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April 2021 Photos

June 20, 2021 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

Here are the rest of our photos from April—and a video clip of Miss Joy drawing! This little girl loves to draw. She frequently requests—or demands—paper and pencil; she wants to “ite!” Since these photos were taken, she has progressed from scribbling all over a piece of paper to drawing little circles. She also cuts things; scissors are her other frequent request. Yesterday, she cut one piece of scrap paper into little bits, then pointed to the stack and wanted another. It was soon in bits all over the floor, too!

Simon helped a neighbor kill and skin a few sheep, and a few days later, he came home with one of them! He and Elijah soon had it cut into pieces. I’m so happy that they can—and enjoy—cutting up meat.

Late one afternoon…I was making applesauce while Mr. Sweetie tried to finish his school work for the day.

A few weeks after Esther and her brothers built the shelves, she and I spent a day organizing the container. This is what it looked like when we started. We never got a picture when we were done, but it’s usable, now! It’s still crowded,but we can find things and get to them.

Simon starting on the tiny house.

They lined it with these sheets of insulation, and then put plywood over that.

4WD Excursion Up the Snowy River

May 30, 2021 by NZ Filbruns 1 Comment

Gayle, Esther, and all our boys went with a number of other people from our church on a drive along a rough track up the Snowy River. The road along this river comes out on the main road about 20 minutes’ drive north of us. They went up that road to the end, where they had morning tea at a farm, and then took the track a couple of kilometers into the bush to a former gold-mining area—the Alexander’s mine and gold stamping mill. Here is some of the scenery on the way to the farm.

Mr. Sweetie gesticulating about something at the farm. (Notice his new glasses, Grandma?)

The center vehicle is Simon’s Pajero. The one in front is his boss’s Land Cruiser, affectionately known as the Troopie (because it’s a troop carrier). My family has been talking about the electric system for this farm ever since they got home. They generate their own power with a water turbine. The power is taken to the buildings with a single Number 8 wire, and most of the year they have to leave the lights on all the time so they don’t burn out the system, because they have too much power!

The first river crossing!

The Troopie has made it across; will the Pajero and the other Land Cruiser make it?

Simon hooking up a snatch strap so the Troopie can help him get up the muddy bank. He says the water was icy.

Checking out the ruts the Pajero made. The bank was apparently about three feet high before the Troopie went up it, and then the Pajero smashed it down some, too.

Eating lunch.

A tree was across the track—it’s a good thing someone had a chain saw along!

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The old stamping mill at the end of the track. They used to use some sort of cyanide treatment to extract the gold. Here is a video I took several years ago of a stamping mill that can still be used; it will give you a bit of an idea how they worked.

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Back out at the road!

The vehicles emerged not much the worse for wear. The Troopie had no damage. The other Cruiser had some, and Simon lost a bit of trim from the sill under his door. They were pretty muddy when they got home, but that was the worst. Simon is hoping to do this kind of thing a bit more often, now that he has a vehicle for it.

Here is a video we put together from clips that Esther took of the river crossings:

Miss Joy in March

May 16, 2021 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

In looking over our photos from March, I’m seeing a lot of them of one person! Miss Joy is quite popular, and very cute. She’s into everything, and jabbers about everything. We can even understand part of what she says!

Her favorite book is Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? This copy was given to Elijah by his grandmother, probably 15 years ago. It has been taped together and glued together, and is still being enjoyed! I just ordered a replacement, though, a board book this time, because this one got left in a windowsill overnight and the condensation soaked it. It’s still readable, but the pages are all falling out and the covers are swollen. We can’t be without this book, though!

Mr. Imagination built a couple of hammocks, and his little sisters enjoyed them.

Helping the big boys mow lawn! She must have been trying to figure out how to start it.

There are two little babies at church, and Miss Joy loves them. So does her big brother Simon!

Miss Joy is an artist. She loves to draw! She often asks for pen and “papee!” She wants to “ite!” She focuses hard on what she is doing, and keeps at it until her piece of paper is covered with her scribbles.

She also loves to climb in bed with Little Miss! It’s so much fun to read at bedtime.

I’m not sure what she was doing here in Esther’s room.

