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Away From Home

Classic Cars

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We had some different entertainment on our way to church this morning.  There was a classic car show in Kaikoura yesterday, and the cars were on their way home this morning.  We probably saw around a hundred of them–didn’t think to count till we were nearly there!  This post is mainly for my brothers who like old cars–we were thinking of you as we enjoyed the “parade”.

A few of the cars were not being driven!

We also saw a couple of railroad track-fixing-machines–made us think of our friend back in Michigan who used to build them!  These were built in Australia, though, it looked like.

We also saw this picture of spring.

Field Trip

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WARNING!  If you are squeamish you may want to skip this post!

We actually took a field trip last week!  We don’t often do that, but Gayle organized a tour for us of the place he works.  It is a small meatworks, although the largest employer in the district.  They process cattle, sheep and pigs, doing everything from slaughter to sausages, hams and bacons.  We found the tour very interesting!  Our children have grown up butchering and were totally fascinated.

Sheep carcasses

Sheep waiting to be skinned.

Sides of beef, and our friendly tour guide.

The best part of the tour–seeing Daddy at work! He was “tender-stretching”–rehanging the sides of beef to make them more tender.

Tender-hung beef

The boning room

Sausages

We had to wear plastic covers and hair nets for our tour.

This Past Week or Two in Pictures

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I keep thinking about things to blog about, but real life keeps getting in the way.  So, here are a bunch of pictures to give you a glimpse into the past couple of weeks.

Now that he can get around we have to be more diligent about cleaning up ashes!

Last Tuesday we had the biggest hail I have ever seen. When it hit a boogie board in front of the house it bounced up 3 meters (10 feet)!

After the storm passed, the cows finally made it to the trees for shelter–and when the sun hit them a cloud of steam went up!

Hail on the trampoline.

Almost crawling!Gayle and the boys built the framework for raised beds on Saturday.

On Sunday we stopped to explore some rock pools along the coast.

Starfish Sea anemone

Shags

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After our hike around the Kaikoura Peninsula Sunday, when we were waiting for Gayle to bring the van back around to pick us up, the children who were with me, and I, were quite amused by the sounds of the shags going to bed in the tree above us.  A shag is a large bird that lives along the coast; I think they eat fish.  They sleep in trees, and when each one comes in for the night they apparently have to discuss the day!  The sounds they make are so funny that I tried to capture them in this video so you can enjoy it, too.

Kaikoura Peninsula

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We had an adventure Sunday!  It was such a lovely day that after leaving church at 2:00 we went to the Kaikoura Peninsula to walk on the rocks.  Gayle has been wanting to walk around the Peninsula again, but we weren’t sure what the tides were.  When we got there, however, it became apparent that the tide was going out, so we took off from the north side of the Peninsula, and walked around to South Bay at sea level.  It’s quite a long, strenuous walk, but beautiful!  We made it to the other end around 5:00.  Gayle went ahead of us the last little ways and then he and two of the boys hurried up the cliff to the trail on top and across to where we had left the van, then came back to get us.

Seagull at the north end, before we started out hiking.

Here we go! Just starting around the first point.

The tide was still high enough we had to be fairly close to the cliffs, and the seaweed on the rocks that were in shadow was extremely slick. We had to search for dry places to walk on. Lots of energy at the beginning!

Simon climbed halfway up that high cliff! He climbed several hills on the way, and at the end ran back across the top of the Peninsula to catch up to his dad, who was on the way back for our van. Incredible energy, there.

Some of the easiest walking on the whole trip.Some of the first seals we saw up-close that day–but not the last!

The game of “Pass the Baby” was popular with the one being passed–until one big brother fell down with him. Then, he wanted Mom.

See the boys most of the way up?

More seals, and a shag grooming. At the base of the cliff ahead of us is where we first came very close to seals–like, on the trail! Seals can be quite dangerous; if they bite you can get a very bad infection. Don’t go between a seal and the water, and don’t threaten them! Signs are posted saying to stay 10 meters (30 feet) from seals.Our protector going ahead to scout for seals.

Here we come, skirting as far around the seals as possible. Simon, behind me, very thoughtfully waited there for me, keeping a lookout while I watched my footing, then brought up the rear.

I had to stop to feed the baby, and while they were waiting, Gayle and some of the boys climbed up through a cave and came out on top, where they could watch us coming up!

We all ended up going through a branch of the cave to get to the other side, because the only other path had a big seal on it!

More seals–all over the path! We were very cautious.

At last! We have rounded the end of the Peninsula and can see the mountains again. Our destination is across the bay.

This fascinating layer of rocks, shells, and bones ran along the cliff for quite a long ways.

Simon found this whale’s vertebrae sticking out! He brought it home.

Seth found this fence post washed up, and carried it a LONG way along the beach. He fell down four times while carrying it across slick places, but persevered. He really wanted it!

South Bay–the end of our hike.

Google Earth map of the Kaikoura Peninsula

Beach and Playground

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Yesterday the sun shone!  We’ve had several weeks of mostly rainy days, so when it was nice yesterday I challenged the children to finish their schoolwork by 11:00.  Everyone was done by 11:30, so we went to the beach for a little while.  We wanted to be home by 1:00 to be around when our landlord’s son came over to work with a wild cow that was here, but the beach is less than 15-minute’s drive away so we can go for just a short time.

A cold wind was blowing off the Pacific, so we didn’t stay out there very long.  I told the boys to see who could find the most interesting item washed up along the high-tide line, and they came up with some good ones.  There was part of a horse mussel shell with barnacles on it, a sponge attached to a shell, and a clump of several different seaweeds with various shells through it.  The 2-year-old collected a lot of sponges.  (When his Daddy came home from work, he wanted to show him his “seahorses”!)

