Christmas 2009

In a break from the tradition of the past 2 years, Christmas 2009 was spent at home in Queenstown, with Andrea's family visiting.

It was great to catch up with the Jarvis clan via Skype just before lunch and we're really looking forward to seeing them for a very belated Christmas catch up in February. It's great to be able to see everyone "in person" even if it does sometimes take a while to get both our videos working!

It was an interesting experience hosting Christmas, as not only were we hosting the meal but also providing the accommodation. A very full house eventuated, including tents on the back lawn and beds in the landing upstairs.

The full house consisted of Andrea's Mum and Dad, Step-Grandfather John, sister Rachael, her husband Dave, their toddler Jeremy (JJ), aged 18 months, Andrea's brother Stephen and other sister Jen. 9 adults plus a toddler and a cat all up.

Naturally JJ dominated most of the photos as the adults preferred to take photos of him and stay in the background. It was his first Christmas that he could actively participate in and present unwrapping had been mastered before he got to Queenstown (complete with sound effects of "Wowee!") thanks to other family gatherings.

We (together with Jen) bought JJ some skis for Christmas, the type that have velcro bindings and are used with gumboots. Jen is a ski and snowboard instructor up at Snowplanet and has offered lessons as soon as he turns 2. He seemed pretty impressed with the gift (although not really sure what to do with them as yet), and from the looks of this photo won't have too many problems getting into the right position for the giant slalom or maybe even some ski jumping in no time.

Greg unfortunately had to work for much of the time that everyone was here but did manage to take a few days off to head into the bush with Dave. They ended up coming out a day early when the weather packed in and delivered on the Christmas snow we keep hearing so much about. This photo is the day before the snow arrived, looking across at the Mt Earnslaw glacier fields from the top of Sugarloaf pass (1200m above sea level).

And one of the waterfalls on the other side. These were trickles the last time we saw them but there has been a lot of rain for this time of year and apparently water wasn't hard to come by!

And since he's by far the most photogenic of the lot, here are a few more photos of the little guy.

One of a little poser on the stairs

And one in his natural state: running and giggling

Rachael, Dave and JJ come to visit

It turns out that Jeremy (our nephew) is the bringer of snow. On the night he was born (last July) we had the biggest snow fall to lake level that Queenstown had seen in years.

This is our house on the morning of July the 5th, 2008. JJ was born the night before.

And here are Andrea and Jen in our backyard with the snowman we all built. We named the snowman Jeremy.

The snow season this year started with a bang, but after that there had been very little snow for 8 weeks. Until the day before JJ showed up - when we received almost half a metre of snow up on the fields, in about 24 hours. Not that we were complaining! The weather cleared out just in time for their flight to land, and stayed clear for the weekend, and packed in again on the evening after they flew out.

While they were here, we tried to help JJ experience lots of fun things.

Like swings and slides. This is the playground down by the little beach we wakeboard off. It turns out Jeremy prefers to be upside down on swings.

At the top of the slide, showing off the jumper that Gran (Louise Houltham) made for him. Sorry Aunty Jen, he had dispensed with the beanie by then!

Jeremy also discovered that he likes ribs.

On their last afternoon here, Dave and Jeremy came for a walk with the two of us along the beach. It was the coldest we've ever seen the beach - the sand had frozen! It was like walking on concrete - quite a bizarre feeling.

And of course we took him up to the snow. He wasn't so sure - everything was just so different to what he's used to. But he loved the chair lift!

And last but not least a picture of Aunty Andrea holding JJ in the carpark before we took off to hike for some fresh powder snow. Sorry about abandoning you guys for an hour or so, Rach and Dave.... but on powder days we have no friends... or relatives.