So what-a-dooo now ???

Why am I really such a Bad Luck Magnet ????

I get up yesterday morning ... 5.30am !!! ... skies a bit cloudy, a bit sunny ... get showered & dressed ... remember we're going to uShaka Marine World = only R 5.00 entrance fee ... Louise phones ... she's running late ... can't get Brendin out of bed ... phew T.G me too, I can't get my lazy boy out of bed either and I have an ANT infestation in the kitchen to sort but before I leave ... (can't leave mum a hoard of bugs to clean up !!! why not ?? LOL)

Eventually get ourselves in the car and 'fly' down into Durban ... got flashed by a traffic camera !!! (o.Fudge) at a traffic light in town ... think it might have 'just' turned red !!!! Park up at uShaka ... crack my front licence plate on the stoopid car in front that has a tow bar sticking out way too far !!! (Idiot can't park either ... me or it!!! LOL) The ques are out of the park and round the side streets too ... w.t.f were we thinking ... every body and their granny was gonna come here today for that price ...(and trust me they were ALL here & not only was the sky very DARK!!! ) it was raining and a bit overcast ... but warm rain !!! However there were patches of blue in between ... A management decision was made ... there was no way we were standing in that line !!!! It would probably take about 3 hours just to get to the front gates !!!!

We went back to Louise's place where she very kindly made us 'breaky' ... Kelsey & Brendin entertained each other for an hour or so ... in that time we had sunshine, rain, wind and then again sunshine ... (oooh forgot to mention ... Juno - she'd already 'chickened' out of going ... Friday she'd said she wasn't going in the rain ... then lucky her she got a visit from her out-laws so that was her 'excuse' !!! cheeky monkey ---then has the nerve to send a message asking if we were having fun !!! :-O)

WELL now what-a-dooo ??? I mean I was quite happy to go home cos me I can always find a stack of things to do ... but 'The Son?' When we got home poor mum's peace was shattered ...

BUT she was baking ... mince pies, cheese scones and Bread & Butter pudding ... this gives me an idea ... "Kelsey wanna bake some Cookies????"

The Best Ever Cheese Scones ... MUM's

The Family Famous - Cornflake Pie ... and Mince Pie for Supper

Yet another of MY favourites ... Bread & Butter Pudding ...

So that's how we spent the rest of our day ... slaving over a hot stove!!!! (and everything is yummy-licious... Kelsey started complaining of a bad tummy about 6pm that could have something to do with all the cookie dough he'd eaten and the 'samples' he just had to try !!!)

Kelsey - First get all the ingredients out ...

Gotta add some chocolate to the Fruit Crunchies ... makes them a little bit extra special.

Mixing Peanut Butter Cookies ... just 1 little taste mum ....

Just out of the oven ... gotta wait till they cool before we cut and eat ....

Fruit Crunchies, with chocolate chips ...

Peanut Butter Biscuits ... next batch ready for the oven mum ...

Peanut Butter Cookies OOOOps forgot there were yet more cookies in the oven ... some a little darker than others !!!

(we can give those to Aunty Irena !!! LOL)

Then I wonder why at 8pm last night we had yet another 'power failure' ... I'd probably used up my quota for the day 'BAKING' !!!! (PMSL)

Not Thursday already???

I can't believe just how fast the time is going ... (heard that somewhere before!)

I was chatting to Juno yesterday about the fact that we are in the middle of another week and again I feel like I've done nothing ... she said she'd heard somewhere ... "time doesn't really move any faster ... we just don't know how to appreciate and live in the 'today ' We are always planning for the tomorrow and even further in advance than that !!! And how true is that ...

Before we'd even finished our first cup of 'crappy' coffee yesterday we had the diaries out and planning the weekend ... next week ... a few weeks from now and hey even next year !!!!

I mean... I got one of those 'fun ... please forward e-mails' that had a question in it : What are you looking forward to doing ... short term, medium term & long term ??? Why not just what are you looking forward to doing today ???? ENJOYING IT... ENJOYING LIFE???

Why the philosophical approach ... heard 2 pieces of crappy news lately ... a very good friend has found 'an alien entity' in her body ... and been told it's the BIG C!!!! How SHITTY is that !!! and then received a letter from another mate who has been AWOL for awhile only to hear she lost her MUM last October and I didn't even know (now I know why she's been AWOL!!!) ... doubly SHITTY ... so all I'm waiting for now is the 3rd bit of Shitty news !!!! (bad news always travels in 3's)

To both of you ... I'm really sorry to hear your news ... you are both in my thoughts and prayers...