Sitting in the windowsill behind the couch. This is where Brown Bear met its demise.

One afternoon she came marching into the living room brandishing a croquet mallet in one hand, a block of wood in the other, and dangling a toothbrush from her mouth!

Another day, she figured out how to climb into the washing machine. Can you tell we enjoy having this little girl around? She sure adds sparkle to our days!

And, here is a video I just remembered making.

Milford Sound—Part 3—The Trip Back

March 21, 2021 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

After we walked everywhere we could around Milford Sound, we gathered at the back of the vans to eat our sandwiches. It was raining, so some of us stood under the open back door; others got inside and sat in the seats. Wherever we were, the sandflies were BAD! They came in clouds, attacking every inch of exposed skin. We didn’t waste any time eating, and got on the road again quickly to escape the hungry hordes.

This is what we saw as we got on the road again. The mountains were absolutely spectacular, even through the rain.

Here we were heading up to the Homer Tunnel again, from the seaward side. Again, there were sheer rock cliffs going straight up. It’s nearly impossible to get a feel for it from a photo. I was absolutely awestruck by these mountains.

There’s the tunnel! I was quite disappointed that the light had just turned green. I was hoping we would have several minutes to sit there waiting, and soak in the grandeur of the scene.

Have you noticed the water streaming down the rocks all around?

Going down the landward side.

We stopped at a pulloff beside a waterfall. Miss Joy was asleep, so I stayed in the van with her while the others went to the viewing platform. This kea was on top of a motorhome; it rode for a little ways, and then flew back to our vans.

Miss Joy didn’t sleep long, so I got out of the van and went to see the waterfall, too.

When we moved on, the red van went ahead. Maybe I needed to feed Miss Joy? I can’t remember for sure. That left Esther and the two little girls and I together when we stopped at another overlook where we could see this spectacular valley. I can’t remember what it was called, but it was an amazing sight.

Our next stop was the Cascade Creek Nature Walk at Lake Gunn. Miss Joy needed some time to play, so I stayed in the gray van with the two little girls while everyone else went on the walk. These are Esther’s pictures.We also stopped at Mirror Lakes. A nice boardwalk led along the edge of a beautiful pond.

We were trying to get a picture of all the children, and another tourist offered to take our family picture, so we quickly organized for this.

Then, we went back to work on the children’s picture.

Miss Joy didn’t want to be separated from Mommy.

Finally, Daddy had to help keep her in place while I took the picture.

When we got back to Te Anau, we still had a few hours of daylight, so we stopped at the bird sanctuary. This is a takahe, a very rare bird. They have a couple of pairs there.

These are blue ducks, also very rare.

Paradise ducks aren’t exactly rare, but we enjoyed watching them. The mother (the one closest to the camera) was very worried that we would hurt her babies, and kept trying to get us through the fence.

This is a relative of the kea, some sort of a parrot, but I don’t remember what it’s called.

This is another parrot.

A table and chairs just her size!

A little house for her, too!

This is the view from our friends’ house. I would love to see it on a sunny day!Here is a video put together from several clips that various family members. The first clip was taken in the Eglinton Valley, on the way to Milford, by Mr. Imagination. Next is Esther’s clip of going through the Homer Tunnel, and then of going down the mountain from the tunnel. After that is a clip from sea level at Milford Sound, followed by one of the waterfall where we saw the kea. Then, there is one of Lake Gunn and a few from the nature walk.

South of Dunedin

February 24, 2021 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

We spent two nights with our friends in Dunedin. While we were there, I didn’t take any pictures. It was pouring the entire time, and we mainly stayed inside. Our friends had built a guesthouse, which we slept in. I wish I would have gotten a picture, but every time I went to it, I was trying to carry a baby and an umbrella, and dodging around the river that was running down the path we took up to it! It was very comfortable, and we enjoyed our time with them. We left late Sunday afternoon, and headed on south to visit some friends in the Catlins. Just before we left, Esther wanted to get a picture with her two little sisters, in the new dresses she made for them all just before our trip.

Our friends live on a mountain, and the road going down is slightly daunting! I have no idea what the gradient is, but it’s steep!

