My Sweet 16th :)

I wanted a memorable celebration for my sixteenth this year, and initially I thought something 'big'. Time slipped away on me though (and I couldn't really think of anything...), so we didn't actually finish organising this until the day before it all took place! 

In the end, the Sonnevelds came to our place around 12:30, and we piled into our people-mover {which I cleaned the night before - go me! :P} to pick up Middy and Becks before heading out to the Hunua Falls/Ranges.

Because we didn't end up having enough time for a long walk, we just went to the falls and then up to the lookout. Afterwards we got the food out of the car and headed for one of the picnic tables. Despite being somewhat gloomy, the weather held up throughout the afternoon, allowing us to enjoy ourselves without getting drenched!

Middy had previously committed to something else later in the afternoon, so dropped her home, then went to Manna Christian Bookstore while we waited for Anne Roos to be ready (she flew back to Auckland that afternoon), at which point we met her at Tenpin Manukau.

Two games later a tired lot of us came back to my place for the rest of the evening. 

While we had been all over town, my mum and siblings had been busy getting the house ready for us to arrive. They made beef casserole for dinner, along with dessert and cake (which we didn't end up icing or eating...oops!). They also pulled out our second dining table and set it up in the lounge for us {since you can't exactly fit five extra people around one!}. 

After dinner and dessert we claimed the lounge suite to watch Saving Sarah Cain. The food leftover from afternoon tea was completely forgotten but near the end we remembered the drinks ;)

By then end of the movie it was 10-ish and time for home and bed.

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This was actually from another day;
it's the mud cake I made and decorated myself.
Yep, tough stuff making my own birthday cake! lol

Gifts from my family

Gifts from friends
See, 16 really is sweet!!!! :P :P

 

17th Birthday Celebration: Mini-Golf

: : Birthday Girls - Middy & Ruth : :

My friends Ruth and Middy both turned 17 in June this year. The following is a description of the celebration that took place on the 23rd (a Saturday).

Since only one of us (Suzanne) has a full driver’s license, we all went in one vehicle; Becka was picked up first, I was next; then we went to get Middy and her mum, before heading out to Treasure Island Mini-Golf (near the airport).

Sometimes it’s really handy being the height I am. For example, when you go somewhere that says ‘ID required’ to get in at student pricing, but I can get it without ID or questions! Haha :P

  

: : Me, Es, Middy : :



I hadn’t really played mini-golf before, so I guess you could say I was a bit disadvantaged in that regard, since everyone else knew how it all worked while I had to learn! We had heaps of fun though, and took loads of photos (mini-golf with friends = photo session, right? Lol).





: : Es and I : :



Some holes were ok, some were cool, and some were just plain annoying, because you could get the ball so close multiple times, but it just wouldn’t go in the hole! I think each of us got one (not the same) hole in a single shot. Mine came on one where we had all said “Oh no, this is gonna be a hard one!” because it was a longer distance than some of the others, and there were two steep rises, and near the hole was just on a slight slope; if you missed the hole, your ball would roll right back to where you’d started from! Also when I got it, the floodlights were off and it was quite dark.





: : Ruth and I : :





: : Me, Ruth, Becks, Es, Middy, & Suz : :



By the end we were freezing and glad to get back to the car. We went to Pak n Save, then to Middy’s. We quickly ate dinner, butter chicken, before going downstairs to watch a movie. After much debating we had chosen All A Girl Could Want, and we managed to squeeze five of us on one couch to watch {good times!}. Because we’re so great at planning (haha), we had piles of chips, lollies, chocolate, and soft drinks, as well as a delicious (well done, Es :) ) birthday cake – which boasted of more variety in icing than I could have dreamed of!

We had heaps of fun, and were a tired lot when it came to home-time! Again, happy birthday Ruth and Middy!

Fun Run 2012

Every athletics season our club holds a 'fun run' as a fund raiser. The athletes run as many laps as they can around the track in one hour. And well yeah, I kinda didn't do it this season!! But hey, I got heaps of photos instead :P Enjoy!


