WHERE'S BEST TO LIVE IN NZ ETC :PART 6!!!

[AngryBeaver]

Wow! Part 6...got to be a record.

MN Towers, where's our prize?!

Wow guys! You all totally rock! Thanks for putting those up, huge help, now if you can tell me what ingredients you buy and where.......... Lol

We move into the house today!

I need to mix up our meals more.

Last week it was quite a lot of lighter meals.

Chicken Caesar salads
Fajitas
Egg, homemade chips and peas
Veggie stirfry's etc

Need to mix lighter meals with more heavier meals.

Taking boys to childminder (at-home educator?) tomorrow then start work on Wednesday. Doing wed/thurs/sat this week then onto normal hours of tues/thurs/sat. Nervous but excited.

Anyone know what I need to do to stop claiming my 20ece through Kindy and transfer them to new childcare?

Agree, it's the lunchbox treats that are expensive. I do quite a bit of baking and have started to bake and freeze - I was very sceptical but the banana cake worked well. Everything else I only buy when on special and freeze it (bread, meat etc..), we also do the home kill whole beast thing. I buy seasonal fruit and veg from local markets or use Fruit World (only buy what you need or it goes off really quickly) (we're in the process of planting our veggie garden, has needed quite a bit of work getting it ready - the boys are growing everything from seedlings)

My fruit/veg bill is a killer though as we all eat heaps of it but I guess I shouldn't complain about them eating fruit!

AB dh has an interview today and tomorrow a 4th and hopefully final interview for the job he has been chasing - funnily it's a UK company building here under the Australasian arm of the business. They are flying 2 over from the UK for this interview. They flew somebody in from Oz for the 2nd one. Fingers crossed, seems a lot of trouble to then turn around and say - no sorry!

Good luck to your dh sibble It does sound promising.

Lunch box treats are what made our food bill through the roof but changed that now so they don't have any pre-packaged food in there anymore. Mini packs of rice cakes/salami sticks/fruit bars all really expensive.

Ds1's Kindy lunches have consisted of something like Half a sandwich with tuna/sweetcorn, a pot of fresh veg, last week carrot and green beans, some fruit, blueberries/grapes and a small treat so a square of home made flapjack or something. Morning teas and snacks have been fruit/yogurts/cheese or chicken cocktail sausages. I buy large packs of cheapy raisins/dried apricots and split them into seperate containers myself.

Been spending quite a bit in K-Mart on their Klip Lock tubs but they really are very useful.

You will be great xminerva!

frick I totally know where you're coming from, I was a bit lost in the supermarket until recently,really! You do no thatthings are usually priced per kilo, unless they say ea?

I bake everthing treatwise. Just made some hokey pokey biscuits, yummy.

They also get water biscuits/raisins/cherry toms/strips of cucumber.
I think once you have the ingredients, you get quite a lot out of them.
As I say, huge bag of bascis flour has lasted me for ages and I use it all the time.You can get the big tubs of spread from pak n save, and a tray of eggs from the dairy.

You're right sibble, it does sound like they have gone to a lot of trouble. Here's hoping

We never buy pre-packaged snacks things, mine eat lots of fruit and we buy the packs of rice crackers that are about $2 a pack and take a few in a lunchbox when we go out. We sometimes make pikelets/biscuits/muffins etc. For school dd1 has a ham sandwich, 2 or 3 different fruits and a handful of rice crackers. Same every day but she doesn't seem to get bored of it! At the mo I often take something like slices of watermelon to eat on the way back to the car after school.

Our nearest shop is a fruit and veg one, which is handy. Bargains there this morning were halves of watermelon for 99 cents, 3 rockmelons for $5, grapes and apricots for $4 a kilo

Meant to ask, AB, have you made any enquiries about that Waiheke house?

Wish I could find half water melons for .99c

Love water melons. Cheapest I've seen them (whole) is $4

I am off sick from work today - hence the posts! Anyway, I also buy from outlet shops/distributers. e.g. Hellers in Wiri have a shop, sausages, bacon, meats much cheaper than elsewhere. Apparently once the goods have gone out from the main works in a delivery truck they cannot go back into the main store but are sold in the shop - all within date etc... various choice each time. Sausages $3 pack (not cr*p ones), bacon half price, beer sticks for $2 each etc...

There are a few such shops here in the South.

Bacon half price sounds good. We don't buy much bacon as it seems really expensive.

Debating buying half a cow and getting the butcher to sort it all into different portions.

