32nd trip around the sun

I have had a pretty sweet 32nd trip around the sun. The trip started off in Scotland, then after a couple months moved through Ireland, Wales, England and on to New Zealand for the last 8ish months of the trip. It's seen me hanging with my new friends in Edinburgh then making a bunch of new ones along my travels and finally home to my old friends and amazing family, all of who I've been lucky enough to catch up with since arriving home. It's seen me go back to study and get back into crochet and sewing, even betting mum at sewing a child's garment in the arts show :) that was very cool. This past year I have also discovered there is kid out there I am happy to tolerate, so not sure how that happened but it did. 

And I just wanna say a big thanks everyone who helped make the trip such an amazing one and bring on the next one :) 

Awesome last wknd as a 31 year old :)

So this wknd is my last weekend as a 31 year old and it has been a very good wknd.  Ystdy just called and worked on my assignment (due this coming week), went for a walk with Mum and watched some motor racing.

Today Dad, Glenny, Sis, Missie and I went for a wander up the hill to find some snow, and get some cool pics.  It was a good walk and the snow was fun and yes we got some cool as pics :) This afternoon we went for a short wander in Pukekura Park, I went and checked out the place I am going to be housesitting in Sept/Oct for 5 weeks and met the two cats I will be looking after.  Now am sitting watching some more motor racing :) definitely a great wknd :)

Selection of pics from this morning

Snow in Inglewood

Ok so it obviously didn't snow in Inglewood in the middle of the day - BUT there is snow in our backyard, how weird...

Hehe Dof brought me some snow from the mountain after his walk this morning :) so obviously me and Glenny and Missie had to play with it and make a snowman :)

Vegas Long Weekend

I managed to get Friday off work so I could have a long weekend, seeing as I missed getting one last weekend, so I headed off to Vegas to see bro on Thursday after work.  It was a lovely afternoon for a drive and like good people we made sure we appreciated the scenery and views we were offered :)

On Friday I went over to Morrinsville to see Hayley (my roommate from Uni) who happened to be there visiting her parents.  Was ages since our last face to face catch up so was really good to see her again, and again Friday was a good day for a drive and discovered there are some hills behind Matamata with the biggest hill having a big as trig or tower of some kind on it which taunted me for quite a large chunk of the trip lol one day maybe I will take it up on its suggestion to go find it.

Saturday bro and I headed down to Mind Junction where we spent a decent chunk of time getting lost in the maze and giggling and laughing for a fair amount of the time.  We had to find our way to the 4 corners and also find 5 questions, 5 answers and 5 animals.  We managed to easily find the 4 corners and 4 questions, 3 answers and 3 animals.  After a bit more hunting we found the last question, the last two answers and one more animal, but no matter how hard we hunted we couldn't find the last animal - a fish.  Eventually we decided it had swum away so wandered out of the maze, then the lady behind the counter told us to go back in and find the fish and she gave us a hint, it was between '5' and the elephant question.  Well we re-found those two easy enough but could not find the fish, eventually we split up and bro stayed at the elephant and I went to the 5, then I spotted the fish by looking over the walls, then bro found it by going under the walls :) success :) hehe.  Yes I did find it the proper way after a couple more attempts.
After the maze we went into the lego part and spent a while admiring the city they had built while trying to find the most wanted characters.  We found some of them but not all and not the most most wanted dude, but we were ok with that.

On the way back to Vegas we stopped at Rainbow Mountain (I think its called that) for lunch and also for a wander.  We only went to The Crater Lake partly cos we had other plans for the afternoon and also partly cos my body hates me and I doubt I could have comfortably made it to the summit.  Plus we weren't really sure how long it would take or how hard it would be.  But we will be going back :)

Rest of the weekend was chilled, some shopping then DVD watching on Saturday and on Sunday just chilled and chatted some, cut bros hair (yes I don't love him and took all his head warmth as its coming into the colder weather hehe), then I headed home and again it was a nice day for a drive.

Nice view of the moon and sunset on Thursday

Yellow aka corner one

Blue aka corner two

Green aka corner three

Red aka corner four

Rainbow Mountain, Crater Lake

Bro at Crater Lake

Me at Crater Lake

One of my fav views on the drive to/from Vegas, taken Sunday (Thursday the sun was inconveniently setting in the background)

Update from lil old me

So its been awhile, yes I know, but in my defence I have been very busy procrastinating writing my final assignments for the semester and then actually writing them when I realised no one else was going to help me, I know I am so unloved right.  And in with all this non-existent stress (as if I would let something as little as three assignments stress me out) Glenny and I have been going through what I spose could be called a rough patch, this was much more stressful than those pesky assignments.  But don't worry, after a couple of discussions, ok so after I yelled at him a couple times and called him useless, we have come to an agreement, kinda.  We/I were discussing how useless he is, he wants me to move into my own place, mostly so that he can just create havoc and mess and won't have to worry about anyone telling him off, yes he seems to think I will let him get away with anything, haha dream on buddy, but anyway our discussions were around how although he wants this he in no way is helping, and ok maybe having paws limits what jobs you can get but he doesn't even do the small things that I ask him to do like making my bed and pulling the curtains, but whatever, we have come to a compromise and he has taken responsibility of guarding the things that are important to me so that I know when I do get my own place it will be well guarded when I am not there, and probably also when I am there.  And since my assignments are all done and submitted my self-imposed sewing ban has been lifted, yay.  So yeah things are all good in the world of Jilly :)

Guarding my bed, or is it my bedroom, I am not sure and they never explained

Guarding the fire, not sure how long it will take them to realise that if they don't let me past it is going to get cold....

