Time flys when you having fun...

I can hardly believe that this time last week, we were with my dear sister and her family and they had just arrived here for the party weekend! The week has flown by and we have made some headway and had fun with our learning.

The children had the opportunity to do the illustrations for a bi weekly kids newspaper called "Learn the News". We thoroughly enjoy getting this in our inbox twice a week and often end up having lengthy discussions around the news articles. We look for the various countries on the map and I find it is a great way to broaden their general knowledge. The paper has stories related to world , Africa ,environment ,business and sport news as well as a section on this day in history.
J illustrated the story regarding the reopening of schools in Britain, despite swine flu.

Z illustrated the story on Angola where scientists are having a great time looking for dinosaur fossils.

And K did the illustration for the article on Malaysia where people who live their traditional way of life deep in the forests are ready to fight outsiders who come and cut down jungle trees
for their logs.

We have had fun with our Zoology studies and the children made seed bird feeders. We have been more aware of birds and it is amazing to see the children's interest sparked by our studies. K and I had the opportunity to watch some Egyptian geese one evening as we walked the dog while Z played soccer. Just today we had a Glossy Ibis in our garden. Z and I spotted a white dove this week too. We are also reading a fantastic living book called Citizen Bird, a beloved classic story of our feathered friends.

We hope to attract many more feathered friends to our garden with the seed feeders!

The children had fun making a salt dough moonscape and rocket for our Konos Studies. Z would be happy to stick to the astronomy forever.....

he says he would like to visit the moon some day.....
We moved on to some seasonal poetry today and then took advantage of the warm afternoon out in the garden and did some weeding and planting. I am hoping for some beautiful sunflowers and daisies!

The children had a great time in the garden and spent much time playing with little snails they had found. They named them, fed them leaves , raced them , talked to them and let them leave trails of slime on their arms...We found a lizard sunning himself, caterpillars, lady bugsand what looked like tiny cocoons under a nasturtium leaf.

We ended our day with a wonderful long walk in the forest with T. The children and dogs had a whale of a time splashing through the streams and getting thoroughly wet! I was glad to have worn my wellies too!

NEWSFLASH!!! Almost forgot to mention that Jand K made their grading for karate last night and J is now a blue belt and K is now orange!

40th on YouTube!

The 40th

Well, what a party is all I can say! We had been helping T with preparations in the preceeding weeks for this special event and it was fatastic to arrive on Saturday night and see how it all pulled together in such a magnificent way!

The tent was up, the chickens there,the hay bales arranged,the dance floor laid for line dancing,the lanterns lit and the decor was something else!It felt like we had stepped right into a Western! She sure knows how to get it all together!

The cousins had a ball! It was a boys paradise. They spent the evening playing with their guns ,shooting geusts with water pistols and swopping clothes in the hopes they would not be recognised by their victims and finding lollipops and chocolate coins to eat. Not to mention putting some adults to shame on the dance floor!

It was great to have my sister and brother there too! I miss her SO much!

The happy couple....G proposed to L!!! Eveyone was thrilled all though some of the geusts had an inkling his might happen, I had no idea and shed a tear as he went down on bended knee and popped the question.

The geusts had great fun riding the mechanical bull. I was not going to try it as I dont do "spinning".....it was bad enough watching some of those cowboys!

Z had a great time and kept going back for more!

J and two pretty cowgirls! (sister and cousin)

The Saloon bar shoot out was a big hit too...

Father and son shoot out ....they kept going back for more!

Uncle C and the boys

T did an outstanding job on the cakes......

We partied until well past midnight and there was one tired little cowboy who had his fill of fun!

First Lego League

Its the season for First Lego League again! It feels like just the other day that J took part in his first tournament. They did very well last year and got a trophy for the most innovative research.

This year, there are only 4 members on the team and we look forward to them doing well again. Schedules will be tight as he will be doing extra training for karate in preparation for competitions too! He sure does have a busy and interesting life!

If you would like to follow Team Equilibrium's blog, here is the link http://fll-cape-town.blogspot.com/ Enjoy!

Whirlwind weekend

Friday night brought a sweet reunion with my dear sister and her family. It was so good to see them again! They had travelled 13 hours by car to be here for her husbands brothers 40Th birthday party. We planned Z's party for the the Saturday afternoon so his cousins could be here here for the fun too.

On Saturday, I was so relieved that Z was feeling better and that we had been blessed with sunshine for the day. The children went to Acts club in the morning as usual. J continued with his copper beating and K made some wonderful omelettes in her egg cookery class. We headed on to register Z for Upward Soccer and to do some last minute shopping.

