The Apple Kid

The Masterton trip

2011-01-07T21:53:00.000+13:00

On the 31st of December it was my dad’s birthday. We decided to go to Masterton for his party. We stayed there for one night. On the Friday we went to Castlepoint at the beach. It was really fun. We went for a walk up to the lighthouse and we saw some dolphins.
The dolphins were jumping up and down and up and down. There were about pods of ten. There were a number of pods. A pod is a family. There was this ship nearby, and it was a fishing ship, it was throwing the bad fish and the dolphins would eat it.

The lighthouse was beautiful. I saw some fish and this really big kind of seagull. It was fun to play in the sand dunes although your feet would get really hot. The sand was very hot on our feet. I had to go in the water quite a few times cause they were burned.

It was fun jumping the massive waves, they were like monsters.

I found this rocky island in the middle of the water so I went to it and climbed on it. We were going to walk to a very high cliff. Mum was too scared.

We had some lunch at first. And it was yummy. Ham sandwiches. After the beach we went to the playground after we had dinner. It is the best playground in the world. It has got almost everything. It has even got a pond, and it may have my duckling in it. I raised a duckling named Daisy.

After the playground we went for a walk around a lake. We went around and we followed into a frog pond were mum decided to stop and have a look. Then we ran into some geese. There were lots and there were some chicks. There were more than thirty. Silly my brother, guess what he did, he decided to go with no shoes. We also saw a swan.

The following day we went for a walk in the rain. It was a bush walk. And on that day it was my lucky day. Two kererus in a tree. We had to go over a swing bridge. And boy, did I love playing in the long, long grass.

- as told by Esmee

Christmas spectacular

2010-12-26T22:17:00.000+13:00

2010 Is nearly over, I can’t believe it, it went so fast. Christmas passed, Easter passed, Haloween passed, teachers only day passed, my birthday is passed, and it is the end of the year. We are doing a catch up over the last few months. Today I was on such a sugar high. Everything I drunk and eat was sugar. Even right now.

For Christmas I got a new bike. It is really cool, my bike. I just went for a really long bike ride, one hour long. It took forever, thanks to mum, because she didn’t want to stop. She wanted to go for an adventure on the tracks.

The great bike ride

In December we decided to go for a big bike ride. But this was before Christmas. I was still on my 16 inch bike. It was cute and small. We were going for a bike ride and it was going to go to the lighthouse, but my mum thought I couldn’t do it but I said to mum I will prove you I can do it. I biked all the way to the lighthouse and back. I had a drink of some icecubes and we only lasted with ten pieces of biscuits and they were small biscuits.

We saw sheep and when we stopped for a break, we decided to stick our thumbs out and wiggle them around and wait for the ferry to catch us. When we were doing that, the ferry went right pass us but didn’t bother to stop. We didn’t care, we had our bikes with us. But we would have loved a free ride.

My bike broke, it’s back bit came of. But I feel pretty embarrassed saying this, but I was wearing a Dora helmet but I didn’t have another helmet. And I didn’t care (I kind of did though). Near Christmas day my 16 inch bike had to be given away with its Dora helmet for Christmas. But hey, guess what, I love my new bike, it is so much bigger and better, it has 21 gears where my little bike has zero.

At the river

At the river there were lots of stones, flat, big, small, round, fat, squares, hearts, and there were puzzle ones as well, we had to find the other pair. It was really cool, I got to swim in the river. Lucky no eels bit me. There were two different kinds of eels in there. The short fin eel and the long fin eel. They both looked okay, but hey, I didn’t care.

The water was really fast but it was nice and warm. And it was really cool sitting underneath the bridge on the stones. I tried crossing the river and it was really fun crossing. I even got new pair of pants when I was there as my pants had holes in them so we decided to cut them where the holes were, and then I had socks. And I even saw small tiny little fish in the puddles.

At the rock pools

At the rockpools the water was full. I didn’t quite find any fish but I found krill and some starfish.

And these blobs, I don’t know what they are called. I tried to catch some fish. I managed to catch some krill, but not all.

