Smooth Sailing

One week (can you believe it) into the new school year already and my little people have done me so proud. The kids are all happy with their new teachers, which is fantastic news, in fact, if Madam Fluff could move in with hers, she'd be quite pleased. Fluff has taken on the role of student like she was born for the role and has practically "grown up" overnight. Kade says his teacher is really nice and he's just happy that 3 of his 4 best buds are in his class this year. My little Bug is taking it a little harder than I thought, although he is still acting very tough about it, he is a little overwhelmed. His previous school was very secure, small and Aunty B created a very loving environment, like a little family. He's also a little disappointed that he hasn't managed to make a friend yet as none of his "old school" friends have gone to the same school. He's a tough, mischievous little man but with a jello heart; I'm praying that he'll adjust easily and make some really cool new friends.

Back to School

WOW...Two more sleeps.....

The kids are super excited about school on Wednesday....Well 2 out of the 3 are really bursting at the seams. Kade is off to Gr.3 and as much as he is excited about going back, I think he is a little nervous of what to expect when he gets there. Madam Fluff is in her absolute element at the idea of going to Gr.1....she has been counting the sleeps more sleeps ago than I can count; it was *almost* a more important feature in her life than Christmas. And my little Bug is off to Pre-Primary and so relieved to have the kids not tell him he goes to "baby school" anymore. They just grow too fast.

WOW...just two more sleeps

Bursting my bubble

I just found my weakness, my kryptonite......

Ignore me......

My husband has been doing it to me for days, weeks and it is slowly shredding me up inside. I live a very isolated life. I live from home, raise kids from home, work from home and socialise mostly on the internet from home. You can imagine how many words, as a female, I have left at the end of the day; bar the arbritary pleads, yells, discussions, whatevers with the kids, I'm talking grown up words.

Well when I go to bed, all those words are still bottled up inside, not having had anyone to share them with. Hubby comes home. Hello is about as good as it gets. Give him supper; oh, there's a thank you. He falls asleep on the couch (every night) and that's where he stays till morning light.

I am about to burst, OK, maybe I do, but then all the wrong words come out and I get reminded of why I am not being spoken to in the first place. *sigh*

baby steps

Wow, who would have thought that time would fly that quickly. In the last year I have found myself entirely preocupied with running a household, raising my three kids an my husband and venturing into the "business world" by starting my own business, whilst still doing the admin etc for my hubby.
I found that every time I attempted to sit here and type something, there was never anything positive to say. My kids were driving me balmy, my husband was about to leave me...and still is... and my life was spirally so out of control that I didn't want to end up sounding like a moan a lisa every time a posted on my blog. Needless to say my life is still spiralling out of control, probably more so now than ever.
So where to from here, well as cliche as it sounds, I suppose we could just take one day at a time, baby steps and start over, bitch and moan about the bad times and remember the good times.

The Great Expectations of Fluff

I have never considered myself one who gave in to "party politics and demands" and certainly didn't when the boy's had their birthdays. They were relatively easy to cater for, they both knew who they wanted as guests and what they wanted as gifts, easy, sorted, quick sticks. Madam Fluff on the other hand, has had me rather stressed out over the last two weeks. Every attempt at making the guest list shorter only results in the guest list getting longer as she is absolutely adamant that she only plays with and is bestest friends with all but 3 kids in her class, add to that the "usual birthday party suspects" and a few other invitations, we are sitting on a handsome number of 35 children. Ain't gonna happen chicky bird! And we hit a standoff.

In desperation I approach the teacher, (who, by the way is now my very own personal Agony Aunt, when it comes to Fluff anyway) who always seems to have a solution for everything. A word here, some advice there and the real list of 4 children in the class Fluff is really close to and plays with regularly. I make my way home absolutely relieved at my now drastically shorter list.

Then there's the gift list that is practically longer than the guest list and I have even been advised on how to redecorate her room in order to make space for all her apparent soon to be acquired riches, which range from a new cupboard to a play play microwave and more kitchen equipment than even I own to hair and make up accessories and clothes. Is there anything left in the shop I ask you? Barbies and Bratz dolls were on the list too including some clothes for them "because they can't walk around naked you know and they need to wear something when their existing outfits are in the wash!" And so we have it, I think, until we attempt, at my own detriment, to go through the list again and hopefully make it shorter one last time or perhaps I should call it a day and not bother, for sanity purposes. Armed now with indisputable proof, I must agree with my hubby when he says that fluff is a quantity girl and not a quality girl. (I suppose if the quality came in quantities that would be a different story but with her, the more, the better)

Ageing requires special attention..

