Update

Well, just spoke to the doctor and Richard is fine. The biopsy showed a very severe gastritis and he can continue on the meds he is on already. He is obviously a lot more stressed than what we think, just doesn't realise it! Will pump him full of vitamin B's and try and keep him away from coffee and spicy foods. The good news is that he has his appetite back and will now start picking up some weight again. He is also taking part in a skating competition at school tomorrow and he is hoping to win! Boy is pretty good on a skateboard with all the scars to prove it! Will see if his dad will go and take some photos tomorrow.

I have been very miserable the past couple of days and then I automatically do not blog. Feeling better though and hopefully back on track again. Going scrapping this morning and that always cheers me up tremendously. Great bunch of ladies!

Bye for now!

Richard

I took Richard for a gastroscopy this morning. He has been sick for about 3 weeks and the doctor eventually decided that that was the way to go. He also lost about 14kg in that time, a sure sign that something is wrong as Richard normally eats non-stop. The scope showed a small ulcer and the rest of his stomach lining is very inflamed. The doctor took a biopsie of the ulcer and we will know tomorrow whether he has a bacteria in his stomach or not. Then it is very easily treated so he should start eating us out of the house again pretty soon!

It is amazing what the drugs can do to people. He came out of theatre with a very silly grin on his face and he was giggling! The hospital gives them this particular drug so that they won't remember what happened to them and I was a bit worried that he was maybe enjoying the feeling too much, but I think he is okay now. He can abviously not remember any of the things he did and said just after he came out of theatre and it is probably just as well!

The rest of my day will be very quiet - all I have to do is fetch Robyn from school at 14H00 and then see the chyropractor at 15H00 as my neck is very sore. Getting old is definitely not for sissies!

Later ......

Langebaan

Colin, Andrew and I (and don't forget about Jamie) went up to Langebaan on Saturday afternoon to spend the evening and next day with our friends at their house. We left home at 15H00 and what a mistake! I ended up sitting in the sun all the way there, even the aircon didn't help to cool me down! Anyway it was all worth it! We had a chicken braai for supper and it was really good - for some reason food just taste better up there. We ended up sleeping in the same room as Andrew, which is actually not a problem as he sleeps like a log. We opened the blinds when we went to bed and the stars were just gorgeous! You do not see them as clearly in Cape Town!

The men and boys went fishing on Sunday morning and us girls went to Friday Island for a late breakfast. For me it is the most beautifull setting in the whole Langebaan! You look out on the most stunning view of the lagoon! We sat there until we actually got to cold (mist started coming in over the sea) to sit any longer. If you ever get to Langebaan do yourself a favour and go their for a meal - it is really worth it! They also hire out rooms. Such a lovely homely atmosphere, but food is top class!

The men only came back from fishing at about 18H00 and we only got home just before 9 last night. We were all very tired, but the fresh fish and mielies for supper was great!

Blue pool

Well, I am happy to report that our pool is once again blue! A bit of a murky blue, but blue nevertheless! And no, we did not follow the Hypermarkets advice, I took a sample of the water to a poolshop that I discovered has been in our area for a looong time! The lady their is pretty good and sorted our pool out for us. We are all very happy!

Colin asked me to water the garden this morning as Andrew did SOMETHING to the sprinkler and it doesn't want to work no more (not my little darling!). It was so great being outside between all the green plants and such a perfect place and time to speak to the Lord. I think I must do it more often!

I had a rather frustrating day yesterday. Went to gym again for the first time in 3 weeks and thoroughly enjoyed it, until I got home and realised that I am getting old, because as the day went by I felt all kinds of aches in pains in strange places! After that it was of to fetch Richard at shcool and then the 2 of us had to be at the dentist at 16H00. What a stressfull thing! Fortunately my teeth were fine and I can relax for another year! Took Robyn and Andrew on Wednesday, Robyn needed one filling and that was sorted out quickly, but Andrew is another story. He needs two fillings and one extraction, and being the anxious kid that he is, has to have the work done under aneastetic (sorry, can't spell). That is happening on 6 March.

