Capital Classic

On Saturday the 27th of Jan Wellington hosted the first sea swim of the summer, the 2.8km Capital Classic (out to the lighthouse by Roseneath and back). Adrian entered with his brother Dominik and sister Emilia, and Daryl and his brother Brett came down as well. The Henehan boys set a blistering pace and the Mazur family failed to hunt them down... but a great time was had by all.

But the best news was that Adrian won the big spot prize of a trip to Vanuatu to do their ocean swim in June! Very exciting (even though it is a trip for one...).

Clothes swap

On Thursday the 25th of Jan we had an absolutely massive clothes swap at the house. Nearly 30 lovely ladies turned up and we all had a ball. As you can see by the photos, it was pretty civilised until the starting call was issued!

Everyone brought heaps of stuff and went away with nearly as much. All the remaining clothes (and there's A LOT) will be given to charity, so it's a big thanks to everyone who came and gave all their stuff! I know I got some great things out of it :-)

Visit from Amy

Amy decided to return to the Antipodes (Australia to be precise) and stopped off in Wellington with Enrique on the way. They're currently still in Marlborough (I think!) but will soon be off to find fame and fortune across the ditch.

Baby godson!

Loretta and Autiko (AJ) welcomed a new baby boy to their family on the 4th of January and I got a new godson in the process :-) He was a big boy, weighing in at 4.99kg (that's nearly 11lbs) but is just gorgeous.

His name is Seymour Elive Daunakamakama. Seymour is a reference to AJ's German grandfather, Elive is a reference to Loretta's grandfather and Daunakamakama is Autiko's surname and means 'Master of Fire' in Fijian. So, luckily he's a big boy because he's got a big name to live up to!

The photos are of Loretta about a week or so before the birth, and of me and Seymour when he was about 18 hours old.

Summer holidays

Caught a (very) brief taste of summer over the Christmas/New Year break when I headed back up to Auckland for two weeks and then down to Tauranga/Mount Maunganui for a few days before heading back down to grey and cold Wellington...

Christmas was preceded by a fabulous Nativity party (cheers Julian St!) where Spotlight came to the rescue and provided all I needed for a 'manger' costume (photo is of Nicola as Mary and me as the manger...). I ended up shedding wood wool all over the floor so that tarpaulin came in handy for more than one reason...

Christmas itself was just a family dinner and then for the next couple of weeks spent most of my time hanging out with everyone who hadn't joined the mass exodus out of Auckland.

Was at the Mount for the half Ironman where Adrian came a great 64th out of 580 competitors in a time of 4h45m (even just pipped Nige). Was lovely sunny weather (that's the moon still over the Mount at 6.30am) and lots of sweaty bodies in lycra - everything you could want really! ;-)