What the heck is that?

I woke up early this morning to check emails and out of the corner of my eye I thought I saw a mouse. I wish.  It was not a mouse but a huge creepy Weta bug.  I  F-R-E-A-K-E-D out.  My giant man child Morgan (6'1") wouldn't go near it.  I had to catch it and release it since our resident vegetarian, Ewan, pointed out that it is protected and we cannot kill it.  We probably could have grilled it and had it
 for lunch with leftovers.
The Weta bug is revered in NZ and they are , in fact, protected. They do bite, though I didn't know that when I was catching it.  Other than leaving a stinging bite, they are harmless. You won't die or need to go to the ER if you get bitten by one.  Good to know.
You see, our delightful house in NZ does not have air conditioning and since it was hot last night (84 F), I had left our windows open.  Of course the Kiwis don't put screens in their windows (that would be wimpy) so our new house guest just waltzed right in unmolested.
If anyone can find regulations on State Department housing and air conditioning / screened windows, please forward it to me. I will be eternally grateful.  I can learn to love pink walls and tile floors but there is no way I am going to let my kids melt at night or snuggle up to Wetas, no matter how "privileged" we are to live in New Zealand.

Our new friend

House a home?

It is no secret that I was less than thrilled with my new home in NZ. I was happy with NZ, don't get me wrong, but my house was "quirky."  I'm not going to get into the details. I am tired of hearing myself complain, so I'm sure my friends and family are tired of it as well.

I had heard that homesickness really starts to set in at 6 months into a tour, and especially during the holidays. Check and check. On top of those two triggers, we surprisingly sold our home in Costa Rica just before New Year. I was supposed to be happy, but I wanted to cry. Now I was completely and truly "homeless."  This pink and green fiasco was my only home. I was not gonna go into a decline and feel sorry for myself.

We need a party, I decided. In my former life as a publisher's wife, I had many parties. Adrian and I would invite all the "cool kids" to our parties and shun the pompous hoitie-toities.  We had a blast.  But, having a big New Year's party would require everyone coming to our house. Ugh. I just couldn't see it.

Having given up hope of ever wanting to entertain people here, I turned our dining room into a sewing room and the main living room has been transformed into the kids' room. So the only area left was the kitchen/family room with its tiny stove and ridiculous dwarf couches. 

I did have that rockin' fake fireplace, though, so there was still hope. Adrian, ever the diplomat (even before the new job) reminded me that people don't care at New Year. As long as there is food and alcohol, they will be happy.  So, it was decided. We were going to have people over. Lots of people, and each of them would be bringing children.  So, we began inviting the cool kids.

I cleaned and hastily hung up the pictures I had been "meaning to get to" since the movers came 3 months ago. My new friend Peggy helped me decorate and I cooked all day. People came, people laughed, kids played and everyone had a great time. After all the children were fed, we rolled out the Pièce de résistance - our CHOCOLATE FOUNTAIN.  Mmmmmm.  Nobody, I mean NOBODY can resist the chocolate fountain. One of our guests, who is allergic to chocolate, even tried it. It is heaven. Our cute little guest Misa was covered in chocolate within 2 minutes. Luckily, I had the foresight to put the fountain outside so the house did not suffer. In the end, nobody wanted to leave and I saw in the new year for the first time in years. My house was now my home.

This weekend I completed the transition by fixing all of the little annoyances that have plagued me since moving in. I hung up my favorite artwork, cleaned out closets that were still filled with boxes unopened, and lovingly placed family photos. My southwestern styled couches are now covered with IKEA covers and I choose to believe my pink walls are beige. Hey, you gotta do what you gotta do. My rugs are covering hard tile floors and the combination of white tile, pink walls and green Persian carpet doesn't seem too ridiculous. In fact, it looks "eclectic." I like it, it is my home, and I love it.

Before                              After

And, the additoin of my faux fireplace

Still working on these :)

Choosing to love my new home was a conscious decision.  It had to be done.

Best Birthday Ever

Well, while Ewan's birthday party was a bit unsettling, mine was awesome.  Since Adrian had a week off of work and the boys were off from school for summer break, we decided to head to the South Island and spend my birthday there.  We did ZERO planning aside from booking tickets on the ferry.  With our diplomatic status, we were entitled to half price ferry tickets (usually $800 for 4 people and a car) until the 15th of December. So, we kinda had to plan that, the rest of the trip we were gonna "wing it".  We had a general idea of where we wanted to go and what we wanted to see but no set plans or hotel rooms.
The ferry ride over was very nice though both boys got a tiny bit seasick. Adrian was in heaven. I think he took a thousand photos.
We spent our first day and night in Nelson and found a very clean and comfy hotel right near the beach. I have to say, this was one of the best beaches so far that I've seen in NZ. It reminded me of Fla. The sand was light and clean, the water was lovely and there was room to run around, or fly a kite!

We moved on closer to one of our chosen destinations: Abel Tasman Park. It is reputed to be gorgeous and did not disappoint.  Adrian wanted to go Kayaking with the boys and since I had no intention of going out for a 4 hour kayak, I volunteered to pack up the hotel and hang at the beach we had found the day before.  While Adrian was hunting for our 2nd hotel of the journey, the boys and I found this sweet little lagoon right off the beach at Abel Tasman.

No sharks :) 

The restaurant selection here was a bit dismal but we had places to go and things to see in Kaikoura so we headed east to our next destination.
Kaikoura is a really fun place to spend your birthday. I have to admit, I was spoiled. Kaikoura is home of the Crayfish, or as we call it, LOBSTER. They aren't cheap ( @ $80 each) but they are good.  You can stop at a little trailer on the side of the road and have a lobster right there, freshly plucked from the ocean.

