I put up…

This little beauty this evening.

Absolute Addiction

Since I found it, I have been in love with www.designsponge.com. I had to stop going onto it for a while, my ideas list was getting overly full and there was nothing I could cut off the list or save for later cause they were all equally amazing. Today, I went onto Design Sponge for the first time in a very long time and I relived the feeling of falling in love with it. The ideas running through my head right now are insane. I can not wait to start some new projects… Maybe one day soon I'll finish the ones I've started.
Yip, I believe this is love.

Awesome Cup

This is me last night. When I felt ten times better than I do tonight. But the cup is awesome. Wickedly awesome. The Lemsip Cold and Flu drink that is in the cup is what is really killing my week about now. Not to mention it’s only Monday. Thanks cold/flu (I haven’t haven’t yet decided which one my symptoms are leaning towards).

PS. Still loving the cup!

Can you feel it to?

Cause I certainly can.

Christmas is in the air!

It is on it’s way!

It’ll be here sooner than we know!

So…

You better watch out,
You better not cry,
Better not pout,
I'm telling you why:
Santa Claus is coming to town.
He's making a list,
And checking it twice;
Gonna find out
Who's naughty and nice.
Santa Claus is coming to town.

As much as Christmas is my second favourite time of year (selfishly, my birthday is my first) I am super slack when it comes to present buying. So far, I only have a tiny gift for my mum, a tiny joint gift for my brother and his partner, and books I bought for Tyler yonks ago. Luckily, I only have four people to arrange presents for. And, I am super proud because one of the presents I do have I made myself – off an idea I found online!!!

Christmas PARTY!

I am going to start by explaining that there is no way I could explain the absolute love I have for my job, and in order to love your job you have to love your work place. Yes, we have our problems, like any work place. However, these problems compare in utterly no way to the pure agony I used to go through every day as I dragged myself to my place of work.

Our Christmas party way a blast. We drove to Puhoi on Saturday afternoon to kayak from Puhoi to Wenderholm. After we drove up to Leigh, where work had hired a house for us to stay in for the night, and we had dinner at the Sawmill Cafe, followed by a small party back at the house.

The kayaking was fantastic. Relaxing. Fun. Enjoyable. Entertaining. It took us around two hours to kayak eight kilometres. We spent the time singing, talking, enjoying the scenery, and running into trees.

The house in Leigh looked out over the ocean and was the perfect size. There was even a fish pond built next to to back yard deck.

Dinner was nice, nothing like the reviews we had received, but still nice. We all got along very well and laughed so much. We were meant to be staying for the live bands that were playing from 9pm. But, they didn’t start till 9.45pm and they weren’t up beat enough for our party, so we ventured back to the house and the ones going back to Auckland went on their way.

We stayed up until around 2am standing on chairs singing and dancing, watching everyone do the most hilarious acts, sharing our deepest and darkest’s, talking smack, and giggling about but all.

This tops the fun we had at conference by a huge million. I can not wait for the rest of the fun that is going to come to this job. From doing something I am extremely passionate about, to enjoying every aspect of it fully; this is something I truly love.

To the Lighthouse

I have finished my second book off my big long list, “To the Lighthouse” by Virginia Woolf. And, once again, it is very much the same as the first. In my opinion: “The book in a whole is actually a rather good read. That is after you get past the first two or so chapters.” In the lighthouses case, its good once you get to the Part III (otherwise known as the last part) of the book.

The book is about a painting, a lighthouse, a family, a holiday home, and the guests the family invite to their holiday home. But really it’s not about those in any particular order, they just intertwine (oddly) to make the book: sad, happy, exciting.

Fairly nervous is the emotion I am feeling about contemplating buying another book off my list and read it. It only took me over four months to get through this tiny one hundred and sixty paged book. However, it was a very good sleep-aid. I knew if I read it for at least five minutes I'd be asleep five minutes later.

Really, I have to stop bagging on this book. The story is a very good story. It is just written in a time of patience and extremely great literature.

Conference

On Thursday night our over two’s team flew to Wellington for the 2011 Childspace Institute Peace Conference based on the slogan “Teach Peace.”

It was exactly what we needed as a team. We have grown so much closer and are gelling ten times better than we have before.

There were a few speakers at the conference who were not very interesting. However, every topic that all the speakers spoke about were interesting and relevant.

My favourite was one by Dr Stuart Shanker. He spoke about the development of Self Regulation – google this. It is amazing and has changed my views on so many things, from children sleeping to children with neurological disorders to calming children down and teaching them how to calm themselves down.

Dr Rangimarie Turuki Rose Pere gave the closing speech for the conference and she was awesome. She is all about love and loving oneself and loving every single thing in the world from the grass to the salt the salt in the sea, to the people who don’t like you. And, she is also very if you have a problem with me that is your problem, not mine.

On Friday afternoon after all the speakers and work shops, our team went and sat in on of our hotel rooms and we came up with so many planning ideas, it was the best planning session we have had since I have been at CK. We spent two hours sharing our ideas, extending on each others ideas and making plans of how to put in place all our ideas. We also discussed ideas that have been tried before and that we will try again, as just because something hasn’t worked when it has been tried before does not mean that it can not work now.

We had two days of conference and then flew home last night.

I can not wait till conference next year. It is going to be in Rotorua and be based on the slogan of “The nature of nurture.”