All birthdays should come with party packs, even at 74

The Little Missy believes that all birthdays should come with party packs included.

She checks out the party packs when we arrive at a party, and it takes a bit of convincing before she leaves it to the end of the party.

She asks for party packs  even when we celebrate a 40-year old birthday, and yesterday her Granddad of 74 also had to explain where the party packs are.

We had such a chilled weekend, and celebrated a belated birthday, which we missed because of the accident on the highway in December.

Missy got to blow out the candles

We also celebrated another year yesterday with my Dad who is 74 now!
He looks great and he can still go forward, but says that it takes a bit of motivation in the mornings.
I hope we celebrate many more with him!

During each celebration we become much more aware of how sad it is to not have family nearby.
We miss the family members who are on different continents, and we now also have a Student who is off doing her own things at Varsity!

It is not the same being able to communicate on Skype and Facebook and emails! (Just saying!)
And it is not getting and feeling better with time passing... NO!

Coming up for some air, before talk-talking on!

And the rest of the weekend we got a barrage of Missy talk. Non-Stop!

She still has the pink house in the clouds, with two dragons and three dogs. Her little sister and two brothers are staying there. Someday she might invite us there. There are two trees nearby the house that they had to cut down, because a grown-up used too much toilet paper in her loo... 

An art work from the weekend
 (1 of 100, give or take)

Happy Monday!

How was your weekend?

Wordless Wednesday #133 - Feeding the birds with Grandpa

Wordless Wednesday #132 - Let's move, Grandpa!

The princess has found her dad!

The fairy tale ending in the Toddler’s life revolve around the princess finding her Dad!

Whenever we read or see a story about a girl / princess meeting and marrying her prince, the Toddler exclaims:  “Sy het haar pappa gekry!” (She has found her dad!) No doubt as to who is the most important in her life at this stage!

My dad has been in hospital, and we visited him twice this weekend. He has a very bad upper respiratory infection, but it seems he is on the mend again...

The Toddler has been very interested in this whole hospital story, and she has been babbling non-stop about the “doctors fixing him”...

After her first visit she exclaimed: “Hy soek sy Ouma!” (He wants his grandmother!) (My mom was not with him when we went to visit the first time.)

The Toddler sees the world as fixed when the family unit are together...



Hope you all get your “Dads” this week! (Wink smile!)

Movie Clip Monday #16 - Toddler with Grandfather

The Toddler loves her Grandfather James.

She is very lucky. She also has another grandfather Dries that she is also very fond of. I think it is the greatest gift to children when they have the company of the grandparents!

Grandfather James  helps to drive the children around for the day care, and the Toddler gets to see him almost every day of the week. First she used to cry every time he had to go, but she has now become used to saying goodbye when he has to leave her for another round of picking up kids.

She usually walks around the play ground, and goes to the teachers, saying: "Oupa nie hier nie?" (Grandfather not here?) An she gets very excited when she hears he is around!

I think it is great that she gets to see him on a regular basis!

Lending Tasneem's Movie Clip Mondays on MumDrum.

My Dad gave us a scare

My Dad is in his early 70s, and still as busy as a bee. When he is not reinventing his garden, and replanting all the plants, he is busy driving the kids around at the day care in the afternoons. He is also involved at the Church, and goes with the regular prayer group to the hospital.


He is always available when somebody needs him, and usually looks after all the neighbours’ gardens and houses when they are away. He drives around every week for his mother, who lives nearby. On Thursday he was planting flowers at her house - and his house - before he had to leave for the afternoon to drive the kids around. After that he felt extremely bad, with a chest pain.

They identified hiatus hernia on Saturday, but had to confirm it with more tests...

Today he had two stents implanted in the veins near his heart! It was caught just in time! Totally unexpected!

Very scary indeed! Nothing that brings you close-up with mortality more than this! The heart [not attack] scare!

We hope you feel better very soon, Dad!

Mieka loves it when she sees him at the day care. He has to carry her around. Or swing (“swee-swee”) her to her heart’s delight on the swings! She sometimes gets very upset when he has to put her down to do his rounds!

“Oupa! OOU-PAAA!!” (Grandfather) sounds so cute when coming from the toddler’s lips! Every Time!

Wordless Wednesday #38 - Feeding the birds

Wordless Wednesday #29 - Great Dads!

Great Dad!

Great Grandfather!