Glenn found the cupcakes, and apparently cos he's been so good at guarding and bears eat fish and they match his nose they are all his... I do not agree with this logic, for some reason

Since I haven't been able to sew I have been creating fairies :) so cute but they do seem to be growing in number

Missie has returned

Some of you may have noticed Missie's absence over the past view weeks, this is not because I don't love her, cos of course I do, but because she has been hanging out with Sus and going on adventures with him and Doffy.  She has been to every hut on the mountain as well as every peak, including the summit :)  Its a good thing she had the sense to befriend someone as active as Sus otherwise she would still be waiting for most the peaks and some of the huts.  Doffy has been nice enough to share the photos he has of Missie and Sus so that me, and therefore everyone, can enjoy seeing her adventures :)

Missie has now returned to hang with her big bro's Glenny and Fishy for a while.  I am pretty sure they will try to corrupt her but am not worried cos I know she can hold her own :)

Missie and Sus at some place when I was with them but this is the photo from pa so diff to mine hence the sharing lol

See long explanation above hehe

See above :)

Missie at Syme Hut (Sus is hiding behind her and Dof)

At Fanthams Peak

View of the coast from Fantoms Peak

They made it to the summit 

And the top of the Kaitake Ranges

Pouakai Summit didn't offer as gooda views though

At Lake Dive Hut

And the final hut, Waiaua Gorge Hut

Talk about confusing

If you have ever wondered how similar in looks the landscape in NZ and Ireland, Wales and Scotland is I can tell it is very very similar. All my photos have decided to mix themselves together and the South Island roadtrip I did with Bro is all mixed in with my Ireland pics. Atlst if he's in it I know for sure it's a NZ one hehe :) 

Semi Active Wknd

This past wknd I had a semi active/mostly lazy wknd. The mostly lazy was watching the v8s go badly round in circles, they crashed way too much to be considered good at it :) made the watching fun though :)

The semi active on Saturday was going for a wander along the Coastal Walkway from the Aquatic Centre to East End then up the Te Henui Walkway for a bit then back to our cars via iced coffees/chocolates with Mary. It was a lovely lil wander and great to be out and enjoying the limited sunshine. 

On Sunday mum and I walked in to meet dad on one of the walks on the mountain. We met him just over a swing bridge which was cool as meant we still got to cross it, if you have walked down all the steps before it (which you have to walk back up to get out that way) you deserve to get to walk over the bridge and go bounce, bounce, bouncey :)

Coastal Walkway wander

Mountain stroll

 

  

I is still around

Just thought I would let ya all know that I am still alive and kicking, not posted for a while cos not much has been happening that is exciting, just been doing what I do best which is having fun and chilling with Glenny :)

This past week has been a pretty busy week for me though, well relatively speaking.  I submitted my first lot of assignments and should have marks back in two weeks time so then I will know how I am going, its always a bit tricky before the first lot of marks I find as its hard to know if you are taking it all in how it is meant to be taken in etc.

I have also got myself a part time job, woot woot.  I am going back to the Parks Team at NPDC but not in the same role as I was in when I to Scotland.  Should be a good job to fit in around study and I know its a great team to be re-joining.

I also finished Hart of Dixie this week, its a tv show for those who do not know.  I watched season 3 and 4 this week, so so good.  It is the show that I learnt you can actually watch 14 hours straight of tv and your brain does not explode, in fact nothing actually happens cept you are pretty zombie-like the next day (I started after lunch lol).  The show solidified my belief that I need to go find me a cowboy, not necessarily a bull riding cowboy but a southern gentleman cowboy :) If I am rich when I finish study I am off on my search :)

Glenny and Fishy have also found how cool Nerf guns are and we have been having loads of fun and have had to hunt round bro's flat for the bullets a few times.  Glenny is a pretty decent teammate, believe it or not :)  and I found a way to make both him and Fishy look kinda smart, hehe bro put my glasses on them :) yes we are having fun :)

Today I also tried to lighten my hair using household ingredients, I tried that salt and water one cos it was handy and easy plus isn't meant to take ages like lemon juice does.  Good news is my hair didn't fall out, bad news is no lightening happened :( boo hair, not cool.

Other than some colouring in and a lil bit of sewing aint really been up to much else, well other than bugging bro but that is part of the lil sis job description so something I just gotta find time for :p hehe

And thats about it...
Till next time atlas :)