So what have we been up to this week ... believe it or not ... a lot of nothingness really ...

Still doing the aquaerobics, Monday & Wednesday ... loving it, although as I think I might have mentioned before ... aching in the funniest of places ... Lana our instructor makes sure every muscle and fibre of the body is stretched and abused !!! LOL . Again by the time I get back from our 1 hour lesson, shower and get dressed it's almost 11am so the day seems almost over !!!!

I then download e-mails, surf the net for about an hour, which is not much really (you computer junkies will agree on that one !!!) and before you know it it's lunch time ... followed by pick up - homework for about an hour and a half ... start the dinner ... eat the dinner ... watch about an hour of TV and it's to bed to get up the next day and start all over again ...

Tuesday's are the worst - OK TG no Aqua but it's taking mum to do her bits & bobs in town ... (pensioners day etc) then back home, pack away groceries or whatever ... pack Crafting stuff in car ... teaching 1.45 - 3pm, Kelsey at cricket, collect him at 3.15pm take him for his extra lesson with Mandy then it's back to rugby practise from 4 - 5pm ... Thursday is my favourite day of the week ... I do drop off and then I don't have to be at school till 5pm cos Kelsey has cricket AND rugby!!!!

So with all this NOTHINGness in my week how come I have no TIME to do anything !!!! There's that word again TIME !!! I seriously have to find me some more ... well I did start a 'page' on time in my journalling attempts ... well I seemed to have a bit on my hands between cricket & rugby on Tuesday ... this is it so far ....


Work still in progress ....
OOOO I do have something to tell you ... yesterday I was witness to a rather 'unusual' accident:

The Scene: I'm the 2nd car waiting at the traffic lights ... the lights turn green and we proceed across the road ... now I have to explain these particular traffic lights are on a small incline so when you go over them you can't go fast as it's uphill and it's a busy intersection ... the car in front moves off at a normal speed , as she passes the set of lights on the opposite side of the road a pedestrian (drunk as a skunk, and some of you out there will know exactly the 'type' of person!!! ) stepped out straight into the left side of her car .... his can of beer flies into the air (yes you read it right his beer !!!) ... he falls down all dazed and confused ... the poor lady in the car in front doesn't know what the hell has hit her and he doesn't know where the hell he is !!!! He has a large gash above his left eye ... he stands up ... brushes himself off ... straightens his shirt etc ... and is just standing there swaying !!! The lady pulls over ... luckily (or not) there was a police car on the right hand side waiting to turn right and a car behind that had also witnessed this whole thing ... the police took my details as a witness and then I moved on .... it looked so funny, and to me it all happened in slow motion, you're all probably laughing about it too BUT apparently I'm told the guy died at the scene a bit later !!!!!! (W.T.F)

Don't know what's going to happen now !!! But I may have to give some sort of a statement I guess ??? I tell you ... in a blink of an eye !!!!

We're still having great weather ... yes I have to mention it ... cos I realised I mentioned the bad weather a lot too so this is to even out the odds ... we're hoping it's going to be good for the weekend cos Ushaka Marine World has a promotion on - only R 5.00 p.p. entrance (normally R 120.00 p.p on Saturday) and the gang that went out last weekend are meeting up this weekend hoping to go !!!! See there I go again ... planning our future away ... but it means I may just have a 2nd weekend of full-ness instead of nothing-ness

Well I'll keep you all posted ....

Today's thought: TODAY is the TOMORROW you worried about YESTERDAY

Glowing Darling ....

Simply Glowing !!!!

WOW what a great day we've had today ... Kelsey & I were invited to join Louise & Mark to celebrate Brendin's Birthday at a waterpark in Toti called 'Splash ' ... and boy have we had a fabulosso time ...

All week we've watched in anticipation at the weather ... as the weekend drew closer we were a little worried as the forecast looked cloudy with thunderstorms later .... I think the weather man must have been reading next months 20th not todays ...

There wasn't a cloud in the sky ... and the temperatures I'm sure rose way above the forecasted 29c ....

