Easter Buns and Nutty Kid

Yes, Dennis can be just as nutty as in the photo.

Tom isn't the only one in the family who can bake. I made Easter buns using the hot cross bun recipe but omitting the crosses (which look great but don't add any flavor).

A new thing we did--we attended roller derby on 7 May. A friend from church is training and into roller derby so we thought we'd check it out. Wellington will have three more roller derby events, so we'll see how many we can go to.

Fencing and Other Activities

Another wonderful opportunity for the home-educated kids was fencing. The kids got a 2 hour introductory class on Tuesday, 12 April.

Dennis is the shortest one in this photo with his face towards us.

Back in March we had tae kwon do testing. Dennis aced his poomsae or patterns.

The Capital E Children's Theatre had a special two weeks with all sorts of plays at various venues in Wellington. We got a good deal on tickets for two plays and then we got free tickets for another two plays through Dennis' drama class.

Soccer season began on 2 April. Dennis' team is called Zoom. They have been winning their games so they will be paired up with more challenging teams soon.

The school holidays were the week before and after Easter. Dennis did 3 1/2 days of gymnastics over the two weeks. It was good I scheduled him for Tues and Thurs since he needed a day off afterwards.

On Saturday, 23 April, I was introduced to the board game Settlers of Catan. I did okay for a beginner.

Dennis' 11th Birthday

Dennis turned 11 on 27 May.

I ordered a gift for him that we had to pick up at the post shop. Once Dennis saw the box, his jaw dropped. The lady at the counter asked if it was his birthday. So what was in the box? A new Wavestick two wheeled skateboard (aka ripstick). It will take quite a bit of practice to get the hang of it.

This year we had a small party. I took Dennis and two friends go karting and bowling. I joined them for the bowling.

Clay and Dennis zoomed around the course pretty well. Clay was the fastest. Three times he got stuck on the tires. Hannes had some trouble keeping his kart going so the attendant helped him out. I lost count of how many times they went around. They could have gone longer than 10 minutes.

We all did all right with the bowling. We started out without the bumpers. Dennis decided he didn't like gutter balls so he asked for the bumpers to go up. We could still get a gutter ball, but at the very end right before the pins. All of us got better scores the second game.

Here in NZ what we did is called Ten Pin Bowling since outdoor lawn bowling is also popular.

We came to our house for homemade pizza, the movie "Narnia The Dawn Treader," cake and presents. The pizza was delicious. The cake was homemade chocolate. I bought a cake decorating kit. Dennis and I made yellow, green and blue icing. He squeezed it out all over the cake and then topped it off with some sprinkles (hundreds and thousands). It was certainly colorful and festive! At 8:00 p.m. the party was over.

Now Dennis has two new Nerf guns, new Lego sets: airplane and aquashark, four new Lego Bionicle figures, and four new comic books. It's Saturday morning and Dennis is shooting his Bionicles with Lego darts.

Horse Riding

On Wednesday, 9 March, Dennis and other home-educated kids got to go horse riding. The stables were in Wainuiomata, a valley about 40 minutes drive from Wellington. The owner/operators got the kids involved in saddling and harnessing the horses as well. It was probably the first time Dennis has ridden in an English saddle. The kids had a positive experience with horses on a warm, sunny day.

Dennis is a Black Belt

Dennis took his Black Belt test today. I will describe it here but one must watch it to understand the emotion of the event. Five boys from 10-14 took the test (Dennis was the youngest.)

After lining up and introductions the examiner had someone from the audience pick a lad go stand by them and the testers were then told to do as many push-ups as they could do in one minute ... counted. Then they had to do sit-ups in one minute ... counted. Then they had to do squats in one minute ... counted. The numbers were reported to the examiner, and then it got hard.

Next was a few of the forms (there are eleven in all.) Break for some more counted calisthenics. More forms (each one was done three or four times, sometimes facing the front, sometimes facing the back (we usually practice facing the front. Then single out one or two kids for they may not have done it as well as the examiner would have liked, but not to worry the rest of the kids were kept busy doing sit-ups, push-ups, or squats. To break up the monotony the forms were intermixed with power test (that is kicking pads they had about 25 different combinations to execute,) self-defense (oh demonstrate that you can make an attacker wish they had not gotten up in the morning,) pre-arranged sparring (just fun little vignettes to prove competence of basic sparing techniques - these are very exhausting work) and of course all these were accompanied by push-ups, sit-ups, and squats. Did I mention that the examiner had them do sit-ups, push-ups, and squats?

Well after about 90 minutes of this hard work the fun began ... sparring.

