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My Cat Sleeps in Boxes

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We have a cute picture book about cats. It describes cats around the world who are very talented… they might dance, or sing, or many other things… but every second page says, “But MY cat likes to hide in boxes.” Well, we have a cat who loves to sleep in boxes, any boxes. Grizzly was overjoyed when we were emptying boxes of jars during canning season, and putting the empties outside to be taken back to the garage. Perfect places to sleep! We’ve also found her sleeping in a child’s wheelbarrow, carefully braced so she didn’t slide out, or in the trailer (very big box!). One day, when Elijah’s bedroom door was laying on sawhorses in the carport while he was prepping it for painting, she found that someone had put a newspaper (another favorite bed) in one of the inset panels on the door. So, she had not only a box with tiny sides, but also a newspaper! Perfect!

She generally wakes up when we come to take a picture, but this time Esther found her sound asleep, laying on her back in the box!

I took this picture one day when it was drizzling. Gayle had driven the ute somewhere, so of course the engine was warm. Apparently, the heat trumped the wet. Grizzly was curled up tightly, with her paw over her nose. I said something to her as I walked past. She uncurled enough to half open one eye and sleepily say hello (she’s a very talkative cat), and immediately curled up again, fast asleep.

Goofball likes boxes, too. She’s much more dignified than her sister, though.

Tiger Moth

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Sometime in early March I was in Greymouth with the children and we noticed three small planes flying over in a triangle formation. They circled around in front of us and came toward us, in a straight line. We happened to be driving past the “airport” at that moment, and realized they were planning to land, so we pulled over to watch, since we had noticed by then that all three were biplanes. After they landed, we drove around to where we could get a better look at them, and several more that were already pulled up to the hanger. In the next day’s paper, we learned that they were Tiger Moths, and the owners were making a tour around the island. How fun to see them!

Four Wheel Drive Trip–Napoleon Hill

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A few weeks ago, a group of local friends decided to go on a four wheel drive trip over Napoleon Hill, close to our home. James decided to do something he has been thinking about for a long time–take his tractor on the trip! It added some excitement; I’ll let Joe tell about it in a story he wrote. (The solar panel mounted on the back is to keep the battery charged, since the alternator doesn’t work anymore.)

One young lady gave my two little girls and another little girl a ride on the quad bike.

This is the Safari that Simon spent a couple of years restoring, and then sold to a friend. It’s getting quite a workout; after this particular episode, water poured out of all the doors!

Things went well, until….

They drained the water out of the engine, and it started right up again! Yay for 1960s vehicles with no electronics. James did take it to the garage for a complete oil change after they got out of this track.

And, here is the story:

THE FOUR WHEEL DRIVE TRIP

            A couple of weeks ago, we went over Napoleon Hill, with a few of the V’s, the B’s, and some of our family. James, after a lot of thinking, decided to take his Pajero and his tractor. His tractor is a 1960s Fordson Super Dexta, two wheel drive, six speed manual. It’s about medium size and can attain speeds up to about 50 km an hour downhill. Since it is as old as it is, the alternator doesn’t work, so to charge it James has mounted a solar panel that keeps the battery charged, so now it is updated to the 21st century.

            We headed off from our house to Napoleon Hill about 9:30 and started along the four wheel drive track. The tractor is very slow, so the vehicle I was riding in, the troop carrier, got ahead of everybody else and so we ended up doing a small side track, which was fun. Going through the first mud hole, the tractor’s bell housing filled up with water, so when he came out water was spraying out of both sides of the tractor, which was fun to see. Napoleon Hill is a very fun four wheel drive track, which if you nail it only takes about an hour, but at the rate we went it took us over half the day.

            As always, we stopped at the cemetery and had a look around there, and then headed down the mountain. When we got down into the river gorge we stopped and waited for everyone else to catch up. A few minutes after everybody got there and we headed off again we got to the caves. There are three of them. The first one is just big enough that a quad can squeeze through. You can drive through the other two. It is really fun, because the last one is really long and more than twice as high as the vehicles.

            After we got through the caves and got out to the bigger creek we stopped for lunch. During lunch, L wanted to have a turn on the tractor, so James took him for a drive. They were going up the creek and James wasn’t really paying attention to where they were going till the tractor started bogging down in the soft sand. He told L to hop off and then started going backwards and forwards to try to get out. He thought maybe he should get someone to pull him out because he didn’t know how deep the creek was to his left, but shrugged the thought away. Then, he tried pulling forward again and slid off an underwater shelf into an over-chest-deep part of the creek. The tractor nearly disappeared and almost instantly died.

            S pulled him out. They took the injectors out and turned the engine over several times, so the pistons pushed the water out of the cylinders where the injectors usually go. It was fun to see the water spraying everywhere, and nice to hear the tractor start up again as good as new—maybe even better because of the engine wash it had just received.

As we went out, P, in the Safari, took on a heap more of the side tracks and several of them that he took in four wheel drive he went back through in two wheel drive. We had a lot of fun that day and I was glad I got to go along.

