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After meeting her husband George while walking the Milford Track, it took three attempts at IVF for Hendrika Dennison to finally fall pregnant with her son Pieter.
“He’s a miracle,” smiles the Dunedin woman, although she points out she was 40 when she gave birth, making her an “older mother”. Yet despite their age difference, Henny was determined to find
a hobby they could share.
When he was growing up, Henny, now 66, spent years building Lego creations with Pieter, and would chauffeur him to Lego shows everywhere between Invercargill and Nelson. He may now do those road trips with his girlfriend, but when Pieter, 26, wanted to enter Lego Masters NZ, he knew the perfect partner.
All aboard! Pieter’s model of Dunedin Railway Station.
However, entering the TVNZ 2 series took some convincing for his self-confessed introverted mother on the verge of retirement. “I say I’m not proud of myself, although really I am,” smiles Henny. “Pieter wanted so much to do Lego Masters. He didn’t want to go with someone he didn’t know and he knew how I build.
“I’d have been disappointed if he didn’t get the opportunity. I’m just scared of the negative comments I might get. But I remind myself that if I wasn’t good enough, Robin wouldn’t have picked us.”
They both find Lego therapeutic and a good way to unwind, although it’s not their only shared skill – Pieter has followed part-time machinist Henny into sewing. It’s a job he can manage after glandular fever forced him to drop out of his first year of an architecture degree.
In Henny’s audition for Lego Masters, she built a sewing machine. Pieter says, “This experience taught me how much she really cares about me. I’m really thankful she did this with me. I’m very proud of her.”
Did Lego spur his desire to be an architect or did architecture help on the show? Both, says Pieter, who believes his studies gave him a good understanding of the foundations to hold construction. “But I also travel around to brick shows and have to make sure that my builds are stable enough so they don’t break in the car!”
Lego Masters NZ screens 7.30pm Monday to Wednesday on TVNZ 2.