Louise insisted we arrive at 'Splash' by 8am ... although they didn't open till 9.30 and the rides didn't work till 10am ... Juno and her kids also joined us and we thought maybe Louise had really lost it ... well how wrong were we ??? Although we stood and waited for an hour & half ... there was a que a mile long before the doors opened ... so sorry for doubting you Louise .... ;-)

The Bathing Beauties ...

Kelsey coming out 'the Wash'
The four rascals: L-R Lee, Kelsey, Tristan & Brendin (birthday boy)
Kelsey having fun on the tubes ....

The best looking gals there : L-R - Louise, Me, Juno

Janet & Juno ....at the start of the day

Louise all organised with the food ... Brendin the birthday boy on the right

We grabbed our 'spot' and we were set for the day ... the kids had a ball ... there's quite a few water rides to go on, there's a fairly large ' splash pool', a 'washing machine' ride that spits you out the end into a swirling wash of water and there's a 'smooth' river ride around the park ... as well as a mini put-put course on site too ...

The 'right spot' under the trees....

Kelsey at the start of the day before too much sun !!!

Needless to say I think Kelsey was the first kid in the water and the last kid out ... but I do have to mention that while we were waiting for the park to open, Kelsey just had to take a dive in the Indian Ocean ... and ooops sorry dad ... donated your silver bracelet to the Ocean Gods !!!!

(dad's response "nice one" whatever that's supposed to mean !!!)

Have to mention Kelsey was passed out on his bed by 8.15pm !!!! :0

What a really lovely day spent baking in the hot African sun ... enjoying the water... the good food and the fantastic company .... THANK YOU ALL :-)

Open Day for High School ... Already

Yup you read right ... this morning I visited the High School we are hoping Kelsey is going to go to in 2011 !!!! Talk about wishing your kids life away !!! He's only just started in Gr7 ...

But the demand for 'the correct' High School is sooooo high that you have to get your applications in as soon as they announce the date ... DONE - in fact my application was number 1 on the list ... YES I SOOOO WANT HIM TO GET INTO THIS SCHOOL ....

And this morning the school had an open morning where the kids from the local schools are spending the morning and the parents can 'visit' and have a guided tour of the school ... wow I was impressed !!! I knew it would be the right school for Kelsey ... Now we have to wait ... we, the parents have to attend an interview (sweaty palms ... stress levels go up etc. etc. ) your child attends an interview (more stress, more sweaty palms etc. etc.) and only THEN do you find out if your kid's been accepted !!!!!

Now you know what why my 'HURDLE' for 2010 is !!! Once we get our answer (and I'm hoping it will be a positive one - well I'm praying real hard for that) then I can relax a bit for the rest of 2010 !!! well on the High School side ... we'll still have to keep the pressure on to pass Gr 7 ... but this year my son is a changed boy ... he is definitely benefiting from being in a smaller class and he actually says he's loving school ... (where is Kelsey and what have you done with him ??? ) lol

After our cooler spell yesterday ... 'spikes' (a.k.a the sun) woke this morning again with a vengeance (lovely stuff) heater is back on again and the temps are due to rise to 29/30 today and getting hotter by the weekend ... Oh yes !!!

P.S. Just had to add this quote:
Keep your chin up, only the first 40 years of parenthood are the hardest

WOW ....

What a week .... AGAIN ...

Our weather has been magnificent ... hot & humid ... the Aquaerobics has been really good fun ... hard work ... I now think I have muscles that I didn't have before !!! or didn't know about them ;-)

I had a meeting on Monday with someone .... for a shop premises ... "watch this space" ... sounded very good but waiting for the details in writing ...

Papercrafting with the kids on Tuesday was good fun too ... although I think that may well be the source of the headaches ... knowing what lies ahead !!! PMSL

Check out these photos of them all hard at work ... trying not too obviously to look at the camera ...
And of course - not the kid - Juno ... (well debatable really) she's a mum that also enjoys the classes and helps me out when I need another adult !!! ...
And these are the cards they have all made ... stunning stuff eh? what .... As I mentioned before I am starting them on the basics ... teaching them HOW to use Stamps & Inks properly (not Post Office Style!!!) And making these little 'cards' is a great way to teach them stamping ... inking and randomness !!!! Boy ... Did we have one hell of a Thunderstorm last night ... a true and typical African Storm ... 2 weeks of heat all rolled up into one huge orchestra of sound, wind & rain ... it has cooled us down considerably !!! Not that I am complaining ... only stating the facts !!!!

