The New Me

Okay, so I did it!! For the first time in about 20 years I have got dark hair! In my previous post I mentioned that I had been colour coded and was classified as a Winter. I also had an assessment with a hairdresser who advised that my current hairstyle was rather outdated and that what was left of my highlights was making me look grey. So, here I am before:

And here I am after I had my hair done:

The colour is slightly darker than my natural colour and I must say I really do like it.

The new me, signing off ....

Dedicated Blog Follower Award

I have been given an award from Desire at Doing Life for being a best blogging buddy and dedicated follower. From Desire's notes, I have left a comment on every one of her blog posts - not bad hey!! I must say I do find her blog most inspiring and eagerly await a new post to see what she has created.

Here are the RULES for presenting this, hopefully soon sought after award:

Pick 5 bloggers that you consider as your best blogging buddies and deserves this award for their contribution towards the blogging community, no matter what language.
State the name of the author of each blog as well as a link to each one's blogs.
Each blogger (upon acceptance) of this award should do a post and show the award on their blog and put the name and link to the blog that has given her/him the award.
Link to DOING LIFE's blog, so everyone will know the origin of this award.
Show these rules.

The bloggers I am awarding this award to are:

Beryldene Stemp from Lovevanillacupcakes. Beryldene writes such inspirational posts and I always get something so positive from reading them.

Andrea Robertson from Life in Lindfield. I met Andrea at a scrapday she hosted and then she left to go and live in England. I found her blog through Beryldene's and I have so enjoyed reading her posts about her and her family settling into their new country and especially her innermost thoughts on where she is in life. Something I can relate to.

Claire McGeer from Inspiration for the Soul. I met Claire at a Bundu week-end she arranged. We had so much fun and she now lives in Wales. I have enjoyed reading her posts on their new life and how they are all settling in. Love the photos she takes.

Leanne Ramsay from New Beginnings. Leanne is my daughter and I so enjoy reading her blog (when she updates it). She has such a wonderful, carefree way of writing. I have also discovered that she takes really good photos.

Desire Fourie from Doing Life. I know this award was created by Desire, but I have to award her back. If it wasn't for Desire, I wouldn't be scrapping, I would never have tried my hand at mosaicing, I wouldn't know how to take decent photos, I certainly wouldn't have this blog and I wouldn't appreciate nature as much as I do now. Desire's blog is such a creative inspiration and I just love looking at all her creations.

So bloggers, please accept this award from me.

Dedicated blog follower signing off ....

Dancing Award

Not me, but my sister Liesel and she actually agreed to stand and smile for the photo!!! Liesel has been doing Line dancing as well as some of the different ballroom dances and recently had a competition and received a "Highly Commended" award. She had her prize-giving last week-end and received her certificate as well as a trophy. Way to go Liesel and thanks for agreeing to be photographed (I know I made you pose for quite a few to get the right one!!) Here she is with her award:

PS Liesel hates her photo being taken, so this is really quite an achievement for me!!!! he he

Sister to the dancing queen signing off ........

A make-over, some cuteness and lots of work!

It has been a wonderful week-end.

On Saturday morning Dereck and I had our final gym session with our personal trainer Helen (known as "The Dragon Lady") and her evil assistant Niels (I will tell you more about this in another blog, when I have some pictures and stats) and then went to Run Walk for Life Westville for our annual prize-giving which was in the form of a breakfast where Saras outdid herself again with wonderful catering - thanks Saras!!

After that we got ready and went down to Derek's late mom's flat to collect a few things and then came home.

I made a really yummy pudding to take to my brothers place in the evening as it is his birthday today as as they were having a show house he had his birthday get together on Saturday evening.

Then I went for a colour assessment. Fay Coleman who lives in Hillscrest (her daughter Megan is Miss South Africa and I didn't even click when I was there!!!!) did my analysis and confirmed that I am a WINTER meaning I must wear cool colours - bright vibrant colours!! She then proceeded to show me how I should wear my make up. Here is me as you all know me - natural with lipstick:

And here I am after she had finished with me:

The next is the hair. I have an assessment on Tuesday and have booked my hair appointment for next week Saturday - looking forward to seeing what that transformation will look like!!

