Packing & Storms

So we are now half packed for our trip back to the states. We leave tomorrow evening and land the same day in the morning. That is right... we are traveling back in time. Since we cross the date line we are going to leave before we take off according to the time stamp. But, we have all of our laundry done up, and we have taken a few orders from people who want some jeans from America. Since a pair of Levi jeans cost $150-$250 here, several people want us to bring back some at the lower price tags. We are going to do some shopping ourselves and stock up on all of the summer things going on sale since we are going into summer now in the southern hemisphere.
I am sure many of you have heard about the tsunami and earthquake in the the south pacific. This affected the area of Samoa, which is about a 6 hour flight from where we are. It is a big tragedy for many New Zealanders with family there, but we only had mild waves of 46cm over what is normal. There were some tornado warnings as well, but we just had some rain and lightening. About a month ago when we were staying in Wellington we did feel an earthquake at 2 am. It was our first and very scary, but according to the lady from the front desk they have about 20 a year and never worse than the one we felt.. so not too bad. Up in Auckland there are very few ever recorded. Just one of the joys of living on a fault line!
Back to more pleasent news... we are watching top gear and looking forward to our flight :) Love you guys so much and miss you more each day!

TV and Maromite

So today was a slow day. The weather was acting up so we are staying in tonight. There is a show here that explains what is in your food and compares brands. This is really good when you are still getting used to what to buy. We have made some of our regular dishes like lasagna and red beans with rice, but shopping for ingredients is tough. Tonight on the show they are comparing spreads like Nutella and Maromite. Maromite is a kiwi thing... it is a yeast spread and tastes like liquid bread with too much yeast :) But it is what makes kiwis kiwis! We are trying to aquire the taste for it so we fit in a bit more.

Lemon tree and Kiwi Hot

Hi guys! It has been awhile, but I am proud to say that we have been enjoying New Zealand and have "heaps" to talk about. We went out last weekend and walked the entire length from the beach in the bay from the back of the house the the one in the front. It took 2 hours because of all of the rocks, but it was so pretty. People were fishing and diving right from the rock edges. We found out that Orca's make frequent appearances in Stanmore Bay (the one in the front of the house). We saw an article about 12 of them at once just this past year. I don't know if I would want to be in the water with a killer whale though. But maybe when it is summer we wont see them and we can go fishing.
We have gotten used to our house here. There is still no furniture.... but it is in Auckland now! It will take about 2 weeks to get to the house since the stuff has to go through customs still. That works out just fine for us since we are taking our trip back to the states this week. We leave on Thursday and arrive in charlotte late Thursday. With the crossing of the date line we gain a day, but the trip will take about 30 hours start to finish with layovers in Atlanta and LAX. In house news, our beans were growing great. I saw "were" because something ate them. I think it is the neighbors cat since I have caught it eating out of the compost pile already. But we replanted seeds in little pots and but them on the porch since it gets full light, but the cat is too scared to come up there. We also riged up a little protection for the beans out there with a 2 liter of soda bottle that we cut up. It is pretty ingenious if I do say so myself. The strawberries are doing amazing though. We love them, and the lemon tree, too. We just got a bigger pot for that and I painted it. I did a little picture of our back yard with the water, palm tree, Brandon, me, lenox being a bear, lily watching him, and the ridge. It is very cute!
Speaking of the puppies... I miss them soooo much. I am really excited to see them this trip. We have found a company to transport them here and a place for them to stay during their quarintine time. They will be very well treated and we can visit them during thier month long stay.
We also found a take out place that we have been to once a week since we got here. They have excellent pad thai and we are already regulars. The man who takes are order saw brandon last time and said... oh 2 pad thai with chicken, and American hot. That is how we put it the first time we went. When you say you want something hot, they normally ask you if you want that "kiwi hot" or "thai hot". Kiwi hot I must say is very mild. I would not classify it as hot on any scale. So we said in between since thai is way too hot... so, American hot :)
I want to thank all you guys back at home for keeping up with us! It has been really comforting to know that we have so many great friends and family members. I just caught up with mom on skype, and really enjoyed seeing her and cliff. We are looking forward to getting there this week.
Well, it is nearing 2 in the morning so I should be off to bed! Since I am on Brandon's computer I don't have pictures, but I hope to figure it out soon. Love you all too much and miss you tons!

TheKnot

TheKnot

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Garden and Getting Settled

We have now moved into our new home. Of course within days we both had a cold. We did get a surprisingly large amount done despite this. We planted the beautiful (yet just starting) garden you see here, and found the basics we needed to start living in the house. The garden had tomatoes, beans, and strawberries in the main area, and the small one contains hot peppers. And of course we cannot forget our new favorite part of the house... our lemon tree. It will probably take awhile to actually produce lemons, but we love it all the same.
The house is recently renovated so the carpets, tile, bathrooms, and kitchen are all new. It has a bit of a beach house feel to it. (Probably because of its location between two beaches) It was missing a few things that seemed necessary for us to live here comfortably... A fridge, clothes washer, microwave, and a bed. These are the things we set out for the first weekend here. We found a ton of stores for appliances, or white wear, so we started bargaining with one of the places to get a refrigerator, washer, dryer, and TV. TV's from the states DO NOT work in the NZ (pronounsed N Zed). The frequency is different, so we had to sell all of our tv's in the states. The good news is that they have really good free channels here, so we are able to get them through a digital anntena. Back to our bargaining... we were able to not only get them to knock off a third of the overall price, but when we mentioned we would like to ask about what they could take off a price of a phone the salesman just said he would give us the phone if we left. We felt very proud of ourselves.
To address the bed problem we ran into the only store open after 6pm.. the warehouse. It is litterally that too, shelves of just stuff... no fancy displays.. no fancy packaging... just lots of stuff for not a lot of money. We found a very nice air matress there, a microwave, sheets, pillows, extension cords... everything you need. We however throught our sheets and one blanket would be enough for the heat problem. We were very wrong! We had to unpack our clothes and pile them on the bed to stay warm that night. So we got a huge wool cover for the next night... still cold. So we got a space heater, and we slept very warm until its timer would run out that we set (safety first).. but still a good option except for the fact that we were sick. So finally we got the greatest thing of all... an electric blanket! Now, we are very cozy.
I will leave the washer story for tomorrow:)
Thanks for being patient while we waited for our internet to arrive. Love you all and miss you like crazy!