Samstock

Samstock went off!
We camped out with the entire whanau, the children had a great time. And yes, it was cold but we managed to wrap up warm, mostly. Not sure on the numbers but what a fantastic experience to hang out with a big crowd of mostly Christian young poeple having a great time together. Wide range of music from thrash to Alabaster Box who also came and played at Student Soul on Sunday night. And a great chance to catch up with youth leaders from around the South Island. It did rain on Saturday night but we borrowed sufficient tents to stay reasonably comfortable.

The children are on holiday for the next two weeks so we are hoping the weather will be fine so we can all get outdoors a bit more. We are hoping the funding comes through for the Opoho School Holiday Program as it would be really convenient to have Janine and Zach just next door; Janine in particular has her heart set on going. Hannah will go to her Montessor school next week after Trev goes home to Lower Hutt.

The weather has started warming up again after the cold snap last week, hard to believe we were in T-shirts 2 weeks ago!

Chris took the evening session at Kaikorai last night and I am on worship at Leith in the morning and Student Soul in the evening next weekend. It is all go!

My, how time flies

I think you can tell we are settling into life in Dunedin as the time between posts is gradually becoming longer and longer. As are the days - the younger children are quite confused now about when to get up and when to have dinner. Hannah was really upset last week because I started making dinner before sunset; ah, how to explain daylength variations to a 3 year old!
Last week was particularly intense as we had 2 intensives, Kathryn Grant came to stay and the girls had their big muisc concert on Sunday. We've also had a visit from my sister Sue and her family yesterday - good times! And Chris preached on Sunday, which went well; and I ran a music team meeting on Saturday, which also went well, played Sunday morning... well, you get the idea, it's business as usual.
We are really enjoying the warmer temperatures,I've been out and about on Katarina's bike, and now a completely different set of muscles are complaining! Zach's class is off to Dundas bush tomorrow for some more clean up stuff.
This is a big week for me as I have an assignment due on Friday, a sermon to prepare for Sunday and a trip to Invercargill on Saturday plus hosting the entree course for a progressive dinner. It's all good.

Take the long road home

Chris is away tramping with Student Soul until Sunday but there is plenty to do in the meantime. Janine has a party and sleep-over up the road at the Flett's house, Zach has his last soccer game tomorrow and I am leading worship at Leith Sunday morning. Good times.
With the slightly more flexible timetable of Field Ed., I managed to pop in on Zachary's "Breakfast at School" this morning. Poor Zach - he has really taken the healthy eating message on board and insists on having brown bread now. Of course, they only had white toast this morning - I heard all about it later on in the morning from one of the helpers!!
And I also managed to get into Hannah's special lunch at school in honour of Maria Montessor, this being her birthday! Cool!
And just in case you thought Katarina was missing out, she isn't. She is off bowling tomorrow night with the youth group. We might just make it up the road for the rugby match; one of the students has got Sky and we are developing a routine of hanging out there for the match.