Christ the Lord is Risen Today

Our garden

When we arrived back on Sunday from Cape Town we discovered that our garden was still flourishing and had provided us with a few new surprises.

This was the first one.... Keith received this Strelizia bush as a birthday present for his 40th and I think in all the time we've had it it's maybe flowered once! So here's the bloom that opened in the last few days:

And this is our other bush that also flowers now and then

The Sunday before we left for Cape Town we received a cactus plant at church... one each, with instructions to "Nuture your gifts".... ie not necessarily green fingers but more that when you tend this plant you remember the gifts that God has given you and put them to use. Well here's our cacti

Now they didn't have the greatest start as they got forgotten in the boot of Keith's car and lived there all in the dark for the week we were in Cape Town. Then they also ended up with a trip to work and back before being put in their rightful place.... on the patio! So let's hope they survive and flourish.

While taking these pics, I also snapped this one of some pretty pink whatsits

And on arriving home this afternoon from work I spied these purple irises popping their pretty heads up

And so now you've had a small glimpse into our garden.... the rest of it... well it's green and it's there but not much to show.

Beading????

Me doing beading??? Never!!! hehehe... okay maybe once... or should that be Thrice??? Yip I decided to try my hand at this too.

I had seen a beautiful pearl bracelet on Helen's Misi store and decided that seeing as I have some pearl beads, maybe (?) I could make one myself. Well at Hobby-X I managed to find some nice cheap memory wire and promptly made myself THREE bracelets with the beads that I had lying around here.... scrap beads that would really never make it on to a layout in a million years!

Thanks also goes to Judi for turning the ends in.... I don't have the right pliers... and even Keith didn't have it in his extensive collection of tools in the workshop! So here for all to see is my handiwork:

The pearl bracelet:

I had some left over pearls and put them together with some pink beads and added in the purple flowers (curtesy of my sister-in-law Denise from years back!)

And then I found lots of brown beads.... from my first ISE Convention... and made this one. I added in some bling butterflies... also from an ISE if I remember correctly... and finished the ends with two tiny yellow flowers (from Denise as per above). And just for added interest I put a dragonfly charm in the middle.

Okay so now I've been there done that. Don't think I'll make any more in a hurry.... unless I get more beads from somewhere!

Congrats....

Well done to Desire over at Doing Life on reach 20 000 hits.... wow... I wish!! hehehe. So to commemorate this momentous occasion, Desire is giving away a bundle of goodies.... go check it out http://www.desiref.blogspot.com/

Cape Town Photos

Here's photos a-plenty from our holiday with a bit of a recap...

The sunset the night before we left (29 March)

We had a good flight down on Monday the 30th, picked up our rental car and drove through to Keith's sister Heather's place in Durbanville where we spent the rest of the week.

Tuesday morning we went through to Canal Walk shopping centre and Aaron and I spent most of the day in the MTN Sciencentre... absolutely fabulous place. We did break for lunch at John Dory's where Aaron spied some chopsticks in the cutlery basket and decided he had to eat his fish fingers with chopsticks.

The afternoon we each went our own way (with me sneaking some photos)... we had fun building a HUGE floor puzzle of the map of Africa.

Once home Aaron got acquainted with his cousin Kaylin... 7 months old. She is absolutely delightful and laughs so easily at Aaron's antics... especially with him running around the garden on her horse!

Wednesday morning we found Cool Runnings and had a ball doing the downhill tobaggan.... for someone who does not like fast/high things.... ie I DO NOT do rollercoasters.... this was FUN!!! As Aaron is under 8 he had to go with an adult.... we bought 3 rides (cheaper) and so he got to go twice with Daddy and once with Mommy.

We then took a drive out to Bloubergstrand and took a walk along the beach. I snapped a photo of Keith & Aaron to update one I had taken years ago when we visited a similar beach when Aaron was 1.

Once home and the kids were bathed, Aaron read Kaylin her new book

Thursday morning we trekked out to Butterfly World.... I really loved this place and got to play with my camera and took LOTS of photos of the different butterflies and moths. Aaron also spied the largest butterfly that is at Butterfly World... the Owl Butterfly (Bottom centre)

For lunch we made our way to Fairview Wine Farm where there is The Goatshed restaurant.... we shared a cheese platter and sampled various cheeses that they produce, including goats milk cheese... yummy

We then attempted to go to Blue Rock near Strand, but were disappointed in that it was closed for two days for a company team build, plus it was blowing something awful... so we just headed back home and Aaron had a swim!

