Temuka and Waimate - road trip continuing!

I adore small towns - even more so when they have historic buildings in them! (Auckland has a tendency to bulldoze anything and replace it with a shiny tower....).

These two are small towns in the South Island with an awful lot of charm.

I'm not sure I could ever live in a really small town (and I consider Auckland to be small... even though it's the largest city in New Zealand!), but i love visiting them.

(One day we'd probably like to get out of this city - it's a traffic nightmare - that's the thing that drives me crazy! Houses are over $1 million for a truly ordinary house now, and my kids will never be able to afford to buy here and renting is going much the same way... ).

These small towns had pocket money houses to me - full of charm and delight. I'm not sure if there are many jobs though, though you do make of a place what it is I believe! I'm willing to live anywhere really and give it a go!

Great little op shops in both places. Wide streets, few cars, few people....

Fantastic to spend a couple of hours wondering around, before getting back in the car to continue the journey further south! It's always good to support little townships and their independent businesses too!

And neat to see more of New Zealand! There are just a few small pockets I haven't visited now! 

 This is Waimate below - I was totally blown away and took an awful lot of photos! The town is well known for a drifting race - i think this might be the event of the year for the town!

 These old grain silo murals were amazing!

 There wasn't a lot of action in the town, but it did have a decent proper harberdashery shop with Liberty fabric which impressed me! Never right small towns off!

little things from fabulous op shops

I love op shops. I don't go into them a lot, as I've been trying not to buy so much stuff this year, but oh my goodness there are gem op-shops in the South Island! The small town of Temuka has a few fabulous ones! I found board games for my future classroom really, really cheap!

But by far the BEST op shop (and I'll go as far to say THE best op shop in ALL of New Zealand, is Shop on Carroll, a Presbytarian Church shop on Carroll Street in central Dunedin. Oh My - I have never seen such an amazing range of stuff especially the linen. The entire shop is full of incredible things and it is all so beautifully laid out and organised. I'm not sure I've ever seen so much vintage linen anywhere else! I bought this table cloth and a few dressing table mats and a cool apron. The shop had a fabulous range of vintage sewing patterns, fabric, bone china, etc 

Thrilled with my buys! 

 Interspersed with new books from the incredible Otago University bookshop. I'm trying to build up a numbers, plus an alphabet collection of books. And any Waitangi Day title is always snapped up by me! I've just started reading "Bear Twon" and oh my gosh - it is a put down book a lot to me, as I'm not sure I can bear the suspense of what might happen in a ice hockey game....

 I adore, adore, adore, adore this vintage apron!

South Island trip

Life for me is run on impulse! My cousin who lives in the South Island suggested a couple of weeks ago to come and visit her a week later. I was on 2 weeks of school hols, so thought what the heck and booked some flights! I'm lucky I've teens who are independent and can do their own thing!

I flew into Christchurch - these photos are taken over the South Island. I spent a night catching up with a Christchurch friend, and drove out of Christchurch the next morning without really seeing any of the city. My cousin drove up from Dunedin to pick me up and we spent the next 2 days meandering down the South Island through little townships, back to Dunedin!

 Man, petrol is expensive in the South Island! Yes Australians, this is what we are paying over the ditch! Up north it is around $2.37 a litre at the moment....

 First stop outside of Christchurch was to buy a packet of broken biscuits from Cookie Time. These biscuits are good, but evil. Guess what the teens want for Christmas? Luckily they do mail order!

 And then driving along to Ashburton, where the stunning Ashford wool and spinning shop is. Ashford is known worldwide for their spinning wheels and weaving looms. The shop is heaven! And believe it or not, I actually walked out of there without spending a cent on any wool or anything else! I did have an afghan at their delicious cafe, which is worth a visit alone if you are not into wool hoarding...

 Love this....

