Goodbye Hawke's Bay - Hello Taranaki (again)

I have officially left Hastings, and am now back to living in Inglewood.  I drove over yesterday/today with a stop over at Mum and Dads last night.  It's nice to split the trip, cos it is a long one, plus I needed some warmer clothes and they were already at mum and dads lol.  I am happily all unpacked now, the cats have been fed and like typical cats I have not seen them since feeding them dinner.  (For those that don't know I am staying with Susan, a long time family friend, while I get my unit sold and find a new place to call my own.  Susan is fostering two cats, and she is currently in Australia so it is up to me to keep these two cats fed and alive for a couple weeks... 😶 and yes Susan is Aunty Susan but as I don't need an adoptive Aunty anymore, rumour has it I'm all grown up now, thought I'd give calling her just Susan a go 😊 lol).  Anyhow, I thought I would sum up my time in Hawke's Bay somehow.  Cos it was quite a while that I was there, the longest time I've lived anywhere since leaving home to go to uni way back when.  And as you likely know I like numbers so here is my time in Hawke's Bay in numbers 😄 

8 yrs 1.5 months - total time lived here

1st home bought (and now on the market to hopefully be sold)

4x places of work, 5x different roles

4x Art Deco’s attended

1x props room needing sorting that lead to a wonderful and strong friendship

0x props rooms actually sorted (lol)

4x book groups joined and regularly attended (each for a while at least)

3x local theatres joined

2x major health setbacks

2x major health setbacks overcome

11x tattoos (give or take… lol)

Things I have not been able to accurately count (for different reasons):

Amazing friends

Book events/launches attended

Authors met

Theatre shows taken part in, either back stage or front of house

Winery sessions - hanging with friends or reading a book on my own

Visits to The Figgery (I did buy myself a The Figgery t-shirt before leaving, it was a must really)

Dinners cooked by Namaskar

Kilometres run

New to me music discovered (some is new music, some is old music I didn’t realise I loved)

Dance parties held in my lounge (Glenny can confirm my dancing has not improved, not even a little bit, but my enthusiasm has never wavered lol)

Radio shows produced/part of

Hairstyles and hair colours

Wknd fun

Last wknd ma, pa and bro came to visit. Dad was only a slave for a bit of his time here, rest he was a visitor 😊 he even got out for dinner and to see a couple waterfalls hehe.

Ma and pa drove over on the Saturday as did brudda. Bro stayed Saturday night only while ma and pa stayed till Tuesday. Didn't do much on the Saturday afternoon but dad did some stuff for the house or yard, kept himself busy I think. We all went out for tea on Saturday night which was real nice. We went to Lone Star, always good food and lots of it there.

Sunday morning bro and pa and I went for a couple walks that I wanted to do but hadn't yet. The first was at White Pine Bush, very nice and not at all challenging. Some lovely nice photo areas though, and some annoyingly big trees that were rather difficult to get all of in a photo. The second walk was Tangoio Walkway to check out the two waterfalls. The first waterfall, Te Ana Falls, was pretty cool 😊 I even braved the not even close to warm water to get nearer the falls for a photo, so worth it once I could feel my feet again lol. The second falls, Tangoio Falls, was not worth the extra walk in my opinion (and dad and bros), super not cool. Maybe it would be better after some rain but then the track woulda been so muddy it wouldn't have been worth it anyhow.
The rest of Sunday was just chill and hanging out really, dad prob did more work cos he seems to like keeping busy, nothing at all to do with a maybe demanding dorta...

Not much happened for the rest of the week after mum and dad went home and this weekend has been a nice chilled out place to myself wknd. Today is my 6 month as a home owner anniversary and to celebrate Samara and her mum came for dinner. It was a very lovely evening. I also got bored earlier today and made myself a tablecloth 😊 Me, Missie and the boys tested it to make sure it worked. The boys think it works marvellously as Glenny finished first followed by Fishy while Missie and I seemed to keep finding every snake and took our time finishing. Think it's cos the snakes are purple and you know how much we like purple hehe.

Tomorrow I have a rostered day off, my team is trialling a 9 day fortnight at work to see if it will work as a possible option for the whole organisation. Next week is the first week of it. I get Monday off, then work 7.30-5 Tuesday-Friday, next Monday I work 7.30-4 then same as previous week for the rest of the week. And repeat. Explaining it to you guys cos the team decided (one day when I was not in the room) that I would do a blog about my days off, so instead of starting a new one gonna just add to this one, if I remember. Cannot guarantee anything interesting will be done on my days off but will be nice having 3 day wknds every second week 😊

White Pine Bush

Had never seen mushrooms growing on a tree branch before 

Te Ana Falls

Tangoio Falls

Sunrise from craft room other morning

Ensuring tablecloth works

Visitors for New Years

Meant to get this up a few days ago but what can I say, I'm on holiday and feeling a bit lazy hehe. My friends Bridie and Alice came to stay over New Year's. We had lots of fun and did quite a bit of stuff really. This is the abridged version 😊

