Ophs, sorry bloggers, forgot to tell you I was taking a break. You guessed it, to Hawkes Bay. We returned to Cape South where we’ve been going every Easter since we came to NZ to live. Once again it didn’t disappoint.

We dined at Craggy Range Winery (reported as one of the world’s best dining spots), went to the cricket, watched the sea at Ocean Beach and generally chilled out in one of the most idyllic places you can find.

Lots to blog about so hold onto your hats!

Just in case you’ve been visiting this week and found not much to read you should now be able to catch up with the domestic-executive musings as I’ve finally got the blog posts up to date. Sorry about the interuption in service, hopefully things will be better from today!

Well bloggers I’m afraid that my holiday photoblogging is going to be pretty restricted until Bob comes back from his South Island tour – he’s been the master photographer and I need to pinch some of his images to give you a real flavour of Golden Bay. In the meantime, here’s a taste of the marvellous views.

Ligar Bay from the veranda where I spent a lot of time!

That’s when I wasn’t in classic sofa pose – yes had required inside for the sun which kept streaming in!

I know that this sounds like a cheap excuse for not blogging but it really has been full on. Festive domesticity is always a challenge but for this domestic executive in this year it’s been more challenging than most.

Fortunatly my just in time methodology served me well and we didn’t miss out on any of the essential festive treats. We had presents to unwrap, food to scoff and plenty to drink. Also, we found the fancy china from our secret storage place and dusted off the Christmas decorations to put a bit of festive cheer.

Now I am ready to relax. To live for the moment and not the ones coming up. I am officially on domestic executive leave and looking forward to enjoying some sights and r&r to recharge the batteries.

With this new found time I might actually find some time to do some blogging more regularly, now that would be a novelty eh!

It’s an official excuse for not blogging for a few days – I’ve been struck down with a lurgy. I think it’s just a bad cold but as you get older you get less resilient to even the common cold. Having been as grumpy as a girl can be I became officially ill on Monday and have been off work ever since.

Weekend was productive, if not that much fun.

We went furniture shopping to Masterton (on other side of hill about 1.5 hours drive) and found exactly what we wanted without much fuss. Beats trogging up and down Thorndon Quay, the lifestyle quarter of Wellington. Looks like we can afford two set of sofas for the price of one we looked at in Wellington. The best thing is that they do curtains and stuff too so we’re getting a price for them to get them made up and fitted too. Since we don’t have close neighbours these are less of a priority but nevertheless I am sure that even the sheep want some privacy from us parading around the bathroom!

Sunday was birthday treat for Naomi. We’re so over buying useless presents for each other I treated us both to seeing the NZ ballet instead. It was a smashing performance of Cinderella – a real crowd pleaser! I was finding it hard to breathe by this point and even turned down ice cream in the interval (that’s how rotten I felt). The last time I saw ballet it was £5 tickets during Paul Hamlyn Week at the Royal Opera House – Giselle I think. We had stall tickets about 4 rows back so it was real close up. At the St James Theatre New Zealand we were up in the god seats that gave you vertigo to look down (or maybe that was the cold kicking in). Still, good night was had by all.

Am sure I’ll be back on the mend and may break myself gently tomorrow by working from home. Let’s see if I can improve blogging performance again!

I know it’s been a while. I’ve been crook. Flu don’t you know. So bad I had to stay off work.

But I’m back and entering that manic phase a couple of days before a holiday trying to get everything done in time and kidding myself in the process that I really will get it all done. Yes, we’re off to a warmer place for a week.

This domestic executive hasn’t been loitering though. I’m full steam ahead with my countdown to life post 26 September. I know people didn’t believe I would but I’ve decided to cut lose of the clutches of full time employment and fly solo as planned. I am going to put together a proposal for my new boss on some project work I can continue with on a part time flexible basis but otherwise I’m handing the reins to someone else on for the day to day management of the Communications Office.

It’s all rather exciting really as I’ve managed to hook up with a couple of branding boys who do fantastic work and they’ve asked me to join their team. I’ll still work self employed and build my personal brand but otherwise leave the empire building to them. After all, I’ve got visitors to think about!

With flu, major presentations at work and thinking about the future it has been a hectic time. Another poor excuse for not blogging but really, it’s been very dull. I’m still hunting paint colours, carpets and wallpaper but that is almost done too!

The house is still there and progress being made. The painter rang to check outside paint colours so I know there are still people working up there. We’ve not been up recently because the weather has just simply been awful and because we can’t get inside the thought of peering through windows isn’t my idea of fun. I’m working on the principle that seeing progress next time we’ll get a real sense of things moving on. I do know that the wall linings with Gib Board (plasterboard) has started and this was a worry because it’s been so we we weren’t sure if the council would give sign off. But, the lovely Upper Hutt Council building inspectors did!

Talking about Council’s we’ve just put in for planning permission to build our barn/garage. It’s going to be a red heritage barn. OK its not quite the boutique accommodation I was planning but we need something to garage the car and keep all Martin’s new outdoor boys toys safe and sound in. There is plenty of room to expand the accommodation on site but for the moment we’re going to stick to putting up the barn. Hopefully we’ll get the go ahead pretty quickly and work can start on site.

In the wider kiwi world not much happening apart from wintery weather. Oh yes and public scandal where political advisors intervened on the appointment of a Communications Manager in the Ministry of Environment. The kiwi $ is sailing higher and higher which is good for me but hopefully by the time visitors start arriving someone will have got a grip on the economy. Winter sales are on in the shops and people at work are taking very long holidays for trips to the northern hemisphere. Pity its been raining in the UK too!