Check out one of my regular visitors ... I have about 5 of them that live in the front porch and keep the fly and mosquito population under control ... now you know where the 'gecko' name came from .... They are cute ... and they 'bark or click' at each other ... it really is quite fascinating (really):

These photos don't show you the real force of the storm but you can see some of the flooded areas of the garden ... wish I could have provided sound ... it is really quite something to listen to ...

The plants were loving it !!!!

The start of our very own 'swimming pool' in the front garden ....

And of course don't forget ... Pancake Tuesday ... me - miss out on pancakes .... NEVER ... and TG the weather did not cause a power failure ... surprisingly ... No we had that this morning ... on & off half a dozen times that's why it has taken me all day to post this blog ...

Mine's with Cinnamon sugar and lemon juice... please.

Well ... LOVE' rly

So all you 'LOVE' birds ... hope you had a Love...rly day yesterday ???

No Paul did not turn up again this year (boo hoo ... but hey we are still trying to build that house !!!save money where we can!!! ;-) but he did the next best thing .... Love'rly Flowers (ROSES) and Chocolates(Belgian) courtesy of Inter flora ....

Aren't these just LOVE' rly ????

But enough of that soppy stuff ... Had a busy (if not somewhat boring) weekend ... look what I was reduced to ... sorting bloody alphabet beads ... for starters ....

And remember that book I made for me ... with the Bind-it-All ... coloured some pages with acrylic paints ... (just found out Penny (the sister -in-law) has imported a whole range of these from USA and here I am buying them from the local art shop !!!! Sometimes I do wonder if she lives on this planet ... promise you she never said a word to me ... she's into Polymer Clay soooo how would I know she has paint too ???? DUH! AND she has Gold & Silver !!! Really)

So where was I, oh yes ... coloured in some pages and decided I would join (well try to join) a challenge ??? by the Kathryn Wheel to do a page a month for a 2010 Calendar .... check out the others on this site : http://www.thekathrynwheel.blogspot.com/

So here's my January page ... it's a bit tame compared to some of the others but hey ho gotta start somewhere eh????

The completed page :

Question : do all crafters work on their beds or is it just the 'Nutty' ones ???? PMSL ;-)

8 out of 10!!!!

Can you believe that's what I (oops I mean Kelsey) got for his box !!! What!!! I don't do 8/10 I only do 9 and above ... PMSL!!!!

But seriously I am soooooo PROUD of my boy ... he got 8/10 for his Container (we lost points because we did not advertise the prices on the box !!! (I mean really ... we knew how much everything was ... honestly ... what do you want !!!!) he got 9/10 for Product and 9/10 for Advertisement ...

.... so overall he got 26/30 = 87% !!!!!!

How fantastic is that !!!!!!! And they told us EMS was one of his weaker subjects!!! Pah Fooeeey

OK he didn't sell everything but that wasn't the point (the sales and quantity did not count towards the marks) seems the kids didn't quite grasp the 'Love Notes' he came home with 5 of them ... 1 Lollie and 1 Bookmark (but no problem now I have a few little goodies to give away !!!)

SO Now what am I going to do this weekend ??? (oh yeah) Kelsey has to do an Afrikaans Valentyn Kard ... I think we can manage that ... with a little help from Aunty Nan for the verse ... the rest I'm sure we can do ;-0 !!! LOL.

The weatherman seems to have got it all wrong again ... we were supposed to have 'cooling down' thunderstorms last night ... didn't happen ... in fact I'm sure it got hotter ... and today was supposed to be the coolest day of the week ... NOT !!! So I guess Aunty June's going to have visitors again this weekend (well her pool is !!!) ... sowey !!! ;-)

Got some good news they can fix my camera ... at a price ... of course ... well I have to have it so I'll have to go sell something to pay for it ... Hey it won't be my body !!! I need more than that !!!
Never mind something will come up ....

So for all you romantics out there ... a little ditty for Valentine's Day :
Giving someone all your love is never an assurance that they will love you back.
Don’t expect love in return; just wait for it to grow in their heart;
but if it doesn’t be content that it grew in yours.
;0}

It can't be ....