We went up Te Mata Peak, yes I know I go there lots but I like it so why not. Also it has nice tracks that are shaded if you don't want to go to the top and it's also close by. So yup I'll keep going and keep taking ppl there.
We also did a winery bike tour, I liked the biking and the wine tastings but personally prefer to not mix the two. Biking is exercise and fun, wine should be drunk while chilling lol. In saying that would recommend doing one if over here cos really is quite fun.
For New Year's evening we went to a free concert at the Sound Shell and the family fireworks cos they were earlier in the evening and meant we could wake up for the sunrise on New Years Day. Although there were a few more clouds than I would have liked we still got a good sunrise.
We went to the Open Air Cinema to see Mamma Mia 2 one of the nights, good movie, great venue.
Along with general exploring, sightseeing and some shopping the time flew by. Bridie and Alice also did Cape Kidnappers and went to see the gannets, I didn't go as my body doesn't walk on sand for the amount of time required without some loud protesting and brokenness. They really enjoyed it tho and one day I'll do the tractor ride version of it hehe.
Ps all the above may not be listed in the order we did it 😛

Open Air Cinema

Te Mata Peak

Winery Bike Tour

Sunrise 1st January 2019

Friends made while shopping lol

Post #350 - never thought would keep this going for so long :)

It's been a pretty busy week and a bit for me, good busy though :)

Last wknd bro came to visit on the Saturday, just for the day. We went and saw They Shall Not Grow Old, a war doco movie which was actually not to bad, better than I was expecting. We then went to the Lions Annual Book Sale, which was also better than I was expecting. So many books and at good prices and in good conditions. Will def be going back next year, and most likely donating books to them as well. Can't member what else we did other than eat but it was good to hang out.

Sunday did some stuff round the house then went and saw A Star Is Born with Samara, David and Carolyn (Samara's mum). Think I'm about the only person I know who thought it was predictable and not super amazing, still worth seeing but would prob recommend waiting till dvd or streaming it lol.

Work Monday and Tuesday was standard life stuff, minus the heading over to Ohakune after work on Tuesday. Stayed at Laura and Ted's and on Wednesday early morning Laura, Shura, Laura's parents and I all headed up to Auckland so Laura could have a look at wedding dresses. She had one in mind and was going up to try it and few others on. It was a very long but happily successful day :)

Came back home on Thursday, and much to my relief Glenny hadn't pranked our place like he had claimed he was going to. Dad also arrived here later on on Thursday as he is visiting for a few days.

Had Friday off, cos what is the point of working one day when you have a visitor and leave to be used... hehe. Dad and I attacked a couple trees and he also put a window in my garden shed, and it now is way less murder shed like lol. We went out to dinner with my friend Steph, we went to Bareknuckle BBQ which was real yum. Steph and I then dropped dad off and headed to Aubyn Theatre to see a show, it's just down the road from me so we had to go check it out. Was real good and we already know we wanna go again next show, whatever it ends up being :)

Saturday took dad, Missie and Smyly up Te Mata Peak, then we went out for lunch. Arvo was back to work cleaning up the mess we made the day before, got most it cleaned up but had to finish off some this morning. This morning we went to the dump twice, well we went once and drove thru twice as we had general waste and green waste and its done by weight. The guys there were very helpful though and helped us empty out the car which was appreciated. I then took dad up two more hills, mountains if we wanna sound more impressive though hehe. On the way up Sugar Loaf we ran into Carolyn who was heading down with Kaysha, we had a quick lil chat then headed our own ways. After Sugar Loaf we headed up Bluff Hill, then made our way back home. Can't see heaps happening for the rest of the day cos this old girls feeling very buggered, dad's pottering though so who knows.

Te Mata Peak

Two friends just chilling

Sugar Loaf

Bluff Hill

Smyly pointing the way home

Samara takes me to the most 'interesting' places lol

This wknd has been an extra long one for me as now that I live in the Bay I get Hawke's Bay anniversary which is the Friday before Labour Day, so 4 day wknd, score! And awesomely Hawke's Bay anniversary coincides with the last day of the A&P show, so that's where Samara and I headed on Friday morning. Was pretty awesome, watched heaps of wood chopping, saw the chickens and sheep and bulls and alpacas and clydesdale horses and a gecko and weta, even saw a police tractor which had the whirly lights and everything :) recognised some of the names and faces of the wood choppers, turned out they were the ones from Taranaki, maybe I watch a bit much wood chopping at events like that but am sure that's not a bad thing :) even found out how the handicap system works which was cool, for those wondering they get 1 second added for every $50 they made in that event at the last round. So the dudes that start at 23 or 25 are not only better but richer than those who start at 3 hehe.
We also checked out a talk by the ladies from Hapi (a gluten free organic cafe in Napier) which was pretty cool. Did have a gluten free hotdog, the type that is a sausage in a bun which ain't had for ages, for lunch from the stall they had. It was super yum and I wished I coulda fitted two in.

