The Cheetah Run

Since we've been back

This is another test....don't know if I will redo this post or not :-)

Slideshow of our return

Do NOT CLICK ON ANYTHING....They are all ads...just wait and watch!!!

Our Last Week in New Zealand

Antarctic Center Photo Album

This is a new attempt. We'll see if I like it, my bet is I stick with the slideshows.

UGG One of these days!

I have been meaning to update this forever!!!! And instead spending time doing this....though I have wanted to do this since I took these pics....this was for his passport at 1 year old. I LOVE ALL THESE FACES!!! Too funny

Cave Stream Hike

We hiked upstream in a stream almost a half mile through a cave in the absolute dark yesterday. We all enjoyed it though I had a couple moments of PANIC!!! I was scared of the absolute dark, the idea of rocks rolling and crushing our feet, Tyler slipping, and then we saw a spider so creeped me out for a bit!! I was also scared of someone catching up to us without me noticing their lights first….and it happened even though I kept looking back! I was reaching for a rock and then suddenly there was another persons hand there!! Then his face appeared…eek! Luckily only Erik and I got scared! Tyler loved it and you can see it in his face in the pics!

I had to go back to using photo peach because the iPhoto slideshows chop off so much of the pics and the clarity wasn't as good. Plus it was a pain to finally get them uploaded to youtube. So sorry if you don't like going to the other page to see these, but I like it so much better. So just click on the link to see all the photos. :-)

Cave Stream Hike

This was what the hike looked like to me for most of it!

Christmas Trip Part 2

Aoraki (Mt Cook) National Park

Borrowed from the web.

Our next stop was at the Aoraki National Park. It was cloudy again but we did the longest hike of Tyler's hiking career and we wouldn't have made it if it had been sunny and hot. Tyler and Mommy don't do well in those conditions :-) While we were packing our lunch at the car we heard brief thunder. Weird because it was cloudy but in no way a thunder storm type day. A little later there was a more significant sound, and we realized it was an avalanche in the canyon we could hear. We all looked at each other shocked! It was such a cool sound, and incredible to know it was from massive snow and rockfall from off the peak! The third one we heard was the longest and it lasted for about 40-60 seconds! Unfortunately from where we were we couldn't see into the canyon so we missed seeing it, but the rest of the hike anytime we thought we heard the rumbling sound, we stopped to investigate for as far as we could see! We did get to see one small one, and so funny, it kept rolling down the mountain long after the sound stopped. It was only for the initial few seconds of movement when the largest mass was moving, when it stopped so did the rumble, even though ice and rocks kept sliding down for minutes after. The snow also had that amazing blue color that glaciers have! I couldn't really get a good shot but in a couple you can just barely make it out. It was really incredible! There is also the Tasman Glacier at the end of the hike. It was covered in black rock, even the face, so it didn't look that amazing but you can see in my photo some of the chunks that have eroded off floating thru the lake. This shot was taken by someone else and we didn't get to see anything this dramatic, but you can see the blue ice, which is really just incredible!

Lake Pukaki and Tekapo

Lake Pukaki has this incredible tropical blue, turquoise color because of the kind of silt/minerals that is in the water. We were thinking we might swim, but it was too cold.

Lake Tekapo is cool because on its coast is the Mt John observatory, and this portion of New Zealand is protected from light pollution and is set aside as the world's first Star Reserve.

Because of clouds rolling in and then rain we were unable to stay for the stars, but got some cool pics of the old church on the lake called the Church of the Good Shepard.

Photos from Mt John Observatory

Our Long Trip through South Island Part 1

The two panoramic pics are my pics. These others will be in the slideshows, but are borrowed from the web since the shots we got looked nothing like this due to the inclement weather :-) This is our view of Wanaka.

Milford Sound

Lake Tekapo

Lake Tekapo Starlight Reserve

Aoraki (Mt Cook) = The cloud cutter in Maori

Our View of Queenstown

Since we are leaving New Zealand we tried to cram it all in!! It also works out because most of these locations are about 1-2 hours from each other. We just had to make an 8 hour drive down on the first day! I had memories of being stuck in the car all summer for our family vacations and I don't know how my parents did it day after day! Tyler is a great traveler….its Erik and I who get wiped out :-)! We stayed in Te Anau and then drove 3 hours south west into Milford Sound. It was POURING RAIN, so we luckily did not have to deal with the horrible sand flies that inhabit the national park, but it did make for a funny day walking in puddles, and some temporary streams! The shot I took of the grey clouds is where the most iconic photos of New Zealand are taken. I have included what it looks like on a perfect day for comparison…pretty funny! But I was still happy because no sand flies!! (PS Because I lost our other camera the color contrast of this one is not that great, plus I have been having problems with the iPhoto slideshows so sorry about the quality…hopefully you can at least get a taste of our fantastic adventure!)

