Getting Lost - April

Today has been a really special one... not only is it ANZAC Day but it is also the first time my granddaughter has taken part in a Dawn Service and parade.  Earlier this year Chloe joined Brownies and I've been taking her to her weekly Brownie meetings.  

We both look forward to our Nana/Chloe time at Brownies and she's carrying on the family tradition of being involved in the Guiding movement.  I was a Brownie and a Guide as was my second sister.  My third sister was a Brownie and my mother was 'Tawny Owl'.  Krystal joined both Guides and Venturers... and now Chloe is the fourth generation from our family to join. 

Yesterday afternoon Chloe and I took our gear down to the Guide hall and set up for our overnight sleepover.  I can tell you now that air pump beds and Nana's sore knee don't really go together... especially when the air slowly leaks out of the bed and by 2am there is little to no air left in the bed... but we stayed over together and that was the main thing for us.

The alarm went off at 4am and Chloe really was a bright little button... all excited for what lay ahead.  By 5.15am we were down at Ohinemutu  for the Dawn Service... followed by McDonalds for breakfast and then the Civic Parade.  

I am very proud of Chloe and looking forward to watching Te Karere later this afternoon to see if I can spot her on TV! There don't appear to be many people in this photo but there was a LARGE crowd there this morning.

Since it is ANZAC Day I decided to focus on the two areas we were at this morning... Ohinemutu Village and the Government Gardens... and I also decided to take all my April Getting Lost photos in black and white.  Krystal came with me to take photos today and she offered up a different perspective on the photos and prompts so here goes:

#1 Camera in manual - head north, in automatic, head south.  I had my camera in manual this morning so we headed north after parking the car and Krystal spotted something she thought would look interesting - especially in black and white.

#2 Stop at the next signposted attraction and take 10 photos.  Definitely not a hard prompt in Rotorua... there's tourist attractions all over the place... and Ohinemutu Village was literally 150m from where we were.  Somehow I managed to cull down 30+ photos to just these 10:

 

#3 Take as many steps as you have battery percentage left and frame your shot.  I had a full battery on my camera... and we both felt a little tired so we used the battery from Krystal's phone which had 32% for this one.

#4 Take a photo upside down (you or the camera). I always like doing this prompt because you get such interesting photos.

#5 Drive until you see water and then stop and take a photo of the reflections.  At this point we headed to the Government Gardens... and we were rewarded by spotting a seagull down by one of the ponds.

#6 Take a photo of a living thing.  We'd seen a few seagulls around and spotted some goldfish in a pond but the water was a bit murky and then we spotted some pūkeko which was serendipitous since I am the leader of Te Roopu Pūkeko at my school. 

#7 Take a photo from the perspective of a flower. I really wanted to capture some of the ANZAC wreaths today and this was the perfect prompt to do exactly that! Yes I did get down on the ground for this photo... but it was so worth it!

#8 Early birds head east, night owls head west.  I've always been an early bird... not usually 4am early!  We headed east on foot and bumped into this... very appropriate given the theme of the day.

#9 Follow a bee and take a photo of it on a flower that it lands on. When you're taking photos in black and white it changes the whole perspective but I'm pretty happy with what I was able to capture.

#10 Stop for a treat (and take a photo of it)... this felt like perfect timing... we were both tired and my feet were aching so we decided to head to one of Krystal's favourite bakeries for a little treat and then head home.  I sampled a sticky date cake and it was delicious!

As always, I wanted a title photo for the month and the entrance way to the Government Gardens worked beautifully:

Thanks for taking the time to stop by my little corner of the internet.  Wishing you all a safe and happy weekend :)

Shelley

Project Life: Week 18

I’ve finally got April done and dusted!  The weeks are rolling by much too quickly!

Here’s an overview of the week - April 27th - May 3rd:

Monday 27th was a public holiday so Mike and I headed over to Hamilton for some lunch.  We found a great little café place at The Base and thought we’d try out a couple of items on the Chef’s menu… turns out we should have asked for the prices because our extremely average lunch cost us $71!!!

There were a couple of ups to going to Hamilton though… we spotted a very cool ATM machine supporting the ANZAC Day celebrations and we also discovered a little chocolate shop.  We had quite a lot of fun selecting a few treats and then after having our Wellington chocolates melt on us we promptly sat down outside to eat them!

Here’s a closer look at the start of the week:

Toby has been enjoying some big bones lately.  Mike has discovered a butcher that he likes and he keeps coming home with treats for Toby… which Toby is very happy about!  The only downside is that Toby isn’t quite so ‘sleek and slim’ anymore LOL

I didn’t take as many photos during this week but I had found some cool things as I was traipsing around the internet so they got included in this weeks pages.

I DID manage to get a screen shot of April’s Daily Challenges with Solitaire.  I really love playing cards and the huge advantage playing on the computer is that there’s no cards to pack up and shuffle!  I enjoy the monthly challenges too because there’s lots of variety although some of the ‘expert’ ones have me going insane at times!

Meanwhile the hockey season got underway this week.  I’ve been given a Year 3 and 4 team to coach although it’s been YEARS since I’ve actually played hockey myself.  Thankfully a lovely Mum approached me to say that she’d love to coach the team and run the hockey practices so I’m more like a ‘silent partner’ in the whole process and just go down to watch them play on a Saturday morning.

Here’s a close up of the second part of the week:

Toby makes the most of weekend mornings when Mike tries to catch a bit more sleep.  He’s quick to make himself comfortable on the bed and snuggle!