People often jest and say "My, but I'm getting old!". Is that something that you say to yourself just to make certain that your mind and body keeps up with the programme? I don't know but lately I've heard it quite a bit. Scary, if everybody around me claims to be getting old, does this apply to me too or am I just hanging around with a bunch of old farts and need to find myself a friskier crowd of acquaintances?

I have become quite enthused about scrapping again and decided to dig into the "box of the past" dah dah dah dum (drum roll please) and I found a collection of negatives (you know those things we used to have to take to the photo shop to have developed, oh, never mind) hidden in an envelope. Off I scurry to the photo shop (no not adobe photoshop, the actual shop shop) to discover pics from the past and reminisce a little of days gone by.

I hand in my negatives and select a few pictures that I would like have developed. Amongst the lot of negatives that I found was an old strip of negatives, which for the life of me I cannot recall the name of, but they were from those first little thin cameras with the even thinner strip of film. I hand them to the shop assistant, young and frisky little cow and she turns to me without hesitation and says "Oh my gosh but these are soooo old!" Excuse me? "We can't develop these here, they need to go to a special lab." Yes, thank you, I know I'm special but surely my pictures can be developed without any special attention or such drastic action? No, it turns out, they need a special lab. I leave a little disappointed and rather insulted, I mean, she could have at least tried to contain herself and her outburst, hmph.

It looks quite possibly, sniff, sniff, that it is my frisky acquaintances that should be looking for a younger crowd to "hang with" because clearly this old hag is fast approaching her sell by date. Now if you'll excuse me I am going to purchase myself a box of Loreal to wash that grey right out of my hair........ because I'm worth it!

A lost friend

A sad weekend was had by all when we lost a good friend in a car accident on Thursday night.

Dear Marius,

May God Bless and keep you safe in his loving arms. The "big guy" with an even bigger heart. You will be missed.

All our love

Go Grandma

It isn't very often that I receive jokes or stories via email that really have me practically rolling on the floor with laughter. This is one was just too good not to share. Enjoy.

Grandma's letter.
She is eighty-eight years old and still drives her own car. She writes:

Dear Granddaughter:
The other day I went up to our local Christian book store and saw a "Honk if you love Jesus bumper sticker". I was feeling particularly sassy that day because I had just come from a thrilling choir performance, followed by a thunderous prayer meeting. So, I bought the sticker and put it on my bumper. Boy, am I glad I did, what an uplifting experience that followed. I was stopped at a red light at a busy intersection, just lost in thought about the Lord and how good he is, and I didn't notice that the light had changed. It is a good thing someone else loves Jesus because if he hadn't honked, I'd never have noticed.
I found that lots of people love Jesus! While I was sitting there, the guy behind started honking like crazy and then he leaned out of his window and screamed, For the love of God! Go! Go! Go! Jesus Christ, GO! What an exuberant cheerleader he was for Jesus! Everyone started honking! I just leaned out my window and started waving and smiling at all those loving people. I even honked my horn a few times to share in the love!
There must have been a man from Florida back there because I heard him yelling something about a sunny beach. I saw another guy waving in a funny way with only his middle finger stuck up in the air. I asked my young teenage grandson in the back seat what that meant. He said it was probably a Hawaiian good luck sign or something. Well, I have never met anyone from Hawaii, so I leaned out the window and gave him the good luck sign right back. My grandson burst out laughing. Why even he was enjoying this religious experience!!
A couple of the people were so caught up in the joy of the moment that they got out of their cars and started walking towards me. I bet they wanted to pray or ask what church I attended, but this is when I noticed the light had changed so, I waved at all my brothers and sisters grinning, and drove on through the intersection.
I noticed that I was the only car that got through the intersection before the light changed again and felt kind of sad that I had to leave them after all the love we had shared. So I slowed the car down, leaned out the window and gave them all the Hawaiian good luck sign one last time as I drove away.

