Wahey, it's Marmalade time!!
There's a grapefruit tree at the house Joey and I are interested in and Joe Gabriel, the estate agent, has let us nab a load of the fruits. So Joey decided to make some marmalade...and shock horror!...it worked. We are now the proud owners of 20 various sized jars of top notch grapefruit marmalade...happy days :) And we've made you all a jar...just come and get it!! ;)
[Although do notice the slightly wonky 'jar' - we got a bit short and the peanut butter was almost empty...]
Latest adventure sports that we are keen to turn pro at are...KITESURING AND RIDING. Phil has had a long term ambition to kitesurf, and I’m just game (?) for a laugh…so we are currently practising our power kiting on the land before our first water sesh. And I’ve alwaysbeen keen to further my riding career (begun in my teens….and hastily cut short when I discovered ballet??) and especially when there is the opportunity to do a 2 or 3 day ride out to Rohan (LOTR) on South Island in our summer...so a weekly hour's riding after work has been arranged :)
An extension to the kitesurfing lessons bit of the story is the all too familiar picture on the right...a 'Saturday afternoon purchase' of proportions that Greglet would be proud. These 3 kitesurfing kites plus lines and bars (8, 12 and 16m2 for Joey and I in different winds) were on trademe (ebay equiv.) and too good a bargain to miss. However, the disciplinary panel is still considering the legality of the purchasing manouvre...I've a lot of justifying still to do!
Refugee Resettlement
On reading our website, we realised that it just sounds like we play play play...so we thought we’d better tell you about something a little more meaningful that we are involved in. With our homegroup from church, we are doing a course in welcoming and settling refugees to New Zealand (part of the UNs quota for NZ). Currently refugees are arriving from Burma and our role is to introduce them to life in NZ (what do we know??! Having recently arrived ourselves!). We’ll be helping with school enrolment, finding a doctor, finding furniture, language familiarisation, perhaps how to use a computer or telephone?...it’s been really challenging to imagine being forced to leave your country, your home...to leave behind your family/friends...your possessions...and to imagine how overwhelming it would be to arrive in a fully developed country like NZ.
4/127 Grand Drive and 70 Tahapa Crescent
Here are just a few pics of life at 4/127…..we thought we’d better put a few up, as we’re hoping to buy a home shortly….currently we have an offer in on a house in Meadowbank – just over the ridge from us….it is called 70 Tahapa Crescent (right)and has great views of telephone wires (the Kiwis love their crazy telephone wires), a beautiful reserve and the Sky Tower in Auckland City!! It also has the famous grapefruit tree in its garden – hence all that grapefruit marmalade!
Update: There's now more to this story, so check out the latest in our August newsletter!
Geeks rule! And I [Phil] am ashamed to admit that this was on a Saturday night. We're just too fun...Jonny and I age of empiring. It's only happened once though.
Phil kills more herbs. 
Our fun friends the Pastiroffs (Shirley, Frankie and Eve-Matilda here) and the Roes came round for our pagan BBQ celebration of the 25th June - start of the evenings getting lighter which is important in a country that has Christmas and the New Year crowded into the summer holiday.
Phil manages not to kill his first loaf of bread which he is very proud of (special thanks to Gene and Mick for the Bread Maker).
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Rugby = kiwis. And we (Joey, Jonny and I) were lucky enough to get to see them having a go at Ireland in the lashing rain at Eden Park.
What a brilliantly fun game - Ireland battled magnificently (ironically, a performance of which any Brit would have been proud!). New Zealand were immensely powerful and it was incredible to see the way they attack in every tackle, taking the man back yards. The All Blacks eventually won 25 to 16 or something similar, but Ireland certainly gave them a firght. Sadly Ireland weren't to make green jersey history to beat the All Blacks for the first time in the 101 years of playing.
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And next time...
A few photos of our very recent trip (this weekend, so photos still being developed) across to Waiheke Island with our beloved, if a tad unreliable, tandem...