Visitors

We had the pleasure of dear daughters company for a short while this weekend. Aimee brought her ten baby rats for a visit, along with mum and dad rat. So I just have to share a few photos with you.

These little fellows are 9 days old already

  Dyni' (dad rat) is Aimee's pride and joy

I feel a scrapbook page coming on...not tonight though. need to get cleaned up ready for the busy week that lays ahead. 

Missing Aimee

Aimee is gone and I'm missing her already!Funny that I have been looking forward to some quieter times, but now Id like the chatter and clutter back in our house. Aimee looked somewhat lost without her friends when we left her at Studholme. I sure hope she's not 'Nigel no mates' for too long!

We took these photos before we left home today...

I know Aimee is going to miss these two great friends (Claire and Charlotte) heaps!!!

She may even miss her mum a little bit :-)
Cody and Aimee work hard at pretending they are not friends, but I know differently

sigh... all of our children are growing up..."slow down" I say


Hard to beleive our little girl is 18, how nice it would be to wind back the clock.
Tonight I have had the old photo albums out and decided to scan a few favorite's from days of old. Here's a peek at Aimee when she was a whole heap younger....


...with big brother Cody

...and in pig tails

...face paint

All dressed up for her 5th birthday party, with Cody and best friend Claire (as seen in the photo at the top of this post)

Snow fun.

Ballet days

Aimee,with best friend Claire again.
Horsing around.

This photo was taken in 2000, spot a younger Camden in the background.

Good Luck sweet girl xx

The end

The class of 2009...in their final hours.

Aimee and best buddy Jess.

Jess was telling me yesterday how she remembers her first day at the college. She didn't know anyone and remembers well going to sit by Aimee and asking her if she wanted to be friends. Well, that was lucky for Aimee, Jess is an awesome friend, and as the girls them selves say...They've come along way.

The girls again at Graduation dinner on Saturday night (14th November)

..now it gets kind of ugly!!!Schools out, but things at the girls hostel are heating up!!

Aimee is looking quite ill here, not sure if it because she has emptied out that bottle!!...or because of the flue she has at the moment. Amazing how her feeling unwell did not damper her festive spirit!

Good luck girls, may you all have bright, rosie futures ahead of you.

Last day

Today was Aimee's last day at high school. I pinched this photo from her face book page! Looks like the last day of school was pretty laid back, and I see that her white school blouse has undergone a dramatic change!

Tomorrow night we have the graduation dinner to go to. Sunday morning we have graduation mass and in the afternoon its graduation speeches and prize giving, so all in all the weekend ahead looks like a busy one!

Next year Aimee was going to go to teachers collage, but has since been accepted at the college of Physical Education. As physical education is her passion she has decided to go with that.

Her course is a four year one and she is intending to do an extra year on top of that, which will enable her to teach physical education as well.

Good luck Aimee, we are very proud of you!!

Go Aimee

Thursday, the first of October, saw us tripping to Dunedin. Our Aimee had been shortlisted for an interview at Teachers College. This morning we received a letter in the mail to say that she had impressed the panel with her references and interview and there is a place waiting there for her next year. We are feeling very proud of her :-)

Go Aimee!

A few photos from a proud mum

Last night we went to the ball. Aimee was a little mortified when i told her we were going to!! However, we stayed on 'our side' of the room, most of the time and did not cramp her style too much! Aimee even come and said hello a few times during the evening, so we felt very honored!
Here are a few photos... forgot to get one taken of Andrew and I though.

This is Claire and Aimee, these two have been best of friends since playgroup, in fact they used to sit side by side in their car seats on the playgroup floor, before they could even talk!! Now days they never stop talking!!
This is Michael, Aimee's new best friend. Michael's mum is the background and you may just be able to see Andrew there as well.

Snapped this photo just before leaving the motel to head to the Ball parade.

Aimee and Michael strut their stuff on the 'cat walk'.

Aimee does not look too phased by our presence! ( I did not take this photo by the way! )

One more photo...

I meant to add that my clever mum made Aimee's dress from a picture on a tiny video clip on U tube, emailed to us from Aimee. (Click on the photos for a look at the detail)
Thanks Gran!!!

