Our 2009 from MikeandNeen on Vimeo.

Because we're just cool enough to make a montage....

Yip he grew a mo again this year... and on Tuesday it was time for it to go.
:(

Last weekend was a busy one...
On the Friday I we both took the day off work, took the cats to the vet for their shots so they can go to the cattery, got our hair cut and then headed our separate ways.
Mike headed down to Taupo where he was entering the Cycle Challenge, a 160km ride around Lake Taupo.

...and I headed up to Auckland with renewed friend Amy ;) to see PEARL JAM!
It was AWESOME! Took me back to the teenage days locking myself in my bedroom getting mad at the world haha.... I'm so bad at driing in Auckland - I always have my human GPS Mike with me. I got lost about 3 times and had to call him to get us back on the right track.
Hands down best part of the concert was when Eddie Veder dedicated my favourite song to 'anyone from Te Awamutu'... ekk! Stoked.After I'd been there, done that got the tshirt, we headed back to Hamilton were I crashed at my ma and pas. I can't remember the last time I ever stayed over at my parents and it was nice... mum sorted my breakfast and had my bed all made... nice. Mike pixt me this... ...from the start line (he was there at 7.45am and demanded that I not just drive all night and get there to watch him start) and mum was so impressed... ha ha.

Then I jumped in the car and headed to Taupo to watch Mike come in over the finish line.He did really well considering that 45km into it he got a puncture. The bike shop here had sold him the wrong innertube so he was gonna be stuffed BUT there happened to be a good Samaritan parked up were he got the flatty. This guy was in a relay team and had done his part and was just watching for his tams mates to fly by. He ran to his car and got out his spare innertube and gave it to Mike. What a top dude. He even grabbed out his big pump and did the tire up for Mike. It cost him 30mins but what an awesome display of the good in people.
So his official time was 6.44... but we know that it was 6.14 really. Proud of my man.

Oh and Jesus was there too......

Yeah that's right... I moved it back again... mainly cause Wordpress was making me sad and I can use Blogger a lot more... and hopefully update this more because my scrappy blog is with blogger too... ya.

Sunny sunny sunny... wines, beers and just basically chilling with good friends.
MORE PHOTOS: CLICK HERE!

For the rest of the photos CLICK HERE

[vimeo vimeo.com/6549863]

...and it can't go fast enough.

We've been working most weekends trying to save up as much spending money as we can. It will all be worth it in the end... once we get on that plane and order a glass of wine, pop on the headphones and the wheels lift from the runway. Sigh... come on already!

The downside to all the extra work is that we've had 2 friends have 2 little girls and haven't been about to go visit either of them yet. You know we'll get there soon guys, bear with us!

Other than that not a lot to say... oh I got my new camera... a big Canon Digital SLR... stoked. I have wanted one for YEARS and so glad that it's here. Now I just have to learn how to use it before we go. So I'll post a photo from it just to show I'm learning.

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="500" caption="Mum got a new camera"][/caption]

Flying post...
Us ready to head out to Raglan to our old flatmate Blairs 30th birthday military themed party... it was cold but awesome. Repairing burnt bridges... it's a very good thing.

I've not really had a lot of home time lately and when I have I've been so exhausted from the rest of the day. I've had to use the bulk of what time I've had to do all the boring things like tidy the house, cook and just blob to recover :)

But FINALLY I've had a bit of spare time to whip together some more Little Things kits so I'll be popping them up over the next couple of days. I do struggle with all these ideas for kits in my head... have to start a list to get them out so I can create them with a bit of sense of order.
I wanted to share that Mike and I headed to the "winterless North" last weekend where it was blowing and gale and pouring with rain. We went to see my birth family (if you don't know - I'm an adopted kid) as it was my birth-fathers 50th birthday.

It was so good to hang out with them but there really are no words to explain just how strange it feels to be around people who are so much like you but you don't really know. They are so different in so many ways than my family and that just makes them even more interesting to be around. I have 3 bio-brothers who are as weird as I am.... actually weirder ;) Mainly as they know bigger words than me.

As proof of the weirdness... I ask for a group photo and get a brother on brother lap dance routine instead. Sat up til about midnight on the friday night watching this with Daniel the eldest bio-bro...

My birth father is an artist. His medium is lithography and I am totally in awe of the detail he puts into his work... I snuck a couple of photos...

And we haven't really been up to much. It was Queens Birthday last monday and we went through to Hamilton and took out the Catalina for a cruise around town.
We've been spending a lot of time in the travel agent and online trying to sort out our trip for september... exciting but exspensive and frustrating trying to get to the travel agent at lunch time when everyone else is in there... but we'll get there.