The trail that goes up and over a small bluff to the beach.

Off on the search for treasure!

The clump of seaweed and shells.I carried baby, in his wrap, and the sponges that 2-year-old collected.

After spending awhile on the beach, we went to the playground on the other side of the bluff.  There is just enough of a rise of land to break the wind, and it was lovely and warm there.  Some of the boys just climbed around, but most of them spent time one time or another figuring out how to balance the seesaw with their various weights.  A seesaw, by the way, is a great way to learn how a balance scale works, and how you can use your weight on a lever in different ways!

Balanced! Baby woke up and enjoyed the bright day, too! On our way home, we drove through the Cheviot Domain–an area of public land–to admire the daffodils.

Jar Blessing

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I took the rubbish to the dump today, and paid the usual $3 to get rid of it.  While I was dumping it, I noticed, beside the dumpster, a couple of boxes of jars.  The man gave them to me, and then remembered that I like big jars, and brought me a gallon jar that was there, too!  All this for nothing–I would have paid $32 for them at Recycling.  That pays for a lot of trips to dump rubbish!

This Past Week

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It’s not real easy to write when most computer time involves multi-tasking (which being interpreted means feeding the baby!).  I’ll just put in a few pictures from this past week.

Baby thinks life is rough!  He even frowns in his sleep!

For Dead Boring last week, we met in a gym and the children played while the moms talked.  The group is so large now that we’ve had to split in two, but still want to all see each other occasionally.  Four times a year we plan to meet this way, and just have a social day without sharing writings like we normally do.  The children played hockey.

These are two of my boys, James and Simon.

The child farthest left and the one third from right are mine.

Baby studies things–mostly to figure out how they’ll taste!

Haircuts last night!  This was the pile after I cut six heads of hair!

Bedtime story!  We’re reading Horse of a Different Color, by Ralph Moody, right now.  Baby was asleep with his mouth clamped tightly shut.

On our way home from church today, we stopped for half an hour at the beach, where the Kowhai River empties into the sea just south of Kaikoura.  The waves were very high today.  I love those cliffs in the distance, just south of Oaro.

Brotherly love–the bank at the edge of the parking area, going down to the river’s edge, was steep, with these large rocks.  I like this one so well I put it on my desktop screen!

This is the boy who reads the best, enjoying Naya Nuki by Ken Thomasma for the fourth time.

Big sis was playing with her new tripod, and caught this picture.  Glad that leg was up to hide everything else!

Fossil Hunting

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Yesterday at our homeschool writing group meeting, a man showed us a powerpoint presentation about fossils.  He has been collecting fossils for several years and has an impressive collection from the local area.  My boys badly wanted to go to Gore Bay and search for fossils along the cliffs there, so, since it was sunny and warm today, we went right after lunch.  When we arrived, the tide was high, with waves hitting the cliffs, so we sat on top and read some of our books for school before we went down.  The tide was still so high that we couldn’t get to the best places, but the boys climbed up some of the less-vertical cliffs anyway.  We never found anything that we were sure was a fossil today, but had fun exploring anyway.  One unusual thing we saw was an oystercatcher (bird) with a missing foot!  I could tell something was strange about it, and when I was able to see its tracks, it had one normal footprint and one that was just a round peg.  Poor thing.

The tide when we arrived.

Reading stories.

This one quickly got bored with the stories and found something more interesting! Climbing the cliff to hunt for fossils

After they gave up on fossils, they cut a few branches of lupine bushes.

Driftwood makes a great boat.

The tide when we left–quite a ways farther out, and notice the shadows. Short days right now.

And these two pictures are just because they’re cute!  The first one was this morning when 2-year-old needed something to do during school and I assigned him to “read” to baby.

This one was after we got home this afternoon.  I set baby on the couch while I went to do something else, and when I came back he was staring, fascinated, at his booties!  They kept wiggling!

Apple Picking

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Yesterday afternoon we went to pick apples to feed to the cow.  Well, it was a great excuse to take a drive around an area we don’t otherwise have an excuse to go to!  We did get apples to feed to her, to help keep up milk production, and had a great afternoon together enjoying gorgeous scenery.

We drove through the hills to the west of us.  Lots more rugged than right here where we live!

The first tree we found that had apples on it was at the top of a steep cliff!  This cliff went nearly straight up–no problem for my fellows!  The rest, however, found a slightly easier route a little to the left of this picture.

I did not go up.  The two youngest stayed down with me.  After the rest had all gone up, the 2 1/2-year-old decided he wanted to, also.  As he was standing at the base of the cliff, facing it, he proclaimed, “I am going to climb up the hill!”  After a pause, “Where is the hill?”  I told him he was looking at it.  The place he was standing at was an eroded, rocky spot that went up at about a 45° angle.  He gave it a try, but soon gave up and told me, “This is a broken hill.  This is interesting!”

The next tree we stopped at was beside this wool shed/yards.  We only stopped there because we remembered the tree from last year.  It bears small, delicious orange apples.  There were two left.  We went several weeks later this year than last.

The birds had gotten most of the apples from this tree, but we got some that weren’t too rotten .

After picking up apples from that last tree, we allowed the boys to run on ahead and see how far they could get before we caught up with them.  We drove slowly to give them time, and I believe they got most of a kilometer!  The one in the lead kept going till he had gone probably twice as far as the others before they gave up.  They had fun doing that!

This hillside dotted with Angus cows was beautiful–and we got to see it from both sides.  The road continues on, then doubles back just beside those pine trees at the top of the photo.