We arrived in NZ

Relaxing in Auckland

But before we arrived, we had to leave Seattle.

Last Drive on 99 - elevated highway in Seattle to be demolished in the fall.

So after a few little bumps in the road, we finally made it to Auckland, New Zealand.  Our flights were a bit of a mess to get out of Seattle.  We worked so hard to get to the airport on a sunny Friday thru rush hour traffic.  Auntie Mary and Uncle Jimmy gave us a ride and helped us get there.  It all went smoothly so we had about 2 hours to burn at the airport.  The kids went thru their backpacks and all their surprises to keep them busy.  They were great going thru all the lines we waited in.  All was going well until our flight to Vancouver kept getting delayed allegedly from poor weather there (but my phone showed none).  

Archie with his new haircut and going thru his goodie bag from good friends at the airport

Being entertained at the airport waiting for our flights

So with a two hour delay to departure, we missed our Air New Zealand flight to Auckland (thanks Air Canada for messing that up).  Upon our arrive to Vancouver, we were told we had a new flight that evening to.....Sydney, Australia with a connection to Auckland.  That flight was supposed to take off at 11:35pm....but left at 12:30am.  The kids had been up since 6:30am and I had to keep them up so that I could physically get them to walk on the flight.  So they wearily watched the iPad (thank goodness for technology) until we were finally able to take off.  

Waiting it out in Vancouver

Once on the plane, we tried to go straight to sleep.  Anyone who has ever tried to get 2 tall children to sleep in 3 seats while yourself exhausted on an airplane can understand the joy that is.  We spent a few hours with them asleep but continually moving around to get comfortable and stay asleep.  Archie kept sticking his legs into the aisle.  Sylvie kept kicking Archie (I was in the middle).  I keep jerking my head up every time I nodded off.  We eventually settled with Archie sleeping on the floor, Sylvie stretched out over the seats, and me sitting up with Sylvie's legs over me.  But we slept.

And then we arrived in Sydney sometime on Sunday morning after 14 hours of flying.  The kids watched a bunch of movies.  Once at Sydney we waited several more hours for our 4 hours last flight to Auckland.  I look forward to going to Sydney for fun in the future but I was very happy to leave it quickly on that day.

And after a lost car seat and quick trip thru customs, we met Campbell in our new city, Auckland.

 Our good friends let us stay in their house for the first week here.  They were away and we were able to just settle in while at their house.  It was such a nice treat and made the transition easy.  The kids had lots of room to play and jump on the trampoline.  

And we were happy to all be back together and Campbell.

And now we are in Auckland for winter.  It is a really warm winter compared to Seattle so I think we will be just fine.  The beach is a 15 minute or so walk from our house.  And only being here a short time, it seems life has slowed down and is more relaxing.  We didn't have much jet lag and it was just easy once we were here.  Having a couple weeks off before school started helped us just get used to our new home country and city.  It is even more pretty that the pictures show and people are very friendly.  So far so good!