Our plan is to spend about a week in Oregon on the way over to the UK... it means that we'll be there for Mikes 30th and be able to celebrate with Jes and Johnny our friends who we are going to go and see. Mike is really looking forward to going to see the Goonies house... his all time favouite movie.

Well I am off to work for the day... long day on saturday. Mike will have to keep himself entertained all day ;)

For his 30th birthday last September I paid for Mike to drive a Holden race car at the Taupo motorsport track.

Yesterday we drove to Taupo and he slipped behind the wheel....

CLICK HERE TO WATCH MIKES V8 DRIVE!

He's stoked. Lord knows it's been a long time coming. He's on trade me morning and night typing in that one little word "holden". So if anyone knows a great deal it's that boy.
She's a 2001 Holden Statesman... the flagship he says. Full leather. She just needs little New Zealand flags flying from the front ;)
I'm so happy for him.

So today was the day of the hand over... it's officail - the paperworks all done and Catalina is now in the family... we took her to Raglan for the day...



CLICK HERE FOR MORE PHOTOS

We have a couple of mini breaks over the Christmas holidays but this time we took off the whole week. Well almost - Mike worked the friday and I have to work the saturday but it's the longest break we've had since we went overseas last year.

We had a blast... taking photos at sunset, chilling on the beach (even sat there watching a scrub fire on the hill around the bay one night). We tented and the the fact that it's day light savings we'd get ready to go to bed and then look at the time and it'd be 8.30! A bit of card gaming, cooking in the tent foyer, hot chocolates and easter eggs and reading mags and library books.

My fav though was the day we walked to Cathedral Cover. We stopped along the track at Gemstone Bay and went snorkelling. It was so awesome - we had a blast chasing snappers and running (swimming) away from stingrays.



We had a bit of a drama - somehow I all my daily worn jewlery... I always take it all off before I go to bed so whereever they are they are all together, my watch, my earrings and my NEW Pandora bracelet. I was gutted and cried a lot... and then rung the insurance company. We have replacement cover so I am now back in action.

Lucas came into the world at 5.52pm April 13th 2009 at 8 pound 4. Check out all that hair!

Well again I am a bad blogger.
But we have been busy. It's stocktake season right now so by the time we get to sunday I would have done 5 stocktakes and Mike 2. My work is pretty big so we slice it into departments...on sunday it's my departments turn so I've been flat out this week sorting through pens and pencils trying to get ready.
We had an up and down week last week. Mikes dad had a mild heartattack... he's pretty secretive about it but far as we know he is doing ok. Then we had a meeting at the hospital with Mikes new cardiologist. The guy was awesome. Knew what he was talking about and we left really happy. He basically told us that the procedure Mike was to have a year ago is way too risky for number of "events" that he has. He also told us all these risks that the last guy didn't even go near telling us, scary risks and basically for the number of times it happens he was saying "would we do it and something happen and we think - was it worth it for something that happens every 6 months?". So the end of the story is that we are switching meds and seeing if that helps. And we'll just wait and see... the op is an option but one we only wanna go to if we really really have to and that might happen later in life.

Meantime it's definatly heading towards winter. The temp when down this morning and when I left to go to work all 3 cats were on the bed and having no ideas of heading out... tarts.


We had the weekend off and had a double up of events. The Beach Hop was on and as much as Mike wanted to go we also had his best friends 30th birthday party in Palmerston North. You can't turn down a best friend. So we drove the 4 hours to Palmy and hung out with Blair and his fiancee Lynda, caught up with Lloyd for the first time in 2 years and met his bride to be Sarany and spent the night at Blairs mum Lynns place. She moved to Palmy now after Pete passed away I guess Whitianga wasn't the same especailly with the rest of the family far away. Shes a top ladyand it was awesome to see her gorgeous new home.


No much else to report. Might see the family this weekend. It was my mamas birthday yesterday. We are also expecting my brothers lil boyto be born any day now so we'll be Uncle and Aunty soon.

Ohand I better post this so mum can see. Today we had a bit of a celeb in store signing his new book. Kelvin Cruickshank is a medium who has been getting more and more known and been on TV etc. His dad used to come out the farm and dose the dogs back in the day ;) Claim to fame haha.

It just went on and on... and we still have to catch up with friends this week for dinner... whew.
Haven't felt so loved in a long time though.
Firstly on thurday Mike spoilt me rotten. I got a Pandora bracelet with 3 charms, Juno on DVD and chocolates. Mikes mama sent me a gorgeous wallet to match the handbag she sent me for christmas, and I got cards from lots of friends.
That night we shot through to Hamilton after work for drinks and dinner with my family. We hit the Bank first for a drink... I got a birthday shot and we had cocktails...