In the meantime Richard has been rather sick for the past 2 weeks. Has gastritis that just won't get better and has to go for a gastroscopy (again, I can't spell) on Tuesday, so please pray for him! And of course being in matric his mommy is forcing him to go to school. He just can not afford to miss any more classes than he absolutely has to! Specially with the "sport" being over for a while and the school is now eventually teaching the kids again!

Scruffy and Co

I took Scruffy to a "new" parlour yesterday as I couldn't get an answer from our regular parlour and being my usual patient self I didn't feel like waiting! Shame, poor thing came back looking like a little rat! The other parlour never cut the hair on his legs this short so it hid his scrawnyness a lot! Think I must go back to the old one.

Jessie, Scruffies long suffering wife!

I will show you the rest of the animal family another day.

Had a good day today. Had breakfast with my mom at Tygervalley and then went looking at make-up. Always fun doing the girlie thing!

Peace and quiet

I had to take the kids to school this morning as Colin had to be in Stellenbosch early and Michael has training on Tuesdays and also has to be at work early. Actually I am just a passenger until we get to school as Richard is still practicing his driving skills big time! Anyway the 5 of us left early (Richard, Roby, Andrew, Scruffy and myself), actually not that early because Andrew's bus was waiting when we got there. Dropped Andrew of and then had to do the 2 km drive to the high school. Traffic was not too bad today and the trip went very quickly! Scruffy and I was home again by 7H45.

I am sitting here blogging and it is so lovely and quiet in the house so early in the morning. All the birds are busy eating, the maid is somewhere down the passage and all is right in the world! I can see a bit of the garden through the window and it is so gorgeous - the leaves moving gently in the breeze!

Anyway, just an update on the pool - I phoned the Hypermarket yesterday and spoke to one of the trainee managers that put me onto the "pool expert". He suggested a product called "Splash" that is supposed to turn green water into blue within 24 hours. Colin got to the poolshop in Bellville to late yesterday so I will go to the one in Brackenfell today to get some. Hopefully I can report good news tomorrow! It is really useless having a pool if you can't swim in it and I am really starting to see why Colin has always been so adamant NOT to get one! I really have the greatest husband though, even though he was unhappy when I got the thing, he has been very good at trying to fix our "green" problem. I think he realised that the kids have great fun in the pool and we have some lovely pics to prove that. Here is one taken on Christmas day. Actually I can't get the photo to come in where I want it. What am I doing wrong?

Anyway, I am off the scrapping a bit later and later it will just be carting kids around again. Have a great day!

Monday

Well I can't believe that it is Monday again! Time is just going by so quickly. We had quite a busy weekend, but not one single photo to show for it! My sister came for a visit on Friday night as she was a "Matron of honour" at a wedding on Saturday and wanted me to paint her nails. We had a lovely evening together as Colin and the kids were all out.
Another friend came to visit on Saturday as we went to a scrapbook session together - scrapbooking is my favourite pasttime at the moment, so that was obviously the highlight of the weekend!
Sunday we went to Canal Walk and ate some delicious cinnamon buns - entrance 2 for those of you that would like to go and try them. My parents and in-laws came for supper in the evening so that took up pretty much the rest of the day.
What amazed me this weekend was that their was actually some nice movies on. For those who don't know, nice movies in my eyes are movies without any swearing and violence! We watched "Love comes quietly" on Saturday night and on Sunday night, can't remember the name, but it was on Mnet at 20H00.
Altogether not a bad weekend!

Sand, sand, sand and more sand

This is what our front garden looked like last Saturday morning. The sand from accross the road blows over and piles up on our front lawn and blows into the house. Colin and a "helper" swept the lawn and cleaned up all the sand and now it looks much better.

The problem is that the piece of open ground belongs to the Department of Education and Colin e-mails them regularly, ignores our problem completely! We even had an inspector from the Department here last year to come and have a look at the mess, but he couldn't promise anything. The other problem is that people with their big 4x4 bakkies drive over the field, making the problem worse, and then our glorious neighbours allows their kids to drive around the field on their quad bikes, compounding the problem even more!