Grouping up around the start line




Middy, Mrs. Rakete, and Mrs. Bennet marking people.
The athletes get a mark each time the cross the start/finish line;
at the end of the night, the marks are counted to determine the
number of laps the athletes have run.




Katie (8) and Amy (7)




Bryce (4)




Joanna (4)




oops..she saw me! Danielle (5)




ok, so maybe instead of asking her to pose,
I should take a photo when she isn't looking?!?hehe
cute tho, right? lol




Joel and Essie




Mackenzie (4) and Matti run the sausage sizzle

  After we arrived home for our awesome night at athletics, our neighbour Melissa dropped these in:


 Yes, they were delicious!!!

Bible Study Breakup

Written 24th and 26th December

Monday, December 22nd saw me baking banana cakes, writing a shopping list, and rushing around the supermarket when Mum finally took me! When she dropped me home, I made a pasta salad, and iced one of the cakes almost as fast as I could. Then I got myself ready, and was picked up by the Sonnevelds at about 3:15, and went to their house.

My friends and I cut and prepared a LOT of food(!), and had a go at making punch…although no one seemed to have much of an idea of how to make it! We survived the ordeal with only one bottle of soft drink spilt (don’t worry Joanna! (4years)), and a few blood splotches on the floor because Joanna had cut her foot (I think without realising?)

Once we had all the food ready, we took it down to the flat, er, garage (it doesn’t look like a garage though…!).

We turned on the plate thingie (what’s it called?) for the gourmet dinner, and were slightly surprised at how fast it heated up! So we quickly lit the candles, and put some food into the trays to cook. For those of us who like to do things as fast as possible, the food cooked a little too slowly, but we did really enjoy it!

Middy has an ipod, so we played music for a while, and someone also came up with the idea of us singing! As tradition has it, I had a mind blank and couldn’t think of any songs I knew and could sing (although, in fact, I love music and singing along to it, so there probably is at least a few songs that I know well enough to have been able to sing them!), but it was fun watching, photographing, and videoing the others! I took all the photos on my camera, and all the videos on a friend’s camera, but unfortunately they deleted all the videos. =(

Middy, Ruth, Essie

Amid the singing (and laughing!) we did find time to eat! A lot too...haha We ate TONS of dinner, then decided to go for a bit of a walk before dessert. We walked through a paddock (inhabited by sheep...why on earth didn’t I put something on my feet???!) to a rope swing, that swung over a decent sized drop! We soon walked back for dessert.

We lit the candle and poured the chocolate into the bowl for the fondue, and while we waited for it to melt, we roasted, and completely burned, some marshmellows (yum!) . Anyway, it did melt, and we dug in..it was delicious! My friends then went a little crazy (I think they{er, we!} may have had too much sugar?!?!):

Middy, Ruth, Essie

Essie



Middy



Burning marshmellows....*grin*



And a group pic just before we left...



Mrs Sonneveld did eventually manage to get us all into the car to drop us home! (Thank you!)
And thus ended our awesome night! =D

Bee

Athletics Prizegiving

Just quickly, here are some pics from Athletics prizegiving, for the season of 2010-2011.
I helped with lining up children and taking them around to the back door, and on to the stage when it was their turn. That is sooo difficult when no one listens to you..oh well, I was rescued when that happened so anyway shouldn't complain I spose.. ok and then after they've been presented with their awards you have to help them (mostly the younger ones) go out the right door and have their photo taken.

Diana being presented with her certificate and trophies. Can you see that
everyone just thinks she's the cutest?!? lol ok maybe I am a bit biased.. =D

Diana tries to balance all her trophies! ( She recieved three; one of which was the 'Champion of Champions')

Middy and me with our certificates et cetera
(I was the only one in my age group, hence all the trophies...lol!)

After all of this had finished we all lined up for free food...yumm!!! =D

We've all had a good laugh about this: it was the first prize-giving we were able to attend, Danielle and I had won one trophy each from past years, and Mum thought the irony of it all would be the one year we attended prize-giving we wouldn't win anything...we came home with six (I think) trophies in all...lol!