Friday at last

Team Challi arrive tomorrow (only the two team captains are coming though - Lieutenant Robin and First Mate Kirstie). Here for 4 or 5 days and then awaaaaaaay to hot and muggy Singapore again.  Birthday drinks for Jim on Sat night in Shek-O, and then on Sunday we're hooking up with Sam and Mary for lunch (starring the Challi family again). Oh, and on Sunday morning I'm helping a photographer friend to shoot a wedding ceremony, which will be a fantastic experience. Anyway - a nice and busy weekend, which is useful for helping us forget that we're not in NZ anymore...

Happy Birthday Ross!

Happy Birthday Ross! You are now officially closer to 40 than you are to 30. Sorry, dude. A few photos after George's first night back in Hong Kong.  After a touch of grumpiness triggered by his desire to start his night sleep earlier than usual and his mummy's desire for him not to sleep too early, a Mexican standoff was avoided, and little man had a good night of dozing - with only a few grizzles before morning arrived.  Not bad, given that he ought to have a touch of jetlag.  A bit of tummy time this morning led to an inadvertent roll - which we would like to put down to his immense strength, but sadly have to accept that it was more due to the size of his cloth nappy relative to the rest of his scrawny torso. Poor kiddo rolls around like a spinning top if unsupervised.

As you can see, his afro is really coming along.  I'm struggling to tell whether it's morning hair or a true afro.  I'll let you know after bathtime tonight.

Home again

A few more photos from holiday

George with his security detail and George with Grandma Shanti [EDIT - I already posted that photo of Grandma, but it's nice and big this time):

A few random photos from the batch sitting on my hard drive

A few more of George hangin' in New Zealand

spacespacesapce More busy days for George - on Saturday he went out to Lydia and Brad's farm in South Auckland and had a lovely lunch out there with Lydia, Brad, Bump (due May), Bridget, Marcus and little Isabel. Just a few photos from there:

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And then a few photos with George's Aunty Jane and Aunty Chipper:

Another day out for Big G

spacespacespace A few more photos from G's day out.  Daddy is missing his editing software (and his cats) quite a lot, but only a few more days until he is reunited with Photoshoppy Goodness. In a late change to the itinerary, Rachel and George are staying on in NZ for another week to chill out, while Daddy brings home the proverbial bacon...

George with Aunty Amanda:

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Hanging with Uncle Eugene in the afternoon (when Mummy and Daddy accidentally stumbled upon him in downtown Auckland and tagged along for a few wines):

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And one last photo from the Stanley Bay ferry:

Photos of various people around New Zealand holding George :-)

Haven't got time to edit or organise photos, but here are a few I grabbed from the camera of little George with various new friends around New Zealand - firstly with Grandma Shanti (one on the couch and one just before bathtime), George and Aunty Jane-O, George and Aunty Kate, George and Uncle Aaron and finally a few of George with Honorary Grandma Joy:

A day of play

spacespacespace George met his mates Thomas and Angus this morning, and in the afternoon hung out with Claudia, James and their respective parents.  Daddy went nuts with the camera, and despite not having his editing software here in New Zealand, there are some very sweet ones of the day.

Firstly, Thomas and Angus tearing up the back yard:

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And then some of Teams Pearce, Hayes and Georgeous at Chez Hayes:

A few photos from holiday

Holiday is passing all too quickly, but I've managed to take billions of photos in any event... The flight was fine, and we sat next to a lovely Kiwi girl Jenny and her 4 month old Isabel on the way here.  George was impeccably behaved on the flight, and with the exception of a pants explosion before the flight, and a minor flipout after we landed, he was an angel. We went to his Aunty Momo's wedding on Saturday, and again he was impeccably behaved.  Slept through the good bits, smiled through the photos, and passed out during dinner.  A few photos from the week and from the wedding. More to come later in the week:

The Daily George takes a short break

Internet access in NZ is suckysucky, and so the updates for the next three weeks until Easter will either be sporadic (at best) or via my mobile phone. But I will be taking plenty of photos of him, and I'll upload what I can whenever I can. Rachel packed his stuff today, and I think it's cute that a 4.5kg kid has a 12kg bag of stuff.  I also think that the days of sprinting to try and get to the front of customs and immigration are long gone, and I'm pretty much resigned to the fact that we'll be needing a luggage trolley for the next, oh... 15 years?  Not to worry - tomorrow will be a wicked learning experience.  Our taxi arrives at 4:30pm and our flight leaves at 7:15pm.  Plenty of time to chill out and settle the wee man - and we get to take the stroller right up to the door of the plane (it magically meets us when the plane doors open, too).