Our destination for the next 24 hours was the delightful (and new to me) South Canterbury township of Geraldine! Oh my gosh - it was such an incredible little township! I could seriously have knocked off all my Christmas shopping in this little country town! It was wonderful! We had lunch at Nosh for $13 each - beautiful food and gardens and spring blossoms!

 I was over the moon to find a New Zealand made shop full of goodies and picked up this cheesecutter hat for the 14 year old for his upcoming birthday. I was thrilled, as it is hard to buy teenage boys gifts I think!! These are made here in New Zealand by Hills Hats.  It was an amazing shop full of NZ made things! Decent quality, which can be hard to find these days!

 And socks to send to my sister-in-law in Switzerland!

 We found the giant jersey in the Geraldine visitor's centre.

 And a few photos from around town - We stayed in the just opened motel Black on Grey, which I highly recommend!

Geraldine is also known for Barkers - there is a fabulous factory shop there. Plus Talbot Forest Cheese, of which some came home with me too! Such a sweet little town, with plenty to do and see! Lots more photos to come of the next 2 days!

Winners of blog giveaway

Oh my gosh - time flies! I've just spent the first week at my final practicum - this time with an amazing year 5/6 class. I've 3 weeks of sole charge teaching coming up! I'm learning a lot and pushing myself a ton especially with maths!!

The winners of two books are - Linny for the Cath Kidston decorations and Linda for the Mollie Makes Christmas one.

Please e-mail me at Kimberley@atkinson.org.nz and I'll throw them in the post asap! (some days I have long staff meetings after school, so won't be able to make the post office that fast!).

Have a good week - I've been away, so lots of photos etc to share!

Mollie Makes / Cath Kidston Giveaway

I've been going through my bookcase - I need to clear space, as there is no new bookcase being bought in this house, BUT there are too many books to fit on the bookcases.... roll on 2019 classroom :) !

I found these 2 brand new Mollie Makes Christmas books, bought a few years ago and am kidding myself if I think I am actually going to make anything with/from them! The decoration one comes with all the bits!

I also found a Horrible Histories writing letter kit - someone must have a child/teen who might like this!

Leave a comment below telling me which one/s you'd like and I'll choose winners in a weeks time! Open internationally. Please make sure I can e-mail you easily for address too :) (one prize per person!)

October

Thank you so much everyone for your lovely wishes re my new job! I'm thrilled! I'm filling in the oodles of paperwork for it right now.

University is OVER! Like, as in, no more lectures or assignments! I'm waiting for something like 10 or so assignment grades to come back, then final grades!

The maths exam was *okay*. I've honestly no idea how I've done.... It was a fair test and I stayed the entire time. My great mates were waiting for me to finish and then we walked down to the pub (well I walked to the pub via the bookshop....)

I've finished these and in 24 hours have finished another one too, and then cast on my next one! I'm making a few for Christmas gifts as people have gone ga-ga over them! (They're fruit and vege bags for the supermarket).

I actually went to the supermarket for the first time in a month today too! It was all about uni the last month or so...! My husband does so much for me!

I've written about 10 letters since Thursday night too - this was today's pile going out...

 I went here today - ugh - not sure what it more traumatic - teeth cleaning or maths exams....

 And OH MY - I'm SOOOOOOOO excited about this! I won tickets to see the incredible Australian singer Paul Kelly at Neil Finn's studio on Friday night - oh my! This is going to be wonderful!!

 Spring has sprung!

 And a cheeky little impulse purchase from Kate Sylvester yesterday - I'm in love with it!

 And I started reading this! I am even more outraged with the Australian government and their treatment of refugees - I got to page 10 and had to stop reading! It's unbelievable that what is in this book is actually happening! I've since picked it up and it's harrowing reading! My dear twin brother bought it back from Australia for me last weekend.

 Sorting out magnetic lettering...

And I can't believe i have no more uni work to do. And I've 2 weeks of freedom to do whatever I want , when!!! Yippee.

I actually did skip across the campus on Thursday after exam and yell out yeehah when I saw my mates :) !

Happy week everyone!