Sparkly Sparkler!

Hi all,

We thought you would like to see some pics of the engagement ring! Again, a bit of a whirlwind as we didn't plan to get it so soon, but just before my birthday we decided to have a 'browse' for rings at a Jeweller in Wellington called the Village Goldsmith and only went and bought one! We looked at lots and then sat down with the designer (who was the owner) and he takes your ideas to draw and then make it from scratch. We thought this would be quite a long process and were quite thankful as hadn't worked out how to pay for it but to our surprise it was ready within a few weeks. The best bit (or most worrying) is we don't actually own it! They do an option here that if you are leaving the country even for a weekend you can purchase tax free which as you can imagine was quite appealing as the tax back just about covers the cost of a holiday! So basically, we hand the ring back 2 days before going on a flight, they clean it and send it to the airport where you pick it back up before going through departures. All sounds quite straight forward and by that time we will have saved enough to pay for it!

Anyway, we wanted you to see the ring and hope you like it! I think its really beautiful, exactly as I had imagined when describing my ideas to the Jeweller.

I love it!
Bye xox

Flippin' heck

Flippin' heck!

It's July! And i am back on holiday - well off school at least so should give me a chance to get myself more sorted and should give Katie and I a chance to get some more photos from some fun times.

We bid a fond farewell to Vicki, Adrienne and Kirsty this week - Vicki and Adrienne put us up in Melbourne and we returned the favour here in Welly. We cannot believe that it was back in November that we stayed with them in Oz - where does the time go?

Staying with people you know makes life so much easier - you can get a proper wash and get your clothes cleaned and dried. Not sure our house was much warmer than their camper van but at least they had cooking facilities. (And Adrienne is a fantastic chef) We hadn't met Kirsty before but we now love her as she pretty much completed the Wasgij for us. For those who don;t know a wasgij is a jigsaw where you don't have the final picture on the front of the box you just have a clue. Wasgij is jigsaw backwards but it's not really a backwards jigsaw if you know what I mean and it's pronounced Wasjig but spelt Wasgij. Crazy. Here was the result though for posterity:



They stayed with us here in Welly on route to the rest of the North island. Was great to see some familiar faces and it was also great to have an excuse for midweek drinking and going out to the pub! Good luck to the girls for the rest of their trip - we're so jealous now that we are stuck in one place again but the good thing is we know we will be moving around again really soon.

Katie and I are planning on going skiiing with Iain, Lorna, Barry O, his girlfriend Kaz (who is also working in NZ just now) and Clare Young from home. We are also planning a trip down to Queenstown and Milford Sound etc in the South island so all in all a busy old time as usual.

Questions on my mind this week:

1) Is anyone reading this blog anymore?
2) How much can I cram into 3 weeks off when I don't have a car?

Hope everyone back home is doing well, I will definitely be scheduling some get in touch time this week now that I am off during the day. So expect a phone call some night this week - I will be trying to get round as many people as possible!!!!!

Thanks to my Dad who sent me through a new Rangers top as requested - thanks Dad.

All the best everyone,

Steph

Our birthdays in New Plymouth

A few photos from out recent birthday trip - more to follow on flickr.

All Blacks

Hi,

Just a quick one - I managed to get some All Black's to our school this week. Luke McAlister, Conrad Smith and Isaia Toeava.

When I introduced them to the year 8's I was so intent on getting Isaia's name correct I screwed up and called Luke McAlister, Luke Wilkinson. I would be embarrassed if I knew who the hell these guys actually are. Sometimes it's good not knowing!!! ;o)

By the way, in case you didn't know - New Zealand were beaten by France here at the weekend and that was a shock result. Luke and Isaia were two players who made a couple of big mistakes - so perhaps they can forgive mine!

I think seeing myself next to these guys I might have to get myself down to a gym sometime really really soon.

All the best,

SB.

Famous ex pupils

Just a quick one - I was delving about the internet today looking for interesting things and found out that an ex pupil of St. Mark's is doing rather well for himself. Lord of the Rings and the new Star Trek movie to name but two.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karl_Urban

Sickness

Hi folks - I am off work today having finally crumbled under the weight of the avalanche of germs primary school pupils carry with them. They aren't the most hygienic of creatures and it seems like all of them have some sort of illness at the moment - forget swine flu - Wellington Cough seems to be the fashionable illness at the moment and I have it.

To tell you the truth I have actually been trying to get rid of this cough for a good number of weeks but have finally decided that enough was enough so I went to the docs ($60 for 10 minutes) and got some antibiotics ($20). and I am staying at home today in an effort to recover in time to drink beer this weekend. ;o)

Things are still going well here (apart from the illness) and we are gearing up for our next big holiday - not sure exactly what the plan is yet but Clare is going to arrive in a few weeks from Sunny Scotland and we will be trying to cram lots in during her stay. Exciting stuff.

The photos above are from our trip to New Plymouth - katie's camera is having a wee illness of it's own at the moment so these photos were taken with my mobile phone. Photo 1 is of the bread capital of New Zealand (what's the bread capital of scotland? Anyone know?) and the second one is of Mount Taranaki - which was really stunning. (Mount Doom in Lord of the Rings.)

Right - I am off to get lunch and get back to bed - will write more later - hope everyone at home is doing well! Stay healthy people and remember.....you're better off healthy and in bed than struggling out to work and becoming a swine flu statistic just because you didn't want to let anyone down at work. Eat well, exercise, get some sleep - stay away from primary school pupils (for legal and many other reasons too) and you should be able to avoid any pandemic coming your way. (and the police)

June already?

Can't believe it's June. Where have all the weeks gone?

