My Little Lady Of The Lake

I love how our days pan out here. A lazy lunch followed by an afternoon beach combing at the lake. This little girl of mine, just loves the water. She spends long periods sitting and playing quietly by the waters edge. She loves to throw pebbles into the water, taking joy in the plopping and slashing as they hit the water. 

Today this little girl of mine really made me smile. There is something about preschoolers and costumes, they are like moths to a flame, and my little Holly is no exception to that. Lately, I rarely seem to see her out of costume and todays choice was a butterfly fairy. She flittered along the waters edge, testing the water and enjoying the freedom to unleash her little butterfly fairy along the empty beach.

And as usual for my little girl, we spent time collecting the prettiest of the treasures to take home.

Gotta love days like this.  

A New Beach

I love 'our' beach, it is so familiar, yet somehow, we never tire of it's warm sands. But, there is something very exciting about visiting a new beach, who's landscape is all new to us, it's colour darker and it's shells just a little foreign to us. 

That was how we felt last week when we explored the shores at Carter's beach. A beautiful, isolated spot, we found the beach almost void of any other people, leaving us free to explore in glorious isolation.

And the shells, oh the shells. There were so many, in a rainbow of colour.

My little beachcomber came home with more shells than her little hands could carry, although she was not keen to take this little fella home with us-

But she did take home a huge shell collection, which now takes pride of place on our coffee table. 

Hello Spring! Welcome to my world.

Although it is not officially spring for a few more days, spring has defiantly been in the air here the last few days. This is the littlest one's first spring and I think I can safely say, she is gonna love it. 

Now that she is on the move the world is her oyster. The beach has lots of new and interesting experiences and although she discovered sand is not as tasty as it may look, she also discovered that paddling in the ocean IS a lot of fun (especially when you have your Pop there to help you)

Even though the water was still freezing, it was fun to pretend that summer is not too far away.

Roll on Spring!

Good friday

The weather was mild here today and a little gray. I decided to take the little one's for a walk on the beach and was a little surprised how busy it was. I had expected the weather would have put people off, I was wrong. It was nice though, spending times with the kids in the fresh salty air.

Happy good friday.

Our little house

When Holly was a baby, we bought a new house. Well I say new because it was new to us but in reality, the house is over 100 years old. Now in some parts of the world this may not be considered very old, but here in New Zealand, where European settlers only started to emigrate about 200 years ago, it is old. Most of our family thought we were mad to move here, to this run down old cottage. But, two things sold me on this place, one- it is only a hop, skip and a jump to the waterfront and two- it felt like home. I have lived in lots of houses but this was the first place that I have ever felt attached to. It did need work done though and after living through one cold winter here we decided that we really did need to get onto it. So shortly before Isla was born we got the builders in to do some big renovations for us. Thought I would share some of our before and after pics-

Bathroom (which was a laundry) before-

Bathroom after-

Lounge before-

Lounge after-

Kitchen before (was a bedroom)-

Kitchen after-

Holly's room before (was a bathroom)-

Holly's room after-

We have largely finished the inside of the house now, just a few little bits and bobs but nothing major. Next job is to tackle the outside..... when the budget permits.

Holly's treasures

My girl, like many toddlers, loves finding treasure. Even a walk to the shop is filled with stops to examine flowers, plants,leaves, berries and any other special finds. So, it is no surprise that a trip to the beach is one of her favorite things and a bag to collect her treasures is a must.

Holly got to do just this last week during a special trip to visit her Nan and Pop. She bought her bag of treasures home, spending much time playing with her new finds, examining them and carefully lining them up before proudly showing them off.
The thing that is most beautiful about her treasures is what she chooses. Unlike and adult, who would select beauty based on shape and colour. She selects her shells for their unusual little features, a bit of dried seaweed still attached, a hole in it or two shells fused together.

For me, it is another example of the joy I get as a parent, glimpsing the world through the eyes of my child and it, like her little shells, is beautiful.

A day at the bay

We have a holiday home at the bay. We don't get over there as much as we would like since having the little ones but when we do, it is magic. To wake in the mornings and look out at the calm sea, to take the little ones beach combing for 'treasure', swimming or just lazing around in the sun- this is what memories are made of.