January/February 2025 Photos

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I got started writing this post last week. I had the first paragraph halfway written when the notice popped up that I was offline and the post could not be saved. I waited five minutes, because our internet randomly flicks off, and then comes back a little later. Then, we realized that there were only two websites that were not coming up–my blog and Internet Archive, from which Esther was trying to read a book. I restarted both modems, and got the same results. I gave up. Three hours later, both websites were loading again! So, I didn’t give you a post last week. Today, I actually have some time to think!

This summer has been even more jam-packed than usual. Not only do we have the normal garden work and preserving of the harvest to work on, but add in three renovation projects as well, and you can imagine what life has been like here! One project is finished, one is close enough to put it on hold for a little while. Elijah’s house is still a main focus. I have spent most of my Saturdays for the past six or seven weeks there, helping to paint. We can see the end in sight now, though! I should be able to share pictures of a finished project soon.

Meanwhile, here are the pictures I have left from the first two months of the year.

Over the Christmas break, the boys built a garage at Simon’s house. I only went over there once, but a friend sent me a couple of pictures he took of the boys working, and I grabbed a picture near the end of the project. I just realized I don’t have a picture of the finished building!

Mr. Imagination built several live traps. He tested them with the cats, and they worked for that–but no possums have been caught. He gave up on that project. (The cats were quite happy to be trapped, as long as it meant they got extra cat food!)

I was in the garden one day, and Miss Joy wanted me to take a picture of her with her hollyhock dolls.

I’m not sure what this was about–but it’s a shot of Elijah, taken by a friend who sent it to me.

Miss Joy is quite a writer! She frequently dictates stories, and one day she dictated this original poem, and the explanation for it.

Little Miss took a picture of Miss Joy inside these tubs. See her eyes peeking out?

After I harvested the first lot of onions in mid-January, I asked the children to braid them for me. They were happy to do that job, as long as they could listen to an audiobook while they did it!

This was the onions before braiding, when we laid them out to cure for a day or two in the sun.

James got his sleepout finished in early January. He used recycled rimu boards for the walls, and oiled them with linseed oil he was given. The ceiling is white-painted plywood, and Elijah laid secondhand carpet for him. This room is quite a comfortable place for James, Joe, and Simon when he’s here.

Elijah’s room has had a complete face-lift in the past six months. I don’t have any recent pictures, but this was Simon oiling the lower part of the wall in January. Those boards were originally on the walls, in that position. They were painted with a thick coat of yellow paint. Elijah was able to remove them carefully enough that he could line the lower part of the walls with them again after running them through a thicknesser to remove the paint and sand them down, and then they put a couple of coats of linseed oil from James’s drum on it. The upper part of the walls is plywood, and has now been whitewashed. The effect is beautiful!

Some of the random pictures I find on my phone!

A sunset over the mountains.

Mr. Imagination brought this bug in to show me one day. It was tiny!

Our first homeschool group meeting of the year was a picnic at Nelson Creek. It rained right after we got there, but then the sky cleared and it was perfect for swimming. See the boys up the bank, just above the midpoint of the picture? They jumped from there into the water.

We really enjoy these birds. The blue one, Reepicheap, is very active and curious, which makes him very fun.

Simon spray-painting the lounge ceiling in Elijah’s house. He has done a lot of painting there. This was immediately after he started; within minutes he had gotten hold of a respirator to wear for the rest of the job.

Little Miss sometimes helps Miss Joy with her flashcards. They like to make a game of it!

Esther made a pretty cake one day. I think it was a yellow cake; it had strawberries and raspberries on it.

Elijah’s House

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Elijah bought a house! He put an offer on it in early December, and signed the final papers the end of January. Then, we all started working together to help him get it ready for renting. Here are the pictures I got the day he took possession.

Garden–February 2025

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Just over a week ago I took a video of a walk through the garden. We hadn’t had rain, at that point, for about a month and a half, but a few days later, we got 2 1/2 inches over the course of 2-3 days, and everything is a lot happier! We’re bringing in bushels of food; yesterday Esther picked 46 kg (2 banana boxes) of tomatoes. Yum!

December 2024 Photos

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Here are the rest of our pictures from December! One Sunday afternoon, Gayle took the girls on a walk down to the river. They found a field of wildflowers.

Elijah found this interesting moth somewhere.

James has been working diligently on his sleepout. Here was the first of three coats of paint to go on. His little sisters were delighted to help!

Little Miss took this picture to illustrate a story she wrote about her chores, which include feeding a bottle to the calf.

After our budgie died in July or August, the cockatiel got very depressed. We finally got him a friend, hoping to cheer him up, but it was too late and he died a few days later. So, we got another budgie to keep the new one company, and we have two birds again! The blue one is a very young male. Some friends had a pair and hatched this one; we got it when it was old enough to leave them. The green one is a female. They get along very well. We named the blue one Reepicheep and the green one Jewel, since Esther had just finished reading the Chronicles of Narnia aloud.