Any suggestions? I think we should go to the newspapers, but Colin seems reluctant to do that.

Valentines Day

This post was inspired by reading Stefanie's this morning - thanks Stef!

I decided to do Valentines Day differently this year and made supper for my whole family. We had sweet and sour pork with rice and I made (with my hubbies help) chocolate mouse. And yes I bought these little cupcakes from Checkers (oh, horror of horrors, Checkers!!!). I had a pretty good day, going to the south and buying some lovely papers (thanks Jo) and getting inspired to carry on with my business again! My daughter likes the Techno pop paper.

Then I got home and PMS hit BIG time! I was so grumpy by the time dinner came around that I growled at everybody and it was just unpleasant! Not that I think the kids noticed. Colin brought me some lovely roses and I just had to add them onto the photo.

Got up feeling a bit better this morning - maybe the chocolates I had before breakfast helped!

School

I have to write about this as I am totally gobsmacked about the fact that our high school kids seem to be spending less time with school work and far to much time with extra mural activities!

My son is in matric this year and so far he has been at home for about 4 days as they are not doing any schoolwork because the kids are practicing for the co-ed. And not for the athletics, but for the singing of all things. It has become such a huge competition between the schools that it seems to take up ALL the time for the first 4 - 5 weeks of the first term. Am I missing something here? When I was at school we practiced for a little while during schooltime and still carried on with our schoolwork for most of the day. If I look at the work the kids have to complete in a year I just cannot understand how the teachers can justify wasting such a lot of time!

My other pet hate is the kids staying at home while they are writing exams and then finishing with their "school term" about a week before the school actually ends. Last December I actually ended up having my eldest at home for 3 weeks before school ended.

Anybody have any ideas as I can definitely not understand how they get that right?

My weekend

Had a very busy weekend as always! On Saturday we were invited to go to friends for lunch. We had a very good time although we were all suffering terribly with the heat! The kids had a ball "swimming" in their little splash pool. On Sunday it was church as usual and afterwards we had to do a bit of shopping at Tygervalley. Had supper at my moms house and that was lovely as always. My parents have air conditioning so it was very pleasant.

I visited my doctor this morning and she diagnosed a throat infection - I figured that could be why I felt extra hot over the weekend.

I was busy sorting through some photos this morning and found this one. Sorry blogger stuck it in at the top! I am really enjoying my new camera!

Andrew

Andrew had his athletics day at Jan Kriel School last Friday and I am so very proud of him!

At his school the emphasis is on taking part and finishing the race, not on winning and it works very well at building the childrens self confidence. They obviously make a huge fuss of the kids that come first as well!

We have come a long way with Andrew, as he initially wouldn't even take part. The funniest part of the day was in the one race, 4 boys took part and as they took of the front 2 just charged past, and the kid that was coming third turned towards the boy coming fourth and mearily chatted away until they were over the finish line! I thought it was very cute, they obviously had all the parents in histerics!

Certainly no dull and boring moments at their athletics day!

Jamie is in love with Michael!

When I read the book about companion parrots before we got Jamie, I read, and heard from various sources, that companion parrots "mates" with one specific human, normally of the opposite sex, which makes sence! I am the mommy so I knew that she wouldn't "mate" with me.

Horror of horros though, she chose Michael!! He can do absolutely anything with her and she just loves being with him. Parrots regurgitate (I know it is gross) and drag their wings for their new mate. Michael was quite impressed in the beginning but he soon realised that she can be a pain when she feels like it. Now he is not impressed anymore and avoids the poor lovesick parrot!

Almost gone!

Hello everybody! Well I went into my blogger account with every intention of deleting it, and then got sidetracked with photos, etc. So I decided to stay a bit longer. So be prepared for some boring, and hopefully somedays not so boring, posts.

A lot has happened since I last blogged, but will have to give it to you in short posts over the next couple of weeks.

For a start I will just say that our pool is still green and that my dear husband has spent a lot of time and energy in trying to get the thing blue again. A pool is definitely not much fun when you can't use it to swim in!