Father's 80th birthday celebrations and many more...

Pic of my parents and Aunty Talosaga (right) at the exhibition launch

 This last week has been an absolutely fabulous and busy week! (hence not much activity on the blog). It started with the celebration of my father's 80th birthday breakfast in the morning and then we rushed over to the Mangere Arts centre to launch my first exhibition kindly sponsored by the local Mangere Otahuhu board and then off to the Orbit Restaurant in Skycity to celebrate his birthday.

The pic above of my parents and aunty Talosaga showcase my paintings boards in the background as my parents flew in from Samoa to not only celebrate my dad's birthday but to also attend my exhibition launch and a family wedding. I honour my parents and aunty as they have always been there for me and have supported me on my journey along the way and I thank God for them.

It was really special for me to have them attend as this was another dream come true for me. As a child I loved art at primary school and in intermediate I remember going to an exhibition of one of my screen prints that a teacher took to an exhibition and my parents took me to view it. I never took a pic but I remember being so proud that we got to view it with other student works.

And in taking Art in senior high school but not getting enough marks to enter Elam art school at University was a set back for me but it didn't stop the dream of wanting to paint and now the books have allowed me to express the artistic side of me that was suppressed for so long whilst pursuing academic credits in a teaching space.

This week I was given the privilege, through the kind funding of the local board to run workshops for local primary, intermediate schools and early childhood centres around my artworks in celebrating the Samoan language week. I was able to hold 10 workshops, give away books with 6 different schools which was such a blessing and got to be a guest speaker at my old intermediate school after some 40 years last entering a school assembly there.

Today, I'm off to continue celebrations with a stall at the Mangere markets in collaboration with the Samoa business network where we are showcasing our Samoan businesses (15 stalls) and this is such a neat opportunity to share my books and meet with our local community (although I usually shop locally to support our local businesses.

And then I'll be looking forward to winding down for a bit before the next book launch which is scheduled for this month and looking forward to launching 'Fale Samoa'...