Man oh man if only I knew how to save my blog as I typed…this update is going to be shorter than expected! AS I was nearly finished and about to post when I hit the wrong button and lost my entire blog. So this is going to be an abbreviated version. (The original post wasn’t as long as I had hoped either because I wasted so much time trying to format all the pictures and redesign the layout.)

I can and can’t believe a week has already gone by. As a new residence to New Zealand I don’t feel “home” yet –but I also don’t feel like a “vacationer”. I feel a slight urgency to travel as much as possible but I don’t want to rush myself into making quick and senseless travel plans. Luckily Emma and I were able to do some sight seeing on Wednesday and the whole weekend 🙂 Having a travel buddy is AMAZING!!

My week day schedule is 7:30-4ish with the kids, and then around dinner time I help out with the meal. I am not going to blog too much about the family and kids in this blog; as we are still adjusting and getting used to each other. Later down the way I will share stories and details! On Wednesday, Emzie came to the house to see me for the first time and it was magical! She met the kids and then took me out for coffee —where else but Starbucks?!! Soy hot chocolate are delicious. We went to Mission Bay really briefly as it was dark and hard to see too much. We walked along the viaduct and captured our first pictures together. It’s funny that, for all the walking we did along the viaduct..I didn’t even think to take a single picture. So our via duct collage actually has no pictures of it.

On Thursday my family went to the zoo! I couldn’t tell  you who was more excited, the girls, the mom or me? I was a little let down at how many animals were already put away by the time we got there. We did go later in the afternoon after the girls had eaten but it wasn’t close to closing time so it was sad that we didn’t see: the tigers, penguins, kangaroos or orangutans. Oh well there is always next time. It was really neat seeing some of the animals mingling amongst themselves. The zebras, giraffes, ostriches and emus, chickens and rhinos were all together just wandering around together.

We got to the hippos at the right time! They were both in the water wadding and we kept saying, “hello hippos hippos hippos” and they got out of the water walked around in the sand and went back into the water. It was the neatest thing seeing them get in and out of the water 🙂 I even got to see my first kiwi bird!! It was pretty exciting as they are nocturnal so it’s hard to see them. To be honest they are kept in a really dark room so I didn’t get to see it in very good lighting but I DID SEE one and they sure are cute! I would love to hold one but I doubt that is in the cards. A girl can dream though.

Saturday morning was my first day of sleeping in. I wouldn’t call it sleeping in since I was in bed listening to the baby crying while rolling over repeatedly to try and fall back asleep. I was just thankful that I wasn’t needing to be up and in the shower at 7am! Emma drove over to get me and we drove to Piha beach. It was around an hour drive from Mt Roskill. The beach was absolutely gorgeous and we had so much fun frolicking in the sand. It WAS sunny but the wind didn’t let us feel the heat too much. We climbed up Lion Rock Kiwi style (shoeless) and it was gorgeous near the top.  The top isn’t accessible to the public because of safety regulations. After walking along the beach and laying in the sand we found it too windy and headed off to another beach called Takapona. It was MUCH too windy for us to even consider getting out of the car so we decided the next best thing was shopping :)…Emma showed me where Albany was and where the busy busy Westfield Shopping Centre was. The parking spots are so narrow and there are always people trying to find a parking spot! It reminded me of trying to find a parking spot around Christmas time. Just nuts. We spent the evening visiting Emma’s kids and the next day we walked around Auckland’s “Downtown”. We went to with the intention of buy postcards but we kept getting really distracted. All and all my first week has been great. Now I just need to find the time to organize my pictures and post them to Facebook. I am proud of myself for keeping up with my Apad (Amanda’s.photo.a.day) so if you want to see one photo a day from my travels go to my Facebook album to see!

~~*thanks for reading*~~
Amanda