I will not ever never...

not love Charlie & Lola... Just when I thought it was safe (after playing with Charlie & Lola stuff)... there was a sale today... Merry Christmas to ME! Also bought, but at Jabberwocky, My Extremely Very Important Diary. I'm hoping that, by being so extremely very cute, I might actually USE it and have it with me...

Photo time!

So, my camera lives in my bag (which one of them I have with me) and my USB cable lives plugged in at home... handy. And, as I said earlier, facebook is the way to go for photos. Want to know what those around me have been up to? Visit my latest photo album - it's the Santa Parade. Oh, and my beads are there, too. Must update those soon...
On the work front... there's the Harry Potter stuff; Outreach Therapy Pets visit; random work photos - including the sight of me in pink!

In my family life - there's some random photos taken at random times; my sister's 50th; a niece's birthday & Guy Fawkes; my brother-in-law's 50th; a niece's 21st; up north & dad's grave; girls' week on the Gold Coast; random stuff from around home - including ducklings, my Molly cat and my favourite holiday destination; a great-niece's 4th; a great-nephew's 6th...

More to come I'm sure. I'll just update this post...

It kind of looks like Christmas

Santa Parade time! With photos...

Star gazing

For those of you who had something on & couldn't make the Last Saturday of the Month drinks... nah, nah, nah... those who made it spent a couple of hours celeb watching as they arrived on the red carpet for the TV awards... oh, alright, not too many BIG names but hey! Hilary Barry's dress was divine. The Fair Go crew looked pretty good. And Jeremy Corbett & That Guy managed to change quickly...

Ok - bad photo - but if you look really hard it's the Mascot, from Pulp Sport.

Cuteness!

Just when the last bunch of ducklings have grown up and become groups of marauding youths, we have a brand new clutch... [yes, this might skew the poll results...]

Costume drama

Look what I saw at Smith & Caugheys - costumes from the new movie Elizabeth: The Golden Age. Pretty, but also terribly cumbersome and hot!

We've got to get to school before the dragons!

I have this little sister Lola. She is small and very funny...
Thus begins pretty much every Charlie & Lola book by Lauren Child.
I don't want a little sister like Lola - as I am a little sister, I want to be Lola.
So, with gift vouchers for my birthday, I bought But excuse that is my book - all about Lola's visit to the library to get out the bestest book in the world. But someone else has it!
We've done this as a readers theatre for a special storytime - and I demanded to be Lola (just getting into my character, of course).
The next day I got an email from a former workmate who had seen a new Charlie & Lola book online... and now we have it on order - This is actually my party.
Then a friend & I went and played in the toy section of Smith & Caugheys - with the Charlie & Lola toys! Oh the want! Daytime and Nightime Lola... Messenger bag... Umbrella... Giggling Lola and Giggling Charlie. I felt all Lola aged! My friend knows the obsession - she bought me I absolutely must do colouring-in now for my birthday last year.
Thank goodness I don't have a credit card...

New Zealand Children's Books in Print 2007

NEW ZEALAND CHILDREN’S BOOKS IN PRINT 2007 available now.
Keep up-to-date with information about books for children by New Zealand writers and illustrators.
A useful resource for librarians, teachers, authors and illustrators, booksellers, publishers and others interested in children’s books.
Recommended by National Library advisors.
New Zealand Children’s Books in Print is a fully annotated catalogue of children's books currently in print for children from birth to secondary school, plus teacher/parent resource books, by New Zealand authors and illustrators (excluding text books or series readers). It includes fiction, poetry and non-fiction. Titles published both in New Zealand and overseas are included.
Listings include full publication information, a short description and age recommendations. There are five indexes – by author, illustrator, photographer, translator and title.
Order from Silvertone Ltd, PO Box 21 265, Henderson, Auckland 0650
Phone 09 836 1261
Email nzbooks.orcon.net.nz
Send no money, an invoice will be sent with your order $16.00 plus p&p

what did I learn...

