Happy Easter, Passover, Spring and Autumn...

Nelson continues to be one of my favorite places here in New Zealand. I love walking around the town checking out all of the great shops filled with beautifully crafted items - glass, pottery, jewellery, art and more.

Unfortunately, Eric caught that nasty flu and was quite under the weather. He still made the trip, but was planning to take it easy. This was the last stop on Mom/Sue and Mary's trip before heading back to the states. And after 3 weeks, Mom/Sue's knee was also in need of a rest. So Eric and Sue got to enjoy some extra relaxing time together while Mary and I did a little more adventuring.

The highlight was going over to the Able Tasman National Park.
The last time we were there we drove the hour plus. This time, aunt Mary and I took the water taxi over. It was a beautiful day. The weather was perfect. I was in heavan - in the sun, in a boat on the water -wind in my hair. Reminded me of so many other times years ago....
We spent the entire day outside, on the water and walking the trails along the beaches of the park. In places the Cicadas were almost deafening.

It was a great visit and a great little summer get away.

And summer continued. This was the warmest and longest of the summers since we have been here. I have thoroughly enjoyed it. As Autumn now approaches(here)- the cicadas have gone quiet, mornings are dark and the rain is overdue. We are actually having a drought here. And the lack of water is costing the country significant money. They are saying 2 billion.

This is the calm before the storm so to speak. The first three month of the year have been relatively calm and easy. We have had relaxing weekends and some great evenings and meals with good friends. And I only had one 10 day trip back to China.

Now we will blink and the next three - four months will be a blur.
In some ways it will be lots of great fun but it will also be quite a bit of work.
I am scheduled to run our Weta booth at two shows in Australia. This will be my first time to Australia, and unfortunately I won't have any spare time to explore. But I am very much looking forward to it. I will be at SupaNova - a pop culture/ComicCon type convention in Melbourne and then the Gold Coast. Then both Eric and I are scheduled to go to Calgary Expo in Canada. And hopefully a few days visit with family in LA on our way back. If we do get there, we apologize to those we will not have the time to see, but look forward to catching up in July when we return for a longer visit.
Still working out the details, but will likely have another trip to China too.
Still working on new products to launch for Weta and The Hobbit as well as plans for San Diego ComicCon in July. Eric is hoping to get some more work as The Hobbit gears back up for movie pick-ups for films 2 and 3.

Tanner is continuing to hang in there, and Casey is doing amazing. She competed in a dance competition and Wow! She won a 1st place Platinum award. Look at those legs!
Really looking forward to seeing them both again soon.

Myztyc is doing great. She has managed to grow into a healthy full size kitty from the tiny malnourished kitten that we rescued a year ago. Her favorite activity is chasing down any bug that gets into the house.

Warm wishes to all.
Cheers,
Eric and Stacy