It was coming to sunset and we had to go, but I wanted to stay. Kapiti Island looks so beautiful in the sunset. Be careful when you are at the rockpools, you never know, you could slip. The blobs were full black and their mouth were red. When they yawned, there was a big red dot. Do you know what they are?

So Merry belated Christmas, a Happy New Year and enjoy 2011.

- as told by Esmee

Sorry for a beautiful bird of prey ...

2010-12-26T21:23:00.000+13:00

We went to the beach and collected driftwood. We collected small pieces, that we could drill a hole in. So that we can make a mobile.

We had a stop at the garden centre and I bought a flower. It is a small, yellow flower. I bought a flower at the garden centre because I have one empty space in my garden.

We stopped at a forest and there dad found something on the grass, lying there. Dad parked and we got out of the car and went to go and see it. It was a bird of prey. For who doesn't know what a bird of prey is, it is a bird that preys on animals that are native from any country. I thought it was a hawk, it looked like a hawk. Well it just died, it was still warm. I think it flew into a truck. My mum thought that it may have been hit by a car. We carried it to a safe place in the bush. We went for the bushwalk, and then we turned around, cause it was starting to get too muddy. We went to where we put the bird. I felt sad, I don't like animals dying.

After that we went to the river and I enjoyed it. I saw lots of fish plus one eel that was nearly two meters long. It was exactly the same as the eels in Masterton (Mount Bruce). Then me and my brother started building a pool in the river. We made a little pool with stones. Then we made little pools that were in the sun.

- as told by Esmee

The Great Lessons

2010-03-24T18:32:00.001+13:00

Before the big bang, of course most of you guys probably don't know what the big bang is. Before it happens though, it was black in space. I think lots of little pieces of gas swirreled around in space. Sometimes combined together and created stars. Meteors struck. Meteors are a big rock ball with flames all over them. And when those meteors fell in space it made the sun. Then the galaxy came to life. Swirls of gases, lots of billions of beautiful stars, plus we can't forget about the milky way. The milky way is one long strip of beautiful stars. We had the milk way for 4 billion years. And that is how the earth came to life. After the big bang, through the big bang. And then at the end of the big bang earth was there.

Earth is a wonderful place to be. On earth it was all ocean. A few years later mountains came on earth and they were all volcanoes, burning hot. And they didn't stop. Rain didn't stop either to try to stop the burning hot rocks. But there wasn't enough water. The sun complained to the clouds, to the volcanoes, to everyone. And then they said it is all the sun's fault.

In space there were these little jellies that came onto earth. They are not jelly fish, they are not jelly that we eat, they are a different type of jelly. When the jellies came on to earth there were seven different types of groups. One for the breeding, and one to take out all the salt of the sea. And that is all I remember of.

Now when they took out the salt it was like little pages of books. And then a few years later, more creatures came into the sea. And then we also got some plants into the sea and we got more land. A few years later again, some of those sea creatures decided they might try out the land instead of living their life out in the water. So some of them went on the land and got legs. And they became amphibians. Amphibians are creatures that live part water, and they have to keep their skin wet, and half land. And as the years went by, some of those amphibians turned into reptiles. And that is when we got some of our dinosaurs and other types of reptiles.

And then another few years later we got birds and mammals. And everyone thinks that dinosaurs died from meteors. But it got freezing cold and that is how the dinosaurs died. And that is how some dinosaurs and amphibians, birds, mammals and fish lived from that coldness. And that is the creation of the big bang and the first life on earth.

- as told by Esmee (8 yrs)

Note: The above story is Esmee's recollection of learning the Great Lessons at her Montessori school, and we have been reading the following books:

- Born with a Bang - Book One, The Universe Tells Our Cosmic Story
by Jennifer Morgan
- From Lava to Life - Book Two, The Universe Tell Our Earth Story
by Jennifer Morgan
- Mammals who Morph - Book Three, The Universe Tells Our Evolution Story
by Jennifer Morgan

Harakeke

2010-03-13T21:55:00.000+13:00

Harakeke is the Maori word for flax. Flax is fun to use. You can do everything with it. Make an ika, a putiputi, or a windmill. I bet you don't know what an ika is, or a putiputi. I bet you don't know what those two are. Ika is the Maori word to say fish. I made one today and it was great.

