happy new year , and more travelogue

happy new year everyone from our myself, jake and Noel. 2008 has been great. wishing everyone had a blessed and joyful 2009.

i attached the above photo sampler of our trip to Manchester. we took the train from London to manchester.

Photo sampler from birthday

The Birthday party

We celebrated N's birthday on 15 Nov which fell on saturday. we invited our friends from LG and choir, and jake's colleague and boss who's N's godgrandpa:) and his friends from creche.

Party started at noon time but we started the prepration much earlier than that.

We got a two tiered cake and as you can see, it was a pig cake and it drove the kids nuts.

The theme was jungle party but we've dressed N up in his grandparents present (the tux) so i think the official theme should be james bond in the jungle.

Round and Round

this was taken on late November, a week after N's birthday.

have tried to upload several times, but it didn't attach properly.

Jungle Bells

this year my company held the annual Xmas function at the Auckland Zoo. the event started from 6pm and once we get our wrist band we were free to roam around the zoo and congregate at the rotunda at 7pm to get our feed.

Taking pic with Mega Bull one of the company mascot ;)

The giraffe was the first animal we saw at the Zoo. Btw, do you know that giraffe's tongue is as long as 45cm!?!?!?!?! man, that's long!!!!

Zebra..

Flamingos..don't you think the flamingos are not very pink?

Jake showing N the bird. N seems to be into bird at this stage..

More birds..i just love that red and purple coat of feather on the bird..

The giant turtle!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

SPider monkeys which were getting quite rowdy there..

my colleague 's grandchildren. I love their face painting .. Lachlan, charlotte and oliver..L loves Harry Potter (hence the HP's glasses on his face)..Charlotte is super cute and has this really nice voice..she even let N play with her pink handbag!!! Oliver has cheetah/leopard type painting on his face..

taking picture with one of the popsicle band member..

there must be 1000 of us (employees and family)..there were babies, toddlers, strollers everywhere.

N checking out the products..

Above is us around the zoo. Me bumping into colleague's daughter..and we tried to pose with "sanka" the southern hemisphere santa who wears the 'lava lava' (the islander version of 'sarong' on men)..our food for the night ..and the rotunda where everyone congregates ..N munching on his bread while me and jake quickly had our dinner..

From this to that ..

Night before the haircut ...

After the haircut..

N.B. We brought N to a hairdresser. His name is Mr Hung :) he's very good with kids..

Spring Festival

Our church has organised a spring festival to provide an alternative for Halloween on 31 Oct.

It was like a mini fun fair. You can go to different booths, and get tickets and exchange toys with the tickets collected from the booth. There's hop scotch, fishing booth, bubbles booth, etc..

N at the 'crawl' scotch booth.
Photo booth..





Fishing booth

Face painting..

There's even a petting zoo!!!! the little girls were all super excited about riding the pony and playing with the rabbits and mices.

N taking photos with Ms Amy, who usually looks after him during sunday service at the creche. N here is apprehensive because he can't quite recognised Ms Amy who has now grown extra plaits..

N with wilma..

"Man of steel" attempting to bowl...

Checking out mommy's diaper bag

N checking out the bouncy castle..

The aMAZEing race...

It was a very enjoyable experience. Not only did the festival cater for our own congregation, we get a fair amount of visitors coming to the spring festival..

HOS spring show 08

this year the HOS spring show fell on the same day as the ladies retreat. I divided my time between the two events as I have volunteered to be a certificate writer at the spring show.



I didn't take many photos this year not because the show wasn't pretty. I found that when I have too many photos, i ended up not posting them at all.


So this year, these are my favourites from the show:

This year's club display shows orchids by a 'stream'. it's amazing how the committee comes up with all the ideas to put on a display. they usually meet up at the president's house over lunch and then discuss what sort of materials, and the 'theme' they want to set up.

I like cattelya. they have big flowers and they also have a nice scent. Unfortunately I haven't got one in my collection.
This is a cross between zygopetalum (see below) and something else.

A zygopetalum. see the resemblance in the last photo?

Another view of the club display..
Laelia..even the name is pretty!
This grassy speciment actually belongs to the orchid family too. I think it is called dendrochillum.
Floral arrangement category.
Another type of dendrochillum. This one has slightly bigger flowers ..the scent of the flowers are just amazing.
The grand champion of the show. It bagged several trophies.
The grand champion in close-up!! perfect composition, , size etc!!!!

ladies retreat

i had the opportunity to attend the ladies retreat at my church this year. Here in the photo is our guest speaker. she not only speaks but she also sings. her name is Aliki Flodine. She said it's very easy to remember her name just remember 'a leaky' tap.

anyhow, i enjoyed tremendously listening to her .she was down to earth and captivating. and she spoke in a very aussie accent (like Kath and Kim) and she also looks like The Nanny from some angle.

check out http://www.aliki.com.au

Drawers

Here's N opening and closing the drawer. he'd just found out the cause and effect of his action. he was mesmerized.