he can't bear to be parted from her.  Nic is glowing - despite the pain and the weakness after the blood loss.  She says that she can't believe that she loves her more each time she holds her.

The Facebook Phenomenon has also added something to this birth - we could post on fb straight away - and as it was daytime in SA, there were messages immediately.  Hundreds of them, if you count up all the "likes" and comments on our pages, Rita and Graham's, Ray and Nic's, Sarah, Laura's and Sihle's.  There have been wonderful comments - like "Where is the LOVE button - LIKE isn't enough" and Pam saying "Where is the Positively Adorable button?"  And everyone has been able to see pictures straight away.  Nic will be selective about who can see the pics after these, which is sensible, but for the moment, everyone needs to see and share.

So our little love is home, Ray is getting some sleep (he's been at the hospital almost 24/7) and Nic's milk is coming in, despite all the blood loss.  We are all so blessed and feeling so complete.

Welcome, little Emily - no longer Ricky, but her own special little self.

Let's go shopping

Being in New Zealand such a long time, we’ve done a lot of shopping – regular, everyday shopping, not only tourist shopping.

It’s been interesting seeing how different shops are here.  Firstly, the shopping centres.  There are Malls, but most grocery shops – the main chains are Countdown, Pack n Save and New World – are not anchors in a Mall.  They often stand alone – in the middle of big parking lots.  They all have covered foyers – obviously built for the miserable winter weather.  They may be linked with other shops – Fraser Cove Shopping centre near Nic’s home has a Countdown – but here the shops are not all under one roof.  This centre – like many others –has a mass of chain shops and some speciality shops but they are spread out with covered verandahs linking them.  But it’s quite a trek from one end to the other and when it’s raining, despite the verandahs, you get wet!

The grocery shops we have patronised are mostly Pack n Save – a huge “hyper” type shop with aisles cowering under towering shelves reaching up to the ceiling.  I always feel a bit claustrophobic in Pack n Save – it’s like Makro but narrower and sells mostly groceries.  It’s cheaper than the other stores, and you get to take your groceries home in the trolley or a box – no packets.  Mostly the shoppers are grumpy but the tellers are super friendly.  You mostly only find Pack n Save in a big town and usually in the centre. Countdown is found in more places – every suburb has its own and there are big and small ones.  I like the one in Fraser Cove – it’s open and bright – but it generally is quite expensive.  It’s more Pick n Pay than Checkers.  Nicky hates Countdown but we find it convenient to go to.  Then there’s New World – you see less of them and they are nice shops – like Parklane Spar.  But we seldom shop there.

In small towns, you don’t find any of the big chains – just a 4Square which is like a local Spar.  You find these local convenience stores all over – even i9n the middle of shopping streets.  They are usually expensive but open long hours – not that the big chains don’t – there are even 24hr Countdowns in some places and most stay open till 9 or 10.  And then in Suburbs, you find “dairys” – what we would call a “tearoom” – both totally inappropriate names for small, very expensive convenience stores.

I’ve found shopping for groceries difficult – there are so many specials and prices on fresh goods fluctuate much more than they do at home.  Nic gave me a list of what prices I should pay for meat, butter and fruit and veggies – if it’s more, don’t buy now – it will be on sale next week, she says.  And it is – I’m not used to groceries being on sale.

Sales are big – everyone is always having sales.  Briscoes (a home goods shop) has a different sale every week.  We’ve learnt that you never buy anything full price at Briscoes, because it will soon be on sale.  Farmers (like Edgars) had a pre-Christmas sale, a Christmas sale, a Boxing Day sale, a New Year’s sale and then a Waitangi Day sale – all in the space of 6 weeks.  TV adverts are full of sales – Harvey Norman seems to have a different sale every week.

A shop I love shopping at is Spotlight.  This is Ragland plus Prints Charming plus Mr Price Home all in one.  And their sales of fabrics are amazing – sometimes you pay 25% of the normal price for a few days – so heaven help you if you don’t buy enough fabric for your project!  The quilting fabric is fantastic! I have had such fun working with the fabrics in the packs – they are so well put together.

But my very favourite part about shopping in New Zealand is the shopping streets.  In Tauranga there is Devonport Street – lovely, varied shops on both sides of a paved street you can drive down.  There are some chain shops – like Whitcoulls, the bookshop, Stevens (homeware to die for) and Glassons which sells ladies clothes (Miladys), but also lots of smaller shops, boutique shops, cafes and restuarants.  Lovely arcades link the two main streets with charming shops hidden away next to shops which do alterations and tattoos.  The Rialto Cinema – 5* cinema – is in one of the arcades.  At the bottom of Devonport Street it opens out into the Strand, with tourist shops and restaurants.  When the weather is good, you sit out on the pavement drinking your coffee and watching the world go by. 