I love using flax. Putiputi is something fun to make. It is the Maori word for flower. And those flowers, you can weave one, or not weave one. Either way you do it, it is still a nice flower.

Flax is green, long strips. I have them outside my house. And maybe one day I might cut one and make a putiputi. If you cut a harakeke with a little white strip in it, don't you even cut it, because if you do, you pull out the whole entire plant. When you make your first ever harekeke thing, it could be anything, always give it to one of your bestest friend. That is how I got my ika.

- as told by Esmee

Why you should pick blueberries

2010-03-10T21:43:00.006+13:00

On the 30 January I asked dad and Camiel if they wanted to go blueberry picking at the blueberry picking farm. And that would be fun. We collected blue berries and we made blueberry jam and blue berry ice cubes for our smoothies.

I love blue berries because they are round and blue and they are delicious. How did blueberries come to earth I wonder. Did it come from space? Did it come from a type of specie. Who knows?

My dad and mum, twenty years ago, was in Australia and they did orange picking. Dad cleaned the top and mum cleaned the bottom. Of course that is what dad and Camiel did. Dad cleaned the top and Camiel cleaned the bottom and then I hang around the other trees. Dad got a full bucket, me and Camiel got a half bucket and we got about 3 kilos.

When we got home we thought what should we make with these blueberries. We wanted to make blueberry pies but they took up four kilos. We also, I just remembered, we made blue berry pancakes and they were not that good. I don't think they were that good, they actually were bad. The blueberries didn't taste that good inside the pancakes. And when we had the ice cubes that had the blueberries, when we put them in the smoothies and mended, those smoothies tasted delicious. I wish we had more. The trees were flooded with blueberries.

- as told by Esmee

More about Australia

2010-02-07T22:28:00.004+13:00

We climbed the biggest rock I have ever done. There was chains. Sometimes daddy had to help me. There was a path for some of it. We climbed really hard. It was called Cathedral Rock and it was mum's worst nightmare, because she did not really like it, because it was too dangerous.

On the rocks there was no path, no fence. So we had to stay away from the edges. Some of it it was a little steep. There was an intersection were there was some seats. From there it took an hour to climb up to the top.

We got to the top and it was a beautiful view. There was even a bit higher were me and Camiel and Fem sat, and mum got some good pictures of us. There was a thunderstorm coming. Camiel kept on saying it was KingKong and mum didn't like it. We had to climb down.

- as told by esmee

My Australia

2010-01-02T23:22:00.007+13:00

On the 21 of December 2009 I went on a plane to Aussie. And right now on the second of January I am in the gold coast. And I am going down to Melbourne. I went to the Australian Zoo and I saw otters, tigers, elephants, lizards, crocodiles, dingo, and I saw Bindi. And I saw kangaroos and one had two joeys.

We went to the Great Barrier Reef and I went snorkeling and I got stung by a jelly fish. I saw beautiful fish. I wanted to see a turtle but we didn't.

We went to the Daintree and cassowaries kept on coming to our tent. The Daintree is a national park. It is beach and rainforest. The rainforests had waterfalls. They are the oldest rainforest in the world, and it is even older then the Amazon. I made up a song about cassowaries. The beaches have different sand than in New Zealand.

We went to another national park, we camp there and there was a koala up in the tree.

These are the animals I have seen so far. Peacocks, cassowaries, lizards, frogs, wild pigs, kangaroos, ants, butterflies, tropical fish, coral, parrots, wild turkeys, wild horses, flying foxes (that is a type of bat), swamp hen (pukekos), crabs, ducks, dingos, emus, wallabies, crocodiles, dolphins, kookaburras, and the biggest spider I have ever seen, it was even bigger than my hand.

So this is the 21st of December to the second of January, 2009 and 2010. We still have two and a half weeks to go until we are in Melbourne.

- as told by Esmee

Pukaha Mount Bruce - national wildlife centre

2009-12-06T21:51:00.008+13:00

We went to the national wildlife centre. It is called Mount Bruce. We went to the gallery first. We saw a baby tuatara. We saw a movie about the forest. It burned down into farmland. The animals had to move, to relocate.

