I am all movied out!

This weekend we had a very relaxed one where we watched 5 movies and ate loads of home cooked lasagne and drank plenty of red wine. So what where the five movies, well the first we watched was Hostel, its a Quentin T movie and its was awesome, very very gruesome, loads of horrific blood scenes and if you loved Saw or Saw 2 then you will love Hostel, I dont want to tell you the plot and i recommend you dont read the back of the DVD it will spoil the plot.The next was the Weather Man with Nicholas Cage and i think even his wife would find it hard to like this movie, please unless you have no will to live do not watch it!

After that we watched Derailed, with Clive Owen and Jennifer Aniston it is about these two married people was have an affair and they get attacked and Jennifer gets raped (she really played her most unlike Rachel from friends role the whole way through the movie) but they cant go to the police because of their affair. The attacker then blackmails them for money etc It was a pretty good movie to be honest, dont expect to much and you will enjoy it.

Next up was Transamerica with Felecity Hoffman, this is the one where my favourite desperate housewife got an oscar nomination for. She plays a man trying to become a woman and she finds out she has a 17 year old son one week before her gender change operation, and she cant get the operation signed off unless she deals with her son issue. I was so impressed by FH in this she was fantastic and the whole movie is very heartwarming, i would recommend giving it a watch.

I finally gave into temptation and went to see Johnny Depp in Pirates 2, well if i am honest i'd say that if it wasnt for Johnny Depp with movie would be crap and not much to look at! It is the kind of movie you have to see at the cinema for the effects etc, but if you have missing your chance dont worry the DVD wont lack that much. Even though i didnt really enjoy this movie i find myself waiting for the third one, maybe so i get to find out what happens as this movie is left in suspence and i wont have this big question mark hanging over me! Who knows?

Ha ha ha

As you all know i am a toastmaster and every year the toastmasters organisation runs contests, this morning our club ran the club level contest for humurous speech and i won. What this means is that I go on to respresent our club at the area level contest and whoever wins that will compete in the district level and the winners of that compete at National level.

Last year i won the club level and area level but i was overseas at the time of the district level i didnt compete, so fingers crossed this year i get another chance!

My speech was about the things that happen when you babysit, and i told of two of my experiences when i was younger and babysitting my two cousins Stephen and Maria. Its a 5 to 7 min speech so its to much for me to blog about but i promise if i win National level i will blog it all! :)

I am no cannibal but i love having friends over for dinner!

On Sunday night we had our friends Kirsten and Jason over for dinner, nothing flash just a good old fashioned chicken roast. Anyhow on Sunday we decided we would cook some duck breasts Kim gave us during the week; that night turned out to be Tuesday.

Kirsten looked for a nice recipe and between us both we pulled the ingredients together. We decided on duck cooked with with shallots, garlic, herbs and pistashio nuts, served with stir fry red cabbage with sliced almonds and mashed kumara. It was yummy! If i am honest Kirsten cooked the duck and i was the sliced, dicer and veg cooker! :) All washed down with some delicious red wine, it was superub!

What a fantastic day for a ride

Sunday was just the most perfect day for a weekend ride on the Harley, although it was shall we say fresh out the sun was bright and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. We met up with about 30 other bikes and with the majority of them two up, there was about 45-50 people so great fun! We headed out of town and up state highway 1 as if we were heading towards Kim and Susan place, our destination was Shannon a town that is a few km inland and about 90mins from Wellington, some people were wanting to just hang out and do some bird watching thing up there but myself and Al weren’t up for that, on a beautiful day like it was the last thing you want to be doing is not being on the bike, so we decided to go for our own tour and we took the back roads to a seaside town called Foxton and then followed the coast back to Wellington. It was just what we needed to blow out any cobwebs that had developed since the ride we had the weekend before!

Scallops and Duck

On Saturday we went to one of the partners at Al’s work house for what can only be described as a gourmet dinner! Roger the host together with his partner and hostess Arti served us up home made pate and bread/crackers and various other canap‚s to get our appetites flowing, we then sat down to some yummy scallops and bubbles for starters, for main course we had this delicious duck with veg and mashed kumara and the sauce they served with it was just so divine! For dessert Arti made a chocolate mousse, now I don’t like chocolate mousse in fact I don’t like any chocolate thing that is not a pure square of chocolate, but my mind was changed with this dessert, heavenly, divine, yummy and totally delectable are only a few words that I could use to describe it.

All of this food was of course washed down with plenty of red wine, bubbles, dessert wine and port although I was driving so I only had two glasses of wine, Al sure did make up for me J As did the other guests Adam and his partner Karen, it was a great night but I am now officially to scared to invite them to our house for dinner, not unless two minute noddles is their kind of thing!

Our Anniversary

On Friday myself and Al celebrated our anniversary, we have been together 4 years now, cant believe its been that long as I still get butterflies when I see him sometimes, but that said I often feel like driving a screwdriver through his head sometimes too he he only messing! Its been an amazing four years full of all the good and bad things about life but most importantly full of love and laughter. We went to this fantastic restaurant not far from our place in Newtown, it’s a really cosy French place which has an open fire etc, Al had obviously charmed the waitress there as we got the table by the fire! We have been there before, as that is where we went to celebrate Kirsten’s birthday, they have changed the menu since and the choices and the food was as good as they had been the last time. So we had a great night, we ate loads, drank loads and laughed heaps, which is basically what I like to call a perfect night!