***** Sorry a bit of a long posting today ... so much to tell you ******

Thursday already ... where does the time go ... ???

Firstly ... Happy Birthday to mum for yesterday ...
I wanted to do this yesterday on her Birthday but I was tooo busy with my Aquaerobics first , then taking her for brunch (had very yummy eggs Benedict without the salmon!!! at Vanille... good thing we did an extra hard workout !!! ;-) ... organising a birthday cake for her and then taking Kelsey to go buy her present ... hope you had a great 71st mum !!!! June & Irena popped round for a surprise visit last night so we still managed a bit of a party ... cake, candles etc ... (you'll see the photos when I find a way to get them on here!!!)

Still having major camera hassles ... not heard about my 'baby' and we've managed to bugger up Kelsey's camera - I think it was the shock of being used again ... my OLD cell phone keeps jamming up, so I've finally managed to get some photos with my NEW cell phone (the one I got last year and is still in it's box ... I'm terrible when it comes to technology)... and now I've spent the last 3 hours trying to download the photos ... finally got it ... so here goes the rest of the week ...

We've been soooo busy (makes a nice change - see that's what happens every time I decide I'm going to get the craft stuffs out and actually do something!!!) although a lot of it Kelsey has been doing all by himself ... he's had to organise all his 'Valentine Love Stuff' for school ... here's the photos for you to see him in action ...

Part of the 'project' was that not only did he have to make the 'items' to sell but he also had to provide a 'box/receptacle' etc. that he could sell his items from ... it had to be portable so he could 'walk around and sell' at school ...

He covered a (beer) box in red paper that he had stamped black hearts etc. all over ... then we had to think of a way to get the 'Love Lollies' to stand ... good old oasis to the rescue ... covered in red paper ... some ribbons tied in critical places and the box was ready to go ....
His 'MOBILE SHOP' ... called 'LOVE STUFF!'
The 'Love Notes' .... remember those red pegs! He made Love Notes out of those ...
Last week we dyed them red ... coloured everything else too ... but hey !!!! That was fun ... when they were dry ... I cut very thin strips of pretty pink papers for him ...
These thin strips were glued to the sides of the pegs:
He punched out red love hearts:
The love hearts were attached to the top of the pegs:
He cut up smaller pieces of paper, stamped love images on them and hey presto ... Love Notes.

The 'Love Bookmarks' ....

Firstly he cut some pretty pink papers into strips of different thicknesses...
Then he stuck them onto an A4 sheet of white card:
This was then cut in half (A5) and then cut into 5cm strips to make these lovely patterned pieces of card ... he used my Zutter Round-it-All to round off the corners:
Next he stamped a 'love' stamp onto white card:
He punched out the image using a circle punch ... to make little medallions:
Punched 'button holes' in the medallions:
The medallions:
He inked around the edges of the medallions so they would stand out against the pink background:
WE added some ribbon but then decided that ... hey bookmarks are not sooo cool so I had found some pin badges with love hearts on at one of the warehouse shops I visit ... and even though they were not supposed to 'sell badges' (that was 1 of the rules .... ooops) we said theoretically we were not selling badges as we added the badges to the bookmarks ... now they look COOL....(hope he doesn't get penalised for that ;-0
Now how 'COOL' is that ... with these you just 'gotta luv reading' !!!!! ????

I'll let you know how he does ... I hope he gets good marks cos he worked really hard at this ... especially as all this 'faffing' is not his 'THING!!!'

You'll probably notice in most of the photos Kelsey is half naked !!! It has been sooooo incredibly hot this last week ... it's LOVELY .... but because of the heat you find you just don't have that much energy ... the aquaerobics classes have been a special treat ... swimming early morning ... mind you not that it cools you down for long cos Lana ... that's our instructor ... she sure knows how to give a mean workout ... (Just hope we get see some results one of these days lol ... but actually it's not that hard on the body ... even at my age !!!! ;-)

Unfortunately cos of the heat the boys have not been able to do rugby practise either so Kelsey's been 'miffed' about that ... school rules : if it's raining & dangerous no rugby ... if it's too hot & dangerous no rugby ... he's hoping practise is on today because it has cooled down a bit and we have thunder- storms forecast for later on today ... hopefully not during practise !!! ;-)