We went to go and see the birds. We walked to the lookout. It was steep. We found a wooden chair. Somebody cut a chair. On the way we saw a baby bird. It flew through my dad's legs and dad nearly stepped on it. We looked up what bird it was, it was a wren - rifleman or titipounamu (says mum). We saw a dead mouse and a dead rat, they killed it, because they poisoned it. I found an egg shell, and it was white.

At the top of the lookout we saw a beautiful view.

They have the tallest trees in the world, they are called redwoods. They don't belong here.

I will tell you all of the animals we saw: native pigeon, kaka, kiwi, tuatara, rabbit, house sparrow, parakeets, tui, eels, blue ducks and a dead skink in the shop. I hope these guys read this blog, they never noticed there was a skink behind the shelf.

- as told by Esmee

Breakers Bay - Wellington

2009-11-20T22:07:00.002+13:00

We went to Wellington, the capital of New Zealand. We went to the beach. It was a big sandy and rocky beach alright.

Dad explained to me how the waves work.

We walked to the end and at the end there were rock pools. I saw some fish in the rock pools. And we saw a shell that still had an animal in it.

We saw this archway.

We saw a animal that looks like a puppy and it was poisoned, it was a stoat, but that was not on the beach.

- as told by Esmee

DVD review - "OURS"

2009-09-20T15:05:00.002+12:00

My mum ordered a dvd. It is called "OURS". I watched it because I like animals and mum said it is all about nature and animals.

The video goes for 26 chapters. Chapter one is A, chapter two is B, chapter three is C. It goes in alphabetical order. In chapter one there is Autumn. And chapter two there is Bees.

It teaches your kids about nature and the environment. In C for compost they taught me how to turn compost stuff like scraps into soil. When the compost was full they took it of and putted sort of like a blanket over it. After three months they taked the blanket of and it is soil. For every letter it will teach your kid. I like seeing the tuataras in the dvd.

I think it is a good dvd. I think your kids will like it.

- as told by Esmee

In my garden ...

2009-09-20T14:36:00.007+12:00

Right now it is springtime. Time to do some gardening.

I pulled out everything out of my garden and planted new things. Like ferns and lettuce. But today we are getting more. My parents do not need to buy any more lettuce. When it grows big we can pick it for salads.

When we were doing gardening we found a kauri snail. I saw the kauri snail on a new dvd called "Ours". The dvd is about animals and plants like the fern, in New Zealand. The movie was about native things of New Zealand (see review).

My next door neighbour has a tree fern, it is humongous. I asked mum if I could have one and it turned out yes. I choose the fern because I like ferns, they are native to New Zealand. I wanted that fern that I have because it has a koru. A koru is a long stick and at the end it is a little spiral.

After a few months the koru will grow into a fern. I got the fern from the nursery.

- as told by Esmee

Run, run and run, the Desert Road

2009-06-25T23:21:00.006+12:00

We were coming back from Auckland. We stopped at the Desert Road to look at the volcano. We saw a piece of a big giant snow on the mountain. We saw a volcano.

I started to play in the desert. It was a field of grass. It looked like hay. The grass was long to play in and I liked it. I run around and around and around. We ran hundreds of meters. On my way there it hurt, on my way back I was okay. The plants weren't prickly anymore. I loved the big space because it was big for me to run around in. I was running so fast because I was pretending this big giant dinosaur was chasing me.

My mother, after from a long run to a little desert, she found a skeleton. We don't know what it is of. My mum thinks it is a rabbit or a hare, because there were these long bones. I think it might have been a lizard or back from the dinosaur age, a dinosaur.

I saw a big cloud that looked like a tornado. It was a white cloud and it was big. We also saw another cloud that was white and it looked like a huge big fish.

- as told by Esmee

A long weekend #2 - Rotorua

2009-06-15T22:35:00.011+12:00

In Rotorua we went to see the geysers. And it was awesome. And then we went on a big long walk of the geysers. It smelled like rotten eggs. And I didn't like the smell.

I felt cold water and warm water. And my mum gave me a rock that felt warm.

