Happy Holiday

A regular reader (Hi Rosina!) has gently pointed out that I have been very remiss in not posting photos here for some time. So without further ado, here is a traverse through our Gold Coast holiday.

At Dunedin airport

Kookaburra alarm clock

Sea World - we could pat these stingrays.

Pirate ship fun

Dinosaur Island

Pingus!

Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary which we loved. Tyler got to tick two items off his bucket list - hold a koala and hold a snake.

At Movie World, the Harry Potter shop. Tyler now has his own wand.

Wet N Wild - the Green Lantern rollercoaster. That's Chris and Tyler nearly at the top.

Tyler turned 9 while we were away. Cupcakes sufficed for a birthday cake.

One of the four pools at our resort

We had a fabulous time and would like to go back again. Still paying this one off though!

♫♪ We're all going on a ...spring holiday.. ♪♫

A short post - yes I know, I owe all two of you Gentle Readers a long one! But I promise the next one will be long and photo-filled as the Campbell-McLeod family is off for our very first proper family holiday - hooray! We're heading to the Gold Coast for 9 days of theme parks and wildlife encounters and while we are there, Tyler has his 9th birthday. So an extra memory card has been purchased for the camera in anticipation of frenetic photo-taking.

We will be staying at Turtle Beach Resort in Mermaid Beach. We have the Super Pass for Wet 'n' Wild, Movie World and SeaWorld Theme parks and we will be visiting Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary where Tyler is very keen to cuddle a koala. 

See you soon!

Holidays

• So there I was, finishing work just after 3pm on Thursday 22 December....nek minnit......it's 14 January and work looms.

Apart from the earthquakes we had a lovely relaxed holiday, including a couple of days in Te Anau (where I nearly buggered the jetski propeller, but we won't talk about that).  I also had a day visit to Dunedin where I caught up with a singing buddy, currently over from Australia, and had another session with my SLT.

New Year's Eve was spent at a friend's house nearby with a barbecue and table-tennis. Quite a challenge seeing the ball as dusk falls!

Tyler and I have been to the movies to see 'Puss In Boots' and 'Hugo' in 3D (beautiful movie) and amongst all the relaxation I managed to knock off a few things on my To Do list, to whit:

• Clean and reorganise pantry
• Cull books and organise bookcases
• Transfer all 2011 photos and video to DVD

Tomorrow I tackle the office - send a search party if I haven't surfaced by tea-time. The problem with tidying the office is that it involves sorting and tidying music and inevitably I find little gems that I had forgotten about and just have to try out. Six arias, two etudes and a flute sonata later.....

A couple of photos to finish:

A hole in the road with liquefaction just after the 6.0 earthquake on the 23rd

St Paul's Cathedral, Oamaru (Christmas Eve service)

Table-tennis on New Year's Eve

Tyler and Chris have just spent a boys weekend in Te Anau which included rabbit shooting, fishing off the jetski (and losing Tyler's rod overboard necessitating the purchase of a new one) and visit to the Gloworm caves.

Meanwhile, yours truly was free to enjoy some girl-time and tick a few things off the to-do list. Went to see The King's Speech (and can thoroughly recommend it). Followed by my favourite Thai peanut satay beef. Eyebrows professionally dealt to. (Incidentally, isn't it ironic that I lighten my hair and darken my eyebrows?) Watched a DVD on Shostakovich's 'war' symphonies with historical background. Had a 3GW catch-up sitting in the sun quaffing Brown Brothers' Zibbibo and inhaling mini cup-cakes.

Last week of the school holidays so I have taken today and Friday off to spend some more time with Tyler. Today I told him he could choose whatever he wanted to do today and suggested he write a list. Here it is :)

We have now crossed off #4 but have yet to get to #'s 5 & 6. 'Mooives' was Megamind, 'Games' was Beetle and Candyland and 'Pictures' was drawing pictures for each other. 'Playstation' was his new Ben 10 game (me watching him with one eye and making encouraging noises and reading a Dick Francis with the other).

He's off to the movies with the other OSCAR kids tomorrow as both Chris and I are at work. Singing lessons start this week - mi mi mi mi mi ahem cough cough. Best I go and do some more practice!

Dunedin visit

On Friday, Tyler and I headed up to Dunedin for an overnight stay. He was very excited because I booked us in at the Aaron Lodge Holiday Park which has a heated indoor swimming pool. So pretty much as soon as we arrived, we were off for a swim. It's a small pool and even the 'shallow' end is 3ft deep so almost up to Tyler's chin.

After dropping off a bottle of wine and some chocs to Stewart Robertson of Advertising and Art who created our new A Capella Singers logo pro bono, we headed off to Sawyers Bay to visit Rachel, Sam and Morgan and new baby Scarlett. Miss Scarlett is just gorgeous and like her siblings is an early mover. At 6 months old, she is pulling herself up to standing and trying to walk!



Tyler and Scarlett

  We had tea at Cableways and then after a decent interval we went back to the swimming pool. As I was feeling a bit cold I decided to sit beside the pool and watch Tyler. He was having fun toddling around in the shallow end and then all of a sudden, having pushed off the bottom a bit hard in the direction of the deeper water by mistake, he was going under and swallowing water big time. I ripped off my sweatshirt, jumped in and grabbed him. Both of us got an awful fright, but thankfully Tyler seems none the worse for his experience, and even as we were heading back to the motel unit (me fully clothed and soaking wet) he was planning his next swim!



Pre-under-the-water-experience!


The next morning we went to the Museum, and Tyler really enjoyed the rainforest butterly exhibition. He had a beautiful black and yellow butterfly sit on his finger. He also had heaps of fun playing with the kids interactive science exhibition. 

At the rainforest butterfly exhibition

 We then headed for home, stopping in at Dunedin airport to catch up with the Howards who were checking in for their flight to Brisbane.

Only one more sleep till Chris/Daddy gets home!!

Edited for the umpeenth time: As you can see I've managed to get some photos to load, but they have been severely distorted. To see them properly, just click on each one (and then hit the Go Back button on your brower to return to the blog)