Aussie aussie aussie, oi oi oi. Its official, I am Australian.

I attended the ceremony and received my certificate on Monday night, that's me shaking the mayor's hand. I have actually met the mayor before, we got our heads in the local paper when we planted some trees together at the local skate park, well, the council worker planted them and the mayor and I turned up and threw a bit of mulch on them and said "cheese". The neighbourhood centre where I go to knitting group donated the trees, and I am on the committee of the neighbourhood centre and nobody else could go (or wanted to) during the day so I was volunteered to go and plant the trees with the mayor.

He remembered me, I had to remind him of course, but he definitely remembered me, which was lovely. And after the ceremony (which was just wonderful by the way, bagpipes and everything) we got talking to the local MPs and they gave me their business cards etc and said if there were any issues I was to let them know. Next election will be my very first vote in my life. When I became eligible to vote in NZ I couldn't be bothered, and its not compulsory and I didn't give a fig about politics. Then I moved to aussie and wasn't allowed to vote anyway. Since having children I have become very interested in politics and I will enjoy having my chance to vote.

Anyway, being the good kiwi girl that I am (bwahaha) I like to save a buck where possible, so the next day it was off to the uni with my certificate of australian citizenship to see if I could put my degree on tick like everybody else. And the answer was "yes", so I am continuing.

I got my results back and I passed the unit with distinction and got 87% on my final essay and got some very inspiring comments so I am going to keep plugging away at it and I am very happy about that.

My little family came and watched me become a citizen and a couple of my girlfriends Ains and Mel came along, I felt very loved. And the guy behind the flag in the photo above? That's Mel's uncle, who she didn't know would be there, how random is that, lol. He was handing the plants out. We got given a native plant each.

And Callum reached his arms out to give one of the politicians a cuddle so in another photo there is Steve and I and Baden and the mayor and the local MPs and there's Callum being held by the pollie, lol, gawd he's so cute. Callum I mean, not the pollie.