We saw green alien water. There is steam around the geyser because the hot water pops out. I also saw a blue lake.

It was a long long walk. There is a bird called swallow, and actually what happened there is a Pokemon called Tailow and that bird looks like Tailow but its name is swallow and Tailow evolves into a swallow.

And then we went to a different mudpool and it popped. When one jumped, it jumped very high. And then back down again.

- as told by Esmee

A long weekend #1 - Lake Taupo

2009-06-02T20:07:00.005+12:00

We went to Lake Taupo for a lunch break. And I found some stones. One looked like my mother's necklace. The other one was two colours. The next one looked like a shell. And the other one I don't know, it was two colours again.

I looked for stones, for nice pretty stones. They were very light, they were dry. I kept them and bringed them home. I like them. What I am going to do with them? I am going to let my mum use them for her preschool. Because she might need them.

I also started a competition with my brother and cousin. The one that could get the furthest by throwing rocks. My highest worldrecord was two jumps. Jumping stones. We have to throw them underarm. So you get the jumps. I was trying to make the stones jump on top of the water. I only got two. Guess what, my cousin got six.

- as told by Esmee

A trillion crickets!

2009-05-16T07:45:00.010+12:00

My mum breeds crickets. And on Friday the 15th May 2009, we had trillions of baby crickets. And I got ten crickets. I put them in a little tank. What you could do is that you put egg carton or something else for them to hide under. If they are babies they eat chick mash food. When they are adults, they eat smashed cat biscuits. What I did for them to drink, I grabbed a milk lid and put a bit of cotton ball in it, so the crickets wouldn't drown.

What we did for the eggs is that we grabbed a container. and we put it with the big crickets and we putted sand in it and we moist it. The big crickets lay their eggs in it. As soon as there were heaps of cricket eggs in it we put it in a different tank and we have to wait for three weeks. We put them on top of the computer router to keep them warm. The babies are this big, they are as big as an ant.

The crickets can make a noise, they are loud. We hear them all the time. My mum, at her work, she has them at her work too.

Listen to the crickets below (from songsofinsects.com).

-- as told by Esmee

A weekend in Wanganui

2009-05-06T22:21:00.003+12:00

We went to Wanganui. We went to go and see birds. And we saw a cockatoo that could talk. And it said: "I like pie". And on my last saying bye bye it said "bye" and waved its left wing.

We went to the beach and we got rocks with holes in it. And we got pretty shells and nice driftwood and we got stuff for my pet turtle. I ran up the dunes to go to meatvalley, a valley I made up.

On top of the sanddunes I saw my mum and dad. Mum looked at a hut on the beach, dad kept on walking. I felt like a bracheosaurus, on top of the dunes. They are the biggest animals, they are taller then a giraffe, but they are extinct, they are a dinosaur. I came back out of meat valley, I had run of. My brother was searching for me, at meat valley. When he was in meatvalley I was close to a different hut on the beach.

At the beach I played with the water. I was trying to make a river. I was trying to make a tunnel in my river. But the water got in my way and the water bringed the mud in. I started to run of. It was pouring and raining, the rain was bursting my head of.

We found a bowling ball on the river. It was a rock shaped as a bowling ball. We found a nice humongous big rock and we took it to put in my turtle tank for my turtle.

-- as told by Esmee

Mighty mushrooms #2

2009-05-01T11:05:00.001+12:00

Have a look at this!

Mighty mushrooms

2009-04-23T22:56:00.003+12:00

We got mushrooms from the market, mum came home with them. One day over a few weeks, guess what happened? A big mushroom appeared, and mum knocked it off with the door of her car. I took the mushroom to school. The kids kept asking me the same question all over again. "Where did you get it from?", and I kept saying "from seeds".

Mum told me mushrooms grow from spores. Mushrooms don't grow into a big tree, but they do grow into mushrooms. They are fungus. Mushrooms need moist, water, cold and in the dark. We keep our mushrooms in the garage in a bucket full of dirt. The white part in there are the fungus.

I cutted some mushrooms for dinner. I got the mushrooms from my bucket. They were very white. They were yummy.