Grant's friends came over for a visit and his one friend Juan and his girlfriend Nicole have a little girl Genevieve - she is about 4 months old and is just too cute:

We had a boerewors braai at my brother Malcom's place on Saturday evening. A great family gathering, as always.

Sunday, got up at 8:00am. Got stuck in the garden and planted some Jasmin bushes in the front and then planted a few little cacti that I had. Grant and Lauren made us a yummy bacon and scrambled egg breakfast and the I had my shower as Paula (my friend from work) was coming round for some "scrapping" help. Her son's teacher was leaving and one of the mom's asked each of the children in the class to do a scrapbook page to make a memory album.

Paula did very well considering it was her first time and with a bit of my help completed this layout. She just needs to get her son Joshua to write his little bit and then for her to add in hers:

I am sure the teacher is going to really treasure this album.

Now to go and watch a bit of TV and relax.

Made over and worked out signing off .........

Weird or Not ....?

This picture was taken after I had let Leanne do my hair, unbeknown to me she put this blue colouring in it. The cousins had a good laugh and even after 3 days, my hair still had a blue tinge to it - don't know what they thought at work as no-one said anything to me. Either they didn't notice or were being polite - weird that I let my children have fun with me - he he he he!

Ok, so I have been tagged by Desire to list 7 weird things about me, so here goes:

* I love peanut butter on toast with my fried egg (yes, it really is yummy!!)

* I love peanut butter with mature cheddar cheese on toast

* Because we don't sit at a table to eat, I chop up my food small, so that I can eat only with a fork

* If I indulge with chocolates, I will finish the whole slab or packet and then buy another one and eat what was originaly left so that no-one will know that I ate it all (sorry, just can't help myself)

* I am told I have a weird sense of humour as I laugh hysterically at others' misfortunes (can you just picture the gymnast missing the beam!!!)

* Up until about a month ago I did not eat Sago pudding because as a child I got hit on the shin with a can of sago while playing a game with my brother (Shelley made me her Sago pudding and I am addicted now!!)

* I love puddings and can eat them at any time of the day - trifle being my favourite for breakfast (well it has got fruit in it you know, amongst other things - he he

Now, to learn some weird things about a few other people:

Claire Mc Geer

Beryldene Stemp

Sophia Allison

Andrea Robertson

Leanne Ramsay

Wierdo signing off .....

BOM Challenge #10 My Dream Home

Herewith my BOM Challenge #10, My Dream Home:The journalling reads:

My dream hom is whichever home I live in. After getting married we rented a flat for 2 years before buying our first house in 1986.
In 1993 we bought our current house as we needed more space. I don’t have any intentions of moving from here in a hurry unless we downsize and when we would have to sell lots!
Over the years we have had our kitchen done, bathrooms redone, built a bar, put in a pool and entertainment area built a back patio and a cottage (Dereck’s office)
Dereck uses the cottage as his music studio, I have my craft room and we still have a study with a TV, sound system and the computer.

I have never dreamed of any type of house that I would like to live in, my only "requirement" was to have a house with a wall around it and a swimming pool as when I was young we never had that and it was just something that appealed to me. I have been fortunate that in both houses we have ever owned, we put up walls and put in swimming pools, thereby fulfilling my minor dream.

Thanks for looking.

Happy in my house signing off ...

What year do you belong to?

This is quite interesting - click on the link, answer the quiz questions and see what year you belong to - check out mine, I belong to 1993!

You Belong in 1993

With you anything goes! You're grunge one day, ghetto fabulous the next. It's all good!

http://www.blogthings.com/whatyeardoyoubelonginquiz/">What Year Do You Belong In?

Easy going 1993 signing off ...

