How we landed here

Me and Matthew met when he came back from Christchurch NZ to visit friends and family for a couple of months. That couple of months turned into a couple of years. We moved in with each other four months after we met and Matthew never stopped talking about going back to NZ. It didn't take any convincing for me to move really as I was very tired of Philly and the surrounding areas.

So we after we got married this past September, Matthew put out over 40 job applications to schools in New Zealand. Only one application received a positive response and with that he was hired:) With only a month's notice, we sold and gave away all of our things with the exception of a few bags worth of stuff to take on the plane with us and about four boxes that will be slowly mailed to us over time by my Matthew's parents. The In-laws also bought our tickets and bought Matthew's car outright so we could afford to eat when we got here. They didn't really want to let go of Matthew again but they were very supportive just the same.

Saying good bye wasn't as hard as I thought it would be because I couldn't process the fact that I was leaving the country. I literally couldn't believe it and I still can't! I did get teary eyed when I said good bye to Amalthea though. She could process it just fine and we both got a few tear drops on each other's shoulders as we hugged goodbye. Just writing this is making me tear up a bit!

I also got to meet my big brother Jason for the first time the WEEK BEFORE I WAS TO LEAVE. I would have liked to have gotten know him better before I took off but time did not permit it.

My goodbye party was awesome and I realized I should have spent more time with some of the people there as a whole. But I'm a bit of a hermit :(

I also had some reservations about the children in my family coming to the party too because I was packing a large amount of people into a pretty small, not-kid-proofed space but they were just fine and I was very glad to see them before I left. After the family left we all pretty much got shit faced and my Matthew and his friend played with fire poi a couple of times. It would have been nice if my little sister had expressed some interest in coming to my party to say good bye but she didn't (we would have gotten her home before the crazy stuff started I promise). But my brother Jason, Uncle Frank, Aunt Melanie and cousins Chantelle and Evan and all their children were all there and that awesome:)

The flight was twenty four hours straight including layovers. US airways sucks by the way! We stayed in Wellington for the first couple of days as we couldn't enter our new home until the 16th. I took some pics of the outside of the house and will take some of the inside as soon as it looks nice enough.