This is the Dunedin Train Station, which I posted pictures of the other time we were down there. You can find the pictures here and here, if you’re interested.

More interesting buildings in Dunedin.

Houses on the hillside. Dunedin is a very hilly city!

Maybe half an hour after we got on the road, the skies opened in a cloudburst. It was raining so hard that we had to slow down quite a lot. We could hardly see ahead of us. We kept moving, but slowly, and soon the rain let up—but then we started seeing flooding.

We crossed a bridge over the Taieri River, and saw the water pouring over the stopbank on the far side. Esther was taking a video at the time, and caught that.

I don’t think anyone drove into that paddock that day!

It was rather a relief to get away from the flooding as we continued farther south. I was a bit concerned that the road might end up closing, and didn’t want to be caught somewhere we didn’t want to be.

The Clutha River was high, too, but not as bad as up north.

The Catlins are beautiful! Rolling, green hills with cattle and sheep on them.

Ashburton Aviation Museum

January 31, 2021 by NZ Filbruns 1 Comment

When we were planning our trip, Esther and I decided that we wanted to go to The Book Barn, a huge used book store. We knew that the men and boys in our family, for the most part, would not be interested, and would be bored waiting for us, so she looked online for other attractions in the area. She discovered that Ashburton has an Aviation Museum, and the website made it look and sound very interesting—and it didn’t cost too much, either. So, on the third day of our trip, we split up. Esther and I and Miss Joy went in one van to the book shop, and everyone else went in the other van to Ashburton. We met them there for lunch, after they had been at the museum for a couple of hours, and then we took a quick tour through, as well.

Before we got on the road, we had a look at a project our host family’s grandfather is working on. This is the empty tomb, built into a hillside, and on a hilltop nearby, he plans to erect three crosses. Inside the tomb, facing the empty place representing where Jesus’ body would have lain, will be a bench to sit on, and Christian literature.

Miss Joy fell asleep immediately after we left.The father of the man of the family with we had spent the night owns this church, the Church of the Open Door. It is not used for services anymore, but he maintains it as a place for people to come in and pray or meditate any time they want to. He comes every Sunday to clean it.

A close-up of the prickly pear around the front.

Inside the church.It’s always fun to see this giant fish when we got through Rakaia.

The museum! It is at the Ashburton airport. The museum occupies three hangers. This photo was taken from the top of the restored control tower.

Little Miss wanted to show me the hospital plane. It was what she was most fascinated with.

Inside was a stretcher and a place for an attendant to sit.

Little Miss under the DC-3.

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Going inside the DC-3. This plane is fully operational, but it would cost a million dollars a day to pay for insurance to fly it.

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The DC-3 was probably the one Elijah was most fascinated with.

Someone was amused at this sign. They didn’t think they wanted to have to be rescued!

This helicopter was used during the Korean War to transport wounded soldiers away from the front. A stretcher was strapped on to each side, on the outside, with a hood to protect the wounded man from the blast of air while flying. The helicopter’s tail is in another part of the room; it was too big to leave on.

A jet engine.

A sprayer plane, used to spread fertilizer on hilly farms.This may have been the first plane ever flown. It was built at the same time as the Wright Brothers’ plane, and possibly flown first, but didn’t get the publicity theirs did.

The restored 1940s control tower. There was an airforce base near here during World War II.

Mr. Imagination’s favorite thing at the museum was this manual typewriter! He was fascinated by it.

We really enjoyed our visit to this museum. It was definitely worth spending time at! Two days a week, one of which happened to be the day we were there, volunteers come in to work on restoring the planes, and you can talk to them. The founder of the museum was there when we were, and Gayle and some of the boys spent a lot of time talking to him.
Here are a few seconds of video footage that Mr. Diligence got inside the larger hanger.

Devil’s Punchbowl

January 10, 2021 by NZ Filbruns 4 Comments

We arrived home a few days ago from a family road trip. Warning: There will be many posts over the next few weeks with pictures from our trip! I took over 400 pictures on my camera, and am borrowing pictures from three or four other cameras! I just spent a couple of hours sorting and organizing pictures, and have only finished the first day. This may take awhile.

