Away From Home

Nelson Creek

March 7, 2020 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

One Friday evening in the middle of February, one of our older children had a sudden inspiration: “Why don’t we go camp at Nelson Creek tonight?” Gayle and I weren’t interested, but all the children were, so, except for the two little girls, they all packed up tents and sleeping bags and breakfast, and took off. It’s only 15 minutes from home, so quite doable on the spur of the moment. They cooked sausages over a fire for breakfast and then took a long hike before coming home late in the morning. They thoroughly enjoyed themselves and want to do it again sometime.

Mr. Intellectual, Mr. Diligence, Simon, Mr. Imagination, Mr. Sweetie

Mr. Sweetie, Simon

Simon

Nathan

On top of the hill—Mr. Imagination, Simon, Mr. Sweetie, Mr. Diligence, Mr. Intellectual

After their hike, they went for a quick swim. These two boys couldn’t see each other! There is just enough of a curve in the cliff that they were both asking Esther where the other one was!

That same afternoon, Simon loaded three of his brothers into our ute and went to pick up a few more boys, friends from the North Island who spend part of their time down here, and they all went looking for a track Simon had heard about. They couldn’t find it, so they ended up back at Nelson Creek, and grabbed a friend who lives in the village. He went along, and they went up the same track our children had hiked that morning. When they got to the end, however, instead of coming back down the track, our friend led them down into a ravine, saying there was likely an old mining dam down there. They had quite an adventure scrambling down sheer cliffs and through such a narrow valley that they had to have a foot on each side to get through.

This pickax is likely left from the old gold-mining days.

Simon brought two of their friends home for the night, and the boys decided to sleep on the lawn under the stars. About 3:00 in the morning, though, it started to rain! One of the boys woke up and felt the rain, so woke the others and they all quickly came inside. When we got up in the morning, there was one boy asleep on the couch, and the rest were in the bedroom. I was very pleased that my boys could do something like this with friends; they don’t have this kind of opportunity very often. We have so many great places to hike in this region.

January 2020 Photos

February 22, 2020 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

Little Miss, right around her 5th birthday

Mr. Intellectual made oars for their boat. Here are Simon, Mr. Intellectual, and Mr. Diligence, rowing their boat on Orwell Creek.

Miss Joy has discovered a mirror!

She also enjoyed being in a box!

A flower was fascinating, too—for a little while! She quickly becomes bored with almost anything.

We had more brilliant sunsets while the Australian bush fires were sending a lot of smoke this way.

Little Miss loved getting presents for her birthday!

We had a cookout down in the paddock our cows live in when a family from Timaru was in the area. We roasted sausages over a bonfire of gorse branches.

Mr. Sweetie put Miss Joy inside the closet one day.

What fun! A bowlful of greens to play with!

I thought it was pretty cute to see her sitting beside Simon, talking to Mr. Intellectual.

At the end of January, we made another trip to Canterbury. The boys reassembled the trampoline for our friends. They had disassembled it when we were there in November, because it needed fixing.

The younger children played in the sandbox.

Little Miss with one of her dearest friends.

After the trampoline was fixed, they went for a swim.

Apparently, Simon helped Miss Joy wash dishes!

Five months old, and moving around!

Fishing and Milking

February 15, 2020 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

One Saturday afternoon in January, a friend invited us to go out to the sea with him while he put his longline out to see what fish he could catch. Gayle and Mr. Sweetie were already in town (Greymouth is along the coast), so our friend took the other boys with him. Esther and I and the little girls went later, when we learned that everyone else in our church was there, too! They caught 11 elephant fish, a kind of shark. Someone put one of them in the coals of the fire that was going, and we ate it while we were there. Someone else took several of the fish home with them, and we brought eight of them home. The boys and Gayle filleted them the next day (they were in a chilly bin on ice overnight). Yum! This is Mr. Intellectual with one of the fish right after taking off the longline.

Simon starting to fillet one of the fish.

Those are big fish. One of them is more than enough for a meal for our family.

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One morning I finally remembered to take a camera along when I went to milk. Mr. Intellectual had to go out and bring the cows up to the shed. The cow, Poppy, is in the lead; the heifer, Pansy is following.

Poppy goes into the stall with no hesitation; she knows there will always be treats waiting for her.

Pansy wants the treats, too; most of the time, she comes and tries to get them.

They actually spend a lot of time hanging around the shed, chewing their cuds, it seems like. Most of the time lately, they’ve been waiting for me there when I go down to milk.

See the roses climbing high in the tree?

The neighbor’s rose hedge was amazing when it was in full bloom! By now, it’s done blooming, and last week, she pruned the whole thing back to not much. This kind of roses grow very fast, though; soon it’ll be beautiful again. I walk past it every morning and evening when I go to milk.