A little bit of Gardening

Yes, believe it or not, I sacrificed my scrapping to do some work in the garden. Grant, Lauren and I went to the nursery this morning and bought some plants, trees and a couple of bird baths. When we arrived home, my brother, Malcolm, Carol and Byron were at our place. They helped off load everything. They stayed for a short while and then left. Then Dereck and I got stuck into preparing the flower bed. While we were doing this, my other brother Warren, Debbie, Luke and Rebekah arrived. Luke and Rebekah went to play computer games, Debbie found somewhere to sit and chat and Warren, Dereck and I carried on with the task at hand. Here is the end result:

Dereck had started building this wall, and we recently got someone in to finish it off. We have now planted some Eugenia's along the wall to hopefully grow nice and tall and hide the neighbours awning with a broken drain!
This picture below, shows the above corner from a different angle and also shows the wall going all the way around.

This is the opposite corner to where the trees are. The builders completed the wall the whole way round this grassy area. Now we have more place to park and hopefully will have more "feathered" visitors. Below is the other bird bath that I bought. We had a strong plastic one, but with a recent HEAVY wind, it got blown over and broke in half!!

We also recently had an awning put up over the entrance to the cottage/Dereck's office and I must say, it looks quite good.
After all that hard work (and Debbie had said that Warren wanted to come and visit so that he didn't have to do work at his place!!) we had a lovely cup of Nestle hot chocolate mint and sat inside and chatted a bit.

Grant and Lauren had gone to Stokers and when they came home they brought Dereck a snack basket and me a calamari salad - so that was our supper.

I then went and finished off my "Dream Home" layout for the BOM challenge. Will upload as soon as I can take a photo of it. So, I still managed to get some scrapping done.

Off to do Grant's class i year.

Happy gardner signing off ....

I'm a Winner

Yes, my family are all reading this and saying "she is always winning things!!"

I recently entered a competition to win a Bokomo hamper on the Shape website, and 2 days later I received a telephone call to say that I was one of the winners. They said that someone would phone me to make arrangements for the prize to be delivered.

Anyway, on Tuesday when I arrived home, there was this huge parcel waiting for me. On opening it, this is what I had received - a lovely hamper of goodies from Bokomo:

Shape and Bokomo fan signing off .....

Got some scrapping done

I managed to finish this layout over the week-end. The photos were taken last year at our Pinetown and Districts Athletics Club prize-giving where I was awarded a trophy for the walker of the year in recognition of the races I had done, including a 42.2km and 2 x 50 km, a wooden plaque in recognition of my having achieved 5000km in cumulative mileage in the 1000km challenge and was the first female in KZN to have achieved this, as well as a lovely embroidered towel for having completed the required number of races in a league challenge.

Had an interesting week-end - went to a Swipe breakfast on Saturday morning where I was asked to give my testimony on how a product called Promega worked for me. Then in the afternoon I went to a lingerie party (mmm very interesting!! and loads of fun). Got home and made supper for the family. On Sunday, Dereck and I went to Knowles, did some shopping and then had a late breakfast at their coffee shop. Came home and made some salads for a braai we were having in the afternoon. Dereck's sister, Lesley and her husband Alex as well as friends Ian and Jennifer came round for a braai and then we watched the Grand Prix (yes, I did actually sit and watch a few laps and I must say it was rather exciting to see Lewis Hamilton winning the championship.

Awards winner signing off ...

LIFE EXPERIENCES RECEIVES AN AWARD

{The Arte Y Pico Award all the way from Rica in England}
Wow Desire , I am both humbled and honoured by this award from someone as talented as you and who makes the most beautiful, inspiring and creative scrapbooking layouts and cards.