After the show we came back to mine to make sangria and get dinner organised cos we were going to see David (Samara's partner) gig later that night. The sangria was awesome and we played board games as well which was fun. Samara doesn't like playing cards with me no more :( not my fault I won every hand at each game we played last time. We had polenta and meatballs for tea, not sure I'd recommend polenta but as Samara cooked it I didn't complain, much. If your wondering it's not unusual for me to get kicked out of my kitchen when they are here, they like cooking and I apparently just get in the way :)

David's gig at the Common Room was once again interesting. Not him and Michael being interesting, the crowd. Him and Michael are real good, love watching them play. They just have fun and don't seem to care if crowd likes them or not which makes it fun to watch. There were some definite weirdos in the crowd this time, some same as last time, some new. Spent a fair chunk of the evening laughing hard, and a fair chunk yawning while getting the evils from David, lol Samara was yawning too so I wasn't alone in getting the evils.

Saturday morning I chilled then just after lunch I headed into Napier to pick up Samara and we headed out to Zeffer Cidery for their grand opening. We didn't stay long as there was pretty much no shade and there were so many kids. It was way too hot to chill there so we had one quick drink while ppl watching, boy were there some pink ppl already, silly kiwis who still don't get the cover up and sunscreen idea. We are going to go back some other wknd though as it is a nice place and they do good cider.

After we left we just chilled at hers till we headed into town for White Night. White Night is a free art event that kicks off the art festival, some of the streets are closed and galleries are open in the evening for free with activities and performances also happening. We started off by going to the Municipal Theater to see Pango. This was a performance by a dance group from Wellington and it told the story of the Maori version of creation. Samara and I have decided that we are really not fans of interpretive dance. Boy was it weird, and disturbing in places, extremely disturbing in a couple places. We are pretty sure there was cannibalism in it, and a birth, but we aren't 100% certain. Definitely don't think kids should have seen it but there were heaps there. Bits were also really good tho, but overall I'm going with it was interesting....
After the performance we wandered round the galleries, caught another interpretive dance performance which just solidified our belief that we aren't fans. Some of the art we saw was pretty cool tho. Best part would've def been the White Room at the CAN where for $2 you got a sheet of white dots to help decorate room, so much fun. Below are pics :)

Sunday went shopping with Samara and her mum, her mum was getting new glasses and wanted our opinions, and we all just wanted to shop some as well. Was a very good day, even if uneventful compared to the past two days.

Today I just chilled in Hastings. Bit of shopping, lots of pottering, some relaxing. I have changed my spare room from a guest and craft room to just a craft room :) so much better now. It has a table where the bed was so I can now cut and pin fabric on something other than lap or floor :) have also put the pictures I coloured from the dress colouring book on the wall for inspiration. Have more space in there for creating now which is cool, cos yeah having a whole lounge ain't enough lol. Do have an airbed for those visitors who I can't say no to, that was my shopping this morning. See I do kinda care, maybe, if I have to lol.

My dot creation 

The White Room

From prison to a hole in one

This past wknd Laura and Ted came over for a visit for her birthday, Mike and Suzanne also came over but they stayed with a friend in Napier.  It was awesome catching up with them all and taking them sightseeing plus to a few new places.

First on our list of places was Napier Prison. Turns out I'm a pretty good criminal, first didn't really care got arrested, then stole the gun from the copper and then became one :) silly police ppl letting me in haha. And ok I did get locked up but atlst I didn't look quite as crazed as Ted did, so figure points to me there :)
Over all the prison was a bit weird, the start was real fun and cool but then it got real serious and felt wrong to have paid to visit the place, some of the old cells felt eerie like some very bad stuff had gone on in them, which judging from the facts on the walls it had. We all left feeling a lil gloomy and serious. Would say it's still worth going to see but just beware of the more serious side as we weren't expecting it and it took us by surprise.

We then headed off to mini golf (am sure we ate at some stage but cannot remember where or when haha). Did the green course again, mostly cos the blue one was full of kids. Not that doing the one I'd already played helped me at all, though I did get a hole in one, along with Laura and Suzanne :D sorry boys but the girls totally rocked more haha

After a chill out break back at mine we went to Thai Silk for dinner. Hadn't been there before but it wont be the last time I go, the food was amazing and the server was awesome. Definitely recommend it if you are looking for Thai in Hastings.

Sunday morning, once I woke Laura up (hehe) we went for a walk to get some coffee, ended up getting a coffee from a street cart on our wander and walking while drinking them, did 5-ish km all up before we got back to mine to wake Ted up so we could meet Mike and Suzanne and their friend Anna and her boys for brunch in Napier.

Overall it was an awesome wknd, and the weather was amazing for my guests :) very generous of Mother Nature and she also watered my shrubs again today, she is doing so much better at that than me yet is not overwatering them, she must be a gardener hehe :)

Did fare better than this dude haha 

Apparently this cat is sometimes there sometimes not so is known as the ghost cat, seemed pretty solid to me tho... 

Hole in one pros hehe