Happy Post-Thanksgiving!

 Hope your feasting and shopping went well.

We had a wonderful feast with about 20-25 people. It was pot luck and many dishes were shared. Eric made a homemade batch of salsa and I made a 5-layer dip. Both were well received as they were the only appetizers until dinner was served. Stephen was our host and it was fun to meet a bunch of new people. I was sorry I did not get a photo of the whole group. But I was enjoying the company and conversations - I don’t automatically think about pulling out my phone for photos (I think that is 

a good thing?)

Not quite sure where 2023 went. It has flown by. Not going to recap the year at this point, but suffice it to say, it’s hard to believe there is only one month left before we look at ringing in a new year. 

This last week was spent mostly relaxing. We moved from a nice air bnb to another friend’s place for a few weeks before we start our house/pet sitting stint that will get us to almost mid-Jan.  

We saw a subtitled foreign film called “Society of the Snow” based on the Uruguay flight with the rugby team that crash landed in the Andes. It is an amazing film. Really intense and hard to watch though. Not sure I would recommend it. 

Also saw “The Marvels” which was just a fun popcorn movie. 

We enjoyed it. 

And we are really enjoying the new Dr Who episodes! 

Not much more to report on the house or job front yet. We saw a few more homes, but nothing to pursue. Trying to just enjoy ourselves and the holiday time among friends. 

Wow- 2 months!

Not a whole lot new to report this week.

Still enjoying ourselves.

Pretty flower in Henri’s garden. 

Two new puzzles completed.

One was super easy, but was a type I had not seen before. The image on the box cover is not the actual puzzle image but what they are seeing through their eyes. They are called “Wasgij” - jigsaw spelled backwards. Fun concept -they are typically 1000 piece puzzles, but this one was a little 100 piece puzzle.

We went to a fun community craft market. 

Eric and Lance found the playground Lol

We saw the new Hunger Games film - intense and good. Viola Davis was fabulous!

We are now staying in a sweet garden cottage for the week. It is nice to just be the two of us for bit. Next week we are back with some friends and then we have some pet/ house sitting arrangements. It’s great to have all the options and opportunities, but truth be told, living out of suitcases can get tiring. 

The house hunt continues..

Saw a house we really liked but it has some issues, so I think we will continue the search…a few more to see this week.

Eric has now applied for two different photography jobs. We are hoping he will get the opportunity to choose. I have had some good meetings as well and we could both potentially be back to work in January. 

… stay tuned

Wishing everyone a very Happy Thanksgiving!

There is always something to be thankful for!

Just a casual week

 …Saw some more houses but still not any we are interested in. We will likely have to wait until January for more homes to become available. But we will keep looking. It is both entertaining and sometimes scary to see other people’s homes. 

Our container with all our stuff has now cleared customs and is in storage until we have a place to live. 

We had a fun adventure of “lost & found”. Eric’s car keys (remote fob and house keys) fell out of his pocket somewhere along a 30 minute walk around the neighborhood. We rewalked the route hoping to find them, but no luck. Stopped in to several businesses to ask if anyone had turned them in. Still no luck. This was on Thursday. On Sunday we went to the local market to pick up a few things. Eric had left a note with the manager earlier and we asked again if any keys had been turned in. At the same time I took a look at the community board that is on the market wall. 

And there it was!

Some amazing person, Mandy, had found them and posted a note.

We got Eric’s keys back. Yay! This was just another reminder of what we love about this place. Community! And great people. 

We also celebrated not having to get a replacement fob. They are crazy expensive! ($770 NZD) Eric’s keys are now tethered, and will no longer be able to “fall” out of his pocket. 

We have been enjoying staying with our friends Henri and Steve. Henri and I tackled a 1000 piece puzzle with a little help from Kim and Eric. Henri has a nice collection of puzzles but had not attempted one in many, many years. Really enjoying some down time.

We have also met some very nice people who are in need of a house/pet sitter for 5 weeks while they go on holiday. So we will be taking care of 2 sweet kitties starting early Dec. It will be nice staying in one place for over a month. From there we are not sure, but we know we have options. 

And so the adventure continues….

What a week

 It was a fun-filled busy week. The opening of Skullduggery was a great success. We got everything set up on time and everything looked great. About 50 pieces of art on display. The gallery was packed with people as soon as we opened and there was a queue(line) out the door and up about 3 blocks with more people waiting to get in.

Many pieces sold and by the end of the week about half the pieces in the show had been sold along with lots of posters, T-shirts and stickers.

It was an amazing body of work, by immensely talented artists. Many of which are also good friends. It was great to be a part of it and to be able to catch up with so many people. 

Some of my favorite pieces… but I loved many more. 

Still doing some house hunting, but the right one has yet to appear. 

We wrapped up our first 6 weeks staying with our gracious host Lance, and have now moved to our friend Henri’s for week #7.  We have also booked a week at a lovely garden cottage - air bnb, and have a potential house/pet sitting option for the holiday period. 

We love to share all the fun and adventure- the good times, but sometimes life is tough. We have just learned that our sweet kitty Myztyc has kidney failure and will not be with us much longer. We are heartbroken. It broke our hearts finding her a new home knowing we could not bring her back to NZ and still feeling that pain we are now hurting again. There is a hole in our hearts. Perhaps it’s better to think about it as paw prints left on our hearts that will always reside there. And we will be forever thankful to Cee and her partner for taking Myztyc in and giving her a loving home for the past four months. I don’t know how much longer she has, but I know she had a wonderful and loving 12 years.

May she pass peacefully over the rainbow bridge. 😭