At 2.30 the fun began in Tokai Forest. It was time for Z,s Survivor Party! I feel so blessed to have this amazing forest on our doorstep. It was a no fuss ,no mess party and the kids had a great time!

The birthday boy.

The kiddies waiting their turn to take part. We had 18 children ranging in age from 5 to 14. The teens had plenty of fun joining in with all the challenges too!

The "stick game" was loads of fun! I was amazed at how far those children could jump!

We had log pillow fights and the big kids enjoyed that too!

The younger kids decided they needed a long run up for the long jump.

It was great to watch the kids work in teams to build shelters. They had a time limit and there was much fun had by all!

Pine needle stacking saw the teams pulling together again. They had to stack as many pine needles as they could in just two minutes.

They tossed water balloons to each other and the team who could keep it up the longest without dropping and breaking their balloon, won.

We ended off with party packs and sodas and a bag of chocolate coins for the overall winner. For the cake, we had orange cupcakes decorated with plastic flies!

After the party the kids had to rush off for mock grading and then it was on to the 40Th birthday party...that deserves a post of its own!

Mossbank days...

Our first morning at my sister in Mossbank, was an early start. It was her birthday and we all woke up at the crack of dawn to wish her and give her her gifts. In her home, things are done differently...

Her husband grew up celebrating birthdays with cake and candles at dawn! He had bought a chocolate cake and we entered the room singing happy birthday. The kids loved the idea of chocolate cake first thing in the morning! The first birthday he celebrated as a married man was somewhat surprising for him as there was no cake....he asked where it was and my sister was rather confused as to why he was asking for cake so early in the morning. It never crossed his mind that other families didn't do the same thing. Needless to say, he now gets cake at dawn on his birthday!

It was a special time of gift giving as the children and I are seldom there on her birthday and this year we decided to make it extra special by each giving her a gift we had made. Z had made a beaded dragonfly fridge magnet, K a cream scarf, J gave her the wooden bowl he had made at woodwork and I gave her a mosaic mirror. I had made the mirror the week before we left on holiday and it was my first attempt at mosaic. I was so happy with the result. It had be guarded as we travelled as I didn't want it to break on our travels.

After breakfast I decided to make her a wire heart with rosemary and a Camellia. She loved it!

We spent the morning in preparation for the tea party she was to have that afternoon. By about 11 a.m. it was so cold and it began to snow....or so we thought!

My mum was there too by then and the kids were so excited about the snow, they phoned home to tell their dad! Sadly it turned out to be sleet and not the snow we were longing for. It melted shortly after hitting the ground.

The afternoon homemade hat tea party turned out to be a great success. We ate our fill on the most delectable Florentines, chocolate brownies, scones with jam and cream and other delicious tea time treats. My sister has wonderful caring friends and it was so lovely to meet them. Some of them had travelled more than an hour to get there! We are just not used to those sorts of distances in our home town but then country life is different.

I just loved my mums teddy bear hat and it certainly kept her warm!

Double Celebration

There has been great excitement in our home the last few days as today drew closer and closer! It is Z's 9th birthday today! This little guy of mine had a wonderful day and was truly blessed !

He was awake at 4a.m. and came creeping into our bed because there was a storm going on outside. (I think he had just woken up and knew it was not time for celebrating yet and couldn't fall asleep again as he was so excited about his big day!) When the alarm finally went off, he gleefully announced it was time to open presants...he said he had seen them lying on the floor at 4a.m. when he crept into our bed.

As our family tradition goes, the kids all pile onto our bed to open birthday presents and today was no different. He was so appreciative of his birthday gifts and it was fun to hear him exclaim, "oh that's just what I wanted, thank you!" I had been buying little things here and there and had them stored up for today so I knew that they were all items he would enjoy.

He requested a breakfast of French toast so that's what we had. Hubby went off to work and we headed over to Oma's house. He had a pile of gifts there too and a lovely chocolate cake. I took the opportunity of going for a work out while the children enjoyed the hour with Oma. After all in our home, birthdays are not school days....

We spent the afternoon at home ,cuddled on the couch, watching the movie "Gandhi." I had read a book about him to the younger two children yesterday, so they knew a little about him. ( So I was really sneaking in a little school anyway!)

Tonight we went out for ribs to celebrate the birthday and the fact that J had his braces removed yesterday.We had promised we would do that as soon as they came off , so tonight was the perfect night.