Anyway, won’t ramble any more but thought it was time to show a presence. Will see if we can improve the photoblogging with reports from the Great Barrier Reef, Tropical Rainforest and well just the beach! Palm Cove here I come!

No I’m not gone Australian and gone walkabout. It’s been a difficult last week or so with bitterly cold weather, gadding about to Christchurch, rubbish time at work and a busy weekend at the Theatre and choosing stuff for house.

Excuses, excuses I hear you cry. No, just reasons.

No houseblogging this week either. The short story to that is that they have now locked down the house and we’re unable to access it until we’ve agreed terms with the builder about when we can do this. We’re suposed to be accompanied on all our visits which is quite challenging given that we can’t get up there during the week.

Good news is that we’ve concluded most of the decisions on the house. Just need to choose paint colours and kitchen tiles and that will be it for the immediacy. Can’t face the paint colours yet that requires a level of stamina that I just don’t have at the moment!

I need a few days to clear the space in my head and hopefully I can get back into more regular blogging with news and views about kiwi land. For the moment, you’ll just have to accept my apologies and look forward to my reports of going to Hamilton on Thursday, a new adventure to look forward to.

Only hope the tornados and torrential rain have gone by then.

OK, I know I’ve become very tardy with my blogging in recent weeks. The fact of the matter is that being a domestic executive is sooooo time consuming. I’ve got two full time jobs at the moment, the one that earns the money and the one that spends it.

I’ve been totally engrossed in planning and researching fittings and fixtures for the house. Getting what you want requires total obsession with the detail and however good the architect and builders are, it’s down to you to get the specification, sourcing and pricing nailed down.

At last we’ve made huge progress in this regard after my Godsend Father sent over the Fired Earth catalogue from the UK in which to harrass suppliers in New Zealand. Many a conversation, starts and ends with “I want it to look like that”, pointing furiously to the glitzy homey pictures of English country homes. Funny that in New Zealand people are looking at me as if I am completely barmy. The rest of the conversations are usually interspersed with “How much? You’re joking aren’t you……”; “It takes how long to get here…….?”; “Well I know that that’s how kiwi’s do it but I’m not a kiwi so please can you explain again……!”. It’s exhausting and frustrating and it’s consuming my life.

But, light is starting to appear like through the mangaroa tunnel. See http://domestic-executive.blogspot.com/2007/03/photoblogging-tunnel-gully.html

Floor tiles, carpets, woodflooring now picked. Plumbing fittings and tapware selected and two fallings out the with builders on pricing. Kitchen still in progress as we’re now sourcing English made units that can be supplied and fitted cheaper than those built and made in Wellington (if you can work that out let me know!). Wardrobes decided on although we really aren’t doing it the kiwi way (who wants to fill their house with MDF and formica cupboards?). Electric plan drawn up (that’s really going to sting when with the bill comes in) and joinery units specified (not so cheap and nasty now).

The search now commences for the holy grail of bathroom accessories and heated towel rails that don’t look like they’ve come from $stretcher but at $stretcher prices. I will need a holiday before deciding on paint colours.

We’ve also have a wonderful garden landscaping plan which is very exciting and makes a change from thinking about bathrooms and kitchens. The landscaper got the design nailed first time. Funny that it’s a Brit that’s done it …. a concidence perhaps?

Apologies readers for the genuine break in blogging this week. Our computer decided to have a meltdown which has been an all consuming worry. The offending hard disk is still sitting in limbo for a recovery operation but we’re up and running again in the meantime.

I’ve often mentioned how important the internet is to our daily lives – reading papers, downloading podcasts, emailing etc. When all that activity was curtailed it was like losing all the furniture in your living room. Although we were still able to use the laptop it isn’t like having the master computer working in the ways it normally should.

Still, its over now and I’m determined not to morn the lost files. Well not yet at least. Big lesson learned about back up etc but thinking about what might have been is not a good path to take.

Another busy week for this executive domestic counting down to home working. Mid week bombshell is that my immediate boss is leaving so we’ll be all change in a couple of months. I’m delighted for her but that means lots of deals to be done with her before she leaves to make sure that the final home run for me it’s littered with stops and starts from the new person.

I’ve also been investing in being a domestic executive this week but topping up my coach training and networking furiously for future clients. Hopefully that will pay off in time. I’ve got two clients at work now which is keeping the skills ticking over week by week and have just finished my executive coach training which has lasted 12 weeks.

But as they say, all work and no play so the housebuild preparations are still taking up a lot of time and with garden designs to think about now it’s all go.

Avid readers of my blog may remember earlier in the year that this executive-domestic managed new heights of frustration with interference and mind changing of colossal proportions by the powers to be where I work. But, hey I got over it at the time so that’s all good.

So almost 6 months later looks like people have seen the light and I’m back on the case to bring life back into the leadership team. Bring life back because as my boss said to me this week “communications is the oxygen of leadership”. I figured that he was at last ready to listen and engage so it’s been a little manic dusting off all that material and planning done earlier in the year.

The cliché goes that it’s a woman’s prerogative to change their minds. But no, this rule also seems to apply to CEOs, MPs and PMs. As a good public servant I just roll with the punches and move on as much as I can.

Since there is always a high risk that people might change their mind over the weekend I’m employing my new laid back approach. Not working the weekend to impress the boss on Monday but waiting to impress on Tuesday instead!

Work and house building has been all consuming in the last couple of weeks but hopefully new excitements to come next week that I’ll be able to report on – we’re seeing plans from the landscaper, a quiet leadership seminar to support (first step to coach networking for business purposes) and the prospect of a $10 talkathon next week!