My Boy is Growing Fast

That's a photo taken with Aunty Sachi's fancy cell phone a few days ago of our Madison talking on the cell phone.

Looks like he's transferring stocks and bonds on Wall Street!

I love this photo.

Neat Little Feature

Next time you visit Madison's website, bookmark it and then reopen the browser, go back to his website and see if you can see a little Samoan flag in both the address bar and favourites menu.

A Week Without Maddy

This last week has just dragged by, time seems to have slowed down to a crawl without my family around. It's no fun waking to an empty quiet house only to go to work and sit in my office by myself for 10 hours a day. Then I get to go home to that same empty house at the end of the day.

I guess I've been spoilt rotten by having Maddy and my wife around. I'm looking forward to seeing them again.

I spent Saturday on the golf course with our Mulligan Club. We played the Fisheries Department again and yes, you guessed it, we lost again. According to my calculations, we've played them 5 times now and won only once. But hey, at least I drove the first green (a par 4) which was the one and only highlight of my round.

Hope everyone has a nice week.

My Boy Misses Me

I called Maddy and his mommy again last night. They are now in Wanganui visiting Grandma & Grandpa Ponini. After a long train ride from Auckland they arrived safely and were happy to be with family again.

Madison was very happy to hear his daddys voice on the phone and I can tell he misses his daddy because all he was saying was "Go Daddy" which is Madison-speak for I want to go to my daddy.

I'm happy for Maddy to be seeing his family in NZ but I want my boy back. I miss him just as much as he misses me.

I Miss My Boy

Madison and his mommy are in NZ now. He was so excited to go on an airplane, I wonder how he fared. I miss my wife and son, the house is too quiet, I miss the sound of little feet running all over the place.

Last Post Before Takeoff

OK this will be the last post before Maddy and Mommy takeoff for NZ. Anyone over there need anything from here?

How much is that baby in the window?

Rachel told me yesterday that a woman came by her work looking to sell her 7 month old son for $200 bucks. Can you believe that? Even worse, someone took her up on the offer and bought the baby!

I find this outrageous for a number of reasons (a) how can this be happening in Samoa? (b) if you're going to sell a child, isn't a child worth more than a measly $200? (c) why isn't this woman in jail or a mental institute?

Perhaps the child will be better off in the hands of someone who wants it. The birth mother (if that's who she was) didn't want the child so who knows what she might have done with it.

I'm disgusted by people who can put a price on their children. No amount of money in the world could separate me from my son!

You Asked For It, Now You Got It

It's been raining heavily for 2 days straight now. We've been needing this rain for so long now and now that it's here, it looks like we've got too much of it. The rivers are swollen, low lying areas are flooded and while the taps are running, it resembles koko samoa more than water.

The plus side is, the water isn't being rationed anymore. I'm not complaining; having water beats not having water!

Mommy and Maddy are getting prepared for their trip. The suitcases are out and the ride to the airport has been arranged with Papa. I'm happy for them but at the same time I'm gonna be all by my lonesome for 3 weeks and I'm not looking forward to that!

Lovely Weekend

What a wonderful weekend we just had. It was the Lotu-a-Tamaiti holiday so we had a nice long weekend to relax and have some quality time together as a family. The water wasn't on on Saturday but sure enough it came on just in time for White Sunday and wouldn't you know it, we filled up Maddy's pool and had a great time.

Maddy's pool doubles as a temporary water storage tank, so for all you critics out there that think that we were wasting water during a drought, we weren't, we were storing water for the next dry spell (yeah right).

Madison spent Saturday morning at church where they had a special children's program. He came home with a nice aluminum foil hat that he was so proud of and wouldn't take off. That evening we bought a couple of dvds (our collection is now at a whopping 82 dvds oka) and had a video night at home.

Sunday was good, we feasted on some nice food from Michelle's Handy Stopper of Matautu-uta (real nice food there on Sundays) and took 3 swims throughout the day; each time we had to drag Madison out of the pool kicking and screaming. The boy is a fish!

Monday was another relaxing day, I spent the afternoon at golf, while mommy was at home relaxing and Maddy off playing with the next door neighbors. None of us wanted to resume the weekly routine today. What did you get up to last weekend?

Plans for the Weekend

So what's in store for the weekend? This weekend is going to be a long weekend due to White Sunday or Lotu-a-Tamaiti. Since I'm also employed by a US Government agency, it doubles as Columbus Day too. So we all have next Monday off.

I'm thinking we will be pulling out the swimming pool this weekend. Maddy loves his new pool and so do I! After that, I have golf on Monday with our Mulligan Club. It should be fun.

About a week from now Maddy and his mommy will be in NZ, so I'm going to spend as much time with them as I can before they go.

So?

So what do you people in NZ have planned for Madison when he gets there? I hope he's not going to be dragged all over the place while you girls are shopping! Us boys hate shopping and my son is no exception :)

Constant Changes

Madison is constantly changing, not only in appearance but in behaviour too. Yesterday he was dropped off by Papa and he didn't want to stay home. He was crying for 20 minutes after Papa left because he wanted to go with Papa. That's a new one. Normally he loves coming home and is very happy to see his mommy and daddy. We couldn't figure that one out.

Then this morning when we dropped him off, instead of being happy to see Papa, he refused to get out of the car.

He's becoming quite the talkative young man, he can repeat almost anything he hears. Yep, we've got to start watching what we say around him.

I wonder what he's going to learn while he's in New Zealand? Hopefully his aunties, uncles and grandparents don't spoil him TOO much.

New Photos Are Up

Maddy's new photos are on his website and can be found here.

If You're Wondering...

Just in case you're wondering why some of the photos on his blog aren't showing, I think the free web host Yoxio.com I was using has gone under. I've found a new free image host so let's hope this one lasts a li'l longer than the last one.

Spending the Day With Daddy

I took a day of sick leave on Wednesday to look after Madison. Papa had a meeting and Rachel had an all day training event so it was my turn to play hooky and spend the day with my son.

We had fun watching movies, eating junk food and making a big mess of the house. If there was running water at the house we would have been outside with the hose but the SWA made sure we didn't get the chance.

Maddy fell off a chair yesterday and hit his head right between his eyes. SO now he has a swollen brow which makes him look like the Beast from Beauty and the Beast. Boys will be boys I guess.

I'm taking the camera home with me today so we can take photos for his 26th month photos. I'll be posting them on Monday.