-- as told by Esmee

Waterfall track, Belmont

2009-04-15T09:34:00.002+12:00

I took Patches, my dog, for a walk on the waterfall track. We strolled to the wet foot track. I thought it was going to be pretty wet and pretty muddy, and it turned out it was.

First of all, the track was okay. Until there was a river. We had to start crossing the river by going over the rocks. I fell over and got wet. Patches was with me and got wet too, so I had to start traveling in the water. The rocks were slippery. I saw heaps of trees, heaps of rocks and heaps of water. I heard a tui.

It was hard and easy. Going over the rocks was hard, but sometimes it was easy. I enjoyed going over the river and splashing in the water with Patches. I got wet up to just underneath the bone that has my heart in it. At the end there was a huge, huge, huge, waterfall. At the waterfall I played with Patches. We played fetch. Patches got a lot wet.

We walked away from our parents, we just started walking, straight away. At the grass we stopped, we waited for our parents.

-- as told by Esmee

Pauatahanui Inlet

2009-04-11T09:20:00.003+12:00

We went to Pauatahanui. We saw the birds. We saw geese, pukekos, magpies, ducks, swans, and heaps more. The swans, the geese and the ducks were swimming around in the river. The magpies I spotted on the very top of a tree. We heard heaps of sounds. I even talked to some of the birds.

It was getting dark. We walked on a path and we decided to hop of the path to go closer to the other birds. There was no path, it was hard. But then near the river it got muddy and muddy and I had to skate on the mud.

We saw the moon rising. I think the moon was beautiful. It was humongous. It came up in 3 minutes. It was a nice night out and the moon was a hole circle.

-- as told by Esmee

Otaki Forks

2009-04-01T08:12:00.003+13:00

We went to Otaki Forks and we played in the river and did other stuff, like go over the bridge. When I jumped on the bridge it got a bit wobbly, that is when I started getting scared.

It is kind of like a big forest with a nice river. It was a long way from home.

I threw stones into the river. I tried to skip them. I did not do that. I used round stones for that.

I played in the river. It was fun because I love water. It was slippery. The rocks were nice and smooth. I saw one fish. I walked across to the island but it was kind of like a war because the water kept pushing me away. The water went deeper and deeper and then it came up. My knees got wet. It was slippery.

When I walked on the island, I decided to to to a different island that wasn't too far. There were humongous rocks in the island. It was just a rocky island.

I like the river because I like water because I was born in the water.

-- as told by Esmee

Earth Hour, marshmallows and a campfire

2009-03-29T20:54:00.009+13:00

My sister had a party on the 28th of March. We had the bestest party. It was 8.30 pm to midnight. We had a campfire and we roasted marshmallows. I was the first to get a roasted marshmallow.

The campfire was a big flame when we started it. I got to put some pieces of wood in it because it was fun for me. Long sticks would have been easier cause I could just poke them in and let go, but the short ones was trickier and I had to throw them, because it was to hot and the smoke was going into my eyes and my eyes would hurt.

Fem and Nat played guitar and they sang.

At Earth Hour we talked about the Earth. We had about 20 people including me and my parents. I said that the Earth is something like a living thing and the living things are nature, which means nature needs food and water. Watch me in this Youtube video.

In our house we turned of all the lights for Earth Hour. The house looked like it had millions of monsters and ghosts, it looked like a haunted house, because it was pitch black.

-- as told by Esmee

Peka Peka Beach

2009-03-22T21:17:00.008+13:00

It was nice and sunny today. Very hot. We went to Peka Peka beach. It is a sand dune beach. I saw shells, sand, sand dunes, and water.

I saw all types of branches and a hut. I decided to make it bigger and to make a little bedroom. I then would like to have a little nap in it and have a roof on it, with a little gap so I could have some sun to keep warm. Most of the hut that we were building was already there. I just added a few sticks on it. I stopped and then came back to it.

I found two snails, one of them had their shell crushed and the other one was just fine. I let them free, in the sand, so they could live.

We saw swallows. They were small and fast and we saw heaps of them. They fly around and go near the water. They fly very low so they can grab its meal, bugs and insects. They live in the sanddunes. They make holes as their nests.