Boo Hoo he's gone!

Yes folks my friend Darren headed off on his big overesas adventure OE, this is a photo of him on his last day in work here with his colleague Josh and his boss and my friend Lydia.

We had his leaving party in town on Saturday night at a really nice restaurant, and we had a nice few glasses of wine. He was leaving Wellington the next day to head to Auckland for a few nights so he coudl catch up with his sister, her husband and his twin niece and nephew. A few of us including Lydia went to the airport to wish him off, and i must say because i was so happy for him to be going off into the big bad world and excited for all the adventures he would have ahead i didnt think i would be emotional...................doh! as if! As soon as he was giving me a hug goodbye tears start to form in my eyes and they trickled down for a few minutes as we watched him clear security and board the plane.

I knew i was going to miss him as we hung out heaps together but i didnt think i would miss him so quickly as the next day in work was so weird and quite because he wasnt there :( and now 4 days later its not getting easier but i dont notice it as much.

I have heard from him and he is enjoying it so far now bare in mind he has only spent one night in Syndey and the rest has been in Auckland. He will spend another 6 nights in Sydney before he heads to Dubai for 3 nights and then on to the big smoke itself LONDON! Thankfully his brother and his partner live there so he will have someone to look after him and show him around!

Mandy's wedding

I know of you would like to know how Mandy's wedding went so i am going to cheat here and copy paste what she wrote to me!



We were then called to go downstairs at 4pm, walked down with dad and the bridesmaids behind me started to walk into the ceremony room to the intsrumental version of Bittersweet Symphony by the Verve. Was so happy but burst into tears half way down. Got to Luke and he said I looked beautiful and held my hands as I kept shaking and twitching my arms with nerves. Smiled and cried all the way through our vows and my cousin Sharon's reading "On your wedding day". Nearly said "Awful Husband"
instead of "Lawful Husband and think most people noticed the pause when I said it so they knew was I was thinking. Signed trhe register, had some more photos taken then walked out with Luke to Flowers in the Window by Travis.
Walked into the Marquee and everyone said how great it was and how happy we looked. Had a glass of champagne handed to me by one of the Ushers and had lots of pictures taken in the area outside but didnt feel like the time was all taken by pictures and got to talk to lots of people too. The table was decorated beautifully and our table arrangement had to be removed as it was so big. Had the meal about 5.30pm which was yummy. Started with Goats cheese in filo pastry, then Beef Fillet with black pudding and crunchy veggies then our chocolate wedding cake with raspberries. Gave out gifts of an England Team Signed Football shirt to the best man, cufflinks to the
2 ushers, Tiffany Jewellrey to the bridesmaids, Huge lovely bouquets to the
2 mums, Champagne to my cousin who did the reading and a box of nice wines to my aunt who made the bridesmaids dresses. The speeches were amazing and again I cried lots although think the best man speech had Luke shrinking in his chair - will have to bring the dvd of it when we visit.
The evening came and the Ceilidh Band (Irish & Scottish Dancing) started playing, Luke & I both got up and I kept going the wrong way, bumping into Luke but had a good laugh, think mostly everyone had a go though. Kept feeling sick due to nerves so stayed on water till the DJ arrived at 10pm then had a few vodkas. As we didnt have a 1st dance due to it being a Ceilidh we had a last dance to U2 "Even Better than the real Thing which was brilliant and everyone was clapping around us. Finished at 12pm and everyone headed into the main bar (apparently carrying on until 4am) but I went to our room at 1am.

Its been very busy

I know its been a month since i last blogged as my friend Scott has reminded me, or more to the point teased me. In the past month so much has happened its the busiest time in work as its year end and of course we had Kirsten and John's wedding and various other events/parties and of course hangovers. So i am not going to go into detail of any of them apart from the wedding.

The lads got married in Martinborough about 1hour from Wellington in this beutiful country retreat, where each of the bedrooms/cottages had real log fires! It was a lovely location, and even though its winter here the weather held up for the day.

When Kirsten was getting ready i kept getting butterflies in my tummy becuase i was so excited for her and for John of course, and when she walked into the room and walked up to John i was taking photos and thankfully i was because it meant i coudlnt cry, and during the cermony when i thought i was going to cry i would take more photos............................i took over 400 photos on the day!

Her dress was just uniquely stunning, as you can see from the photo it was green but what you cant see was these beautiful pink and white flowers that were on the back, her Mum made the dress and i can tell you she would give Tom Ford a run for his money thats for sure! I know its cliche to say the bride looked lovely etc but i have to say i have seen Kirsten in her PJ's, dressed in work clothes, dressed up for a night out and she is very pretty and looks great in general but man alive she looked amazing on her wedding day, she really did and to think she did her own hair and make-up (well with her Mum's help)!. I also have to say that John looked very dashing in his suit which his sister in law made (great job Susan).

The food was great, the atmosphere was fun and happy, everyone really enjoyed themselves but most importanly two people who love each very much got married and I was there to see it!