The next morning was Christmas morning! It was a little hard for me because it was the first time since Tyler is born he didn't walk down the steps at our house in Las Vegas to the Christmas tree :-( But the day quickly evolved into so much fun….I am glad we broke our traditions and tried something new! We went to a place called Puzzling World and there was a maze that we ended up walking around for an hour before we found our way out….Tyler and Daddy loved it! I was game until about 45 minutes in! They had all sorts of displays and stuff indoors also including a room built on a huge slant…so Tyler seemingly riding the chair uphill is in that room. I could barely keep from falling over!! Vertigo. Tyler loved it! Then we went on two different hikes, one overseeing the Wanaka valley and then out to a set of waterfalls. We had Christmas dinner at Bombay Palace :-)

The next day was Queenstown, which prides itself on being the adrenaline capital of the world! By 2pm I had overloaded on stress just from watching people! Not my city, but the boys were thrilled with their day! Started by riding the Gondola up to the top of the mountain and Erik doing his 154 ft Bungy jump. It was cold and there was a rainy breeze blowing upwards from the valley floor, but Tyler and I hung out to watch the whole thing, along with a bunch of others doing a rope swing they also had set up. Then all three of us went up higher on the mountain to do the luge. I don't know what I was expecting, and it really wasn't that bad, but for a control freak….letting your kid go down a paved hill in a sled 3 inches off the ground….not really my thing! I would have survived fine had he not got going too fast, gone up on one side, almost rolled, didn't and then lost control and crashed into me and my sled, while I was brainlessly trying to stop mine with my feet and was SUPER LUCKY I didn't break anything! The rest of the ride was uneventful, but as soon as I was off I burst into tears having the 30 seconds of Tyler's out of control sled running replays in my head. I was such a dork walking on this incredibly packed sidewalk in tears and having a panic attack! Crazy!! This is why the boys do this stuff without mom!!! Then off to a quick lunch which while walking to I saw a suicidal instructor doing flips on his paraglider with only 200 feet until he had to land. I almost puked on the sidewalk, still jumped up from my panic attack. Then I shipped the boys off on a speed boat to go do 360's and drive cm's away from bridges etc. Luckily I didn't walk them down to the dock, because I was afraid I would cause a scene or burst into tears there again….but good thing cause when I picked them up I found out the boat had no seat belts, just life vests…INSANE!! But they had a blast and Tyler LOVED IT and wanted to go again! We found a park with a Christmas tree up and got one picture with a tree for this December :) We found a place that had "crispy" chicken wings so we had to go for dinner, because Tyler had been craving them. Here the skin is not crispy just soggy and sauce is usually horrible. But we lucked out and Tyler was adorable enjoying his meal!

These videos are to give you an idea of what we were up to :-)

The guy I saw paragliding that freaked me out so bad was definitely the guide, who was along on that jump for photos and then took the last few minutes for "fun".

Kaikoura and Picton

We got to drive to the Northern most point on the South Island to pick up Telsche and Lance for their visit! Kaikoura is the halfway point and it is INCREDIBLY beautiful!! It was a great weekend where we got to see a TON of seals! There is a small waterfall and hike that has different river bed pools where the baby seals get to hang out while the mom's are out hunting. There were only 3 baby's but they were a ton of fun to watch playing around.

End of Year Concert

They held the concert at the "Cardboard Cathedral" It has cardboard tubing as a main element in it's design, not structural but visual. There are actually large cardboard tubes covering the steel girders for the roof. Tyler was singing the songs for weeks and very excited to be a part of the concert. Unfortunately the Church wouldn't allow the kids up on the stage so all of them are just crammed in at the front, but luckily we got a perfect seat for where Tyler ended up and we could see him for most of it! His favorite songs were "This Old Man" and the Maori song which he says means "The Flower Close to My Heart"! I know it is a bit long but most of the clips are only 1 minute of each song! Enjoy!!

Slight Misunderstandings

I am truly amazed at how much I don't understand of what is spoken around me each day! In Japan at least people spoke broken English to me, and usually slowly…..here when I start to look confused they just keep going or throw in a ton more slang which I have no idea what it would mean?!?!?!?! Now part of it is my fault…. I have a very hard time admitting that I don't UNDERSTAND ENGLISH!! So much of my frustration is internal, however here are some that I actually questioned folks on to ask why in the world they use this instead of the more common words….because almost 100% of the time they know the word commonly used.

busk= If you're child would like to busk at the school fair (pronounced feeeer) make sure they get there by 9am.

