Things are finally starting to get moving again so I thought it was time that I wrote another post. Two weeks ago today, Shaun from Richardson Stevens met Paul out at our property to do the tests prior to writing up our geotech report. He was leaving NZ on Saturday to go to Fiji for a holiday so another guy was meant to complete the report while he was away, but that never happened. Shaun emailed me at the end of last week to say that he'd arrived back at work and had found the documents on his desk, waiting to be completed. He ended up doing the report himself and I received the report via email early Wednesday morning, this week.

I read through the report at work; Dad, Hans and Paul read through it later that night. The first thing I skimmed through the report to see was what type of sewerage system we would have to have. When I discovered that we could get away with having a septic tank, instead of one of those bio systems I was relieved. We've been told by so many people that they're a hassle, especially when you have to pay someone to come out and check it every six months. We'd all tried to find out as much as we could about the different sewerage systems, but it becomes a complicated task when you're told that there are over fifteen different systems now.

From the diagrams in the geotech report it looks as though our house now has to be positioned further down towards the creek. The reason behind this is because we have to be a minimum of ten metres away from the ridgeline, for stability reasons. Other than that there were no real surprises in the report. The only other thing that Dad noticed was that we have to have another engineer's report done, but Paul seems to think that's pretty standard. So now the geotech report has been emailed to Chris Needham and then he will send our plans, as well as the report to council. Paul said that Hans seems to think we should be able to speed things up a bit at council, but we'll see. Our goal was to be able to start building over Paul's summer holiday. Hans has spoken to Tony about the earthworks again so it looks like that will happen not next week, but the following week. It also sounds like we may need to get some compaction tests done prior to the earthworks being done, because we're planning on moving more earth than what's stated in the geotech report. Uncle Glenn still has my iPhone as he's trying to get it fixed, but I'm hoping I'll have it back before the earthworks start. I want to create a timelapse movie of our build.

A couple of weekends ago (9th November) Nana and Poppa came out and had a look at our land with us. I'd sent Nana a txt message as we were driving back from the beach, because we'd decided that we'd take Custard out there for a play again. It's the second time Paul and I have taken her out and she loves it! She jumps out of the car, runs around and rolls in the grass, before making a beeline for the creek. It was a beautiful sunny day so I thought it might be a nice Sunday afternoon for Nana and Poppa to come out and visit. They even surprised us with a picnic afternoon tea, which I thought was really cute. We put a picnic blanket on the grass and had juice and cookies together.

Just before afternoon tea Nana had been looking for a four leaf clover. Paul asked her what she was looking for and she told him. Within a couple of minutes Paul found one in a patch of clover and gave it to Nana. For as long as I can remember Nana has looked for a four leaf clover. Looking for four leaf clovers is also one of my earliest memories as a child. I couldn't believe that Paul had found one so easily and thought it was really nice that he gave it to Nana. It's now in her dictionary at home, under the word clover. That afternoon we also met our neighbours to the left hand side. They were outside building their shed. Custard ran over so we thought we better go over and introduce ourselves. They were really friendly and seem like they'll be easy to get along with. It always helps to know that you've got good neighbours.

This Sunday we've been living in our cabin for ten weeks. It has everything we need and we're lucky to have the set up at Dad's place that we have. Living in the cabin isn't always butterflies and unicorns pooping rainbows though. Sometimes we drive each other nuts and cabin fever is a real thing. Ollie throws his seeds all over the cabin so I have to make sure I sweep the floor every morning before I leave for work. Having a porter toilet isn't the best, but I won't complain too much because Paul is the one that digs the hole in the paddock and empties it every week. I have learnt to step on the electric fences with my jandals so that I can get across the paddock to have a decent shower at Dad and Gail's house. Our shower will go from being warm one minute to cold the next so it's fine for a quick shower, but not so good when I want to wash my hair. Normally I wash it at Hans and Ilonka's after netball on a Monday night and then at Dad's sometime during the rest of the week.

Over the Spring months there have been lots of ducklings and baby pukekos. The ducklings are almost fully grown now and will sometimes come closer when we throw soaked bread to them. The pukekos are a different story. As soon as I walk out onto the little deck the mother pukeko will start squawking and the baby pukekos will run as fast as they can towards the fence line between us and Thomas' paddocks. They're so funny to watch, as their legs still look too big for their tiny bodies. The chickens have taken to jumping up on the deck, while Basil always likes to take it that one step further and come inside the cabin. Often trying to peck at the cat litter or pick up Ollie's left overs before I put her out.

Over the weekend we're going to peg out our building site. Then hopefully next time I write I will have a better idea of when we will be able to start building.