This was not your average three one minute rounds shake hands and drink a sports drink. This was tough. First round was easy, pair up with another kid. Then they introduced the black-belts, most of which were in their mid to late 20's. The fighting was designed to break the kids and frankly it did. Dennis and the 11 year old lost it. I think the hardest part for Dennis was that he thought his fourth fight was the last, then they called him up for another. He fought well at first, then broke down crying when he was kicked hard in the gut. He rallied himself for another go and did quite well until he was kicked in the face. Then it was very hard for him, to keep on going. But he did get back in the fight.

This was the last fight which was a good thing, as he was crying and could not continue. They had a one minute water break where I spoke with Dennis and through his tears let him know that all the kids were crying. Then the examiner had the boys, and the black belts, line up in a circle. One child was chosen and then the rest of the members of the circle had 15 seconds each to kick the living sh_t out of the victim in the middle. I was weeping during Dennis last two fights, crying during this event and it took quite a bit of self-control not to walk-up to the examiner and stop the proceedings. (The examiner may be a 6th dan but he about half my size and I was sure I could make my point.)

Well it was over Dennis lived through the sparing. I helped him remove his pads as he could hardly stand-up. The 11 year old and Dennis were up for breaking some 18 mm boards (that is a nominal 1" for those in North America.) While the other three kids had one minute to do more push-ups than their last counted minute, then yes the next minute was to do more sit-ups. The examiner told each of them the number they had to beat.

When it came to breaking Dennis broke all his boards. It took him a few tries for one of the kicks but he got through it just fine. Now for him the exam was done. Just sit on the side and watch the other children break the boards. I don't know if the examiner was being kind by not requiring him to do the push-ups/sit-ups or just forgot.

When the boards were all broken the kids lined up again and the examiner told them to do 200 sit-ups. It took a few seconds for the children to register the request, they went down to a person and started doing the sit-ups. The examiner had a heart and stopped them after a few.

The results came in and Dennis was given a provisional pass pending a re-test of the forms. Dennis had made a few very notable mistakes when the examiner had them face different directions and the examiner believes that Dennis would do better if he did not have the distraction of the other kids.

I was very proud of Dennis. He showed amazing fortitude to stay in the test and proved that he has an indomitable spirit.

Underwater petting zoo

Yep you read it right, and let me tell you octopus.co.nz is certainly a place worth visiting, especially on a cold wet Wellington day.

Dennis saw a poster; very similar to this one, at the local library and after asking a few times we scheduled a trip down to Island Bay to check it out.



The trip down there was uneventful. If you can call traveling over the mountains, even ones these small, uneventful. I mean the views alone are enough to take your breath way. We saw glimpses of the south island through the rain, as the ocean was alive with white caps.



Arriving at the building we made a mad dash inside as it was pouring.

<<>>

I did not know what to expect and certainly at the time I would have never considered a petting zoo as one of the options. But there you have it, an aquatic petting zoo. Only in New Zealand I suppose.

The star of the place is a shallow table, elevated to the perfect height for adults and children (if they stand on the many boxes around the table) to see and touch the plants and animals that live in the Cook Straights. Here you see a very happy Dennis holding something very slimy.



All the plants and animals in the petting aquarium have about a two-week tour of duty then they are released back into the cook straights as another batch are brought up for duty. Some divers affiliated with octopus.co.nz go on weekend diving expeditions; I suppose it gives them some purpose to be at the bottom of cook straight.

The water in this aquarium, as well as all the others, is continually pumped in from the straight and drains back into the straight. So the animals are in as close to their native surrounds as they can be, except for the continual “petting” by all the kids (and adults I may add.)

I am sure you are wondering why they call it octopus.co.nz. So without further delay here is one of the two reasons.



I chatted up one of the attendances about the Octopus as it was just sitting there on the bottom of the tank. After a brief discussion about the history of the place he started to get the octopus attention. Thus the picture above, and this one of Dennis enthralled by the Octopus below.



There are two of them in the petting zoo. The other one was enjoying a crab dinner while we were there. Nothing graphic about this just sitting on the bottom of the tank tentacles wrapped about the crab in a death grip.

Now is a good time to explain a bit of the history of the place. A bunch of Italian fisherman settled Island Bay right after WWII. This building was where they would clean their catch before sending it off to the Wellington market. After years of the neighbors complaining about the smell the fisherman moved the cleaning station to another location and over time the building was abandoned. Well someone got the idea of the petting zoo and managed to pull together the required support (and funding.)

From the start this project was supported by the local fisherman. For some reason or another they loved the idea and donated their old tackle to the effort. And to this day they support octopus.co.nz by donating fish.