Traveling in January (and the canoe)

February 1, 2020 by NZ Filbruns 1 Comment

We had several visitors from other places in January. Practically every time someone comes to visit, we take them to Pancake Rocks. I ended up staying home from the last two trips there; I have a baby who does not like to go away from home, so I stay here and prepare meals.

The first visitors for the month were two young men and their sister. Gayle and the children took them to Pancake Rocks on New Year’s Day. They stopped at the Brunner Mine first; this is the Grey River from there.

After checking out Pancake Rocks, they went to Punakaiki Caverns. It’s apparently very beautiful! I’ve never been there myself.

They also took the Truman Track down to the beach. I have been there! Here are Mr. Diligence and Mr. Intellectual climbing a rock.

Our other visitors arrived towards the end of the month. This was two young ladies Esther’s age from Germany. Esther took several trips with them. The first trip was to Pancake Rocks; I didn’t save any of her pictures. Later that week, she, Mr. Diligence and Mr. Sweetie went along to the glaciers with them. Here they are walking up to Franz Josef.

They also went to Fox Glacier, but couldn’t drive up as we did the last time. In fact, the road on both sides of the river that goes away from Fox Glacier has been washed out from the record-breaking rainfalls we’ve had this year. They walked up the road on the side away from the glacier; it’s closed to vehicles because of the slips. They walked a total of two hours there!

In between trips, the boys took the German girls down to the creek and gave them a ride in the boat.

Mr. Sweetie, Mr. Imagination, and Little Miss enjoyed the water and mud!

Esther and Mr. Sweetie also went with the girls to Arthur’s Pass. They stopped at Lake Brunner on the way.

This is a waterfall on the Millenium Walk, near the visitor’s centre.

These pictures were taken at the Devil’s Punchbowl Falls.

We have enjoyed having visitors!

Now that we’re home for a Saturday with no visitors, however, this happened:

The canoe has been sitting for the past year, waiting for the fibreglass. Mr. Intellectual got the sanding done awhile ago, and he patched up the holes. Now, the fibreglass is on, with the first coat of epoxy. Doesn’t it look good?

Buller Gorge and Pancake Rocks

January 12, 2020 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

The Sunday after Christmas, we went to church in Reefton. We had a friend with us, a young woman whose family we spend a lot of time with. She had never been to Pancake Rocks, so we decided to take her there. Since we were in Reefton, we drove to the coast via the Buller Gorge, which she had also never been through. We hadn’t been through there in several years, either, so it was fun to see that beautiful place again.

There is some farmland along the Buller, where the valley widens out enough. The colors were so vivid that day!

This place is always fun to see, where a single lane has been carved out of the highway. It may be hard to believe, looking at this picture, but about a month or a month and a half ago, when we had a lot of rain, the level of the water was up to the road there at the cut-out! I saw a picture online of the floodwaters swirling around the guardrail.

We stopped at a roadside picnic table to eat lunch, and went down to the river. See how the grass is laid over, way above the level of the water? That’s where the water was, when the river was in flood!

There was a small, beautiful creek there.

When we reached Westport, we turned south and drove along the coast. This was the first time I’ve ever seen the mountains along this route; the other times we went through there, they were covered in clouds.

There was no action in the blowholes at Pancake Rocks, since the sea was so calm. We got some good family pictures, though! Here I am with my beautiful daughters.

Unfortunately, we chose too shady a spot for our family picture. We’ll have to try again another time.

The Nikau palms were in bloom.

We got a picture of Gayle with our handsome (?—look at Simon!) sons.

The second (or third or fourth) try went better. What clowns!

The next day, before our friend went home, the children walked with her down to where the Ahaura and the Grey rivers come together.

Target Practice

December 22, 2019 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

Simon bought himself an air rifle a few weeks ago. This fulfills a dream he has had for a long time, as the first step towards getting a gun license and learning to hunt, which is a dream he has also had for a long time. Now, at least, he can learn to aim! He has taken his brothers down to the riverbed several times for target practice, as well as some friends.

Mr. Diligence takes aim.

Mr. Intellectual has a turn.

Little Miss running ahead toward the vehicles. That’s the rail bridge up ahead.

This was another evening. The friend who came along this time has three little boys. Two of them are here, playing with our children. Isn’t that a great sandbox!

Our friend helping his oldest aim.

Helping a younger child aim.

Cookout!

November 23, 2019 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

Mr. Diligence wanted to have a cookout down by the river for his birthday, and invite some friends. We decided to have it for Sunday dinner a few days before his birthday, and invite everyone from church plus a few other friends. I think we ended up with a total of 36 people! We spent all afternoon there, roasting sausages for lunch and eating them along with many other treats that people brought. The children played in the creek all afternoon, and we all went home sunburned and tired, but it was a great day!