Anyway, on with the story! We left here around 3:00 in the afternoon on Monday, the 28th of December. We had decided to only drive an hour and a half the first day, to allow time to pack and get everything wrapped up here. It’s a massive undertaking to get ten people ready for a 12-day trip, and organize care for all the animals, as well. Everyone worked together well, though, and we were ready earlier than I had originally hoped. We traveled in two vans, ours and Simon’s. Elijah had spent a few days taking the back seats out of both vans and building beds in them. That left four seats in our gray van, and six in Simon’s red van. We packed our luggage and food under the beds, and figured out how to fit the entire family into the two vehicles to sleep at night.

Off we go toward the mountains!

The pohutukawa was in bloom in the mountains. This tree is often called the New Zealand Christmas tree. It is beautiful!

The road up the Otira Gorge to Arthur’s Pass is always stunning.

I don’t necessarily like driving up the 16% grade, but the Otira Viaduct is an incredible feat of engineering.

The old road is up there. Can you see why they built the viaduct?

Since we had extra time, we decided to walk up to the Devil’s Punchbowl. We’ve been wanting to do that for several years. Mom, we thought of you when we went up this track!This is the view from the carpark. See the train? It was the TranzAlpine passenger train, just coming out of the tunnel that goes under the pass. The tunnel is 8.5 kilometers long, with a steep grade.

We soon set off on our tramp. Most of the children ended up way ahead of us. Here they were regrouping in a meadow.

This is the view downriver from the bridge.The waterfall comes through the “V” between the mountains.

Here are some of the 401 steps that make the track a little easier!I had not done very much physically for a month, because of a health problem, and the climb up those 401 steps was quite challenging!

The children went past the viewing platform on a track that took them to the base of the falls. I didn’t go there!

Mr. Diligence got this view looking downstream from the base of the falls.

Esther took a video of the falls. It can’t compare to actually being there, but maybe it will help give an idea of what we saw.

I like this one! Elijah is to the left, and Simon is holding Miss Joy. She was not happy up there—she didn’t like the cold, wet spray, and was calling for “Mama, Mama!”

Miss Joy was quite happy to be reunited with her daddy and I.

She wanted to walk down the steps by herself. They let her walk a little, but a 16-month-old is rather slow! Little Miss enjoyed jumping down several steps at once for a short ways.

See Arthur’s Pass Village at the base of the mountain?

Everyone stopped in the little meadow again when they reached it, and waited for us slow ones to arrive. We all rested in the warm sunshine for awhile, and just enjoyed being together.

Little Miss wanted her picture taken as we were walking back to the vans.

We parked for the night in the driveway of some friends who live in the village. They weren’t home, but had kindly allowed us to use their driveway and the needed facilities in the house. This is the view we saw from the van, across their yard, as the sun was getting low.

We cooked hamburgers on a campstove in the driveway. It was getting rather chilly!

After supper, and getting set up for sleeping for the night, some of us played a game of Ricochet Robots on the bed in the gray van.That was a fun, novel experience!

Gayle and Little Miss walked to a small waterfall behind the house. Mom, this is the one we walked to from the visitor’s center several years ago.Then, as it got dark, we settled in to sleep for the night. One or two people slept under the queen bed on the platform in each van, Miss Joy slept on her cot mattress on the floor in ours, and Mr. Sweetie and Mr. Imagination slept on a mattress on a plywood platform set over the front bench seat in the red van. Everyone was comfortable, and everyone slept well that night.

Miss Joy in December

January 3, 2021 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

This little girl keeps herself busy, and keeps us entertained! She doesn’t like hats, but kept this old fireman’s hat on long enough for someone to grab a photo.

She was engrossed in the movie everyone else was watching! Can you see what she chose as a seat? It’s a 10-liter paint bucket on its side. She was actually sitting on it, though it’s hard to tell from this picture.Her daddy helped her walk in this empty potato bag.

We found her one evening diligently scrubbing her foot with a cloth. I couldn’t quite capture her scrubbing on her foot, because she moves too fast, but she worked at it for about five minutes.Does she like pudding?

Tired baby!

She loves brushing her teeth. Any time she sees the toothbrushes, or someone brushing their teeth, she wants to do hers, too. That’s Mr. Imagination brushing his with Daddy and Miss Joy.

