Snow Time Like The Present

Road trip to Ruapehu

It's been so long since our last holiday I've almost forgotten what they're like. Going out and doing new things, relaxing, eating yummy dinners... Mum and Dad would say that's what we do on weekends all the time, but holidays are different - especially when Grandma and Grandad are there too.

This year has forced us to spend so much more time stuck at home. But now that annoying coronavirus has gone and the lockdown is over, it's time to celebrate with a few days away somewhere new. So we packed our bags, took our travel sickness pills and loaded up the car for the long drive down to Taupo.

And what's the first place we visit when we get there? Smoky craters and stinky mud pools - it's Rotorua all over again! Maybe I'm getting used to it, or maybe the smell isn't as bad at Orakei Korako, but I enjoyed it this time. Some of the colours of the ground and the pools of water were just amazing.

One of the main reasons for us choosing to holiday in Taupo was so that we could go to the snow. I'd never seen or touched real snow before... and it turns out the real thing is quite different from how it seems in cartoons.

We hired some thick clothes and boots and drove up to Mt Ruapehu. It was pretty cold when we got there, but not as freezing as I expected. Real snow is much harder than I expected, as I found out when I tried to make a snowman or when I threw some snowball missiles at Mum, Dad and William. Making snow angels was a lot safer for everyone.

We also thought we'd test how hard the snow was, and how tough our clothing was, by sliding down the snow on our bums. We found a great little slope where you could get a bit of speed up, without sliding way down the mountain and tearing a hole in both your pants and your bum.

The good news for the day was that the weather was beautiful, with clear blue skies, but the bad news was that the gondolas were closed, so we couldn't get up to the top of the mountain. But we did get to see snowing falling all around us and try to catch some on our tongues, which was pretty cool.

When it was time to relax at our resort, and ease the hurt of our snow-damaged bums, we had plenty of pools to choose from. There were three pools spread across the resort, so over our four days staying there I made sure we visited all of them.

One of the things Dad was most excited about was the all you can eat breakfast. I think he planned to eat enough for the whole day during breakfast and save money later. But he must have pushed the pigging out too far, because he was horribly sick lots of times one night. No surprise that he didn't come for breakfast the morning after that!

When the time came to pack up all our stuff again, I was really sad to be leaving. It was so much fun and I was going to miss our holiday house. Luckily I think it'll be pretty easy to convince Mum and Dad to take us away on another holiday soon!

Return to Lockdown

Coronavirus part two

Just when we thought everything was back to normal. I was back at school again, William was at daycare, Mum and Dad were working, we were planning a holiday... then suddenly we weren't. The coronavirus had come back.

So it was back to doing schoolwork on the internet, Mum and Dad working on our dining table, and William hanging around being annoying. At least this time I got to keep my room to myself, and it gave me a chance to get creative again like I did during the first lockdown.

One of the things I had to do was describe where I'd like to go in the world if I could go anywhere, and what I would do there. Here's what I said:

Dinosaurs are one of my favourite things, which is why I've always wanted to be a paleontologist when I grow up. When I do get old enough to become one, this is the story of one of the adventures I expect to have (naturally I get to name anything new that I discover after me!).

Hopefully this lockdown won't go on as long as the last one, because there are lots of fun things coming later in the year that I don't want to miss. Like our family holiday and Christmas. Maybe I should become a doctor when I grow up instead so I can get rid of this coronavirus!

A Winter's Tale

Life between lockdowns

After weeks and weeks of being stuck inside, not going out anywhere very far or seeing anyone else, we finally went to level 2. Not the exciting level 2 like in one of Mum's Playstation games, but still great news anyway. Lockdown was lifted and things could return to normal - I went back to school, William went back to daycare, Mum and Dad... well, they actually stayed working at home.

It also meant we could get out and about properly again... sort of. Even if coronavirus was gone from New Zealand, other countries still had it, which meant no overseas holiday this year. First we were going to Fiji, then Australia, then maybe Fiji again, and now just somewhere in New Zealand. As long as coronavirus stays away.

We couldn't have a big party for William's 4th birthday like other years, but that didn't stop him getting a yummy chocolate Paw Patrol cake, courtesy of Mum.

The middle of the year is birthday season in our house, and my 7th birthday was just a month later. We should have said to people, "Lego to the party!" because I got lots of cool Lego to build. Me and William spent a lot of time making things out of Dad's old Lego during lockdown, so I'm looking forward to adding these new ones to my collection. Hope I have space for them.

Speaking of space, that was also the theme for my awesome cake with all the planets going around the Sun. One night during lockdown we saw the International Space Station flying past super-fast up in the sky, so that was where I got the idea from.