What have I learnt from the 23 tasks?

1. That I know more than I thought
2. Conversely, that I have more to learn
3. That I've been using web 2.0 technology without realising it
4. That it's quicker and easier uploading photos to facebook than to flickr or bebo, or even burning to CD
5. That I love google docs - and, if the others come on board, it will make some of my tasks easier
6. That I have to carry on with this blog...
7. That I'm happy using technology that does what I want it to do
8. That I'm not really interesting in exploring things I don't have an obvious use for
9. That I need reasonably instant gratification or I just get frustrated and don't bother continuing with something

It's these last three points that I will take with me into customer interactions (or helping fellow staff). We, as staff, need to sell the usefulness and relevancy of any new thing and it needs to work well and quickly, or it's never going to work for our customers.

Photo from my garden

What's the national anthem of Malawi?

I think I'll change allegiance...
After being so grateful last night that the Silver Ferns weren't chokers like the All Blacks...
If you haven't caught up with the fact, we lost to Australia in the final (at least the Ferns did get into the final...)
The standings at the end of the tournament were:

1. Australia (42 in final)
2. New Zealand (38 in final)
3. Jamaica (53 in play off for 3/4 place)
4. England (52 in 3/4 playoff)
5. Malawi - The Queens (52 in 5/6 play off)
6. South Africa (49 in 5/6 play off)
7. Cook Islands (56 in 7/8 play off)
8. Samoa (55 in 7/8 play off)
9. Fiji (65 in 9/10 play off)
10. Botswana (20 in 9/10 play off)
11. Trinidad & Tobaga (48 in 11/12 play off)
12. Wales (45 in 11/12 play off)
13. Barbados (51 in 13/14 play off)
14. Scotland (45 in 13/14 play off)
15. Singapore (59 in 15/16 play off)
16. Malaysia (44 in 15/16 play off)

Malawi has to the be the most fun team, & contains the favourite player of the tournament. Check out this Herald article.

They have Mary Waya. She's 38 (in a country where the average life expectancy is 40), and mother of 2. She missed the 1999 World Champs because she was pregnant. She's 1.62cm tall, and weights 89kg (that's 5ft 4inches and 14 stone in real measurements - at least, I think it is...). She looks like the Venus of Willendorf... See photos below for comparison...

This shows only one example of her committment - she also had trick and flukey passes all over the place!

There's just something about Mary...
Photos from NZ Herald, Arizona State University, & the World Netball Champs site

Get (Irish) jiggy with it...

Listen to author Kate Thompson play music mentioned in her book The New Policeman. Thanks, once again, to NZBookgirl!

Tattoos!

I know lots of people don't like tattoos, including my Dad. But, if you get the right one and for the right reason...

About 10 years ago I got my first tattoo - here's a bit of it (do you know how hard it is photographing your own ankle?)

It's all in Viking runes (I was studying Norse at the time) and is the names of my four grandparents, my parents and myself (this part is my mother's dad Fred, followed by my dad, Ray). The chains represent the links of family that hold us together, and the background is marble, representing strength and solidity.

As part of her 70th birthday celebrations, my mum got a tattoo representing her family and the generations that have come from her and dad

And, yesterday, I watched my sister get her latest one, of a similar design to Mum's, representing family and all the love and support they offer (yes it's red, but it is brand new!)

Google maps part 2 & Movember

One of my regular readers reports that the google map image of his place is at least 18 months out of date. Better eyes than me!
Thank you Patrick! Sponsor him as part of Movember... hopefully this links directly to his info. Good luck Pat. I'd sponsor you if I had a credit card! PS love the photo!

you tubing - part 1

You Tube!

How could I choose which video! I couldn't choose just one... I will admit most of these I've heard about from friends. But I did have to search for the specific video later...