Camiel decided to start digging a very big hole. I decided to dig a hole until it collapsed. I decided to make a new hole. I only got done a bit and then it was time to go.

-- as told by Esmee

I like the dirt

2009-03-18T21:50:00.005+13:00

I like the dirt. I want heaps of it. Dirt can make big mountains. And if you make mountains, sometimes you can climb up them. It will be very fun. I would sometimes slide down.

I made a slide. Also there was a big dungeon, which means I have to be careful.

I love to roll in the dirt. Heaps of kids should love the dirt because it is great and it is very fun to play with. You can do snow angels. You go on the ground and you move your arms and legs out and in, out and in.

Dirt is brown, it is dirty, because it can make you dirty. Dirt is our earth. It helps us to live.

-- as told by Esmee

Chooky the chick

2009-02-28T22:47:00.008+13:00

At Tawa Montessori Preschool a chook called Chooky ran away. It is now 5 weeks old. It ran under the fence. One of my the teachers saved it. Chooky ran away and we don't want it to do that again. It is always lonely and always lost. It has three brothers and sisters. It tries to find his mother. His brothers and sisters keep on pushing him back because it is younger that its brothers and sisters. It is smaller then the others.

We bringed it over to my house. And I am its new mother. It is kept inside in a big cage. It is white and it is very cute. It walks around trying to find its real, real mother. I will give it presents and I made it a card to make it happy. I feed it chicken food, except it is chicken food that is actually into pieces, tiny, tiny pieces. It is called chook food. Sometimes I feed it of my own hand. It is shy, but sometimes it eats some of the food.

If Chooky is a female, when she is bigger she can hop in with the rest of our chickens. And when she is older and she will be a female she will stay with us for the rest of her life. If she is a not a female, she will go back to his mother. I love Chooky.

-- as told by Esmee

Making a pond

2009-02-08T20:59:00.008+13:00

We got a wine barrel. It was in half. We decided to make a tiny pond. We grabbed stones and put them in half of the bottem.

But first before we grabbed the stones we went to the stream to get some plants. In the half that didn't have the stones we put the plants in. We had mud to keep it up.

Then what we did we put water in.

While we did we found two, we think they are eels. We decided to put the other one in my mum's other pond that is at her work, Tawa Montessori Preschool.I am so positive it is an eel, because it is like the shape of an eel and it swims like an eel.

Some eels are electric, some aren't. They come in big, small and tiny. Speaking of big, I would say as long as one door. Small would be the size of my tv remote. Tiny would be the size of a little box that I have. Eels love to live in the sea, in salty and dirty water. Some don't like salty water. The electric eels are electric, if you touch them you get electriced. Some eels bite. If you don't get shocked by an electric eel they will bite you, because they don't like being held. And when they bite you, you get shocked.

-- as told by Esmee

Te Horo (2)

2009-02-03T18:45:00.010+13:00

I went to Te Horo. I went to my friend Rhys's place. We played in his forest. There were streams, we had to go over them. In the forest we played lions. It was hard walking, because the stream started coming up. As soon as we walked in, it was all dryed up where the stream was. Until it came up, it started getting a bit muddy. And heaps of trees, tall and small.

We went fishing, in the pond. We didn't catch anything. We looked for tadpoles, but there weren't any so we played in it. We went in the pond. It was cold. We played in the water. Paulina made us some hot chocolate. Then Rhys said "I am as hot as a volcanoe". It was sunny but after going in the pond we got freezing. That is why we had a hot chocolate.

On my hat are feathers, they are pukeko feathers. I found them at the pond. I saw one pukeko. It was blue and red.
I had fun.

-- as told by Esmee

Hedgehogs

2009-01-29T22:42:00.009+13:00

We saw a hedgehog. In the gutter. It was moving. It was moving very fast, to find food. It was a little one. Because it was in a place where it should not belong, we put it in the bushes where it was safe. It could flatten the tyres of a car if it got run over. Hedgehogs have feet, and spikes, and a body and a head. They look like a ball. Hedgehogs are mammals. Hedgehogs hide in bushes.