Then down the road to Iguana for dinner and birthday cake.

Friday I took hte day off to spend time with my mama. I got a lot of vouchers as gifts so we went shopping with those and had lunch at this really nice new place called Pumice. And of cause... frappicino.
Friday night we headed up to Auckland to stay with Daniel and Ashleigh. Daniel is my biological brother (I am an adopted kid). We chilled out at the Auckland Muesum on Saturday as it poured down outside. They have a T-Rex on loan from the Chicago museum so it was cool to see that.

That night they snuck me out to dinner at an Italian place called Ginas (if you're in Auckland check it out... perfectly Italian - Italian staff, menu and style... awesome). It showed me how much I have lost the little bit of Italian I learnt last year. We have pizza and pasta and peroni and limoncello... just like being back there.

On sunday it was one of my other bio-bro's birthdays and it was a bit of a surprise that the whole family was getting together... so I got to see my 3 brothers and my birth mother and father. We played glow-in-the-dark mini golf... it was weird but fun anyway.

Doesn't seem fair does it... Mikes mama is buried in snow and we have 100% humidity! It's so gross... being hot, wet, clamy, sweaty all day.
It's super hard to sleep too and doing anything is almost out of the question. (Oh and for our American friends... thats 86oF - but it's the humidity that really suks though).

We did spent our lastest long weekend at the beach. This time we packed the tent and headed to Papamoa. It was a nice chilled out weekend and heading there meant we could still catch up with friends but have our own space too. The campground was really flash too... music playing in the bathrooms and these things called Jumping PIllows... sort of like a new age answer to a trampoline but giant pillows in the ground. Oh yeah - we bounced.
We hung out at the beach, and we looked around the shops... and we chilled out in the tent and ate a whole pottle of icecream... haha.

We caught up with our friend Rebecca and my godson Joshua who is growing up super fast and on the way home we stopped in on Jared, Shelley and baby Kayley who is now 7 months and FULL of personality.

I told Shelley she must be an old soul cause it's like she done this all before.

It was a good mini break. The tent has had a major thrashing this summer... it's a good thing.

One last note... big loves ot my ozzie girl Paula. I am so so glad that the horror of the Melborne fires bypassed you guys. It's such a devastating event.... horrific.

So it was all going according to plan and then went a bit wrong at the end.
We both had to work new years eve but I'd packed the car all ready to hit the road straight away. It took us 2.5 hours to get to Wenderholm, a reserve just up past Waiwera (Auckland). We got the tent up and settled in with Dan, Ash and their friends and a few drinks and drinking games.
Then the rain came.
We were all huddled under a gazebo that we couldn't fit under so were hanging out the sides with umbrellas. once we all decided to turn in everyone seemed to find a leak in their tents... the rain was just too heavy. Mike grabbed the spade and dug a small trench outside our door to stop the water coming in too far (everyone had laughed when we turned up with a spade!).

By morning the sun was BEATING down... crazy hot. We headed for the beach and set up under the pohutakawas with books and games. It was an amazingly chilll day... like a real holiday should be. Mike and Dan went for a swim... and apparently that's were it went wrong... I didn't find out til later.
After dinner Mike told me... he heart had gone into AF when he was in the water. This is only 7 hours later... naughty boy.
So we jump in the car and hit the traffic jam into the city. We were in Emergency Care til 3.30am when the charge nurse tried to tell me I had to leave... and go where at 3.30am... home? Sleep in the car? Grrr... But the ward staff were lovely. They let me stay and even gave me a pillow. But a chair is never a bed and I got about 30 minutes sleep once I gave up and hit the tv room. Because Mike had eaten we had to wait. At 11.30 yesterday morning Mike was jump started again and is happily back in rhythm. I often think he has it easier... he at least gets to got to sleep while I pace the halls outside waiting for news.
It was the same story as all the times before, just a different setting. We are getting a great collection of discharge papers from hospitals around the world now.
That was our new years... hoping yours was less eventful than ours. Although having sat in an emergency room for 5 hours you realise just how much worse we could have it. Doesn't stop it being scary though.

Mikes mum rang from England yesterday... it's SNOWING!
It hardly ever snows on the Isle of Wight but it is... and after seeing how bad it is on the news tonight... wow!
Crank up that heating mum and get Trvor to sleep on your feet.

Haven't p to much. Work is full on for me - back to school time is the biggest event on the stationery calendar.
We spent saturday night at a bbq for dads birthday. Other than that we'll just been chilling and enjoying any down time. I've been sorting out my scrapbooking room so thats been a second fulltime job really - but it's getting there.
We've got a 3 day weekend we need to sort out this week and thinking about a week off at Easter... we'll see.