How about the Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain performing 'The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly'. I think I might be a ukulele convert... They're performing at the 08 New Zealand International Arts Festival in Wellington

Then there's performancing poet, Taylor Mali, on 'The Impotence of Proofreading' - be careful who you play this around (and, maybe don't have a mouthful of coffee at the time). This was send to me by a friend. Both of us edit and proofread things, so it seems so very appropriate!

What does this say about me?

I looked through the list of Web 2.0 awards nominees and what does it say about me that the one I focussed on was cocktail builder...
I liked the simplicity of cocktail builder and, in many ways, it's like the recipe finders I've been using for ages. Allyson Gofton's eCook has a recipe finder, which is very helpful when you have strange ingredients you want to figure out, or you know you've seen a recipe for something... and the Taste magazine site has a very similar search, too. Of course, the benefits are - they're both NZ sites!
I've tried Google maps before - unfortunately the satellite doesn't go in close enough so I could see our beautiful new deck, or if the 'new' owners of the old family home have done anything. And it really can't get anywhere near the family bach - search for Whakapirau and you'll see.
I

goggle at google

Google Docs...

Well, how spectacularly easy! I saved some meeting minutes from an organisation I'm involved with, invited collaborators as a test. They all logged in, invited their other gmail selves, made changes... and you can then export anything into word...
I'm a convert! So much easier than emailing documents around! Like a worldwide shared drive, but cheaper and easier.
If only I can convince the rest in the organisation....

Netball!

And the reason I'm on annual leave this week is revealed... so I can watch as much of the Netball World Champs as possible!
So far the best game I've watched has been the Cook Islands versus Singapore yesterday. The Cooks won 45-43, but it was tight. They then went on and beat Fiji today, the upset of the tournament.So far the big four are doing what's expected: New Zealand, Australia, England and Jamaica are all trouncing their minnow opponents.

Photos and jewellery...

Well, after being on leave (unexpectedly) for 2 weeks (as of Tuesday I'll be on planned leave - so 3 weeks in a row!) I was going a bit stir crazy. I decided to photograph ALL the jewellery I've made & kept... so if anyone is interested they're in my facebook photo album.

I've popped in to work today to see Kim's documentary, A great little hobby, showing in the Show Me Shorts Film Festival.

I've also uploaded documents from my work PC to google docs so I can work on them next week from home... will be reporting in shortly. So far, so good! I know, I know, sad... but it's so I can review all those books I've been reading during my time off, without having to remember them, or write notes to type up later.

And, yes, cleared my hold shelf!

Family & fireworks

Guy Fawkes has always been a big thing in my family.

We used to have the whole Guy and bonfire thing - complete with bonfire toffee (and, yes family, I will make some next year! Sorry - but lost the traditional recipe). There are even photos of (a younger version of ) me posing with the Guy. There are photos of numerous family members enjoying (or not) their first Guy Fawkes experiences... from the early 60s onwards.

Remember the time when...

The sky rockets (bye sky rockets - miss you!) came without sticks and Dad used twigs? Not the straightest trajectory ever!

Dad decided to experiment and tied 2 sky rockets together? Lit one, which lit the other one, and they came straight back down

It rained and rained and we made a very pathetic little string of wet refugees hiking back to our cars through the paddock in Moontide Road? (obviously before the house was built)

Phoebe didn't care about fireworks when she was only a few hours old? And now, 12 years on, she doesn't have to sit on my knee anymore... it's now her turn to be the big strong auntie. Happy birthday sweetie!

We all dressed up pretty and had a party. Oh yeah - happy anniversary Beth & Pat! (I remember how hard it was holding 4 year old Phoebe on my lap, while wearing an ankle length dress, heels, while on wet ground...)

For all fire bugs out there - especially my family... some photos from last night. Love you all!

Happy beading!

Another beading class tomorrow... not that I'm addicted or anything.


Nia, the Queen Bead, has just had her first book published... a must for all beading wannabes.
Yes, we even have copies in our collection. Reserve your copy today - then go and buy it (if enough copies are sold - there will be a sequel).
It's so fabulous - I don't have to keep all my class notes!