With some time to kill before upgrading to our next hotel (our first one had no Internet "gasp") we headed to the seal hang out to check out the seals. The lady at the Lobster Shack told us about a short hike into the forest where you can see baby seals hanging out in a stream. They apparently swim up there to hang out while their moms hunt. I had read about this place earlier and was dying to go though our odds of seeing the seals were slim since they mainly go in the winter.  Our chances were also diminished by some jerks who recently had gone up there and slaughtered @ 30 of the pups. The seals will probably never come back now ruining a great local opportunity and tourist attraction. The waterfall was beautiful though and we enjoyed the hike.

Our new Hotel (Waves) was amazing. It was actually made up of independently owned apartments that the owners rent out nightly.  It was expensive and worth every penny.  It was a full 2 bedroom apartment with everything, super clean and very modern.  Right next door was the best restaurant in town where we ate this:

Early the next morning Adrian went whale watching. The boys and I had had enough sea sickness and knew we were getting back on the ferry later that day so we decided to hang out in Kaikoura while daddy went out on the boat. As a nod to Ewan, our resident vegetarian, we went to an animal farm to make up for his lost whale watching trip. It was a bit lack luster but the animals were cute and we were allowed to feed them. I was even able to get over my fear of chickens when a overly friendly chicken sided up to me and begged for food.

I loved it. My birthday was perfect and I got to celebrate it again when we got home.  As a special gift, a pod of dolphin followed our ferry out of the harbor. Thanks boys.

Christmas Lunch with the DCM

We have a very nice DCM here in Wellington and a very good CLO which makes for fun parties.  Our DCM invited the entire Embassy over to his house recently for a Christmas lunch (pot luck). We didn't get the sunshine we were hoping for which called for a bit of reshuffling with the kids' activities but "partly sunny" was good enough.  Everyone brought a dish so we got to enjoy some good home cook food!
I never know what to wear to these things so I wore a dress even though it was considered a picnic. Better to be over dressed in my book. I let the boys get away with polos and shorts.
This may have been one of the most relaxing events yet.  Most of the parties at the Marine House are laid back and casual but for some reason, this one was my favorite, perhaps because it was Christmas.  Erin (our CLO) even arranged for Santa to stop by and hand out candy to the children.
It wasn't the swingin' booze fest Iwas used to from our Newspaper days but a nice change of pace and no hangover.

Not the Best Birthday Ever

Wow, I am ashamed that I haven't written a blog post in over 3 weeks. To say that I've been busy would be an understatement. Let's see, after Thanksgiving we finally had a birthday party for Ewan who actually turned 11 three months ago. Better late than never I suppose. I have no idea why I agreed to having 8 extra little boys sleep over. It started out ok but then the inevitable happened....someone got hurt. How guilty can one mother feel? Pretty guilty. Poor Thomas, Ewan's closest friend and one of the nicest boys I've ever met, actually offered to help during dinner. He was going to fill up the fancy glass water bottles. Did I mention that we have hard tile floors? Everything that falls on them breaks, including Ipods and glass water bottles. Thomas tried to catch his as it fell and ended up in the emergency room for his troubles. I was so horrified, still am.  While I am sure Thomas' parents were not too happy about the situation, they did bring him back the next morning to finish off the party. Perhaps I should offer to reimburse them for the tennis lessons they just paid for but won't be able to use?

Here is the happy bunch before the accident.

Ewan is second from the right and Thomas is second from the left with the banana on his shirt.

Since half of Ewan's friends are vegetarians, we decided to make veggie burgers for dinner but this kid really like his veggies. Not only is he eating a veggie burger and sweet potato fries, he added broccoli to his! This is a new one.

Pilgrims and the Mongrel Mob

So today I had the privilege of serving an American Thanksgiving dinner to the less fortunate residents of Wellington. I wasn't sure what to expect since I had never done this sort of thing before. I'd done my share of volunteering over the years, but I have always resisted helping in homeless shelters, though I would drop off food and sundry items every year. This year I would have to step up since the US Embassy in NZ had organized the event at the downtown mission.

We were all assigned a few tables to look after. We were to serve them as if it were a restaurant. They ordered soft drinks and coffee and we would then take them a plate. As people shuffled in I saw children, moms and dads, distinguished-looking older people, and a few young adults mixed in. What I didn't expect were the few gang members that waltzed in, all tattooed and scary looking. Of course, they sat in my section.

OK, deep breaths. As I approached my table I asked if I could bring them anything. Most ordered juice or Coca-Cola, but the apparent leader of this small group asked if I could get him a 20 year old. "Sorry", I said, "we're fresh out". I tried not to make eye contact. Now he wanted to make small talk. "So, where are you from in America?" he asked.

This is a tough question. I've moved a lot in my life, this one to NZ being my 31st. I began scanning my brain to come up with the coolest place I have lived to "bond" with my new friend. Florida did not seem gangsta enough. Philadelphia? No. Georgia? Definitely not. North Carolina ? Too white bread. South Carolina? Too wheat bread.

I know, "South Dakota" I said.  He looked at me puzzled. "Where the F is that?" he asked. "Well, have you ever heard of Sturgis?" 

"Is that the big Harley festival?" he asked. Well, I wasn't going to correct him. "Sure is". I said.  "Cool."

I had made a friend.

The rest of the lunch was uneventful until my table got a bit rowdy during the Ambassador's speech, with one drunkard asking for a Tui (a New Zealand beer) and another guy passing out.

Everyone was really polite and well mannered (except the drunk guy). I was astonished to notice that even the downtrodden and mob members of New Zealand have impeccable table manners. I even received a friendly kiss from one appreciative fellow. Everything was eaten and everyone was thankful. All in all it was a good day.

I came home very thankful for my life. Tonight I will soak my very tired feet and be happy that I have a home to live in, food to eat, and friends and family who love me.