R and R

Last weekend I was back in New Plymouth for Womad which of course meant fried bread and festival footwear...

 as well as some crowd participation on the Sunday morning - everyone getting down to the Patea Māori Club's Kiwi classic Poi E.  It's on Facebook under Stepup Taranaki if you want to watch a hillside full of people working off all the fried bread they have eaten.

 and the Peacock ladies who did an amazing job of stepping though the crowd on stilts.

This weekend I've been in recovery mode and using the extra days over Easter to prepare some flax for a weaving project; 12 little baskets to give as part of a speakers gift for a conference at the end of April.

New Wheels

When your mechanic suggests that it might not be worth doing major work on your car my experience is that the time has come.  So, having done more than a few thousand kilometers I have traded in my car and am now the proud owner of a lovely little second hand Renault.
  

Catching Up

Mum and Dad have been here the last two weeks so there has been lots of stuff going on but no time to write about it. Opera in a private garden...

the annual street fair...

and a visit to Napier that along with catching up with family included street art and the famous Rush Munro's ice cream

Weird Food!

Among my many favourite things 'weird' food is very high on the list.  Today I made it to one of the places I had been told about that makes Petone a bit of a foodie heaven.

The upshot of enormous restraint was this; Gorgonzola, black sesame crackers, baklava and one happy camper.

I haven't taken any cloud shots for a while but this morning this was the view from the end of my street looking south, out through the heads.

New treats

For a very long time now I've had a Saturday morning routine.  Get up, put on the week's laundry, walk to the local shop, get the paper and a little something for breakfast, back home to make a 'proper' coffee.  By the time I've had breakfast and read the interesting bits of the paper the washing is ready to hang out.  As I've moved around the only real variable has been the little something.  Donut holes, pastry, muffin.  I've now added a new word to my vocab as well as a new treat.  Meet the Schneckennudel.

 In other places it's known as a pain aux raisin, escargot or a scroll but mine comes from a fabulous German bakery just up the street.

Relaxing

The weather has been up and down, as it is in Wellington, but today has been fine and hot and we have been relaxing.