Birthday boy

It was the husband's birthday today - very low key with the 5 of us! We had lunch out at the Library Cafe in Onehunga. I hadn't been to this suburb for a long long time!
We found the house that his Grandad had built many years ago in Onehunga. It is on Grotto Street where there really is a grotto!
I loved the cafe with its books etc - it was extremely busy and we had over half an hour before the food arrived - I was glad I had taken along my new sock to knit! :). The food wasn't bad but not wow either.
We took the boys to the 2nd hand Hard to Find bookshop which I always used to go too - I looked at a gorgeous cross stitch book but decided against it. It is a real rabbit warren.
Had a walk around the high street and a few of the nieghbourhood streets too - I am trying to get out out into different suburbs around the city and explore areas we do not normally go to.

Came home and it really is starting to feel like autumn , especially with daylight savings flicking over last night. Found winter pjs for everyone too - I have barely had to spend any money topping up winter wardrobes which is great!

Two more weeks of school and then hols - yippee.

Anniversaries

Last weekend marked two years since I started knitting socks. I can remember it took me over 2 hours and A LOT of frustration trying to figure out how to join in the round before I cold even start to knit them- I had never knitted on circular needles before and here i was trying to teach myself how to knit socks. My mother thought I was mad doing it on a circular needles - she is tried and tested sock knitter on several needles and will to swap to circular needles!
I have misplaced my first ever pair and have lost count of the number of pairs I have knitted now! My boys LOVE my socks and are always wearing them! I have decided that I just like knitting them in stocking stitch as the wool I use is pretty neat alone without fancy stitches.

Here are a few of the one I have done.

And Saturday April 6 marks one year since we have been in our new wing of the house. What a massive difference it has made having a bedroom for each of the boys and my favourite part - my won bathroom ! Plus my walk in wardrobe! I have been having a big cleanup - clear out over the past fees weeks and my bedroom- walk in wardrobe/ room is looking so much better with a lot of clutter gone or sorted decently!

These photos were taken on a little camera - my good camera is sitting on my husband's desk at work!

Have a good weekend!

Auckland city

A few pics of round the university area of Auckland and the central city area.
Auckland is NZ's largest city with around 1.5 million people.
It is a very liveable city with beaches everywhere but with a growing population and traffic snarl ups common.

Lately I feel like I could leave NZ again and go and live elsewhere before the boys get too old and get too far through the education system. We may be living it too late for the oldest though.

I have serious doubts about the way this country is going, the growing poverty , National Standards and an education system that can frustrate me every week. I work in the coal face and see a lot more than the vast majority of NZers who I think live in lala land.

And Christchurch is being stuffed around by this government and due to the quakes I think the vast majority of money is going down there. The number of schools being shut/ merged too is a very contentious issue. And insurance companies are being utter prats. My heart goes out to all in Christchurch.

All of our brothers and sisters have lived overseas for 8 plus years - Stephen and I lived in the UK only for 18 months due to his father passing away and needing to come back to run his family business.
I have a brother in Switzerland who will never return to NZ and a sister who flicks between The UK and Argentina.

My family think Auckland is a wee dot of a place and prefer really big cities. I doubt whether my boys will stay in NZ long after they finish university. I have a British grandad and Stephen also has Irish ancestry - they boys can get EU passports too. Joshua is on the Irish foreign birth registry - we really do need to get around to sorting out the other two!
We travel quite a bit and the boys are lucky having been to Australia numerous times (Sydney and Melbourne), London, Kuala Lumpur, Amsterdam, Hilversum, Utrecht, Antwerp and Joshua the Cook Islands and Rome too.

Stephen and I have visited multiple countries and driven across parts of Europe - France, Luxembourg, Germany, Italy, Switzerland, The Netherlands, Luxembourg,Slovenia, Italy, Austria, Estonia, Sweden, Finland
Also been to Australia ( and lived in Melbourne- best city in the world), Fiji, Cook Islands,
Boston, NYC.

I would go somewhere every hols if I could! :) - we do travel around NZ a bit too. The next school hols in 2 weeks have nothing planned which is very un- usual for us!
I do not want my boys to stay in NZ - the tall poppy mentality frustrates me and I just do not understand anyone not travelling or staying in a small town for their entire life. But that is me.

We are lucky and I realise that! I do believe that everyone has choices and if they are determined to do something in life , it will happen!

And Unity books - one of the best bookshops in town!

Mess all round

The front pile for the school gala (or op shop if I really get sick of it!) grows and grows.

I have a problem though - am far too sentimental and find it hard through many baby toys/ first board games etc away. And books. On the books. The many, many, many books I just cannot throw away. At least the attic looks a bit tidier but I haven't finished.

And believe it or not, the table was cleared for dinner after a few days of scrapbooking - lots and lots of simple pages done and a new album (around number 30 now.. I do "Creative Memories" style ) too. Photos all down but a lot of writing to do - I will attempt this in the April school hols.

Back to school tomorrow - 13 more days of school and then another 2 weeks off :)

Wool sort

Today while rummaging through stuff I decided that that was it and I was going to have a tower of my wool in the bedroom and the wool all in one place!
I was all set to go and buy another tower, when i decided to look in Ryan's room - i did a re-arrangement of shelves there and a couple of shelves in a hallway cupboard and voila - moved the shelving unit into a corner of my bedroom.
The scrapbooking trolley that was there had to find a new home...

Took me a while to sort through the bins and baskets and paper bags of wool up in the attic and bring them all down..

I am thrilled with the results - all my sock and 4 ply wool on one shelve and then lots and lots of 8 ply and a few whole packets of balls.

It will be so much easier to see what I have and if I really do need to go to a wool shop to buy some more....

Bless the husband too, because once I had sorted it, he has not said one word about the volume... (actually it really seemed to take up more room in the attic and does not look too bad to me here...)

I still have a rather large basket of wool in the attic, butit is small balls, odds and ends - lots from op shops when I was going through a crocheting blankets and squares stage . (must get back onto that one day!)

That then led onto a trip back to the attic to sort through some stuff, pile stuff up for a gala and a clothing bag collection at school.
And a sort of my sewing stuff - I now have one bag bin with all my fabric in it and another with sewing stuff like ribbons, needles, hoops etc etc

A great days work! One more day of the Easter break too.

How do you all sort wool/ sewing stuff?