Praise the Lord for such wonderful folks!!
Will write again soon.
Love, Grandma

Exploring a scrap

I have been enjoying a few stolen moments of scrapbooking again and really enjoyed putting this "puzzle piece" together. It was quite a labour intensive exercise and I'm pleased it is finally finished.

Why?

Have you ever wondered why YOU have been chosen to be your husband's spouse and the Mother of that child or those children? Destiny? Why are some people bessed with their families and some cursed (with abusive relastionships, partner or parent)?

I have often wondered why oh why God has allowed me to be a mother and a wife, I don't deserve them and they certainly don't deserve me. It hurts knowing that I'll never be what they need me to be no matter how hard I try. The best intentions are just not good enough. They are just so beautiful and precious and they deserve better.

Comparing to the Jones's

I have a question(beware I am in one of my moods and regrettably, I don't think Scarlet has anything to do with it). When a person is feeling down it is natural (correct me if I'm wrong) to look at the brighter side of other people's lives. I wish I had full time help like so-n-so, I wish I had a car like him, Wouldn't it be great to have the quality of like that that person over there? You know, the general wanting-to-be-like-the-Jones'-thing. I have been told on a number of occasions that it is not right to compare with others; her kids that listen, her husband that helps and is often there, her lovely clean house. You just have to not compare.

Here comes my question; Why is it wrong to compare to others that have more than you? (I'm not talking about jealousy or envy or comparing in an mean spirited way, I'm talking about wanting it in a strive to better the ways your life isn't. Does that make sense?) The moment one starts the proverbial "bitching" about what more they want, there are those "helpful" souls with the best intentions, who are the ones that told you not to compare in the first place, that remind you of how much more you have than others. Isn't this a little contradictory? I may not compare to strive or want more, but I can compare myself to those who have less or are worse off then I am in attempt to make my lot seem rosier.

I'm confused, so I'm just asking.

Our little Bokkie

Kade played his very first rugby match yesterday and did us very proud. He was a little concerned at playing initially because "I'm not really a good runner with the ball Mom!".

We encouraged him to do his best and he found his niche; tackling. He very proudly informed us that although he may not be very good at running with the ball, he tries his best to make certain that nobody from the other team gets a chance to run their ball to the other side and on occasion he had a few guys down on the ground, at the same time.

We helped him realise that there were other valuable jobs for the team mates to do and being a good tackler was as important a job to the team than just scoring a try. He practically tackled anything that moved after that and he did very well, preventing 6 guys from scoring tries and as a result his team won 8-5.

Perhaps we are going to have another springbok rugby player in the family.

Forgotten promises

It is really weird how life works. Some people call it fate, some call it karma, others like myself, believe that God has us all in the palm of his hand and sends us messages and interventions to help us through life or to teach us lessons in life.

Hubby and I spent the weekend discussing our marriage and whether or not there was anything left to save. Neither of us is entirely happy with life, each other or much of anything right now and we have reached "that" point in our marriage. Do we go forward together or do we call it a day? To make a long story short, we have decided to give it one last try.

Where does God come in you're thinking? Well, I have been invited to a series of scrapbooking evenings, dedicated solely to making a wedding album. I didn't really think too much of it until I spent this afternoon sifting through all my wedding pictures and keepsakes that I had packed away. The things I found and remembered really pulled at my heartstrings; our wedding vows, the order of service in which I had dedicated a poem to Mark, telling him why I wanted to be his bride and finally the letter I had written to him and left on his pillow the night before our wedding day, dedicating my undying love and devotion to him, making promises I fully intended to keep, yet realise I have fallen horribly short. Reading these things and remembering why I married him, why I love him and reminding myself of promises and commitments I made and haven't lived up to. That is where God comes in. Thank you Lord, for choosing a critical time like this, where everything could be falling apart and making me realise why and how I should be working harder at keeping it all together.

From Time to Thyme, things can happen.

Yesterday brought on an unexpected "Domestic Goddess" moment and I just had to share that from time to thyme these moments do happen. The kids really enjoyed getting their very own chicken pie pots. What the kitchen looked liked afterwards? hhmmm, nothing Goddessy about it!

Evil elves in my cupboard

It has come to my attention that there is either an evil group of tiny elves or tiny group of evil elves living in my cupboard. I haven't actually caught them physically so I can't tell you whether they are evil or tiny or both, but I know that they are there. I am not crazy, yes, I know you find that difficult to believe and from time to time I might appear a little off balance but crazy, no, not yet anyway.