Friday morning we picked up my niece, Veronica, after she had finished school and took her to Canal Walk. We had lunch at Spur... shared food off the kiddies menu.... I think the waitress must have thought we were mad!

After lunch we went down to the kiddies entertainment and Aaron and Veronica learnt a little on how to juggle.... they will definately have to practice some more!

The whole reason we went to Canal Walk was for Aaron to ride the train that they advertised. Well we did just that.... but I think it was a rip off.... R10 for 5 minutes!!! Literally!! But he did have fun!

Now we still had afternoon to fill and not enough time to go up Table Mountain as we had planned, so we headed instead for Ratanga Junction.... took a Fun Pass and got to ride the train (again!) and the canal boat.... in effect we did two trips on each..... a round trip twice around the whole place. By the time we were done riding the park was closing.... good use of an afternoon.

Saturday was our last day of the holiday. Thomas & Heather took us through to Franschhoek for the morning.... a lovely drive to a very quaint village.... we browsed all the shops, had lunch there and made it back home by 3pm in time for us to take some last minute pics before heading for the airport.

Again we had a good flight home. Aaron hogged the window seat so when he saw a beautiful sunset I just passed him my camera to take some pics...

And thus we got back to Jhb. My folks fetched us, we got pizzas for supper, spent the night with them and after church this morning Keith and I headed for home.

Once home I unpacked, did washing and read my book till it was finished. It's been a great day to reminise about our holiday too!

Promised photos

These are photos from the end of March....

We have barbets that come visit and sing around our house. Last year it looked like they were nesting in our garden... and this year I got to catch them on camera. The family of three black collared barbets in the tree, as well as showing you the nest (bottom left corner)

The Wednesday before Aaron's school closed we went to Allie's ice skating party.... her birthday was actually in January and this was technically her b rother's birthday party, but her mom decided that she could have some friend too.... so here's pics of Aaron skating as well as Aaron and Allie playing on a cell phone (one of the dad's)

On Saturday 28th March it was Sebastian's birthday. Aaron and Sebastian went to Play Group together when they were 2... so this is a long standing yearly arrangement now that they are at different schools. Anyway, Sebastian's birthday was a "camp out" theme. A guy came and did all sorts of camping activities with the boys.

Build a tent and not get wet when a bucket of water is thrown over.

Make a water filter and see which team's one works the best

Make a fire using a flint ... a bit easier than on Survivor, but still a lot of hard work.... a fire was eventualy made!

Then the boys got to do a typical boy thing.... water fights! They filled syringes with water and squirted each other.... some kids got VERY soaked.

Then as a special treat the guy brought out the paintball gun and each boy got a turn to shoot the target before Sebastian got to empty the barrel.... he ended up demolishing the target!

After a quick swim, some hotdogs for lunch it was on to birthday cake, a welltimed visit by a passing icecream truck got each kid an icecream, then it was present time.

And as a special treat, Sebastian's dad loaded all the children into the back of his bakkie for a trip to the river just behind their house.... the boys loved playing in the river and causing havoc before going home.

Aaron didn't want to leave and so we ended up staying till nearly 6 o'clock. On the way home from the party there was the most awesome sunset.

I think that is all the promised photos... next post will be about our Cape Town trip.

We are back...

We've arrived safely back from Cape Town... left Aaron with my folks for the week... so I get some peace and quiet... hehehe.

I've downloaded my photos from the camera (all 270 of them!) and will now begin the task of collaging them ready to blog... so patience... they are on their way....

Going away...

I've got tons to share with you but no time to do it.... I've got to go do my ironing and then pack our suitcases for our trip to Cape Town. We fly tomorrow morning and don't get back till late on Saturday... will post on Sunday (hopefully)... and then it will have to be two weeks worth of photos.

I need to share with you the following:
1. Daniel's bday party last Saturday
2. Allie's bday party at the ice rink on Wednesday
3. Sebastian's bday party yesterday
4. The sunset on the way home from yesterday's party (awesome!)

and then of course it will also be our Cape Town pics.... so brace yourself for LOTS of photos next week.

Till then, happy happy to all and keep scrapping/blogging.

ps... happy birthday Helen for today... hope it's an awesome day all round

Doing my bit...

I've been hearing about it on the radio , then read about it on one my my blog subs, so after following a link to the website I have signed up for EARTH HOUR..... so why not do your bit for the world too... and go sign up.... all it takes is one hour of darkness on Saturday night at 8:30pm... your local time!

Blog party for Jacki

My most awesome blog friend Jacki is having a blog party... so please go check her out and leave a comment (you might just win something too!).