In addition to the odd octopus that gets pulled up in their nets there are native fish that are generally not on the supper table so they donate them to the museum. I wish I had taken a few more pictures of the inside of the place. Oh well next time, but one last picture for now ...

Dennis petting the octopus.

Pain de Beaucaire

I have graduated from Baguettes to Pain de Beaucaire, between the two was a Cibatta. Once again the recipe is from bredcetera.com. Here is Dennis shortly after I told him "No you have to let the loaves cool before you can eat them." As you can tell he is still pleased with the results.

A closeup the bread without the distraction of a 10 year old :)

We Survived the Birthday Party

Dennis turned 10 this week! We had a birthday party at home today--Saturday. Nine boys showed up. It's been raining the whole week and today was no exception. The party had an army theme. Dennis and some friends wore their camouflage clothes and brought their weapons. We had the help of a university student, Jaclyn to plan and run activities.

The first activity was "Marine Field Training"--a timed obstacle course. There were ties for first and second place so we had a run off. Next was "Rescue Mission" with two teams. The smallest boy was the wounded soldier. The rest of the team had to bandage him with an entire roll of toilet paper. Then they had to carry him on a "stretcher" blanket. The boys also enjoyed a classic tug of war. The winning team had to go against Tom. Tom was victorious. Then I got the music going and they played "Hot Grenade" (hot potato).

On to the "Mess Hall" for cake, Oreos, Doritoes, Twisties (cheese curls), popcorn and soda. The Hall was quite messy afterwards. The boys then "Pinned the Medal on the Soldier." Dennis opened his gifts. Lastly parents showed up. I had to take two people home and left Tom and Dennis to vacuum and tidy up.

Dennis enjoyed his new Legos and toy guns. He's playing a couple of new games on his Nintendo DS. Tom has his feet up and I'm about ready to do the same.

Soccer

Dennis had his third soccer game of the season today. He played defense for the first half and offense for the second. It is certainly his best game of the year thus far. In defense he made some great plays, sending the ball back across the line when it came his way. A couple of times he was able to dribble it right up to the net pass to a team mate and then run back into position, he did well.

However as we all know in sports scoring the goal is what is remembered. Dennis scored his first goal of the season in this game. While on offense he was passed the ball dribbled it to the goal and took a shot.

All the parents were cheering for him as it went in the net.

Dennis was a very happy boy this afternoon.

We did it

On Monday I went down to immigration and applied for my indefinite returning residence visa. I thought it would be a quick drop-off of the paperwork. There were two surprises. The first was the hour wait in line. But as they gave out numbers I just went out and grabbed a bite to eat. The second was that they put the visas in the passports while I waited ... or more correctly stated while I watched.

To the left is a picture of the agent putting the visa in Dennis' passport.

I must admit it bought a tear to my eye to see this. A major part of our desire to go here is to give Dennis another country to play in when he gets older.

With this residency Dennis can live and work come and go in New Zealand for the rest of his life. It is also a first step to acquiring a NZ Passport which would enable him to live and work in Australia and have much easier access to the rest of Asia and Europe. It was a very good day.

Dennis approval of my latest baguettes

Dennis is enjoying my baking. Seems everything I bake is the "best bread he has ever tasted." However he has noted a marked improvement lately.

It took me quite a bit of time to get my baguettes presentable. My family, and a few good friends were kind enough to eat my failures.

I found the recipe, and plenty of advice, for these baguettes at www.breadcetera.com.

Our young crazy dancer ...

Dennis likes playing with the camera, so much so he rand own the batteries recently. Here he is doing a dance for his, and your, viewing pleasure!

The Fight!

Dennis is the one in Red. This is the three rounds complete with intermissions when he was fighting at the last TKD tournament. That is Chris behind the scoring table ... no she had nothing to do with Dennis winning!

Walk on water

Dennis and I were out and about together this afternoon as Chris was at a party.

We started our adventure with walking on water.  Another typical Kiwi thing here.  You simply get a big ball, fill it up with air, and roll the child out on the water.  It is really a great way to keep the kids occupied and to make lots of money.  (If the recession is getting you down in America give it a go as summer job.)

Dennis just loved it!

After this I ran a few errands with Dennis and then we went to the beach.  I forgot to get pictures of our beach adventures mostly because I was freezing.  The water was very numbing but hey we managed.

I asked Dennis if we had seized the day today, his response was "Mega Carpe diem!"

Dennis' Theme

My Theme Australia

I like Whitewater World.

I also like Luna Park and I like making sand castles.

Another chapter in the mundane life in New Zealand ...

Day after his birthday

Showing off ...