It means street perform with a cap out for coins!

togs/jandals= Bring your togs and jandals for the beach outing next week.

tog is a swim suit….both male and female
jandals…flip flops, not sandals because they have those as well!

mufti/gold coin donation= Mufti day to raise funds for typhoon victims in the Philippines. Gold coin donation, and any other generous donations accepted.

Mufti….plain clothes since the kids in Christchurch wear a uniform. We have discovered that this used to be universal in New Zealand but there are now many schools in different parts of the country that allow mufti's every day. Christchurch is just very conservative and likes it's traditions! The high school…i.e. College uniforms are crazy. 3 piece suits for boys and dresses with blouses and jackets for girls. Some of the prices we have seen are insane….like $300 for a jacket ONLY!!!

Gold Coin Donation…..the gold coin is a $1 coin. However the $2 dollar coin looks like the same material so I had to ask which it was!! There is a 10, 20, and 50 cent coin also but most stores use the rounding system meaning an item for sale that is "1 dollar...99", you would be charged $2. The smallest paper bill is $5. Due to the inflated price of things the tooth fairy recently brought Tyler a $10.00 bill which won't even buy him a small Lego set. The dollar stores here are $3 dollar stores…ha ha

I have heard a song that I love on the radio for weeks so I wrote down the name and was finally looking it up on iTunes after hearing the name MANY times!

Safe and Sound by Candle City

Well it is by Capital City……how can I mistake Capital for Candle??? It is just baffling to me! Too Funny!!

In this youTube clip you can hear the challenges I face. Everything is "sweet as" "beached as" "xxx as" There is a S*** word…which is also pretty common, even around children. Kiwi's are made fun of most for how the alter the vowels so "as" sounds like "is" and "chip" sounds like "chop", etc. Funny stuff!!

Beach Day

For the last term of the year, and in preparation for summer the school has a beach day! It is to get the kids aware of the things they need to know to be safe in the sun and swimming in the ocean. We went to the Waimari Surf and Rescue Station and had four lovely life guards teach all the Year 3 kids! They also did some relays, played a game like red rover, and built sand castles. They got to tour the facilities and see the different boats used to patrol and rescue swimmers/surfers. It was all very cool, excluding the fact that it was raining and cold! So the poor kiddos didn't get to swim! They were dressed to, and there was much debate as to whether or not it would be a polar bear swim or not, but luckily they decided it was too cold.….I was hoping the whole time we wouldn't swim….(crazy Kiwi's it is only 50 degrees with a steady drizzle!!!) But I too was prepared to get in if the kids were! The chaperones had to swim along because we had to form an adult wall around the swimming kiddos to be sure all was well with that many kids in the water! As the kids played games and whether or not we would be swimming was still debated….I looked out at the waves crashing and thought…..oh great I am going to have to be rescued by these sweet life guards and be an example for all these kids!! Luckily no near drowning occurred! I am NOT AN OCEAN GIRL!!!

Dunedin

We went to Dunedin two weekends ago to get out and see some more of New Zealand. It is supposedly the "Edinburgh" of New Zealand, and was a primarily scottish settlement. It was much more what I was imagining New Zealand to be, and I know that Christchurch lost a lot of their traditional buildings in the quake, but even before it was not quite as charming as Dunedin in terms of architecture. It reminded me so much of San Francisco!!! Including the incredible hills! We rode our bikes there and it was killer! Tyler and Erik did a ride that was too technical for me that you can see bits of the ride on the second youtube video! Crazy boys!!! We also walked down to "Tunnel Beach" the weather wasn't ideal but it was nice and secluded! We saw only 7 other people. On the hike down we found a good old USA penny that was heads up :) Good luck for us!!

Puzzle Masters

Tyler and Erik worked for an evening and a morning and finished Tyler's Scooby Doo Puzzle. Tyler was so bummed we had to take it apart and didn't buy into the idea that the fun in it is putting it together and getting to do it again later!

Our little zombie

Guy Fawkes Day

So they celebrate Guy Fawkes Day, the celebration of a failed assassination attempt on the King of England 412 years ago, by having fireworks. The city allows for the sale of them for four days, and man did the city love it! For DAYS AND DAYS we heard individual fireworks popping off every 20 or so minutes! One night I was up past 2am because people were out shooting them off randomly! So when we found out it was a holiday and would over soon I was so relieved and we went out to the pier to see the culmination of the celebration….the professional show. There were SO MANY people!!! They walked miles to see the show! Luckily we knew to head in early and got a great spot and set up and played UNO and Erik and Tyler wandered the dunes, found a park and played and made it back in time for snacks and the small time fireworks to happen up and down the beach! 

Our Neighbors let Tyler have a sparkler, which he has been deathly afraid of but he wanted to be friendly so he was brave and then loved it!

Still couldn't handle the sound. These were the small fireworks people had brought with them.