One of the worst things about lockdown was not being able to go out and see people, so as a bit of a celebration for us all getting through lockdown (and not getting coronavirus!), Grandma organized a mid-winter lunch. We had it in this cool old building near Grandma and Grandad's house, with Jake and Ben and everyone else.

It was one of my favourite types of lunch - heaps and heaps of food. So much food that we had to take some home with us afterwards for a second lunch, for dinner!

It was so nice to have everything back to normal. I had my room back again, I was enjoying being back at school and we were planning a family holiday down to the snow. Little did we know that another unexpected lockdown was coming on the horizon...

Chatting About Lockdown

Boys talk

Seven weeks later and we're still in lockdown because of the coronavirus. It started in March, then went all the way through April, and now we're in May. Mostly it's been fun, even if I have had to give up part of my bedroom for William's bed.

Dad wanted to know what things we've most enjoyed and what things we haven't liked about lockdown. Watch the video to find out the answers.

Today is also William's fourth birthday, which is why he's wearing one of his presents, a new Paw Patrol watch, in the video. Hope it's got good strong protection after he sneezed all over it!

More time in lockdown means more time writing, drawing and doing schoolwork. Here are a couple more of my favourite drawings from the last week, one of my flower shop and one of a rocket zooming into space.

We couldn't have a big party for William's birthday this year, but I hope the lockdown finishes soon so we can get out in time for my birthday. The list of things I want is getting longer every day...

Dino Tails and Scary Tales

More coronavirus creativity

It's been over a month now since we started our lockdown at home because of the coronavirus. The first week wasn't very fun - Mum and Dad were busy working, I was missing my friends from school and I was bored just being stuck in the house.

But since then it's actually become pretty fun. William and me get to play with our toys in the dining room where the table used to be (and which is now in William's room for Mum and Dad to work on), there's a great school app that I love doing maths puzzles on with my iPad, and being at home gives me lots of time to get creative.

Dad challenged me to come up with some different drawings, and the first one I did was this picture of some dinosaurs next to a volcano. There's an Ankylosaurus being eaten by a Velociraptor, and a T-Rex snarling at the top.

One of the things I love as much as dinosaurs is space, so I drew a picture of the International Space Station. We even got to see the real International Space Station up in the sky one night - it was flying past so fast and I was the first one to find it.

Plus of course I still love drawing transformers, and this is one which turns into a fier (fire) truck.

As well as drawing, I'm also still writing stories. This is a short one but a scary one, about a vampire spider...

The coronavirus is still out there in the world, so it looks like we're going to be stuck at home for a few more weeks yet. If it goes on too long I'm going to run out of things to draw and write about!

The Lockdown Lowdown

Sharing rooms and space

It's been three weeks now since we started the lockdown at home because of the coronavirus. Guess they didn't find a cure for it overnight then. So there's still no school for me, no daycare for William, no driving to work for Mum and Dad...

And no separate bedrooms for William and me. We've been sharing our room for weeks now, but most of the time it's going well. It's nice to be able to have a chat as soon as we wake up, and sometimes I get to read to William before we go to bed at night (if we haven't been naughty and told off the night before).

More days at home means more time for getting creative. Today I asked Dad what he wanted me to draw and he said "pirates", so here's my drawing of a pirate on a desert island with his pirate ship floating in the sea nearby (ignore the pencil marks by the mast, I made a bit of a mistake there).

I also did this drawing of a house in the rain, and of course just about every day I draw a picture of a transformer. This is a bad guy transformer I drew for Dad (you can tell because it says "to mikeile" at the top), which transforms from a robot into a somearing (submarine).

Some people said they liked the last stories I wrote but that they were a bit scary, so this time I wrote a story about another of my favourite things: space. Here's me reading my space story about the end of the world.

What's going to happen next? When will schools go back? Will the lockdown finish before William's birthday so we can have a proper party for him? Nobody knows, but as long as I have my colouring pens, pads and paper (plus plenty of food) I'll be just fine.

Keeping Creative During Coronavirus

Scary tales of isolation

Just when I was having a nice time at school, going out places in the sunshine and planning a family holiday later in the year... the coronavirus happened.

I don't really know what a coronavirus is - William think it's something big, like a bear, which will chase us if it sees us. Whatever it is, it can make people really sick, so while the coronavirus is outside we have to stay inside. That means I'm now sharing my room with William since Mum and Dad are using his bedroom as an office to do their work.

Because nobody is allowed to go out anywhere, that means school is shut. But the teachers say I still need to keep up with school work, so I've been doing some creative things while I've been stuck at home - like drawing pictures.

That one above is of a permerd (pyramid) in egept (Egypt). You can see all the steps up the sides of the pyramids and the spings (sphinx) which is guarding them. It's very hot in Egypt, as you can see because the temperature is 1000 degres.