But the shopping streets are not just here – Downtown the Mount is a similar street at the Mount, and we’ve experienced these shopping streets all over New Zealand.  Shopping is more leisurely, less frenetic and certainly safer than walking down Church Street!

Busy Bees

Nic and I have spent a lot of time sewing and creating in the last 2 months.  So this blog is a collection of pictures of some of the stuff we have made.

Coromandel 4 - The Karangahake Gorge

Last weekend we spent time with good friends Richard and Vanessa at the Karangahake Gorge.  State Highway 2 goes through the gorge – a deep, narrow gorge with a big river – the Ohinemuri -  running through the middle of it.  The town on either side – Waihi and Paeroa – are linked only by this road. 

It really makes me think about the difference between roads in New Zealand and South Africa.  In South Africa we are used to National Roads – which are generally big, wide and often dual carriageway.  Then we have the Ms – the Metro Roads – like the notorious M1 in Gauteng – my nemesis when I have to drive to Joburg from Pretoria!  There are the R roads – Regional roads – usually smaller than the Ns, but linking cities.  They are often the “old” National roads – as they are superseded by even bigger and straighter roads that people can drive even faster on, they are re-designated as Rs.  Most are tarred – although not all.  And then there are the D roads (in KZN at any rate) or S roads (in Free State) – District or Streek roads – which are rural roads, often un-tarred and meandering over the countryside joining little towns, farms, settlements, etc.  In New Zealand, all roads are State Highways – and many of them are like regional roads – narrow, winding, through incredibly steep terrain – but most are tarred, well maintained and carefully signposted.

The Karangahake Gorge Road is no exception – steep corners are marked, changes in the speed limit clearly shown and roadworks regularly carried out.  But I still find it scary to drive along the edge of the river at such speeds!

We did 3 of the walks – the “windows” walk, the rail tunnel walk and Historic Walkway – about 9kms in all.  The area was a gold mining area, and there are remains of tunnels and mine works and refineries all along the walk.  The windows walk took us through tunnels carved out of the side of cliffs and along paths carved out of the sides of the cliff.  There are some “windows” in the tunnels – short passages to the outside which let in some light and leave some wonderful outlooks.  It has been carefully made safe by DOC, but I met some people inside who used to play in the tunnels as children.  Then there were just crossed pieces of wood that said “Keep Out” - a perfect invitation to little boys!  It was a fascinating glimpse into the way of life of the early gold miners.

Then we walked through the 1 km railway tunnel – damp and further than it looks, but well lit.  The Windows walk required a torch – and thank goodness we had one.  The tunnel and railway was the original link with the Bay of Plenty.

Our last walk of the day was along the old railway to Waihino – good views of the river, some historic ruins and lots of interesting plants – cabbage trees, brambles, complete with blackberries, much to Richard’s delight, croscosmia and even some dahlias, growing in what must have been someone’s garden long ago – only the flowers remain.

We did the clever thing – we had 2 cars and so we left one at either end of the walk.  I enjoyed it much more knowing I wouldn’t have to walk back.  And at the end was the carrot on a stick – the Waihino Railway café and their amazing cappuccino. We walked fast enough, not only to get some exercise, but to get there before they closed at 4.00.  It is a delightful café – the old Waihino Station has been converted into a restaurant and tourist centre.  A train runs from nearby Waihi a couple of times a day – and the Café is the end point.  The platform is decorated with a luggage trolley with old suitcases, there is a wonderful old clock, baggage scales – quite delightful.  And as I said, the coffee is amazing!  The waitress actually offered us a loyalty card, we went there so often in the two days we were in the area.

Spending the weekend with Richard and Vanessa was wonderful again.  We met up on Friday afternoon and went for a walk around Waihi – the town itself is not madly exciting, but the walk around the mine rim was good.  Then we spent Saturday evening at Waihi Beach and Bowentown – mostly in the car because of the cold wind – and Sunday morning at the Waihi Waterlily Gardens – a really beautiful meander around the ponds and streams.

Special friends make even commonplace places special and we had such a good time re-connecting and talking about everything and anything.  And drinking lots of good coffee – Richard has introduced us to Wild Bean Café coffee – hope it’s as good at home! We hope to see them at least once before we head off home.

Coromandel 3 - The East Coast

We spent 2 days on the East coast of the Coromandel – that is the coast we can see from the Bay of Plenty.  Driving across the top from West to East was a bit like all the driving in Northland – lots of farm land, forest – both indigenous and forestry – and windy, windy roads.  But once we got down onto the coast itself, we were on a wild and beautiful sea shore – most of the time.

Whitianga is on Mercury Bay, but has a huge inlet known as Whitianga Harbour running through it and beyond it.  So there are a lot of boats.  A passenger ferry across to Cooks Bay, and a number of fishing and recreational are in the main bay, but as we drove through what seemed to be a residential suburb, we suddenly saw yacht masts.  With a bit of investigation, we found a whole lot of canals which have been excavated so people can “park” their boats outside their “beach houses”.  So OTT!

