Of Teenage Wisdom

Two very important things we learned this weekend.

1. We are old.
2. We act like teenagers so it's okay that we are old.

How did we learn these two facts you ask? Well, I'll tell you.

We were invited to dinner on Friday night by a couple in our ward at a local Mexican restaurant. They brought their seventeen year old son to dinner along with another of our friends in the ward. While we were discussing various topics with our new teenage friend, he made the above observations.  When his parents asked what category they fell into see as a couple of 30-somethings are "old", he promptly replied that they are old like grandparents. Oh to be young.

At least it gave me a good opening line to the youth Sunday school class I taught today, but I would much prefer not being told I'm old just yet.

We did have a good time after dinner. We played a game on their playstation called "Buzz", which is sort of like the quiz night game (from my last post) or trivial pursuit. I think my favorite part of the game was the game show host. He was so mean! It was like having our very own Simon Cowell for every time we messed up. It was pretty funny. Brian won the first game and I won the second so our combined record for winning trivia games is still in tact. :)

All in all, it was a very fun evening (you know if Brian had a good time it had to be good!).

P.S. The Mexican food here isn't very mexican. For example, I'm pretty sure the chili con queso used goat cheese, which I liked for being different, but had no kick to it all all. I can't wait to come home for a visit in the fall and get me a good chimichanga!

Earthquake Trivia

Did you know that there are about 20,000 recorded earthquakes each year in New Zealand? Luckily, only about 200 of these can be felt.

We had a 4.2 earthquake about 25km west of Christchurch on Friday afternoon. I didn't feel it but others in the office said they did.

Isn't life exciting here???

Quiz Night!

Ward conference is a big deal in this part of the ward - it involves an entire weekend of activities. The first activity was Friday night quiz night.

Quiz night is a pretty common activity in New Zealand and is kind of like trivial pursuit. It's a great way to get groups of people interacting and getting to know each other better. Basically you get put into teams and then you have to answer 10 questions from each of 7-8 categories. The teams are scored and the one with the most points wins.

I was really impressed that one of the couples in our ward put together all of the questions across 8 categories, including: geography, history, sports, music & entertainment, science, children's tv, and gospel.

But all you really need to know about this activity is that Brian and I were on the winning team. It was awesome!

Unfortunately it was a rainy night and Brian caught the flu, so we didn't do the two Saturday activities.

Ward conference was nice - I played the piano for the choir and also played a piano number. I was pretty happy with the performance which means I didn't mess up too much lol. Too bad Brian is still sick and wasn't there to corroborate my story!

All in all it was a good weekend - except poor Brian being sick. Get better soon!

Brian's Easter Sunday Talk

I decided I needed to hurry and post before an entire week has gone by.  Brian gave a wonderful talk in Sacrament meeting last Sunday in our ward. He was asked to speak on The Resurrection: A Free Gift.

Brian started off his talk with a short background on our family and why we had moved to Christchurch. He then spoke about why the resurrection was a free gift and how we are entitled to be resurrected because we kept our first estate.

The rest of Brian's talk included sharing some great stories from Elder Featherstone (think of little Teddy Stoddard - and yes, Brian made it through the story without crying!). He also shared the story of when Elder Featherstone was asked to speak at a funeral for a little girl who had been abducted. He tied it all in nicely to the concept that the resurrection should give us hope in our lives, knowing that through the atonement we can be forgiven of our sins and can live with our Heavenly Father again.

It was a great talk! I don't think there were too many dry female eyes in the audience. Great job Brian!!!

What a "Poopy" Day!!!

So I picked up Ike this morning after letting him go out to the bathroom.  After I set him back down, I noticed a strange smell.  That little dirtbag had rolled around in his poop outside and I had it all over my shirt. Gross!!!

Does this look like an innocent face to you?  I think not...

(Yes, I know his eyes look creepy from the glare of the flash.)

Thanks Ike, for needing a bath and making me late for work this morning. I love you too.

Akaroa

Last Saturday we drove the the little French village of Akaroa.  This is one of the only French settlements in New Zealand.  When the British took over, the people of Akaroa wanted to stay and became subject to the British empire.

The village is very quaint with some nice views of various bays around the southeastern tip of the south island.  

The first five pictures here are of one of the harbors as we got closer to Akaroa and driving in the hills.  We think we are getting to be pretty good photographers!  Check out the bird photo bombing my picture and the crab we found on the rocky beach...

These following pictures are from Akaroa itself.  We had a great time walking around with Ike!

Memorial to Akaroa French settlers

Rue Jolie

Cute little French style house

Views from Akaroa and the surrounding mountain...Loot at that gorgeous water!!!

We also took a short walk through Stanley Park. By this time, the sky had cleared and it was much warmer.  The funniest part was when we left Ike on the other side of the fence and watched him figure out how he was going to back to us.

Ike's Journey

Where did they go?

Nope, that's not going to work 

Maybe under will be better

He made it!!!

Heading Towards Helm's Deep

An awesome point you may not know, is that the approach to Helm's Deep is right beyond the location for Edoras.  

If you watch The Two Towers extended edition, you will see Aragorn on the little hill at the bottom of the photo at about 2:31 minutes into the movie.

Our picture taken today

Still of the movie location

Here are some additional pictures taken of the Helm's Deep location and the plains that Saruman's army traveled across to reach the deep!