What a Year!

I can remember many years ago wishing for a really quiet year and to be honest I'm still kind of waiting on that wish.

Despite that, 2012 goes down as one of the best years ever for me!

2011 was a true "annus horribilis" that started badly with just about everything that could go wrong going wrong.

Happy Christmas!

Happy Birthday Eli!

Happy 7th birthday to our amazing boy!

Eli is such a joy and a total blessing to our family and we love him dearly.

Having had his party a couple of weeks ago, Eli's had a quiet day at home playing with his new toys and completing his 500 piece jigsaw. He's also very proud today of his brand new unicycle which has seen a bit of action today.

Now we're looking forward to our birthday tea at Eli's choice of restaurant tonight. So that'll be a massive bowl of spaghetti bolognese then!

We're Doomed

In the words of Private Frazer from Dad's Army, "We're all doomed!".

Or maybe not.

Thankfully Dad's Army was a comedy and Private Frazer's catchphrase never amounted to anything. I guess it's the same with all these predictions by the likes of Camping and misinterpretations of the Mayan calendar, they provide for some great comedy.

Sadly after the Mayan farce we have to wait until 2018 for the next comedian's prediction to be proven wrong. Someone called F. Kenton Beshore reckons the world will end between 2018 & 2028.

Christmas Hampers

We love this time of year because we get to distribute hampers etc on behalf of the church and others.

This year we'll be distributing these sixteen hampers amongst our church families so we're just tidying them up and putting on a Christmas card from church so there's no doubt as to where they are from.

God is good!

Christmas Tree

Finally after a week or two of nagging we let the boys put up the Christmas tree and they did a great job with only minimal moving of decorations required.

They had so much fun doing it and on being unable to decide who should top the tree off with the angel they chose to do it together.

Nice one boys!

Super Sunday!

There are many examples of women in leadership in the bible and just as in life, some of them were great and some not so, but that's one of the strengths of the bible, it reflects so much of the reality of life.

So while some churches turn their noses up at women in leadership or get distracted by voting on the issue we choose to get on with it and allow the women amongst us to blossom and flourish as God intended.

7th Birthday Party

On Tuesday we celebrated Eli's 7th birthday with his party. His actual birthday isn't until the 21st but with the summer holidays beginning a lot of his friends will be away so a party would be a bit thin on the ground if we waited 'til then.

Much fun was had by his friends and Eli loved having his class mates over to play for the afternoon.

Mummy was also very clever with the party food, ordering 10 burger meals from a local takeaway which saved a lot of hassle.

Bell's Palsy Update

The week the Bell's Palsy struck was a very unpleasant week as I thought I might be having a mild stroke. Thankfully that turned out not to be the case but rather it was the palsy.

Having done as much research as I could really be bothered to I was amazed that none of the articles talked about the pain and discomfort involved, most just seemed to take a fairly lighthearted "get over it" attitude.

I was left exhausted and in a lot of discomfort in the first week and the pain hasn't fully gone yet.

The Cape Doctor

The Cape Doctor or Southeaster as it's also known is our summer wind which can blow quite strongly. However the last 24 - 48 hours have been the strongest Southeaster we can remember.

Take a look at this pic of our trampoline which was picked up by a single gust and thrown about six metres through the air onto our gazebo frame and garden table. The gazebo frame had already been damaged by the wind so just in case there was any doubt about it the good doctor totalled it with the trampoline.

School Awards

Today we had the privilege of attending the boys' school awards ceremony, held at the Somerset West library.

It was a great time and we were very proud of our boys!

Eli's class teacher commended Eli for "Never backing down or saying no to a challenge". She has certainly got the measure of our boy!

Joel got an extra certificate for his "Diligence and hard work in guitar". In fact Joel's guitar teacher has been so impressed with his progress this year that he has been invited to play to the old folks on Friday when the school choir go to entertain them.