I apologize for not posting last week. I sent my camera with Gayle when he went to the States for his mother’s funeral, so wasn’t taking pictures. I was also away for four days, so didn’t have time to write anything anyway. Now, I need to buy a new camera, as mine got lost along the way somewhere. I’m thankful that Esther will loan me her camera!

October 2019 Photos

November 9, 2019 by NZ Filbruns 1 Comment

Here are the last of my photos from October! This year is almost over already—how can that be?

One more bubble picture, from when that was the fad. This is Mr. Imagination.

Gayle and all the children except Miss Joy went fishing one Saturday. They didn’t catch anything except a blackberry vine, and they lost some hooks and the handle of a reel—but they had fun!

Little Miss wanted to dress her baby sister one morning, so I let her try. She discovered it’s a little harder than dressing a doll! Mr. Imagination helped her.

The cow and calf enjoyed the sunshine a few days after the calf was born during a rainy spell.

The boys were trying to make a stack of people. Mr. Sweetie climbed onto Mr. Diligence’s shoulders, but when Mr. Imagination got on, the stack collapsed.

Mr. Sweetie and Mr. Imagination made these fish out of silly putty. The fish are playing with a ball, and the top of the frame is the sea.

Simon bought a new backpack, and Mr. Diligence wanted to try it out. He got Little Miss to climb in, and gave her a ride. She loved it!

This enormous dump truck is used in mining, likely coal mining. It is not licensed for using on the road, so they had to haul it this way.

Mr. Imagination was quite impressed with the length of this potato sprout when he helped his daddy plant potatoes a few weeks ago!

We enjoy watching episodes of MasterChef together, and Mr. Imagination has been inspired to create pretty food. This was a “dessert” he made one morning. He has pieces of banana and orange, and he made a sauce with mashed bananas and cream.

Miss Joy at a little over two months. She lives up to her name most of the time, and is a joy to have in the family. As I type this, she is sleeping snuggled up on my chest.

Some friends gave us a praying mantis egg case. We were fascinated to watch the baby insects hatch! Esther took a video of it, then sped it up 8 times.

A Flooded River, and Mountains

October 5, 2019 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

We have had a lot of rain lately. One day, someone told us the river was quite high, so Esther and the younger ones walked down to take a look at it. It was up at least a meter higher than usual at that point. (Last week when we went down to the riverbed for a picnic, there was evidence that it had been a couple of meters higher than normal at some point recently!) We live about a quarter of a mile from the river, and could hear it roaring loudly from here. Usually, you can see a wide stretch of rocks here, going about halfway across the river.

Two weeks ago, we went “over the hill” to visit friends in Canterbury. Soon after we got over Lewis Pass, we had people feeling carsick, so stopped along this river for several minutes to let tummies settle down. It was so beautiful! Such a clear, blue sky and clean air, and the snow in the distance.

This was after we got out of the mountains, and I was looking back.

We enjoyed seeing this herd of Belted Galloways. Those calves were so cute! I wish the light had been better, but this was the best I could do for a photo.

We very much enjoyed two days of meetings with our church family over there. I took this photo just before we left, while I was sitting in the van feeding the baby. It was hard to leave!

Going home—more snow-capped mountains!

Several months ago, I wrote a review about a science program we were using. I just got an email that they have a new resource available, free. It looks really good, and a lot of fun. There are heaps of video lessons in it, and if they are anything like the ones we watched from this company already, we’ll learn a lot from them and be fascinated at the same time. I look forward to enjoying these soon! Go to the landing page for the Mighty Feathers Science Goodie to see what you think. If you like the course and want to subscribe to other topics, use this link, and enter the code loh12 for $5.00 off your purchase. I’d like to know what you think of the Mighty Feathers course, if you try it out!

Dead Boring Concert 2019

August 31, 2019 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

Because of the imminent arrival of our new baby, we were not all able to go to this year’s Dead Boring Concert (Dead Boring is the homeschool writing group we were part of in Canterbury before we moved here to the Coast). However, since Esther has her full license now, she was able to take four of her brothers over to it. They sang two songs and performed a skit.

The first song was, “I Am Thine, O Lord.”

Their second song was, “I Have Decided,” and Mr. Intellectual narrated the story behind the song.

They named their skit “A Gift for the King.” It is based on an old story. One morning a few weeks ago, Mr. Intellectual and Mr. Diligence came up with the idea. They told Simon about it when he got home from work that evening, and asked him if he could play the part of a guard. He immediately came up with an even better idea; he wanted to be the one bringing the gift, and when he acted out his idea, we were all in stitches at his goofy accent and what he called his gift! He did make one mistake when they performed the skit on the day; at the end, instead of saying he wanted a goose from the king, he intended to say he wanted a REAL goose. At the very end, they were throwing candy out over the audience for the children.