The RULES for presenting this sought after Award are:
Pick 5 blogs that you consider deserve this award for their creativity, design, interesting material, and also for contributing to the blogging community, no matter what language.
Each award has to have the name of the author and also a link to his or her blog.
Each award winner (upon acceptance) should show the award and put the name and link to the blog that has given her or him the award.
Link to the Arte y pico blog, so everyone will know the origin of this award.
Show these rules.
My chosen FIVE are:

Over to China - Heidi Swapp who creates such wonderful layouts.
Back to South Africa - Beryldene Stemp who has such an inspiring blog (I so enjoy reading her posts).
Over in England - Andrea Robertson who also has an inspiring blog and does wonderful scrapbooking layouts.
Over to the USA - Bakerella who makes the most awesome cupcakes.
Back to South Africa - Sophia Allison who always has such interesting stories on her blog as well as wonderful scrapping layouts.

Thanks again Desire for the award, I really do appreciate it.

Award winner signing off ....

Halloween

Happy Halloween everyone - will post some pictures later!!!

Mosaicing Week-end

Yes, this is a bit late, but at least I am updating!!!

Last week-end, Shelley and I flew up to JHB to spend time with Desire to help her with preparation for the Scrapday in December. But ....... Desire was sneaky and did that work and we had to take part in another craft - yes that is correct - mosaicing!

Desire is making mosaiced frames for her in-laws 50th wedding anniversary and needed assistance with getting them done. There were about 18 of them. So while Shelley sat painting the back of the frames and the stands, Desire and I got stuck into the actual frames. I so enjoyed doing this, that I will definitely do a mosaic of sorts for someone soon!! You will have to check out Desire's blog when it is updated of what we did as I did not take my camera.

We also took some time out and went to the Montecasino Bird Park on the Sunday morning. We had breakfast first and then watched the bird show. It was fantastic and their birds were most delightful - similar to our Umgeni Bird Park, but much bigger. Once the show was over, we walked around the park looking at all the different varieties of birds they have. It was a lovely sunny day and when we got home we realised how hot it had been as we all had bright red faces, necks and arms!!

Then it was back to mosaicing and at about 6pm Desire and Conroy drove us back to the airport.

All in all a most enjoyable week-end.

BOM Challenge #8 My Family and #9 Fashion

It is a lovely misty morning here in Pinetown, South Africa and Summer is certainly arriving. When I wake up at 5h30, before my alarm at 6h00, then I know that Summer is on its way!! So, that means that I have already taken the dogs out to do their business, fed them, done a load of washing, took the photos of my layouts and sent them to Tracy and now am updating my blog (while I suppose quite a few of you are still sleeping!! he he).


On Friday evening I finished my Family layout and here it is:

The journalling reads as follows:

Ok, so you want to know all about my family. Let me tell you about my side…….
My parents are Lu and Laura.
I am the eldest of 4 children and am married to Dereck. We have two children, Leanne (currently living and working in England) and Grant.
I have a brother, Malcolm who is 17 months younger than me. He is married to Carol and they have two children Byron and Cassandra.
I have a sister, Liesel who is not married and she is 5 years younger than me.
I have another brother, Warren who is 7 years younger than me. He is married to Debbie and they have two children, Luke and Rebekah.
My mom’s parents were known to us as Granny and Grandpa Farquharson and they were always very fair in what all of us grandchildren got. I certainly enjoyed spending week-ends with them at their house in Westbrook (near Tongaat) and a favourite treat there was having Melrose cheese wedges on toast and jelly everyday for pudding at lunch time. My Gran was a wonderful person so full of life, considering that she was crippled in a wheelchair with Rheumatoid Arthritis. She never complained of how much pain she was in and sadly passed away at the age of 83. My one good deed was giving them the pleasure of a great grandchild – Leanne. I was pregnant with Grant when my Gran died. My Grandpa was a very patient and perfect gentleman who always had such wonderful stories to tell us. He died at the age of 88.
My dad’s parents were known as Granny and Grandpa Engler and lived in East London. My Grandpa died while I was quite young, so don’t remember too much about him except that he used to have a pet crow called “Joe”. I always remember my Gran as someone who baked delicious biscuits, who crotched all the time and made lovely blankets for each of my children when they were borne and whenever we were around her, all we heard was the clinking of her 3 wide gold bracelets that she always wore. She also always had her hair under a hair net. When she passed away, each of the 3 girls on the Engler side of the family received one of these bangles. She passed away a few months short of her birthday when she would have turned 99!

