Goin to the Chapel

It’s been the best Christmas ever out here – my brothers and Mum & Dad came out from Eng and we spent it in NZ with Stacey’s family wakeboarding, jetskiing, fishing, pig hunting, cliff jumping, sitting in hot streams, eating, drinking and getting engaged.

 

I proposed to Stace on the day of our Lord’s birth, down by the stream that runs through their bushland. We’d all been for a swim in the waterhole and I took the two of us on a detour on the way back The ring was in a box on a rock in the middle of the water, with the sun streaming through the surrounding native trees and bush etc,  and it was all pretty special. She slipped down the bank upon seeing it through shock but luckily regained her composure to say yes each of the eight times she made me ask her (so she wouldn’t forget).

 We headed back up to the house to announce the news, where this picture was taken, and are obviously both very happy and excited about the whole thing. Only Oliver was a dissenting voice, noting that we had stolen the day from baby Jesus. So we promptly knocked out a medley of Away in a manger & O come O come Emmanuel and all was right with the world.

 On boxing day we hooked up with a bloke based in the next-door village who builds Wakeboard Towers / A-Frames for a living and he took us out on the Waikato River for a couple of hours in his fat boat with the biggest wake I have ever seen. It was scary, but great fun, until each of us either dinged ribs or heads. We hopped off the wakeboard boat straight onto Stace’s brother in law’s jetski and zoomed around on that for a while, each trying to break the previous rider’s speed record (89km/h the winning total) without colliding with a great big barge carelessly positioned in the middle of the river. Was brilliant. The rest of our trip was more of the same, then back here for the Ashes which was fun despite the result (esp due to the combined visits of Jon B & Neisha, Stockport J, Rupert, Andy Robbo, J & Mary), then a 5 day trip up to the NSW Central Coast where we’d rented an 8-bed house (Pete K & Gems having joined our merry crew). Unfortunately Timo dislocated his shoulder but it didn’t seem to hold him back too much (Smith Steel) whilst Pete, Ol and I had a couple of memorable surf sessions on near-deserted beaches. We saw dolphins and big spiders, Stace took the girls to a local market and it was brilliant to be amongst the family again. T&G have now left for London via a couple of days in Melbourne but the others are around and about until the end of the month. Will be very very sad to see them go.

Think that covers most of it. Hope you had a great Christmas too and a happy and healthy 2007. Love S&S