Prime Minister-elect Jacinda Ardern is determined to work in a position where she can help New Zealand's children.

It had started early with an azure blue sky over Wellington that had one National MP speculating it was an omen.

But D-Day, the prolonged campaign's longest day, ended on Thursday with a slew of press conferences that wound up just before midnight after Winston Peters announced which way he was going.

Labour and the Greens heard the good news - and National the bad - at the same time as the rest of the country when Peters fronted a press conference just before 7pm, almost four hours later than the time pencilled in. No surprises there.

ROSS GIBLIN/STUFF NZ First leader Winston Peters announces the coalition Government formed by Labour and NZ First.

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But along the way there were signs, other omens and endless speculation.

NZ First MP Shane Jones kicked it off with his traditional opaque reference as he headed to the decisive caucus meeting. This time he pointed the media to the Shining Cuckoo - Pipiwharauroa. Reporters noted it had green wings and kicked the host bird's eggs out of the nest, but beyond that what did it mean? Apparently the hidden clue was its traditional role as a harbinger of spring.

ROSS GIBLIN/STUFF Labour leader Jacinda Ardern heard she would be prime minister at the same time as the rest of the country.

Then there was Jacinda Ardern's partner Clarke Gayford's early morning tweet about cancelling a fishing expedition at Whananaki, where Peters has his Northland bolthole.

But on a more substantive note, NZ First's final stance was coming into focus both on the Beehive ninth floor and over at the Labour leader's office.

Labour knew they were still in the game because the to-ing and fro-ing, and the requests for clarifications, kept up a steady pace.

But on Bill English's side the contact drifted away as early as lunchtime. Silence was not golden. Up at Paula Bennett's office what turned into a consolation party - silly hats and all - kicked off about 5pm, two hours before the official announcement, and ran late into the night.

The strongest sign came mid-afternoon, with an apparent scoop by the National Business Review reporting National had knocked back NZ First requests for even more Cabinet and ministerial posts.

Whether it was right or not, the fact of a leak from the previously tightly held talks was seen as a clear sign all was not well on the National side - and that someone was trying to spin a narrative that Labour was caving in while National stood firm and principled.

Peters - as well as English and Ardern - has since rubbished the claim. It seems the truth was quite the reverse. National had in fact offered five Cabinet posts and two ministers outside Cabinet compared with Labour's offer of four and three.

What had really been the decisive issue was National's refusal to bend on key policies - which just fed what was seen as NZ First's preference for a new government of change rather than supporting a fourth term National administration with some nipping and tucking on economic policy.

It seems National was prepared to offer more "baubles of office" but was not prepared to compromise on key economic policies including monetary policy, and major increase in spending or further curbs on foreign investment. Labour's policy - by comparison - was already moving in that direction.

Immigration, too, was a sticking point though here the picture is murkier, depending on who you talk to. One scenario suggests Labour would not move substantially from its policy to lower net immigration by "only" 25,000 to 30,000 as planned and it was National that was prepared to make deeper cuts.

Others suggested National resisted making any formal cuts. But both variations agree that National's view was that immigration would fall sharply anyway, as the cycle turned, and it was not a big impediment.

The final big ticket item was apparently National's refusal to countenance Peters' flagship campaign policy of moving Auckland's port to Whangarei.

But of course none of this was obvious at the time.

Reporters staking out the various venues were instead reduced to reading the signs. Did the diplomatic protection squad heading upstairs mean things were moving? And there was a scramble when Peters appeared only to head out to Lambton Quay to Vietnamese restaurant Where's Charlie? for lunch - though he said it was breakfast.

At one point Peters' close adviser Paul Carrad headed to the Beehive theatrette, where announcements are made, to put in a plinth behind the podium - suggesting someone of smaller stature - Peters? - was on the way.

One seemed to have a sticker on his suit at what was thought to be the height of Peters' mouth, as a check that the microphones were at the right level.

But soon after reporters posted that online the plinth was taken away. Reporters drifted down to the theatrette after a warning Peters would be making a statement "shortly". But that turned into a wait of more than an hour.

Just before 6pm - as the speculation mounted that Peters would go live on the network news bulletins, as he had in 1996 - media heard clapping and cheering from Ardern's floor. But a Labour press secretary quickly denied it was a signal Ardern would be the next prime minister. He said Labourites were actually watching and cheering quiz show Family Feud.

But over in the Beehive core English's family, including wife Mary, were arriving. Some staffers also took the lift up to the ninth floor, but their smiles for the waiting media seemed forced at best.

Green leader James Shaw was equally in the dark, describing a sense of unreality throughout the day.

"It felt very hypothetical. There was some last-minute back and forth with Labour ... But even while that was happening I was thinking this is probably an academic exercise - useful for 2020 maybe, but I wasn't really seriously engaging with the possibility that it could actually happen, but I knew in my head it was 50-50. It could go either way."

But about 6.30pm NZ First voted and made its call.

Quarter of an hour later, Peters was at the podium delivering the speech itself with a heavy emphasis on a new economic direction mixed with warnings about the impacts of a looming downturn.

"Our choice today relates to how best we mitigate, not worsen, their impact on as many New Zealanders as possible....Far too many New Zealanders have come to view today's capitalism, not as their friend, but as their foe. And they are not all wrong.

"We've had to make a choice, whether it was with either National or Labour, for a modified status quo, or for change.

"We choose a coalition government of NZ First with Labour."

By 8pm Ardern was addressing the media, promising to govern for all New Zealanders. An hour or so later Bill English made his gracious concession speech.

Finally, not long before midnight Shaw confirmed, completely unsurprisingly, that Green Party delegates had endorsed the deal that would for the first time in the party's history see it hold ministerial rank, albeit outside Cabinet.

After nine years of National-led Government and a 17-hour day of talks, New Zealand would have a Labour-NZ First minority coalition Government supported by the Greens.