Need a chest freezer first.

We are in. Fridge and freezer delivered, I got a pigeon pair, so the freezer is seperate on one side and tHe fridge on the other. So I finally have a decent sized freezer and can do a half a cow if I want yay! New washing machine plumbed in, it's very cool I feel super fancy.

And justa YES to snacky things being very very dear indeed. Because we have been in the motel we have been buying loads of pre packaged stuff and I was beginning to think bloody hell, we will never afford to live here! But tomorrow (as the fridge and freezer will have cooled down properly) I will do a proper food shop at pak n save and countdown and then see how we go.

DD is delighted with her new hello kitty bedspread, so here's hoping she stays in her own bed first night in the new house :-)

Sibble, good luck to your DH and hope you feel better soon, being sick sucks. AB nothing on a waiheke house?

Get well soon sibble.

Am of all your new stuff frick...I love stuff, I do!

We didn't bother asking about that house, but might be getting this one
www.trademe.co.nz/property/residential-property-for-sale/auction-551207458.htm it's been sold and theyre renting it.
Have to go and check me garlicky tatoes, back in a min!

lolly, how are the new additions settling in?

hellers is at 10 Ha Crescent, Wiri 2104
Phone:09-271 0977

Just off Rosscommon Road.

Sorry, the home kill, we have in the past done our own otherwise we buy from friends.

I can also recommend J R Wholesale Meats 6D Malvern Rd Te Papapa Auckland 1061 (Otahuhu). I havn't been to the shop but have got meat at a very good price from somebody I know who works there, they supply to restaurants so it'c much better quality than Mad Butcher, Pak n Save etc...

I buy everything in bulk and freeze

Oh that looks lovely AB! You will need a ride on mower

AB - just come in from work night out (hurrah for Britomart) and little ones are tearing up the house. Still heading from the boys but happy round us. First job was litter tray for me - forgot how crap that is. Only a few week till they venture out.

I feel rubbish - I resort to fruit strings and shapes to fill up lunch boxes. Did make cup cakes this weekend but just eaten 2 myself when I've come in

lolly...give yourself a break, you work full time!! Yuk to litter tray! Glad your enjoying them. I'd love a pup...well, really I'd love a baby, but a pup wouldbe nice while I wait. I want a french bulldog
<a class="break-all" href="http://www.google.co.nz/imgres?imgurl=www.frenchiefever.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/french_bulldog-breed.jpg&imgrefurl=www.frenchiefever.com/&h=234&w=215&sz=1&tbnid=9r4P_I-2Ty042M:&tbnh=186&tbnw=170&zoom=1&usg=__s6MKV1ZpLtAu4gYX2OEzNIm_ZGg=&docid=tsyKnx0xSl5qPM&itg=1&hl=en&sa=X&ei=RzMrUYLDB6bmmAWkj4DwBw&sqi=2&ved=0CH8Q_B0wCg" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">www.google.co.nz/imgres?imgurl=www.frenchiefever.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/french_bulldog-breed.jpg&imgrefurl=www.frenchiefever.com/&h=234&w=215&sz=1&tbnid=9r4P_I-2Ty042M:&tbnh=186&tbnw=170&zoom=1&usg=__s6MKV1ZpLtAu4gYX2OEzNIm_ZGg=&docid=tsyKnx0xSl5qPM&itg=1&hl=en&sa=X&ei=RzMrUYLDB6bmmAWkj4DwBw&sqi=2&ved=0CH8Q_B0wCg

fugly!

Have a small problem with Waiheke.
Just read on fb community page that there is a serial Peeping Tom.

In the area of that house.

Dh is leaving me the 2nd week we get there to go to Sydney for a week. I am now very scared.

hey lolly don't beat yourself up my boys have strings, pretzels, crisps etc in their lunch boxes as well as home baked stuff partly because they are 8 and 13 and want what their friends have and I cave in and partly when I'm working full time (as I am at the moment) and run out of time to bake/run out of baking in the freezer. There's nothing wrong with it. As a cost saving exercise baking is the way to go, but otherwise my boys would love packets in their lunch box every day. In fact ds1 would prefer money for the shop to buy nachos and a can of drink but he can dream on

AB peeping toms seem to hang out in quiet places, we have a convicted one who overlooks our bach. I have to remind myself to pull the curtains when I am getting dressed, something I'm not used to doing at we are not overlooked at home unless you count the neighbours cows)