Then down the coast to Hahei.  This is an amazing beach – big, white, firm – and really not crowded.  We spent a night at the holiday park, and a walk on the beach and halfway up a huge hill (then I rebelled) and an evening sitting on the beach was wonderful.  We went in at 8.00pm for dinner and it was still sunny.

View over Hahei Beach

The other great attraction at Hahei is its proximity to Cathedral Cove. We drove to the parking early in the morning and did the walk down to the cove.  Wonderful views along the way of other coves, and a great walk through the forest.  Pete surprised a hare and got an amazing photo, and then we came across some Californian Quail having a sand bath.  They were imported originally as game birds but aren’t hunted much now.  Later on the walk we saw a mom quail with two babies – we were walking down the path and there were others a bit closer to her, so she hid the babies in the bush and then ran up and down the path trying to distract the people from where her babies were.  Somehow, she didn’t seem afraid of us, and rounded up her babies when we were right nearby, calling them until they joined her before scuttling into the bush.

Cathedral Cove is amazing – you come down onto the beach at Mares Leg Cove and then go through the big arch into Cathedral Cove.  The white sandstone cliffs are unstable and you are meant to keep away, but they are so beautiful, you can’t help taking the chance.  We were there early – we only met 2 people on the path and we were first on the beach followed by another 3 people – and that was all for a while.  There is no way to get there by land except along the DOC path – when they filmed the opening scenes of Prince Caspian there, they brought people in by boat.  This keeps the beach fairly secluded – although we have not found New Zealand beaches overcrowded.  Maybe we are just there at the right times!

By the time we started to make our way back up the path, there were masses of people coming down – including annoying groups of Koreans and Americans.  It really pays to be early birds.  Talking of birds, we sat on a bench overlooking Stingray Cove and just listened to the Tuis calling each other in the forest – I don’t know many birds as melodious as they are.

Our next stop was Hot Water Beach – there are hot water springs which can be accessed 2 hrs on either side of low tide.  If you dig a hole in the sand it fills with hot water seeping up from 2 fissures which are heated by magma about 2 km below the surface.  Apparently, the water can reach temps of 65° C.  We were there towards the end of the window of opportunity, so the hot water was mostly where the waves were breaking.  People were sitting on the sand, with cold waves breaking over them and hot water under them – lovely!  We stood on the edge with hot water under our feet and cold on top.    This is one of the big tourist attractions on the Coromandel, so the beach was buzzing – you can hire a spade from the café for $5 (about R30) and although it was quite late to be digging, people were still pouring across the beach, hired spades in hand.  We walked along the water line instead of the “direct route” and had a much nicer walk on firm, un-churned sand.  The sand is rough and pinkish here with lots of crushed shell in it.  The shelf is also steeper, so there are actually waves – not real waves by SA standards, but quite big ones by NZ standards! And then there were a lot of starfish being tumbled in the waves - we threw a few back.

We were at Hot Water Beach 15 years ago – admittedly in winter – but I don’t remember the infrastructure for so much tourism being there – now it is big business.  I heard someone in the Info Centre at Tauranga today asking about getting there from Tauranga as a day trip – and it’s quite a way!  Tourism has definitely grown in the last decade.

We stayed in a Holiday Park and as I walked to the showers, I remembered the “Rotel” we had seen in the South Island 2 years ago.  It was a huge orange truck and trailer that pulled up at the camp site we were staying at.  The trailer was unhitched and the side opened up – and, voila! It was a hotel!  A series of “rooms” – more like spaces for a coffin – 3 levels high – and a group of about 40 tourists – mostly elderly and German.  They travel around to different attractions in an orange bus and then come to sleep and have dinner at the camp site.  What made me think about them was the way they walked from the bus to the ablutions in their underwear – men and women, old and white and flabby and all – while the rest of us covered up!   Well, there was no Rotel at Hahei, but at Hot Water Beach, as we were washing sand off our feet, I saw a whole lot of elderly german tourists walking down onto the beach – and as we drove out of the parking lot, there the bus was! 

The rest of the road, especially between Whangamata, Whiritoa and Waihi is very windy and Nic prefers to travel all the way round via Thames to get to Hahei – she hates windy roads!

And then home for a night before meeting Richard and Vanessa in the Karangahake Gorge.

Coromandel 2 - On the West Coast of Coromandel

A fairly early start saw us driving to the West Coast of the Coromandel.  Thames was a new place for us – the rest of the drive to Thames was through well known places along the Bay of Plenty.   The Coromandel is a small peninsula bounded by the Bay of Plenty and the Hauraki Gulf – Auckland on one side and Whakatane far in the distance on the other.