This is a “canoe” that Mr. Imagination built for her.

Miss Joy spent a long time carefully putting her blankie into this bucket, and then climbed in on top of it.

One evening we went to the park across the road from us. Several of us played a game, and Daddy took the younger ones to the swings. Miss Joy loved the gravel under the swings!

She loves to feed the cats. Then, she helps herself, too. Esther caught her eating with them one day—putting her mouth down to pick pieces up just like the cats do. She’s such a mimic—but this is one thing I’d rather she not do!

She went into the milking shed one day and found the jar of salve we use on the cows’ teats. She had it spread liberally all over her face, arms and legs. She had pulled her pants up so she could get it all the way up to her knees. What a mess!

Here’s a short video clip Esther got of her one evening when Mr. Diligence was playing with her. I laugh every time I watch it!

Pancake Rocks

September 21, 2020 by NZ Filbruns 2 Comments

We had visitors over the weekend, and since we noticed last week that there was to be a king tide this weekend, we thought it would be a good time to go to Pancake Rocks again! The extra-high tide, we figured, should make for a decent show at the blowholes. We were not disappointed! It wasn’t as good as a couple of other times we’ve been there, but lots better than several times. I apologize in advance if this is too many photos for you. It was a beautiful day… and three of us were taking pictures… and I only saved the best from each of the three memory cards… but there ended up being so many beautiful photos I couldn’t decide which ones to leave out!

The waves were fairly high. I love watching them roll in past the rocks!

The first blowhole we reach is the Chimney Pot. It is spectacular—just like I would imagine a geyser looks! This time, there was a rainbow formed in the mist, when you stood at the right place.

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Esther carried Miss Joy for a good part of the way.

This is the largest blowhole. We stood here for a long time, watching the water spurting up into a fantastic fountain!

I love watching the water in the Surge Pool, too! It’s so wild.

The waves hitting these rocks are spectacular, too!

See the seagulls nesting on top of the rocks?

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Notice the people on the bridge in the background, just in front of the Chimney Pot blowhole? That might help you get a feel for the scale of this place.

By the time we reached this viewing platform, Miss Joy wanted to get down and walk around by herself.

Simon took her, but she wanted to pick things up.

A bunch of the boys broke off flax stalks and had a mock sword fight with them.

They gave one stick to Miss Joy.

She was delighted with, and ran around brandishing it, until…

…she suddenly spotted some flowers! She recognized them; I often pick a few in our yard and give them to her. The stick was instantly discarded, and she got down to pick them.

Simon picked her up again, and held the stick behind her back. She reached around and got it, then started whacking him on the head with it.

This was a wonderful day to be outside! It’s the rainy time of year here, and in the week before this day, we had had 1 1/2 sunny days. It was great to be outside, enjoying such a beautiful part of God’s creation.

Here is a five minute video I put together from a lot of shorter clips, to give you a little bit of our experience. One clip, which starts at about 3:22, doesn’t have much action, but I loved the happy baby noises that can be heard.

Videos for Grandma

July 18, 2020 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

Back in May, Mr. Imagination and Little Miss decided they wanted to put on a show for us. They practiced and prepared all day, holed up behind a box or two at the end of the hallway, and I wasn’t supposed to look. They presented the show to us in the evening, while their older brothers were all outside working on some project. I was instructed to take a video of the whole thing for them. My camera doesn’t work the best anymore, and drained a couple of sets of batteries during this show, but you can enjoy at least part of what they did! If the singing doesn’t sound quite on tune, just remember that this is the boy who never even attempted to sing until he was about five years old. He didn’t quite inherit his father’s talent with music, like all the other children did, but he’s making a joyful noise! As far as the skit, they had watched a video of someone reading Stone Soup aloud.

Also back in May, Miss Joy discovered the picture window. We set her up on the window seat one morning, and she was delighted to be able to look outside–and then she discovered that the glass squeaked when she rubbed her head on it! We were in stitches as she squeaked her head over and over again! She had also just learned how to wave. The other two clips are from last week, when she learned to climb up into the windowsill. She was thrilled to figure out how to open the window.

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Thank you!