Now Playing.. A Tuateawa Christmas!

This is the native Christmas tree, the pohutakawa, that blooms in red around Christmas time every year. Pohuktakawas bring a little Christmas color to an otherwise not-so-Christmasy environment.. Robin and I arrived in Coromandel in mid-December, right in time to see the trees while on long drives along the coast between the towns of Thames, Coromandel and Tuateawa... All of these towns are situated on the Coromandel Peninsula. Thames is the "service" town, located at the base of the peninsula on the West Coast. Coromandel town is an hour North from Thames, also on the West coast. To get to Tuateawa, we then cross over the mountain ridge to the East coast and drive through a small, sleepy town called Kennedy Bay. Neither Tuateawa nor Kennedy Bay have any shops, just homes and a few cows, at least one pig, a goat (that seems to get around as the lawn mower in Kennedy Bay) and dogs.. Why would one go to Tuateawa? Why, for the sea, the forest and the mountains. Our host, Jon, has a new house in Tuateawa, and it is officially my home in NZ. Robin and I came to the house with Jon on the first day he bought it. We've spent the last two weeks sorting out the house, cooking elaborate meals and baking at least twice a day.. In between kitchen duties, we've also transplanted banana trees, made Christmas decorations, painted, knitted, kayaked, and had many beach runs. Bur first... Christmas!

Snowflake-making brought a good Christmasy feel to the house, as Christmas comes in the middle of summer here, and besides Jon we were two Alaskans and a Minnesotan. However, it got to be a competitive sport in the house, as Jon turned out to be a natural..



We decorated our Christmas tree with popcorn strands (made while watching Star Wars and eating brownies) and bones (for Jon's dogs). Our tree was a local, slaughtered pine. Pines are an invasive species, so they're often chopped down by conservationists..


Our tree is in the background here. This is Christmas morning, post-fishmas breakfast (explained below)... Robin is taking down my stocking with care (a hat from Ecuador, my socks weren't big enough!). It was full of Cadbury chocolates and a knitting pattern for socks! Jon is already digging into his stocking, which is a big, woolly sock. He's got big feet.


This is the apron that my sister, niece and nephew made for me! It matches the Pohutakawa trees! It arrived at the perfect time, as I'm spending hours of every day in the kitchen. I wore it almost the entire day on Christmas, while playing charades (the hardest one that I succeeded in acting out was "Stratford-Upon-Avon".. I used lots of "sounds like"s... We were using an outdated British pictionary game for cards)..


I also wore it later that night while playing Settlers of Catan. We play lots of games here at the house, and Christmas was no exception!


And these are the socks that Robin knitted for me! Stripes! Between the socks and the apron, I am definitely the best-dressed house elf in Tuateawa! I'm also wearing my Christmas crown that I got in my cracker, which we filled with more Cadbury chocolates and pohutakawa flowers!



This is Robin and her brother, Aron, who joined us from the states at on the day we moved from tents to the house. Here you see our second round of hats and the headbands that I knitted for Robin and Aron.


Oh right, I forgot the BEST part (sarcasm is hard to convey in type). Jon renamed Christmas as Fishmas! It all started a few days prior, when he asked Robin and I "Do you guys eat fish?" Our answer was yes, but we had no idea that meant that Christmas would turn into Fishmas. Early on Christmas morning, he dragged Robin out to retrieve the net at sea, then spent hours cleaning and filleting the fish. I helped out by taking pictures, attempting to untangle the net and running the fillets up to the freezer. Then we had fish for Christmas breakfast, which Jon thought was great, though most of us just had fruit.
Here's Robin filleting...


And the Big Eye that was just too cute...



Even when it's not Christmas, we are oh so busy here in Tuateawa. Jon is like a New Zealand guidebook, and our walks and adventures always turn up something new like these cat-eye snails..



We've been sooo happy to have a kitchen and have made all kinds of yummy stuff. Digging through Jon's storage containers, we stocked the kitchen with all the necessary stuff.. After a few days, we had a(nother) party for Robin's birthday, one week later, as we were finally able to bake a cake!


It was good to have Aron here for Robin's re-celebrated birthday. We were also glad to have another stomach to feed!


This is Jon and I. Have I even explained what this house is for and who Jon is? Too much Christmas cheer...


so.. Jon runs a program called Earthwise valley. The "valley" is a piece of land that Jon owns near Tuateawa. It's situated on land that was used for Kaori logging (booo!) and, more recently, cattle farming (booooooo!). Jon is beginning this project after after running a different volunteer project, which he did for about ten years. His goal is to plant lots of native trees for birds and bugs, as well as establishing a fruit orchard, vege gardens, and ultimately building big volunteer center.. Last year, they built a pond for ducks (including the endangered Brown Teal) and a composting toilet. This is the second season of volunteers in the valley. The first year, they all lived in tents, and it was tough. Thus, the house is a necessity.. Jon also takes the volunteers on lots of fun trips: kayaking, rock-climbing, etc... The volunteers will be arriving in January, and thus the house is needs to be fitted for its new purpose.. We're bringing in beds and stocking the kitchen for big meals.. In the meantime, we were lucky to have the house for just the four of us over the holidays, and we quickly felt like a family! I'll be here for the first week of the program to ease the volunteers in (and make sure they know to respect the kitchen that I've worked so hard to set-up!)

Golden kiwifruits that we got on a shopping day in Thames.. Oh what joy are fruits and veges when you live almost two hours from the shops!


We're establishing a garden at the house. We planted lettuces and broccoli in a bed that we filled with dirt harvested from the valley, seaweed from the beach and duck goo from the pond..



The view from our house!



Wow. Now that I've started writing this blog, I realize that I should've been writing one everyday! There's so much we've done.. But here's one last pop! kayaking...



And a little blue penguin who was out people-watching while we paddled by...