Christmas Time is Coming

The pahutakawa flower.

Claire's friend Chloe took this photo today while they were playing in our front yard getting these photos of the beautiful pahutakawa red Christmas flower.

This is our driveway showing the early flowering pahutakawa trees at the water's edge. The big balls of blue-purple flowers have popped out along our driveway.

These wirey trees are seen everywhere along the beaches and bays. They are starting to bloom these huge red spiney flowers famous for their Christmas time red bloom.

Half way down the length of Ocean beach is a lava cliff you can walk up where the above photo was taken. You can walk down the other side and continue your walk on the sand.

Ocean Beach is a surf beach (below). They didn't swim but Claire did take this photo of Lynn on their walk.

Ocean beach is where you can see the conservation sign for nesting shore birds Claire's school class made. She made the "Care for nature protect our beach" part with her friend Maddy.

The little mermaid below poses for this beautiful shot Lynn took while they were on a beach walk together.

As part of his effort to connect with Claire, Lynn has started taking her on special walks like the pre-church walk at Ocean beach 10 minutes from our house last Sunday.

Claire and Lynn also took a long kayak ride around the point from the house one day this week.

Boys, all 12 eleven year olds, had fun in the Wap-Wap (NZ for Timbuckto) at the paintball party for Phillip's birthday. Above is the winning team while below is the crew waiting to get geered up.

Phillip is seen getting choked but smiling as boys do.

The twins have enjoyed the sunshine, tree climbing, and sandy beaches but had a very sad week when it was announced their beloved teacher won't be returning for the rest of the school year. The announcement came in a letter from the principal saying the reasons were confidential. There have been a few tears and lots of sad comments. With 3 weeks to go in the school year we are all very disappointed because she was doing such a great job especially in creative ways for teaching reading and they were very attached to her. After next week starts a flurry of exciting weekly events including: my Birthday with a family sailing trip planned, Christmas with the arrival of Cheryl and my brother, Nate's arrival the week after, 2 weeks with Nanna and Papa, and finally 2 weeks of touring the South Island with a final stop in Wellington to see Rus. It's really getting good.