THE KINGSLEY-SMITHS

Friday, 30 March 2007

Thursday, 29 March 2007

Thursday, 22 March 2007

A little update on gracie's social events...

This week we spent time with Rachael...Gracie and Rachael were hanging pretending to be 'barry boys' in her car!

This is just Gracie looking very cute!

Then Amélie and Gracie spent the afternoon playing together-so cute!

We have Emma and Dan with us today up from Christchurch which is lovely, They are just off to the beach whilst Gracie and I have a sleep.
Tomorrow is the day Paul's parents arrive-we are very excited that they will meet Gracie at last....what a busy time of year!

Monday, 12 March 2007

Funny Video

Thursday, 1 March 2007

Matilda, Harry & Gracie

An update on Gracie

Gracie has been on great form recently - she is now at large, sleeping through from 10-7 which is bliss!!! We're loving watching her grow and see her discover new things everyday. She's now well over 13lbs which is fab - as Matilda says, she is very chumpy!!!

Today we took Gracie to the zoo again which she wasn't too fussed about, but we did buy her a bouncy chair which she loved. She has already figured out how to bounce herself using her feet - what a clever little girl!

Friday, 23 February 2007

Made me laugh!

We've been to the Zoo!

Well, today was my day off so we all went to the Auckland zoo, which is just a couple of minutes by car from our house... we had a great fun day...

Matilda met a giant elephant!

We saw some penguins

And some giraffes

And our firm favorite - the Seals; they just swim around and around in circles - it's so coo. Video below!

And of course Gracie was there - the cutest mamal of the lot!

Gracie Talking!

This evening Gracie was sitting with Rosie, and she just started babbling in a way that she hasn't done before - it was utterly gorgeous; we managed to get some of it on film - hope you enjoy!

Tuesday, 20 February 2007

What we've been up to

Hi - sorry it's been a long time again... we seem to have been on overdrive the last couple of weeks, have been very busy. So what have we been up to?

Well of course we've got Rosie, Pete, Harry & Matilda staying with us at the moment, although they have been away for the week with Rich, Kath & Amelie to the Coromandel which is the sticky out bit of the North Island, east of Auckland - it's stunning there.

We had a fantastic weekend on our own, mainly watching the conclusion of 24 series 5 which was really good. On Saturday we went down to the city center at the crack of dawn to join thousands of other Aucklanders to welcome the Queen Mary 2 - it is a beautiful and impressive 'Ocean Liner' and there was definitely a sense of grandeur as it sailed past.

Last night we had a cluster surf / BBQ night out at the Life Saving Club at North Piha, which is out on the West Coast - we had great fun surfing, eating, and chatting and we watched a stunning sunset - the sky was literally bright pink; my photo doesn't do it much justice I'm afraid, but it's not a bad one!

Gracie is absolutely thriving - she is now over 10 weeks old, and is an absolute Angel; in the last week she has really taken to sleeping through the night which is a fantastic - On Saturday night Laura had 7 hours of continuous sleep for the 1st time in ages. While sleeping through the night isn't everything, it is nice to know that when we put her down at night she'll sleep until the morning.

She's getting bigger every day it seems - she really is putting on heaps of weight which is fantastic; we have absolutely no idea what she weighs, but our Plunket Nurse will be coming Monday so we'll find out then. Here's a cute photo from yesterday - Laura spent most of the day with Nicole & Hugh who is very cute; Gracie seemed to enjoy the hammock at their house.

I'm pretty busy at work at the moment - I'm speaking on Sunday night, so beavering away this week writing a talk on 'A life of worship'... any suggestions?!!! I think it will be fine! Anyhow, enough of the babble! Will get back into the swing of blogging once life fully returns back to normal.

Thursday, 15 February 2007

Funny

Beatbox Fame Game
Uploaded by loranger

Friday, 9 February 2007

Sensational Guitar Playing

I came across this guy Andy Mckee this week - he has to be one of the most incredible guitar players i've ever heard. I thought i'd share put his video up here, have a watch!

and...

A day at the beach

Rosie, Pete, Matilda & Harry have now been here for one fantastic week - we started off in seperate houses, but we're now all living under one roof in Point Chev, and we're having a blast!
Today we went up to Orewa which is just outside Auckland - it was a stunning day so we all hit the sea, and surf. The children absolutely loved it.... photo's to prove it below.

Thursday, 1 February 2007

I'm excited today because...

Rosie, Pete, Matilda & Harry arrive here in little over 3 hours. Pete has got himself a job as a GP over here, so they are moving over for a couple of years. For those of you who have no idea who these people are, it's my sister and her family - we can't wait!!! They are staying in our house for the next 2 weeks while they look for somewhere to live permanently - we'll be staying with our good friends Anna, Brent & Noah.

In other news... Gracie had her first set of jabs yesterday - 3 injections in total which I don't think she was particularly imressed with; In true Gracie style she handled the injections well with only minimal cries, but spent the rest of the day feeling & looking very sorry for herself. She seems to be back to normal this morning, so we'll start getting some more photos soon - it didn't seem fair to photo her while she was ill!

Monday, 29 January 2007

Gracie looking very relaxed!

Anniversary Day

Yesterday was Anniversary Day here in Auckland which meant we got the day off; The sun was blazing, so we met up with Rich, Kath & Amélie at Cornwall Park and went for a lovely walk around One Tree Hill - interesting trivia: the U2 song One Tree Hill was named after this volcano - strangely enough there isn't actually a tree up there at all now, so maybe they should think about renaming the volcano to 'No Tree Hill' or maybe even 'Hill'

Rich and I trying to feed our children Diet Coke, and Chocolate Ice Cream.... of course the girls are far to sensible - they are only interested in boobs.... me too!

Friday, 26 January 2007

A perfect Saturday...

Laura is feeling a bit better today, so this morning we headed out to our friends Dizz & James in Oratia - they have a fantastic house on a huge section in the middle of the bush; it really is perfect. At this point I should mention James' new shed - he built it himself from scratch over the christmas break, and I can honestly say it the best shed I've ever seen!!! Photo's to prove it! (from Dizz's blog)

We had a sensational brunch with them before piling into their newly aquired 17 year old minibus type people mover thing. We loaded a couple of longboards, and headed off to Piha, which is a very rugged west coach beach, made famouse for having 'The Piano' filmed on it.

The weather was absolutely perfect and there was some great surf, so James & I went out into the waves for some fun. Surprisingly, I found out that I can actually surf, and caught a few nice wives and rode a couple into the shore.

After the beach, we headed back to theirs for a beautiful roast lamb on their deck. This evening we've got our good friends Greg & Yona and Aaron coming for a BBQ. Clearly Gracie will be too tired to make it!!!

New Car!

Well today we said fairwell to our good friends Matt & Carolyn; they arrived in New Zealand from USA at the same time we arrived in from the UK - they've been at St Paul's for the duration of their stay here, and were founding members of our small group / cluster. Matt also played lots of electric guitar (and well) with me in the worship team. They generously gave us their car as they left, which is a huge blessing to us. How cool does it look - it's a propper family car!

Thursday, 25 January 2007

What's Up?

Hi guys, sorry it's been a little while since we've posted anything of any great substance. The last week, Laura has been pretty ill which has been a lot of hard work or us. She is on antibiotics, so should get better soon - it's made for quite an unsettled week though.

Gracie is utterly gorgeous - she is growing heaps and is becoming more and more responsive to us. We're now getting loads of smiles and some baby talk... very cute. Here is a little video of us yesterday having some baby chatter on the sofa.