I've done some other great drawings too, like this space book I made for Dad, including planet Earth, rockets, the sun and even the international space station. The drawing next to it is of a transformer robot, which turns into... well, just read the description I wrote.

But it's not just art I've been working on. I've also been writing stories, just like I normally do in class. These are two of the scary stories I've written - one about a skeleton and one about a vampire. Hope they're not too frightening for you!

So those are some of the creative things I've done during our first week of being stuck at home during the coronavirus. I'll share some more with you next time.

School's Out For Summer!

Fun in the sun these holidays

After Christmas has been and gone, it would be easy to feel sad after waiting for it for so long. Luckily, the end of Christmas just means the start of a nice long summer holiday for me - thanks to the super-long school break.

This year we've had a real summer heatwave, which meant bye-bye rain, hello trips to the beach. There was so much sunshine we were able to visit lots of different beaches this year - all of them close to home (not that that stopped me moaning about how long it took to drive to them).

As well as playing in the sand and racing into the waves, we even got to see some unusual creatures at the beaches this year. On one visit to Castor Bay we watched a little green turtle slowly plod his way across the sand. He looked so small we think he must have come from someone's house somehow.

Another time, at Waiake Beach, we saw a dead stingray washed up on the rocks. We were pretty sure it was dead, but I still stepped carefully a long way around it, just to be certain the scary stingray wasn't just sleeping.

But we haven't just spent the whole summer lazing about in the sunshine. Most of it, maybe, but not all. We've also done some walking, scrambling over the rocks along the beachfront with Dad and Mum, and biking along some tracks with Grandma near her house.

So with all these trips to the beach and fun in the sunshine, you'd think it was the best summer holidays ever right? Wrong. I also had to go to Greenlane Hospital for a day to have surgery to remove my tonsils and open up my nasal passages. I didn't even know what tonsils were - but they were causing problems, so the doctors had to take them out.

Everyone who knows me knows how much I love food. So I was pretty sad when I found out that lots of the types of food I like were going to be off the menu for a couple of weeks. If you want to see the difference, just look at these pictures: before surgery I could eat the yummy cake Grandma made, but after surgery I could only have drinks and iceblocks.

Luckily my throat and nose were back to normal (actually, better than normal!) by the time the end of the holidays came and it was time to go back to school. I was looking forward to a fun year with my friends in Year Three, but then, only a couple of months in, came the coronavirus.

To be continued...

Wrapping Up 2019

What did we get up to this year?

Santa's gone back to the North Pole to rest, my room is full of new presents and we're going to beaches for swims in the sea. That means it's summer time, and almost the end of the year. Way back 12 months ago, I had just finished my first six months of school and was looking forward to the year ahead. But now that it's nearly over, what were some of the cool things I've done this year?

In March we had our big Australia holiday (or as I like to think of it, Ollie-day) with Grandma and Grandad. We visited an old gold mining town, a wildlife sanctuary and other cool places around Melbourne.

I also completed my first full year of primary school. By the end of year two I could read all by myself - whole books, only needing help with a few of the longer words. Now I sit in bed with William in the mornings reading his books to him.

During year two I even went to my first school disco and a school movie night, both with my friend Talia. When the last day of school came I was very sad to not see her for a couple of months.

I'm also an arm circles expert now! After a couple of years taking swimming lessons, I'm now able to swim really well. I can do the forward arm circles easily, and am getting pretty good at backstroke too - except when I try to move my arms the wrong way and end up sort of swimming backwards!

For a while through the year it seemed like we'd have somewhere new to live. First we were buying a bach up in Wapiu, then we weren't. Then we were buying a bach up in Mangawhai Heads, then we weren't. Then we were buying a new house with more space for everyone... might still happen, but not this year.

As you can see, I've achieved a lot this year. Certainly more than Dad, whose main achievement was spending far too much money on a pile of comics which have been annoying Mum by being piled up in their bedroom all year. What's next? We'll just have to turn the page to 2020 to find out...

My Christmas List

What I'm asking Santa for this year

It's about time! Every week for a couple of months I've been asking how many days it is until Christmas. Then I'd groan when I heard the answer, because the number was so big.

But now it's nearly here. We've put up the tree, hung decorations around the house, and the little magic Christmas elf is moving about night by night, reporting back to Santa on how good we've been (and how naughty William has been, probably).

Since making a Christmas list and having Dad video it worked so well last year, I thought it was worth doing it again. No point having Santa unsure of what to make me - he needs a comprehensive, itemised list. And here's my one for this year. There's a bit of a transformer theme, because they're my favourite toy at the moment. Hope Santa has plenty in his toy cupboard!

We also asked William what he wanted, but all he said was "a digger". I could just give him one of mine that I don't play with anymore. That might even be some good behavior for Santa to hear about. I must tell the Christmas elf so he can pass that information on...