The hollyhocks are blooming, so many dolls get made!

One afternoon I walked down the hill to have a look at the chickens, and took this picture up the valley from there.

Daddy was taking a nap, and when Miss Joy noticed the cat sleeping with him, she joined them.

It rained on Christmas Day. A lot of the day was spent playing games, but for awhile some of the fellows worked on denailing some timber that James had salvaged.

As always, we enjoyed seeing the tuis and bellbirds drinking nectar from the flax blossoms.

The big project during the Christmas holidays was building a new garage at Simon’s house to replace the one they tore down over a year ago when it threatened to fall down.

Boating the Ahaura

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The Sunday afternoon just before Christmas, the boys who were at church decided to boat down the Ahaura River from Jim’s Hut, just at the end of the Ahaura Gorge, to here, near the confluence of the Ahaura and the Grey Rivers. The girls decided to go along to drive the vehicle back, and do some hiking while they were in the area. So, they saw the boys off and then drove up the track a short way. They walked down another track to an old hut, and when they were coming back, some of the boys popped out of the bush! Just after launching the boat and kayaks, the barrel boat got swamped by big waves in the rapids. It sank–and the boys who were in it were glad to have life jackets on! After a brief conference, three boys decided to walk back to catch up with the girls and get a ride out to civilization, while the rest of the party continued down the river with the kayaks. (The boat has never been seen again. It had no flotation devices, and sank in a deep spot. James is unhappy that he lost his water bottle, which he had tied to the boat so he wouldn’t lose it in the river.) About five hours later, the kayakers reached Ahaura and demolished several large homemade pizzas!

Mr. Imagination ready for takeoff.

Little Miss

There is our last glimpse of the barrel boat!

Elijah

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Elijah turned 21 a few months ago, and also completed his floor-laying apprenticeship. We decided to have a party to celebrate, and Saturday night about 60 people gathered in our local park to spend the evening together. Here are the few pictures I took, mostly of where people took refuge during the brief rain. There were a number of little girls crowded into the back of Elijah’s ute, behind Simon and a couple of girls who were sitting on the tailgate.

I put together a slideshow of pictures of Elijah’s life. Enjoy!

Tramp in the Mountains

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The last two days of November and the first of December, Elijah took his two youngest brothers on a tramp in the mountains. I’m not going to add commentary because I don’t know where these pictures were taken, but I’ll add a story that Mr. Imagination wrote a few days later, at the end.

Another picture for Grandma! He thinks of you while he’s out in the wilderness.

OUR TRAMP

Last Saturday, two of my brothers, Elijah and Joe, and I went on a tramp. The first day, we started just on the Bell Hill road by Rotomanu. We tramped to the Jacko Flat hut, following the Crooked River, and then up to the Top Crooked Hut. We saw a lot of 1080 on the way. It was a fairly easy track, although since it was the first day I did get pretty sore. The river was really blue as we walked along. At the Top Crooked Hut, it was about as small as Orwell Creek usually is. We had a swim and then dinner. We had sausages and mashed potatoes. When Elijah cooked the sausages, he had a full pot of water and dropped the whole pack in. The pot was too full and water went all over the floor. We had to wipe it up with Joe’s socks. The meal was very good. Just as we were going to bed an older lady arrived, and spent the night with us there.

The next day, we climbed over the mountains up to Lake Morgan Hut. On the way there we saw a chamois and a lot of grasshoppers. Climbing up some mountain ranges, we got up to 1,400 meters. Since we were up on the tops, there weren’t any trees so the views were very good. There was lots of porcupine scrub and turpentine bush. Elijah looked at the map and decided we should start going down to the lake, but he had seen the map wrong and we accidentally went to the wrong set of valleys. After we figured out that it was the wrong one then we had to walk around to the next mountain range and there, we dropped down to Lake Morgan. After we got to the bottom of the valley by the lake we climbed down we saw a tarn with lots of tadpoles in it. We stopped by the Morgan River for lunch and then went around to Lake Morgan Hut. The hut didn’t have a fireplace, so that was quite annoying. We got there about 1:00 and had a swim. Then the rest of the afternoon we played card games and read magazines that were in the hut. We had some very nice rice risotto for dinner. We slept well that night.

On the third day, we had just walked out of the hut when a kea flew overhead and off into the distance. It was quite misty, but it cleared up pretty well. The mist was cool because we could see it blowing up past us as the wind cleared it. We followed the river and about halfway down the boulders got about as big as our guest cabin. We decided it was easier to bush bash than climb down the big rocks. I managed to destroy my pants falling down one rock, so that helped make the decision, too. When we got to the Cone Creek track we had lunch and then filtered some more water. We found a couple of dead birds going out, probably from 1080. We did not have time to stop and have a soak at the hot pools, so we decided we would do that next time. Where Cone Creek track joins up with Elizabeth Hut track Elijah let a friend know that we would be about two hours out by texting him with the InReach. We got out at 6:00 and were picked up by a friend. We got back to the car and drove home. It was a very fun tramp.