To prove my point let me give you an example; yesterday morning AND this morning I dig in my cupboard for something a little more summery to wear as the dawn of Spring and Summer slowly arises and to my horror of horrors I discover that the clothes are smaller than they were last year! Can you believe it. These little buggers have basically spent most of the winter altering my summer clothes and have made almost every single one of them smaller.

Is that a snicker I hear? Please people this is no joke.

Obviously I cannot make them the same size that they were last summer and a new wardrobe is completely out of the question, so I guess I am going just have to try and lose a few pounds and fit into my newly altered attire. O.K, so getting rid of a few kilo's isn't necessarily a bad thing but jeez you evil little elves, you could have warned me.

Just the two of us

Madam Fluff drew this picture of the two of us and I just absolutely love it. It is very seldom that she really feels like sitting down and drawing so this beautiful and colourful work of art has found a warm fuzzy spot deep in my heart. Thank you Princess. I love you.

Could I have some Tomato Sauce with that please?

I must admit, I am a Tomato Sauce (ketchup) girl. I could pretty much add it to any meal before I would consider using another sauce. Macaroni cheese just isn't the same without a dash or rather a dollop of good old tomato sauce. I do however have to draw the line somewhere, I suppose, like today for example; we arrive home from school and fluff requests a peanut butter sandwich, no problem. As I am about to add the finishing touches to the gourmet sarmie, Fluff tells me to add tomato sauce.....huh?

"No, sweetie" I reply, holding down the urge to reflux right at that moment, "Peanut butter and tomato sauce just don't go together."

"O.K." she says, "Can you just put it on the side and I will dip the bread in?"

The urge to gag returns. " Caley girl, please, tomato sauce and peanut butter sarmies just don't go together."

Thank goodness, the conversation did end there and she sauntered off to munch on her lunch.

Although I am quite prepared to give any food item a reason to be enhanced by my favourite condiment, I'm not sure I am going to give this one a try. Excuse me, the urge to gag has returned again.

Building a life

Something that has been on my mind ever since my "big boy" turned 7 on Saturday and I can't seem to shake it. I have heard it mentioned more than once that the first 7 years of a child's life is considered to be their "foundation" years and all the values, or not, and the "base elements" if you could call them that, are instilled and in some cases drilled into a child in their first 7 years.
I find myself recollecting all life's required skills and values and wonder if I have have taught enough, loved enough and helped him learn enough to be grounded for life. It's sort of like laying the foundations for a building, without any architectural plans or design and if you miss something or add in too little or too much of any particular ingredient, well sooner or later the rest of the building will collapse, not the ideal thought really for a first time builder!!

So basically, I've been asking myself the following questions; have I drilled or instilled, which ever method you chose, the correct and the necessary life skills in these crucial 7 years that will ground him for life? Have I laid the foundations correctly or am I constructing a building that could ultimately collapse because I haven't developed the foundations properly? What do I do if I have missed something life altering? Is it too late now to fix it?

As you can see this is something that is actually beginning to stress me out a bit. I would like to believe, please let me believe, that the foundations can be adjusted and moulded correctly and accordingly as we build our soon to be "towers of virtue and morality" and that they will be the sweet little angels and upstanding citizens that we all aspire them to be.

Happy Birthday Kade

Birthday boy's breakfast order:

7 flackjaps and chocolate sauce. YUM












Check the smile on that face. A cool bicycle for his birthday. "WOW, just what I wanted."

















Lunch at Panarotti's with his friends followed by a fun game of ten pin bowling.


















What a great day. Happy Birthday Big boy.

Play dating on line

Madam Fluff: "Mom, please can I go play at Jacquies house after school?"

Me: "I first have to ask his Mom, Sweet Pea."

Madam fluff: "But I asked her already at Jean's Party and she said yes."

Me: "I need to speak to her and find out what day is convenient for her to have you over."

Madam Fluff: "Why don't you phone her now and ask her?"

Me: "Sweetie, I don't have her phone number, I will have to try and find it and then I will give her a call and ask her."

Madam Fluff: "Well Mom, why don't you just e-mail her?"

Me: "Hhmm" speechless...........