Playing Hard

So this week was full of trips to the park! We actually went to one of the parks two times this week! There are parks EVERYWHERE here….and many of them are quite awesome! They have zip lines and large play equipment…mostly safe…HA HA! Tyler loves it! We had a couple hours to squeeze in a play date so took Tyler's friend Tatsumi out to a park we had found while waiting for the fireworks to start this past week. We also found a cool new park with all the tires! Tyler was hanging so much and for so long over the weekend he ended up ripping a huge callous off his palm! Ouch! The pic of him slouching off at the end of the video is when he has his boo boo and can no longer play!

Poems

Tyler's class had a poetry competition in which each student memorized a poem the third day that he was in school, so his teacher let him opt out of reciting one. A couple of weeks ago she put together a book of the poems that the class worked with and that they were going to keep working on in language arts. Tyler loves two of them so much he has been reading and rereading them! He now has this one memorized….so here is Tyler's recital of My Lunch, by Ken Nesbitt. (Tyler refuses to pronounce it correctly…the author is American…but Tyler says it in an American copying a kiwi accent) The blinking is because of his allergies! We are both struggling with them here :(

Tyler as the Pig who builds his house with Bricks!

They did the play "The Three Little Pigs" in school and Tyler was the the third little pig. He had a blast practicing with us at home and go to where he had the lines mostly memorized. But not under pressure, hence the reading during the performance. They performed in front of another class and Tyler was very happy with how they did! Mrs Ashby was recorded them for the blog! You just have to click on this link!! Enjoy :)

Three Little Pigs

A Scare for Daddy

Tyler has been on a kick for a month or so….before Halloween was even a thought about scaring Daddy. They both started scaring me and I told them that if they wanted me to stick around or not die from a  heart attack they better knock it off. I don't like being scared, and my reactions are entirely disproportionate to the actual scare! My mom and I can jump out of our skin when someone we know is in the house walks in the room?!?!?! Don't know why we react this way but we do and I HATE BEING SCARED! So Tyler has essentially run out of places to scare Erik, so I thought I would help him out and cleaned out the bottom of the cupboard and told Tyler I would ask Daddy to get me some pretzels when he walked in from work so he would get into the pantry….he he! Tyler thought of wearing the bug mask. So we did it and Tyler had a very long and fantastic laugh! Erik barely jumped! He was startled though so at least there is that! I had started to set up my iPhone to record it but it was too late and Erik got home, so we did a video reenactment!

A New Zealand Halloween

Halloween is becoming more and more popular here and there were costumes and candy for sale but not ANYTHING compared to the scale in which we celebrate in the states. In my panic that nothing would live up to Tyler's expectations I bought him a Scooby Doo Puzzle, a small Lego set and a huge bag of candy he would have received trick or treating. Well smaller than that cause it really is insane how much candy we get in the States! Then we made little notes that said Happy Halloween From Tyler and he passed out candy to his class on Halloween day. Then we also luckily heard about a school that was doing a festival on Nov 1st which was Halloween themed and people were encouraged to wear costumes. There was food, the school band played, there was a dj, a bouncy house for the kids, pony rides, etc. It was really so much like the Fall Festival we have gone to at Batterman the past two years, it made me think I was going to run into friends! We went with the other American family we have gotten to know while being here and had a blast, though it did start raining steadily a half hour before it was supposed to close. But Tyler was ecstatic that he got to dress up and had a blast! His only Halloween disappointment was the trick or treating. We did a mini trick or treat with a group of mom's at the park, but Tyler wasn't impressed by that, though he was excited for the candy and the experience! He is such a flexible little guy!! It really is a huge blessing!!!

Maori Greetings at School

Almost every morning at school Mrs Ashby has the kids speak a greeting in Maori. After his two months here this is what Tyler has picked up :)! So COOL and he sounds so cute!!!

Life :)

This is one of the scary sets of shipping container walls holding up a deteriorating building. Right on the road and it creeps me out!

Tyler's pic of himself on his balloon! 

I LOVE the school hat! He looks just too cute!

Every day after school he plays for about 30 minutes! We don't get rushed off the playground like in Vegas.

My child is a walking bruise! He comes home from school bruised and battered every day! The play is a bit rougher here! But he is always happy and said he was having fun! This one was actually from PE. Crazy!!

Tyler asked if Daddy would give him and his monkey a ride up for bed time! Too cute! We love this little guy and will miss all our cuddle time and sweet cuteness that Tyler exudes! He is just a sweetheart and we have loved every second of it! 

A full rainbow we woke up to the other day! The first day that we had rain and sunshine  at the same time. Made us homesick for Nevada where this is so common. In fact it pretty much only rains when there is sunshine at some point :) Here rain is mostly rain and dreary. When it breaks up it does it in steps with high clouds and then eventually sunshine.