We've been busy as usual - Katie starting her new job and moving seamlessly into her thirties. And I've been continuing to work long Kiwi hours at school and have had 350 reports to write for the pupils - not to mention getting another year older myself.

We had a great weekend last weekend with Ian and Lorna up in New Plymouth - Katie had no idea that they were going to be there so it was a nice surprise for her. I think the biggest surprise was that she was going to have to do an awful lot of driving to get us there on the Friday!

I'd like to say that we did all sorts of touristy stuff and went for long walks but to be honest the weather was so cold and wet we just had to sit in the pub - what a shame eh? ;o) Mount Taranaki (Egmont) is near New Plymouth but we didn't actually get to see it until the Monday when the clouds had gone. It was stunning. We did try and drive up to the visitor centre which is on the side but the road was closed due to heavy snow.

We're already looking forward to the next holiday we have which is pretty much the whole of July (at least for me) and in that month Clare is visiting from back home and we have Steve and Shona's wedding too. We're hoping to get to go skiiing or something but we'll keep you posted on our plans.

We are also starting to look at our September/October holiday which will hopefully herald a trip to the Islands somewhere - Cook Islands that is.

That's about it for now really - it's funny how uninteresting our stories get once we both get jobs and are back to working hard again!

once something extra exciting happens again we will post it immediately - promise.

Speak soon,

StephandKatie

p.s. and don't forget you can skype us if you have the equipment!

5 Mins of Fame

Check out www.tennisnz.com to see me in action. Well, not really, but they did a piece about me for their latest news section.

All going well this week, my cold was short lived and I am off up north on Friday to meet with a potential sponsor so fingers crossed.

Also, Steph and I went along to a Kyoshun Karate club last week as we are keen to try out new things and it was fab. Its great for fitness and you actually do have full contact fighting/sparring, the only thing you are not allowed to do is punch your oponent in the head (you can kick them in the head though) or the back or the groin! Needless to say I got well and truly beaten up by two schoolgirls and Steph was defending himself against the head coach and the current national champion. We were both a bit stiff the next day (and the next) but going back tonight for more punishment.

Speak soon,
K x

It's official - I'm allergic to work

After 8 months on the road and being a lady of leisure I have not been ill once......one week after re-entering the working work and I have a cold - clearly work doesn't agree with me!!

Seriously though, its all going well, I started on Monday and was in Auckland by Tuesday at a 2day team mtg/forum. Seems like a great team and there's lots of interesting things happening in the world of NZ Tennis. As a little intro I was asked what my most embarrassing sporting moment was and I replied that it would be in about 6 hours when we go out to play some tennis! Yes that is right, there was the opportunity for everyone to play at the end of the day and I wanted to appear keen so decided (stupidly) to join in. However, I did feel the need to put everyone in the picture re: my playing ability due to the fact that almost all of the people there (including the CEO of Tennis NZ) were all top seeded in NZ and at least two of them had been or close to turning Pro. As usual, I was completely out my depth but had a smile on my face and played the "I'm scottish and the new girl" card to the full. I was of course disastrous and it was very unfortunate that I had to reveal my weaknesses after two days but hey, they new what they were getting when they offered me the job. All in all - I think I'm going to like this tennis gig :-)

Unfortunately the car we were thinking about buying, a slinky little 23 year old red sports car failed its MOT and was going to cost 3 x more to get fixed than we were going to pay so we decided to hold fire on that one. Mechanically it was totally fine but rust was an issue. I get a car with work which will help us to get out and about.

Not much else to report at the moment, just thought I'd let you know I have survived my first week!

How times change

Hi everyone,

A couple of important updates!

We have been our new house since the 4th of April but we with visitors and holidays and everything it has taken us a wee while to get set up with little home comforts (or life essentials to some people!)

Thankfully we now have internet access at home so no more hanging out at internet cafes with disaffected youth playing video games and getting fat in front of massive video screens (not us, them). Hurrah!!!

It also means that we can now skype everyone back home so if you have a quick connection and you have downloaded skype then my user name is stephbrown8 or if you search for my email address it is stephbrown8@aol.com. Once you have skype it means that if we are at home with the computer on, and skype open then you will be able to ring us. If you want to schedule a skype then just drop us an email or facebook us a time that would work for you and we will try and be around the house to catch up.

We're both hoping that having the net at home will let us keep in touch a bit better than we have been for the last couple of months - and hoping that we don't spend our whole evenings fighting over who has been on facebook the longest (not likely)

Once we buy a new cable for the phone we will also have a home phone line - we will post our phone number as soon as we have it so that people without skype can call us. We might not post it actually I might just email it round - if you want the number drop me an email at the address above or comment on the blog and I will send it through to you.

Anyway, the other exciting thing is that Katie starts her new job tomorrow, I am sure she will really enjoy it - getting out and mixing with the working public will, I am sure, make Katie feel more part of the city life which is one of the reasons we are here in Welly. It will also hopefully mean that I can afford a new pair of socks - the pair I have at the moment are starting to look a bit worse for wear and I am looking forward to having to retire them soon (only joking Mum!)

We are also looking at a car - don't want to give too much away just now but it's a red sports car with flicky up lights and all that - don't worry we've not gone mad - it's almost as old as Katie and is going to cost us $300 if it passes it's MOT. If it lasts us 6 months and doesn;'t fall to bits on the motorway then we will be happy. Will send photos if we decide to go ahead and buy it (it's Steve's brother in law whose Dad is from Queens Park in Glasgow so we're getting mates rates)

Well, I best be off just now - just wanted to give you a quick update - it's great being able to do this from home but we are heading out to get a few things sorted in town. Got to make the most of weekends when you work in a school.

Hope everyone is doing well - we will be in touch with you all soon!

Stephen