I'll leave you with some photos of post-breakfast playtime this morning:

Yawn contest

A few random photos

spacespacesap I took a few photos of little fella this morning while he was half sleeping and half flirting with his mummy - and I got a few of the world's most shy cat trying to look fierce (well, yawning).  I'm too sleepy to touch these up or go all  Anne Geddes on you, so enjoy them in their brutally unedited glory:

Two working days to go...

spacespacespace ...until New Zealand!

Here are a few photos from this morning in the lounge.  Daddy did the nappy change and hung with little man on the window seat in the lounge.  And then Ben arrived to check out his new sibling:

George laughing

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Oops - a few more from yesterday

Angelo's photos

spacespacespace George's newest friend Uncle Angelo (remember - George is part Sri Lankan, so every male he knows who is older than him becomes "Uncle") took some lovely photos of the little man at our Saturday morning coffee date this weekend.  Check out little Mr Smiley McSmileypants:

Of namesakes and lineage (a special post for Granny B and Aunty Jacq)

 Although most people know that little George was named after his great grandfather, not so many know that his great grandfather George was actually an All Black back in the day.  This photo of Great Granddad George is taken from the NZRU website.  An excerpt from his website bio at www.allblacks.com:  "George Adkins was a stocky front row player whose height of 1.80m (5ft 11in) and weight of 93kg (14 and a half stones) made him ideal for the prop when that position became the vogue following the switch in the early 1930s to the 3-4-1 scrum.  Timaru born and a product of Timaru Boys High, Adkins appeared for the South Canterbury union in 51 matches in the decade covering 1929-39. Excellent form in the 1934 and 1935 trials and for the South in the 1934 inter-island match won him a place on the 1935 tour of Britain."

Little George has big shoes to fill if he decides to play rugby...

Much to his mother's disgust, little George arrived in bed this morning dressed in an All Blacks onesie (thanks Aunty Momo) that is about 3 sizes too big.  Daddy couldn't resist, having been given free reign on clothing choices this morning.  I mean, really - how awesome is this?

Another morning with Daddy

spacespacespace Quite possibly against her better judgment (which is questionable, given her choice of husband), Rachel left Little One with Daddy for the morning. A more extended babysitting gig than last time, this time so Mummy could hit the hairdresser for the pre-New Zealand touch up (her hair looks lovely, of course).

We ended up at FUEL coffee, meeting my photography junkie friend Angelo - who was about to hop on a flight back to San Francisco. Handy location, as FUEL is about three floors up from the Airport train station.  

Everything went well - Angelo took loads of photos of George (with a camera I would kill for) and even had a cuddle. The little punk (George, not Angelo) had the nerve to give Angelo nothing but smiles and giggles. False advertising, little one...

He snoozed and snoozed a bit more, and then I took him home.  Where he snoozed. And snoozed a bit more.  And at 1pm I had to physically wake him for his lunchtime feed of pureed steak and mashed potatoes.  Ha, just kidding. He got milk.

Despite his voice sounding a tad hoarse (hey - it's not like he has any actual words for us), the new sleeping routine seems to be working well. I still hate watching / hearing him cry, but he really is getting to sleep in a much more predictable way.  It's 11pm as I'm typing this, and he just went down again - four hours since his last feed, and with minimal fuss.  All good.

Anyway, here are a few photos from Chez Narly today. Oh yes - that is indeed baby vomit on my t-shirt. I didn't spot it until Rachel pointed it out after I had taken the photo. Little sod puked all the way down Wellington, down to Picton and possibly down to Kaikoura.

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...and just in case you didn't already know, Ben still has no shame whatsoever:

Daddy stayed home

Daddy took annual leave today, mainly to take the Poppy the cat to and from the vet (general anesthetic - dental work - all is fine), but also to hang with George and Mummy. We had a lovely day, most of which George slept through - and Mummy and Daddy even managed to go out for a civilised lunch at the Marriot (which George slept through).  now all is quiet in the house and I'm watching the ratbags sleeping next to the heater - I'm leaving it on all night so that Poppy can "recuperate" on a nice warm cushion (if the heater is on, it also means that they don't sprint around the house all night...) A few of the sleepymonster from this morning.  Or was it this afternoon?  I forget.