I say Extended Family but we are not all related by blood.  I’m referring to a group of my Auckland friends – a group that keeps expanding as people are matching and hatching.  We used to have dinner parties, great food, a lot of wine and a lot of laughs.  There were around 5 or 6 of us.  Now, a few years later, those 5 or 6 have partnered up, gotten married, had babies.

Ken and the kids came up on Friday night and we chilled out on the couch and watched the Corpse Bride.
On Saturday morning we met ‘the Extended Family’ in Newmarket for breakfast.  You notice I said breakfast … not brunch.  The reservation was for 9am!
I’m not one of the ones who have hatched.  Most weekend mornings, I am bought coffee in bed.  More often than not, breakfast follows.  It’s rare that I am out of bed before 9am.  But not this Saturday!
In order to be at breakfast at 9, we were out of bed just before 7.  Yikes!!  Everyone in the shower, dressed and in the car to get across town.
We picked a great location though – Urban Cafe in Newmarket set out two huge tables for all 17 of us.
Yes – 6 has tripled to 17.

After breakfast we headed over to Morningside to Crave Cafe to meet up with a few people who were waltzing around with cameras for Nikon Auckland Photo Day as part of the Auckland Festival of Photography.   It was lovely catch up with Cate and have a look at the new Nikon J1 – I want!!

On Saturday night we went to Mel’s to watch the rugby.  The kids created chaos upstairs and I said goodbye to wine by consuming a bottle (and a bit).  It was a good night – a bit of a late night – so a sleep in on Sunday was more than welcome.

After we dropped the kids down in Hamilton at rehearsal, we drove out to Raglan to a meeting for a mountain bike race Ken is entering – the Karioi Classic – where they race across the mountain near Raglan.  A group of them are entering to raise money for the David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust.  Expect a blog post on that this weekend.

Here are some photographs from the weekend:

Ken and I in the sun at Wynyard Quarter / Photograph by Samantha Davey

I think this is when I was photography Mikaela with her spirit sticks / Photograph by Samantha Davey