Glitz and glam'

Saturday night (1st August) saw the Waitaki girls, and Boys school formal. Our children do not go to either of these schools, but Aimee was asked to go and of course would never turn down an opportunity to socialise. I spoke to Aimee, via phone, the morning of the ball and said that I might pop in, she said there was no need!! Very independent our girl, so different to our boys!!
Latter that same morning I received a text asking if I could come in after all as one of the hostel girls had no dress to wear...and could I please bring in last years dress. I rounded up all of the formal dresses I could find in our house, iron, needle and thread and headed to town.

When I arrived at the hostel Aimee was in the process of doing her hair.

Here they are soon after... Aimee and friends with their faces and hair looking great!
After picking up snacks, and drinks for the after party I dropped the girls at their motel, and must say this was one extremely busy motel room!!
Here they are dressed and ready and waiting for their dates to pick them up.

All these girls in one tiny motel room, there are also lots of mums, dads, grandmas , pars,brothers and sisters in the background and the odd boyfriend floating around.

Okay.... I'm looking somewhat shabby here, but I had been running around like a mad thing for several hours by this stage! (that's my excuse anyway!)

One ball down, another coming up in a fortnights time. Kind of sad to think that will be Aimee's last ever school ball. Where have the last few years gone...and when did I get so old looking??

Welcome home Aimee

On Saturday we went to Christchurch to collect our lovely daughter from the train Station. Aimee has spent the past three weeks at Outward Bound School, and she has had the time of her life. She has made many wonderful friends and has many memories and hundreds of photos to remember her time on this once in a life time adventure.

Here is a photo of 'Rutherford Watch' This is the name of the 'house, or group that Aimee spent the bulk of her time with. It seems they all got on very very well and fun was the order of each day!

This 'cutter' was home for two nights and three days!! Aimee tells me the toilet was a bucket and quote "when you got really busting you had to ask everyone to look the other way while you 'went'!!" Now I have to say that would be enough to send me swimming home!!! This is sharing much more that I would care to share!!!

Sleeping on this cutter was not great , Aimee says it was very cold and they were very squashed, especially those who had to sleep under the ores.

Aimee is on the left, in the purple jacket.

Here is the whole group again outside their watch house.

As I say, she has hundreds of photos, but I am thinking you may not want to see all of them! :-)

Tonight Aimee packed up her car, again and headed back to the school boarding hostel. Today is one of her school friends birthday so the girls were all going out to tea, then it was back to school to settle down to some school work before the next disruption... the Ball on Saturday night.

Trails and Outward bound

Just a very quick post tonight. All of our children are away for the night, Cody has an 18th birthday to attend at some high country station. Aimee is looking after Uncle Davids children's for the night and Camden is away for the night as he is heading off for a hunting trip with friends early in the morning. Ye Harr, for the first time all year we might not get woken up before 7am on a Saturday morning!!

Andrew and I are about to watch a movie so that will be nice.

Our exciting news for the week was , firstly Aimee completed the Rail trail this week , she was the first girl home and bet a good chunk of the boys as well! Go Aimee!!!
Now, she was still buzzing about that when she found out yesterday that she scored the Outward Bound Scholarship from her school and received a bonus $200 from the principle!! So again...Go Aimee!! It has been one of Aimee's dreams since form one to go to Outward Bound so we are thrilled for her. But I have to say that she is welcome to it, as she has chosen to go in the next school holidays...the middle of winter. Swims in the sea every morning and cold showers.... Crazy I reckon. Aimee sure does not take after me!!

Now just to finish, I have a couple of photos to share with you. I opened the door to wave goodbye to Camden as he headed for the bus stop on Tuesday morning and this is the scene that met my eyes as I glanced over our fence.... spot the frost on the hills and grass, and the mist rising from the river....

Half an hour latter I braved the chill to pop out and take a second photo

Its little moments like these that I often do not take the time out to notice... and goodness me, I must remember to stop more often. How wonderful it is to life in the country..I should add the only sound to be heard was the river flowing in the distance

Message to self.... Be thankful for the small things in my life