23/52: Why monsters are so lucky and a morepork in a tree

A portrait of my children once a week, every week in 2014

Mylo: this is what you unexpectedly came out with from the back seat of the car one morning last week. Dad was so tickled he had to text it to me straight away.

"Monsters are very very very very lucky. Because they get to eat whatever they want because they don't have mums and dads"

I would love to know what was going on inside your head at that moment and why that gem just suddenly popped out. Perhaps you were thinking about the fact that we have to be a bit tough on you at times at the dinner table to try and encourage you to eat chicken or other chewy meat!

 Because of course one must eat all around the outside of the Squiggletop first........

Noah: it was all your idea to take a family walk to Lone Pine, a pine tree on a hill that we can see in the distance from our house. You chose this walk because you were so keen to show me and Mylo the track that you and Dad have been mountain biking a few times now and you kept up a constant chatter all the way to Lone Pine, and onto the Park Bench and the 'Pump Tracks' - where you have to pump your arms as you go over mini speed bumps to make the most of your suspension.

Even the mist rolling in couldn't dampen your enthusiasm for the outdoors

Then on the way back we accidentally startled a kereru out of his tree and realised that right beside him and not battering an eyelid (literally) was a morepork. In broad daylight. We were SO thrilled to see this amazing NZ native owl up close that we stayed and watched him for a good ten minutes or so. And he was as interested in us as we were in him. You also amazed me by recognising a stitchbird's call and spotting him in a tree as well as spying a fantail flitting around us. You are becoming quite the little twitcher, my son, and I love it.