-- as told by Esmee

Pool night and rock pools

2009-01-25T09:15:00.005+13:00

Last night I went in the spa pool. I sat in my favourite star-watching seat. I didn't see many stars. There were two stars in line and they were above our roof. I could hear a morepork. It was behind the back-neighbours. I made an owl sound. Owow.

Today we went to the rockpools. The rockpools look like pools. Well, the water is salty and it is becoming high tide. The rocks were stony and they were rather pointy.

It was hard walking over the rocks.

We found shells, crabparts, paua shell and we saw a hermit crab. There was a big crab, this crab is a feisty crab and another crab. I tried to catch a humongous, humongous crab. I like to draw one of those crab legs and its nippers.

We saw starfish. I liked trying to catch the big, big crabs. I tried in the big pools and in the little pools. I bring some crabs back to the sea because it is where they belong, in the sea.

-- as told by Esmee

Catchpool Valley

2009-01-22T20:15:00.000+13:00

We went camping at Catchpool Valley. I went for a walk with my dad. At one sign it said there are kiwis.

We saw plants, big and small, well actually just big. We saw big rocks. And twigs.

We saw flowers, some were purple, and there were orange, yellow, and white.

At the end of the walk there was a tree that was blown over. Because you could see the roots. It was going across the path. I went over it. When I was at the very end I was as tall as my dad. The tree was so big and went so far away that it crossed the river. We saw quails crossing the road. We looked it up, they are called Californian quails.

We went walking again. It was a very long walk. I got tired. I liked the running. I would go slow when I saw stones and roots. I liked the river best.

Here are some of the creatures we saw on our walks

This is a woodpigeon. In Maori it is called a kereru.
I have to tell my teacher, I don't think she knows that.

This ladybug was black and had two orange spots.

Does anybody know what caterpillar this is?

-- as told by Esmee

My garden

2009-01-18T12:31:00.011+13:00

Me and my dad made a new garden for me. Here is my slideshow.

My Garden

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And I water the garden.

-- slideshow by Esmee

Te Horo

2009-01-13T12:51:00.009+13:00

We went to our friends. They had a frog pond. And we saw a frog. They also had tadpoles in it. And we tried to catch some for me to keep. First of all we got eight or seven until my friend, Rhys, knocked the container over. Which means if we had eight, we would have lost six. If there was seven, there would be five lost. One was in the tank and the other one we found. Then Rhys caught another one which makes three.

Tadpoles evolve into froglets. Froglets evolve into frogs. A froglet is when they have arms and legs, or just legs. Tadpoles have tails and when they have legs and arms they have a short tail. They are called froglets. Tadpoles eat boatmen. There are little black creatures for the tadpoles to easily catch to eat. We saw lots of waterbugs.

I did a little drawing of my tank with my three tadpoles in it. The colours of my tadpoles where light, black, gold and their tail was creamish kind of colour.

We saw dragonflies. I saw a big, big dragonfly and they come in black, red and blue. Some of them where attached together.

We looked it up in the book, they are called damselflies.

There was long swishy grass that was fun to play in.

I saw a hedgehog. And i can't believe this. It was awake in the day. Because hedgehogs are supposed to be awake at the night. Some animals, like owls, are nocturnal. Hedgehogs are nocturnal. Nocturnal means that overnight they are awake.

-- as told by Esmee

Tawa Bush

2009-01-11T23:48:00.007+13:00

I went on a bush walk with half of my family. We went up, up and up. And you know the lighthouse? You know how there are 250 steps? At the bush walk there were 266 steps. It was a long way up.

We saw a leaf shaped as a star. We found a leaf that has different colours at each site and black spots with it. We found a fern. And then we found a different type of fern that had spots on it that were seeds.

I saw a dog, three or four butterflies, birds, and a worm.

And I saw spiders. I saw bugs too. We saw a spider nest that the babies were born in. There must have been about fifty spiders, I lost count.

We saw a stream. We heard a fantail, crickets, cicadas and a tui. We saw yellow, purple, white, and blue flowers. The weather was first cloudy, then sunny, then cloudy, then sunny.

- as told by Esmee