Exploring the Land of the Long White Cloud

One of the other many things that have been going on in 2015 for us is that we travelled to the South Island for a week and went to the wedding of very close friends. Here are some of the highlights along the way... It was pretty wet so we camped inside for a few nights. We definitely did have some sun though. Pancake Rocks day trip. The biggest pinecone ever. And it's like 50 years old. It's pretty much the mayor of Moonlight. Doesn't look that high up eh? He was at the top of this! Springfield (where else?) We were in a French settlement, can't you tell? Watch for a whole post about here. Christchurch coming back to life. This cathedral is made of cardboard. Really. So more stories of that trip to come but it goes without saying and even a mostly-photos post is better than weeks on end with no posts!

Some of these are when he was a young fella and some are more recent!

I found some pics of our house from when it was still an open home. Just thought there were a couple that would really show off some of our changes ;) Check out what the back gate used to be: Now it's solid but I don't have a photo of the same angle unfortunately (we took out those trees): We've been busy working on a laundry room improvement too so that's coming! But it seems like I might have to dig through that Christmas video to find a shot of it because it definitely wasn't photo-worthy in its prior state and I forgot the proper "before" photo. We are almost at the halfway point of all our renovations though! Getting there bit by bit...

Our backyard is great. It really is, lots of trees and shade, enough space for volleyball or running around with the dog, a garden, everything we could want - except a fence that would keep our chickens in! Once we got the tree trimming company to tidy up a whole bunch of odd and random plants and bits, it exposed that many of them were holding up a part of the fence. The asbestos fence. So we slowly and surely worked through the steps to replace it. Dustin removed the asbestos and disposed of it, we had some lovely friends come down and help pour the concrete into the post holes and then we finally put up the fence itself a few weeks ago. Or maybe a month ago? I am losing track of time haha. Here are some before and during photos... it's night time now and I realize I didn't have any "after" shots of the fence so hope to post some later! So this is what we got ourselves into: It was pretty thickly growing! Here are some of the concrete pour p...

This one was pretty much done and dusted in early March - just in time for Dustin's mom to arrive! This is the guest room makeover - funny enough, the paint we had was nearly the same colour it already was. (It was free paint and we could only re-tint it so far which meant that whatever colour it turned out, it would stay.) But at least we know it's a fresh coat... That was what it looked like when we viewed the open home. With a little ceiling ripping down, curtain making and lighting replacement (and the aforementioned paint) this is what you can do: Probably should have sussed out the lighting better when I was taking photos!! But at least the ceiling is smooth and insulated now. That was the important thing in this room.

Check out this little cutie, he's already at least a whole kilo bigger than when we got him! But we've forgotten to mark his height on the door frame so I can't say how much taller he is... I made him this bed out of a sweatshirt. He's already barfed on it a couple times unfortunately so I'm not sure how long it will last as it's hard to clean...