A few things I’ve loved this week…

â¤ Loved seeing a beautiful seal pup on the city waterfront on Monday morning.

â¤ Loved my girls all playing so well together this first week of their two week school holiday.

The weather, though being mostly horrible till Thursday evening, finally reminded us what blue sky looks like. Through the rain, I was thankful for living in a city with a marvellous, free museums, wonderful libraries and great swimming pools. And we managed a few dashes, between the showers, to play in the fresh air and splash in the puddles.

â¤ Loved and been very grateful for having a house with a large garage for rainy days. The car was left on the drive way all week and the garage has gone from a roller-blade rink to an art studio, with all sorts of imaginary play in between.

â¤ Love new friendships blossoming with a special Birthday movie for a friend’s son, followed by a two hour run around and games session in a local park. It was the one blue sky, no rain, no wind day of the week.

â¤ Love friends of old, now living on foreign shores, coming to visit.

â¤ Love my older girls willingly joining in with a ‘Baby Rock & Rhyme’ session at my local library, which their little sister adored. There’s always so many fun, free activities for children at all the wonderful Wellington region libraries.

â¤ Love home made coffee, when getting out the door for a latte with three children isn’t always worth the hassle.

â¤ Love baking chocolate brownies and fluffy scones.

â¤ Love using the local Warehouse as a convenient place to burn off the children’s energy – sent them up and down the aisles wearing roller blades a few times this week 😉 I have to say we certainly paid our ‘entrance fee’ – near impossible to leave the Warehouse empty handed. Came away with new p-jays for the children, a discounted England RWC 2011 shirt for hubbie, a couple of ‘All Blacks’ flags for the car and a few hide-away pressies for Christmas.

â¤ Loving my hubbie for being such a ‘hands on’ Dad and literally dropping his workbag in a flash to change into the role of ‘Prince Charming’ for Sophie’s acting out of Cinderella! I also loved Sophie acting out the part so well that she actually did a remarkable job of cleaning up (most uncharacteristic of her… she’s usually the princess and I’m Cinderella – and I rarely get to go to the ball, hee, hee!). She told me to stop cleaning and sit down to play the piano (or whatever else I wanted to do!).

â¤ Finally, I felt quite awestruck watching this navy ship depart Wellington harbour on Monday morning. The Royal New Zealand Navy fleet converged on Wellington Harbour last weekend. The fleet’s arrival was part of the 70th anniversary of the Royal New Zealand Navy’s founding on 1 October 1941.