It's been a fun party day!

 

Participating at:

Friday - 29 January

Hosted by Cecily and Carrie

Hosted by Chris
I am now compiling a mail as the week progress with my photo per day to publish on a Friday.
20/365: Here fishy, fishy...
I set a difficult task for myself- photograph the office fish and capture the reflection on to the side of the bowl.

21/365: Ten little piggies:
I have decided to do feet shots of the kids before those feet grow much bigger. Today was Little man L - my only willing model. Edited to sepia tone in Photoshop.

22/365: Diamonds:
It has been raining for a week and as I left for work the rain drops in the little rock roses looked like diamonds. Pity there was not a spot of sunlight to enhance the glitter effect.


23/365: Our national flower:
I bought the proteas at the Farmers market. Beautiful and will last for weeks.


24/365: Tutu princess:
Miss Annik twirling in the tutu I made for her on her birthday party on Sunday.

25/365:
MAMMA SELF DOEN! (Mammy, I want to do it myself!) We are having a lot of that at the moment.

26/365:
It was a long day.... Hunter was working late and Little man C only settled down at 9:15 when I remembered that I have not taken a photo yet. So I poured myself a nice bath, took this picture and just as I lowered myself into it, a little voice cried from the doorway: "Mamma.....". It was a short bath, but a sleep through night for the rest of the night.

27/365:
Woke up this morning to a misty Pretoria - a very unusual occurrence this time of the year. I literally had to hang out of our top window to capture this shot of our neighbour's garden.

28/365:
I spent a bit of money last night at the Exclusive Books sale , most books below 50% of their original price- amongst others Dan Brown's newest offering and the full illustrated Chronicles of Narnia. The top book on the pile is calle "African Odyssey" and is a 365 photo book on the Serengeti. Perfect present for Hunter.


I am just loving Friday fragments - have all sorts of stupid random things happening in my mind.

1. We are going to have a very busy very party-filled weekend. Looking forward to that.

2. Only went to gym twice this week - maybe I can fit my 3rd session in this weekend.

3. It's just a few days away from book club and I have not finished my 3 books this month. Not a great way to start the year! I have finished two and my third is "The story of Edgar Sawtelle" and boy it's thick. But I am really enjoying it. I might have to return it and finish reading it when it is not picked by someone else.

4. It seems as we have seen the end of our very rainy two weeks. And I thought we will have an El Nino year this year.

5. I have so much work to do I better stop blogging and go on!

6. I am contemplating giving a weekly shout-out to another South African blogger as most of my peeps are from overseas and I am just getting into the other SA girls. Would you like to get to know more SA bloggers?

7. And one little boy (L) made a no 2 in his potty! Way to go!

8. Another little boy (C) has not been sleeping well the last 3 nights - last night was a disaster. Bith Hunter and I are so tired this morning.

9. I hear on the news that tourists had to be airlifted off Machu Pichu's Inka ruins is Peru due to heavy rains. It has always been a dream of mine to do the hiking trail and visit it. One day, some day.

10. And on that note our Lotto stands on 55 million rands tonight - now that can set you up for life. And free to tour to Machu Pichu!

Have a great weekend all!

Ah, the gym....

I went to the gym yesterday and the day before during lunch time as I often do, and should do more because I work about half a street block away from the gym. For the SA girls, it's everybody's favorite Discovery benefit. On walking in I blindly made for the girl's locker room just to be stopped in my tracks by a second, very urgent shout from a security guard. I had to use the little boys room as they had workmen in the little girls. The boys locker room provided much food for thought though as the differences are subtle, but obvious if you start looking. (if you ignore the urinals, that is - not so subtle)

1. More mirrors - I swear, way, way more. Now this amazes me - are men more vain than woman or just more confident?
2. This does oppose the first item - the scale is tucked far in the back most corner in a set of lockers, away from all eyes. In the girls it sits right at the entryway to the rest of the gym, where everybody passes. Are men therefore more shy of their weight or are we woman subtly shoved into the direction of obsessing about our weight.
3. The wear and tear on the recently revamped wooden laminated lockers is way way more than in the girls room. Is it more used or more abused?
4. I was surprised that half the showers had no doors? What the? All the girls showers have doors. Does this stress the fact that this particular branch is known to be a pick up point for gays or are we woman stupid - we do not like other to see us when we shower but we comfortable dress in front of everybody?
5. The print advertisements behind the doors is the boys room currently is for a liver remedy, in the girls, for a constipation remedy. ;-)

Onto the treadmill and while sweating away, the video give me food plays on VH1 - so not on in the gym? I admit Virgin Active has no control over what VH1 plays, but still ironic. Then I notice that a few of the "fatso girls" in this video is not even really that fat! Gosh, my twin skin is more than the rolls on some of those tummies. What does this tell us? Is the expectations of the world towards how thin a woman should be to be attractive too high? Should we all look like Lady Gaga, Fergie and Beyonce, three other scantily clad girls that entertained me on VH1 yesterday? Gosh, I wish I looked like Madonna at 51 but I do not have the luxury of that amount of time and money.

And what will the expectations be when my daughter is 16? What about rather encouraging healthy eating than skinny bodies? And what about moving that scale in the further most corner?

Way back and wordful Whensday - Super hero day.

Playing along today with Cheryl and Angie:

One of the reasons I love the Lil' Miss' school is that they do truly original and fun things with the kids. Last year for the last day at school (11 December 2009) they had "Superhero or other magical creatures" day . The kids had so much fun!

My Super Unicorn girl.




A very pregnant Super Galactic Girl (teacher Wendy)

By the way, I am going to have fun this year - have been elected to the Parent's committee. Hunter did his stint as chairman of the Fund raising committee 2 years ago with huge success. Now it's my turn.
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I never know where is the "right" place to answer on comments - but here goes: (in future I will do in comments)
"Herself" - thanks for visiting and I would love to visit you, but you have an "empty" blogger profile. Please give me your blog address.

Jenty - you are right on girl - they will be standard presents for girls.

Jamie -we are half a series behind in Grey's and The Mentalist - on some programs we are seasons and seasons behind. And thanks to Marcelle - I know we are ahead of Germany. You USA girls are the first to see anything. We live in the backwoods of the world.

Sunday party day

On Sunday we attended little miss Annik's 3rd birthday. It was a relaxed fun day with close friends and family.

I made my second no sew tutu for her and t was an absolute hit. We also provided some accessories. I made it with 3 colours - white, light pink and cerise pink.


Miss Emma did the face painting.


There was a great braai and some cake

Playing


Swimming

Relaxing

And some great two-somes for twosday:


R with little A - she was not feeling well, but after a bit of Panado got into playing with the little Miss and Emma.

This is how Stefaan carries little miss Tessa under the arm - then he has the other arm free for his crutch.

My original two-some at the pool after their swim. I am always so amazed to see how different their little bodies are build - one with broad shoulders, feet and hands (C) and one with narrow set (L).

Makes my Monday - full marks!

I know that you fellow mommy's will forgive me for a bit of bragging this morning.

Playing along with Cheryl.

The maths program at school did a little test on Friday to check the children's readiness to proceed with Grade 0 maths. She aced with a full score! Grade O (R) maths from today Makes my Monday!

And participating for the first time ever in the :

I know I am late, but I am here!
The challenge is "Yellow':

Little boy yellow,
come blow your horn,
the sheep's in the meadow,
the cow's in the corn...

My Rose Princess.

Wow, look at the rose princess!
Another great face painting by the clown at the Farmers market.

Participating at: