Picking Blueberries

Finally our family (oh excluding our dad!) went on a road trip of sorts! My brothers, my mum and I went down to Ngatea (south of Auckland) with a few church family friends to go blueberry picking today! Originally we had planned to go last Saturday, but it was Chinese New Year Festival so we decided to reschedule it to today.

We all met up outside McDonald's in Greenlane to figure out what route we'd take and who would be following who. It was agreed that the Minister's family would follow Nadine, and Jessica's mum's car would follow Aonghas and us.

The drive down to the blueberry farm took just over an hour. We just saw grass, hills and cows for most of the time so there wasn't much to look at. I tried entertaining myself with the music on my iPod and teaching Hamish how to use the SLR.

There were a few occasions when Aonghas's phone GPS went a little funny. There were a couple of times when the GPS said we were travelling in the water!

We eventually reached the blueberry farm. We grabbed some bags and buckets and went to start picking! We were looking for blueberries on the nearby trees when one of the farm staff told us we were picking from the wrong trees and that we had to go to the far side to find the blueberries!

There were rows and rows of small trees with blueberries on them. We were trying to pick the largest, least-wrinkliest and darkest blueberries! Hamish started to fill his bucket with blueberries our mum wasn't too happy with, so he was just told to find blueberries to eat! We could eat any blueberries we picked, but we had to pay for any blueberries we decided to leave with.

I was trying to pick the best blueberries, much better than Jireh and Tommy's 'high quality' blueberries! After a few hours though I got a bit tired of picking. Joylynn started chucking blueberries at me so I retaliated. It ended up becoming a full-on blueberry fight! Lucky we didn't get caught by anyone!

We eventually got tired of picking blueberries and tried jumping over this huge ditch while the parents carried on picking. We all seemed to successfully jump over the ditch but then Hamish had a go and...landed in it! Fortunately the muddy water was quite shallow so he didn't get too dirty!

We soon decided to head back to the office to pay for our blueberries. I think our mum ended up paying for $40 worth of blueberries! We hung around eating lunch by our cars before deciding to return to Auckland. Before we could go anywhere though we were held up by all these cows crossing the road! They seemed to know where they were going though which was quite impressive!

The drive back to Auckland was a little more tiring, and Aonghas was trying to stay awake and alert so I played some music on my iPod for him. The only thing was I was starting to fall asleep too!

We got back to the McDonald's Greenlane carpark where our parents discussed what we were going to do next. They all soon agreed to go have dinner together at a nearby restaurant called the Golden Horse. Some others from church such as Derek and his mum, Tim and Gabrielle were going to join us.

We sat upstairs, with the younger people sitting at one table while the older people/parents sat at the other table. I don't know who ordered the food as it was done while I was in the toilet, but there was quite a lot of food!

I was full by the end of it, and so we were all talking. I tried asking Tim to tell me the story about how he and Gabrielle's relationship started, and in the end everyone made him tell the story in front of them all! It was quite amusing but very sweet!

After Gabrielle and Tim shared their story about how their relationship started, the minister and his wife shared their story as well. It was really nice! Hopefully I'll have a story like that to tell one day!

By then it was getting quite late, so we all headed off home. It was just as well, as tomorrow is my first day at work!

Happy Anniversary Auckland!

Tomorrow is Auckland Anniversary, and so the Auckland Council put on a HUGE fireworks display over the harbour tonight to celebrate!

As usual, we left quite late so that there wasn't any parking around, and the fireworks started while we were still driving around the waterfront! That's when we just decided we'd just drive as close to the wharf as possible, park wherever we were and get out to watch the fireworks. It turns out that many others had the exact same idea! There were all these cars just parked in the middle of the wharf with their occupants getting out to watch the fireworks! Fortunately there was no police around!

From what we could see, the fireworks were quite big and lasted for a few minutes.

Once they were over though, there was a massive car-jam but somehow all the cars managed to leave in a somewhat organised manner!

Chen's 21st Birthday

Tonight was Chen's early 21st birthday party, since he will be starting uni early (being a medical student and all) and won't be able to celebrate next month when he really does turn 21. This was a really special 21st as we've known Chen since primary school which dates all the way back to 1998!

Chen had asked me to give a birthday speech for him so I stayed up late last night perfecting the speech, while Aonghas put together a a little video montage using a few videos he dug out from the Anderson archives.

I spent this morning before the party trying to make Diane's (his cousin) 21st birthday present that I owe her a year ago (we had an agreement that we'd make handmade presents for each other's 21st birthdays!) but didn't get it done in time, so I asked her if I could give it to her by the next time I meet up with her! Ouch! She was OK with that though so that was a relief!

When we got to Chen's house most people were already there eating. There was a slideshow playing on the TV (I think most of the photos were the ones we sent him!). We grabbed some food to eat and joined some of the guys we knew, like Zahir and Alex from high school and Diane. I knew a few of Chen's friends as I've met them before at Grafton, and some of them do pharmacy!

We just sat around eating and talking, waiting for a few more friends to show up before it was time for Chen's 21st birthday speeches!

I was the only person Chen really approached about giving a speech, so I gave a speech I had prepared for him, followed by Aonghas who played a video he had put together for him without his knowledge. I think that really surprised him!

After we finished, Chen opened the floor for others to say a few words about Chen, and it was remarkable just how many people had something nice to say about Chen! It definitely shows what a great friend he is. We heard all sorts of stories about him at uni and at high school.

His parents were the last to give him a speech and it was very heartfelt and touching!

Chen then gave a thank you speech which was well planned and thought out!

We all went to the kitchen and gathered around the table as we sang Happy Birthday to Chen before cutting the cake.

After we all had a slice of cake, it was time for Chen to unwrap his presents! He got a telescope from a group of his med friends, a shaver from his girlfriend Rose, and from the Anderson brothers he got a model of a heart! He got an iPhone 4 from Diane's family though so nothing can really top that off!

To finish off the night there was Xbox Kinect in one room and Wii in the other. I had a go at both, playing the Dance Revolution on Kinect and looking like a fool, and then losing at baseball on the Wii!

It was just on midnight and time to go. We had our last photos with Chen before it was time to go!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY to a truly great and wonderful friend Chen!

Google Almost Knows Us!

The Problem with Handmade Presents

Last year for our 21st birthdays, my good friend Diane and I agreed that we'd make handmade birthday presents for each other. While she surprised me with a really awesome 21st plushie sorta thing, I hadn't made anything for her by the time her 21st birthday came around, which was actually a week before mine!

I told her I'd get it done and give it to her the next time we met up, but I've been having trouble coming up with something handmade that I could make because I'm pretty useless with my hands!

I finally came up with an idea and originally thought it would be easy enough to make, but I'm starting to realise that it might be a bit hard! I promised I'd give it to her by Chen's birthday tomorrow, so I don't have much time to get it done! I've been shopping with my mum for materials but it's quite difficult too!

Hopefully it all goes well!