The Big Man Turns 40 - Part 2

A few days before Jake's birthday, we were getting ready for our trip to Ohakune during (another) very busy phase of life - I have multiple work projects on the go, we're busy with billions of specialist appointments for Molly, and Jake is 4 weeks in to a new and very busy job which so far has consistently required approx 60 hour working weeks. (And that's not even the half of it!)

You can imagine how I felt when Jake suddenly announced: "For my birthday I want more than just a family weekend away. I want you to organise me a party for next week".

To be fair, I probably should have thought of this before, but life has been a little bit challenging lately and I had instead just been trying to get through everything, quietly congratulating myself on actually managing to buy birthday presents and organise a weekend away in amongst all the other general day-to-day bedlam.

Anyway, I love a challenge ;)

So organise a party I did.

Not many people these days can necessarily attend a party with only a week's notice, but despite the lack of proper planning we managed to gather together a lovely group of Wellington friends for a drinks party at our house.

A couple of cases of wine were ordered, and some nibbles were prepared. And it's Jake we're talking about so of course there had to be a cake as well.

While I prepared the food, the kids were in charge of party decorations. I gave them about an hour or so to decorate the house - and they managed to blow up 3 balloons ;)

(NB If you look closely at the last photo you will see that yes, Jake wore slippers to his 40th birthday party).

Both children stayed up late and were in charge of photos! (I think they need a little practise!)

Alfie hit the pillow at 9pm and Molly followed on at nearly 11pm (!) and after that the music was turned up, more wine was got out, and the party continued.....until 3AM!!

That's the first time we've done a 3am party in a very long time, and we're still recovering!

The Big Man Turns 40 - Part 1

Last week, the big man of the house had a birthday with a large number in it. Yep, Jake is now 40!!!

As well as organising some special presents, I'd also arranged a weekend away for the whole whanau* to celebrate with him - 16 Downings from Auckland, Wellington and Morrinsville.

We all took a day off work/school, and travelled to a roughly half-way point at Ohakune. In a couple of months Ohakune will be covered in snow and full of skiiers, but right now it's too early in the season so things were pretty quiet, still and beautiful, with snow-capped mountains all around. Lovely.

With ages ranging from 3 to 52 yrs, we found it surprisingly easy to occupy everyone and keep things happy for the whole weekend (the only exception to this was tears from Alfie on two occasions, once because of a fat ear received during some rough play, and secondly because of a broken toy).

We found a gorgeous wooden ski lodge to stay in with a couple of roaring fires and plenty of space. We consumed a fair amount of booze in this space - although not with our breakfast despite what the picture of Sam looks like?!

We managed a great tramp through Tongariro National Park - and not a single child complained about the walking! They were full of loud chatter all day, and demonstrated some "interesting" imaginations with excited talk about how they were travelling through the Australian Outback and China!

The kids drank water from the stream (can you spot Molly & Amelia?)...

And then they all played in the water for a while and got wet.....

Most people know the way to Jake's heart, and Sam didn't disappoint him, with a fabulous cake absolutely fit for a 40 year old cake lover - and definitely fit for 7 children!

A great weekend, and Jake was so pleased that everyone could join us. Happy Birthday JD!

*For non-Kiwis, Whanau (pronounced faa-now) is a Maori word for extended family, and is commonly used in everyday New Zealand English. 

The Annual Grandparents Visit

Well, that was quite frankly the wettest April EVER!

Did my parents actually, literally, bring the weather from the UK with them?? Because the rain started on the day they arrived and carried on for most of the month, and then stopped pretty much on the day they left.

I've never known such relentless wet weather here!

But life goes on. So we put them to work on the garden, took them for gentle walks, made them put up with a great deal of moaning from Alfie (who never does well on an indoors day) and forced them to help with kids arts and crafts sessions.

(But secretly I think they were mostly just happy with the excuse to sit around on a couch as much as possible, rest and relax!)

While they were here, we also took them up to Himatangi Beach for a few days, so they could see where we hang out so often at weekends.

The kids had a ball on the bike tracks but Granny wouldn't (or couldn't?) watch!

Instead they did both seem to enjoy sitting on logs on the beach for hours on end! Happy Grandparents!

Meanwhile Jake took time to read the newspaper and think of things other than the NZ film industry.

His new job for Weta Workshop has been pretty full on and the first 2 weeks have completely taken over his brain to the extent that when he comes home at night you might say "would you like a glass of wine?" and he will answer "the workshop tour was full again today"; and then you'll say "lovely darling, that's great news, have you had enough to eat?" and he will answer "the Spiderman 2 movie was amazing and we all stayed to watch the credits"...etc etc.

Help! Weta Workshop has taken over Jake's brain!!!!

The kids don't seem to care that Dad's mind has been taken over by film graphics and hobbits, and have coped admirably with being cooped up so much. On the rare occasions that the sun's come out, they've made the most of it.

Himatangi's sand dunes are amazing!

So while the kids played, the grandparents sat on logs, and Jake thought about hobbits, I managed to find time for an afternoon walk up the beach.

I love walking along Himatangi Beach on a clear day - it's just so stunning.

 And for our last day at the beach, a perfect sunset from the top of the sand dunes.....