Thames is a fairly ordinary town but as we drove out and on to the coast on our way up to Coromandel Town, we saw the most beautiful coastline – to me, even more beautiful than the coast of Northland.  The road follows the coast closely for the first 20km or so, with the water lapping against the stone edges of the road.  Pohutakawa trees overhang the road and the water – it must be amazing in December before the trees finish flowering.  Then the road goes inland through farmland – green, with drifts of flowers growing on the verges – some are daisies – yellow and white- some crocosmia and some yarrow.  Views from the top of the hills are breathtaking – luckily there are lots of view points and lookouts, so Pete could stop and look and take photos.  The roads are narrow and winding and require 100% attention.

The sea at this point is called The Firth of Thames – but on a sunny morning with the incredibly blue water, the clear water that meant we could look down at the sea bed, and the beauty of leisure boats out in the bay, it certainly looked much more cheerful than its big brother in Scotland.

One of the villages on the Thames Coast

As we went higher up the coast, it opens out into the Hauraki Gulf, and we were looking across the water at places we had been at the week before when we were in Northland.  The Islands outside Auckland and then higher up the coast were visible in the distance. 

Mussel farming is big in this area – green lipped mussels are a bit bigger than the black mussels we get at home.  We stopped at a small restaurant outside Coromandel Town for a mussel lunch.  The mussels are harvested by the staff, the veggies for the salad are grown in the garden behind the shop and the food is cooked right there.  We shared battered mussels and mussel fritters – to die for!  We found a recipe and I really need to try them out.

1 cup self-raising flour
Salt and pepper
3 spring onions, finely chopped
¼ cup chopped fresh parsley
500g mussel meat, roughly chopped – best if you mince half and chop the rest                                       3 eggs, lightly beaten
½ cup cream
Olive oil, to cook
Lemon wedges, to serve

1. Place flour in a bowl and season with salt and pepper. Make a well in the centre. Add spring onions, parsley, mussels and eggs into the well. Add milk to combine into a thick batter.

2. Heat a little oil in a frying pan and spoon in batter to form fritters. Cook batches of fritters on medium heat for two to three minutes until crisp and golden brown then turn over and brown on the other side until thoroughly cooked through.

3. Repeat making fritters with remaining batter. Serve fritters with lemon wedges on the side to squeeze over.

Coromandel Town is quite small – the only supermarket we saw was a 4 Square – but some charming buildings in the town and some absolutely amazing houses high above the bays.  The tourist books said it had a bit of a hippy vibe, left over from the 70s, but we didn’t see much of it.  We drove to Colville which was described as the hippy centre – well, there is a school, a general dealer, a pub, a rugby field and a “Himalayan Shop.”  Maybe that was the hippy place……  We stayed in a small resort a bit higher up the Coast at a place called Papa Aroha, and walked on the stony beach as the sun was setting, picking up masses of scallop shells along the way – sadly I had to put them back before we left the beach.

Sunset from our bedroom window

In the morning, we rode on a small train which has been built by a local potter.  It is a very narrow gauge built straight up a hill to an amazing lookout.  He started it to bring the clay for his pottery down to the pottery, and ended up finishing it over a period of about 20 years.  It will be left to the nation, and he doesn’t take any money from the running of the train, making his living as a potter.  Some of the proceeds pay the staff, some to assist new potters and the rest to re-establish native forest.  We saw a lot of newly planted (in the last 25years) kauri, rimu and other indigenous trees.

A Coromandel Jaunt - 1

The Coromandel is just around the corner from Tauranga, but we’ve been so busy doing far away things, that it’s only been in the last week that we got to explore this amazing part of New Zealand.

Nic took us to Waihi Beach and Bowetown.  The beach is at the far end of the Bay of Plenty – very much a holiday and retirement place.  You go past the town of Katikati (what a divine name!) and then turn towards the water.  The beach is flat, wide and hard and we had an amazing walk along it.  A trifle longer than we thought we would go – we looked down the beach towards the headland and decided it would take about an hour to get there, so set off gaily down the beach while Nic took the car down to the other end to meet us.  Well, it was much further than we estimated!  After over an hour, and about 5 and a bit km, we phoned Nic and said we were happy to walk the rest of the way, but lunch would be a good hour away as we were only half way!  So she came back and fetched us at the end of Waihi beach and took us to Bowentown.  This is a small settlement, mostly baches (beach cottages to the uninitiated) just the way the Mount (at Tauranga) used to be before it became big tourist bucks!  The view was amazing, with a close up view of Matakana Island – the barrier at the mouth of the bay – which we see from the Mount. 

On the way home we went to Omokoroa – another beach with amazing clear water and lots of retired people who have made their homes here.  If we win the Lotto and can spend the summers in New Zealand ……. And lots of room for everyone to visit.

Waihi Beach - we tried to walk down to the headland - to no avail

A photo stitch of the bay at Bowentown