The third big tree in our backyard is now cut down!  It’s really opened up the backyard and there’s so much more light coming in now!  Mike loves cutting up all the wood with the chainsaw too!  We’ve got quite a bit of firewood ready for next winter which will be awesome!

In between hockey, Toby and tree cutting we managed to find a shop selling all sorts of products that we haven’t tried before.  It’s one of those discount stores where most things are really close to or just over their expiry date.  We decided to try some grape juice and crackers and they were pretty good.  It certainly made for a nice pick-me-up!

So that was our week and now I’m finally into May LOL  Thank goodness for calendars and dated photos on the camera!

Wishing you all a great week xx

Project Life: Week 17

Despite the fact that I have been a very slack blogger lately, I HAVE been taking lots of photos so at least I will be able to catch up again.  For this post I’ve got Week 17 which was April 20th - April 26th. 

Here’s an overview of the week:

This week it was all about ANZAC Day!  We started Term 2 at school and it was all go!  We knew we were having a special ceremony on the Friday to commemorate the centenary of the ANZAC military campaign on the Gallipoli Peninsula in Turkey.

Over the school holidays one of the teachers had organised for us to have wooden poppies made for every child in the school.  I brought home my class set along with another set to prime ready for painting.  Mike and I managed to do one side of primer before watching Game of Thrones and then we did the second side afterwards… and it’s true what they say… many hands do make light work because we seemed to have all 60 poppies primed in no time at all!

Here’s a close up of the start of the week:

At Glenholme School we are lucky to have Roz on our staff.  She’s a retired teacher that now works as a teacher aide and her knowledge is amazing!  She often gets called on to help out with running records (for reading) and other testing. 

During the war some of her relations sent home postcards and letters to other family members and they’ve kept them all safe.  Roz brought in her very special folder of family memorabilia along with several medals for the kids to look at… they’re super lucky to have such an amazing lady share her stories with them.

During the week we researched ANZAC soldiers, the history of the poppy, painted poppies and lots of other bits and pieces.  The kids were really immersed in history.

Meanwhile, the only ‘history’ Toby was interested in was the box left over from our pizza dinner!  He could smell the remnants of cheese and proceeded to eat a perfect circle out of the base of the box.  When Mike walked past him after his shower Toby was on guard duty!  He was super protective about ‘his’ pizza box… but it still ended up in the fireplace by the end of the night!

Here’s a look at the rest of the week:

The kids really enjoyed making poppy flowers out of crepe paper and they turned out fantastically well.  They look beautiful and were actually quite simple to do.

During the week the school leaders made ANZAC cookies to sell to help raise money for their trip to Wellington later on this term.  They took orders every day and then had the cookies ready to sell on Friday… and they were super delicious!

On Friday we had our special ceremony in the morning and it was very moving.  After morning tea each class was able to have a photo taken with our special memorial and it was pretty neat for the kids to see all the poppies laid out together.

Mum got involved in the ANZAC celebrations this year too and spent several hours selling ANZAC cookies over in Tauranga.  Thankfully the newspaper people were there to capture the moment so I was able to get a photo!

Meanwhile Mike got busy in our backyard and cleared up the second tree that he’d felled.  Toby of course had to go with ‘Daddy’ to get rid of the rubbish!  He actually does try to ‘help’ but this generally involves him bringing sticks inside and shredding bark off them all over the carpet!

I’m so pleased that I’ve been documenting what’s been going on in the backyard because it looks really different now compared to when I moved back in December!

So there you have it… Week 17 done and dusted!

Log your Memory: Week 17 & ANZAC day

Hi everyone :)

It’s ANZAC day here in New Zealand which means no school but I’ve also been thinking about the men and women who went to war all those years ago and shaped our history.  It’s impossible to imagine what they went through and the hardships they faced… but it isn’t hard to remember that without them and the sacrifices they made we wouldn’t have the life that we do now.

At school yesterday I read a story by Jennifer Becks that was absolutely beautiful… the illustrations are gorgeous!

A young girl is reluctantly waiting at the airport for a distant aunt to arrive. She discovers that the aunt is carrying a special gift from the past. During the First World War, soldiers and nurses were given a very special Christmas present from the Princess Mary - a precious box containing sweets or tobacco as the Royal Family's thanks for the hardships they were undertaking.

Here’s a photo of what the box looked like:

Unfortunately the book is now out of print but if you’re able to get it out of the library I highly recommend it!

Now for Week 17 of Log your Memory.  This is the final prompt from the ‘Occupation’ section of this project.  This week it’s all about your work environment. 

Of course many of you know that I’m a school teacher… but classrooms these days are so different from when I went to school.  Thankfully there’s no chalk dust any more LOL

Here’s my layout:

I spend a LOT of time in my classroom each week and up until this year it’s always been about the kids and their learning… as it should be!  This year though I’ve made a couple of subtle changes that have had a bigger impact than I thought they would.

I’ve always talked about my girls in the classroom but often the kids don’t really take it in.  This year I have a ‘Toby wall’ near my desk and I’ve got photos there with my girls and Toby.  There’s even a couple of photos with nieces and nephews. 

When the kids bring their parents in they always want to show them their work… but they’re also keen to show them the ‘Toby wall’ and share a bit about my life with their parents.  It’s not something that I was expecting but it’s made the parents think of me differently realising that I have a life outside of school.

I also have fresh flowers on my desk this year… and in fact I’ve had the odd flower brought to me be the kids.  Quite often they’ll come up to smell the flowers when they want to talk to me.  The boys actually take more notice of the flowers than the girls… that’s another surprise for me! 

So that’s it from me… I’m actually heading into school soon to get some work done LOL

Enjoy the rest of your week xx