Now, for Dereck’s side of the family…...
Dereck’s mom’s name was Francis but was referred to by all of us as “Papi”. A name she got from when Janine was small and she always used to call her “Poppet”. Sadly she passed away in July 2008 having suffered with Cancer. His dad’s name was John and he passed away tragically in a car accident in 1972. Dereck is the eldest of 4 children.
He has a sister, Lesley who is about 2 years younger than him. She is married to Alex and they have two children, Janine (who lives and works in England) and Nicholas. Lesley, Alex and Nicholas used to live in Holland and have recently come back to South Africa.
The next sister is Jennifer who is about 7 years younger than Dereck and she has recently got divorced from her husband Greg. They have two children, Samantha and Kirsten.
The youngest sister is Joanne and she is about 18 years younger than Dereck. Dereck’s mom was pregnant with Joanne when his dad was killed, so sadly she has never known her dad. She is married to Brendon and they have two children Kerin and Ryan.
Dereck’s Gran on his mom’s side was known as “Ouma”. She lived in Parys so we never saw her too often. But when she did visit, she used to make the most divine ginger pudding and then “Papi” used to make it and it is a definite Ramsay family favourite. As the family grew, we needed to have two of these puddings at any function as everyone liked it!!

I get on with all my family and especially enjoy our family get togethers as we always have so much fun – taking the mickey out of each other and generally just having a good laugh. Warren and I seem to have a similar sense of humour! Each family member in their own way is very special to me. I numbered all the pictures in order to indicate who they were:

1. Janine
2. Lu
3. Laura
4. Debbie
5. Nicholas
6. Papi
7. Joanne
8. Kirsten
9. Samantha
10. Luke
11. Byron
12. Cassandra
13. Rebekah
14. Carol
15. Leanne
16. Grandpa F
17. Ouma
18. Granny F
19. Malcolm
20. Warren
21. Dereck
22. Ryan
23. Lesley
24. Brendon
25. Kerin
26. Jennifer
27. Greg
28 Grandpa E
29. Alex
30. Granny E
31. Grant
32. Liesel

The next layout for the BOM Challenge #9 was to do with our fashion sense through the years. I managed to finish this layout yesterday - it helps when you have a husband who watches the Grand Prix and who was in so much pain from his gym session that he couldn't walk around too much, so we didn't need to go anywhere!!!! Here is my layout:

And the journalling reads as follows:

I am not a fashion conscious person. I like practicle clothes that can be mixed and matched and that will last. I like bright vibrant colours. For work I like to wear skirts and loose fitting shirts. For casual wear I enjoy jeans, shorts or ¾ pants with t/.shirts or loose shirts. I don’t often wear dresses. If I am at a shopping mall and I see something I like, I buy it as chances are that when I am looking for something I won’t find it. I have a few necklaces that I wear but I am not big on accessories. I have a couple of pairs of black and white shoes as this is the most common colour I wear to work. I do buy others that will match clothes that I already have. This saves on wearing the same shoes all the time. When I was younger I enjoyed long hair. Since I started walking and now doing gym, I find that that short hair suits me better as I wash it every day. I have had perms over the years but prefer it natural now. I have my hair highlighted – originally for a bit of colour but nowt it is to start hiding the grey!! I am not a big make-up person. I always wear lipstick and if I am going out I will add mascara and blush. My favourite perfume is CHANEL No. 5 and RED DOOR. My taste hasn’t changed – I am still a conservative and practicle dresser. The style of my glasses …… well at the time they were fashionable so I hope in 20 years time I won’t be laughed at!!!

Thanks for looking.

BOM Challenger up to date signing off ....

A relaxing day finished off with a Prawn Feast!

Got out of bed at 6:00am to let the dogs out and give them their breakfast. Collected the newspaper then got back into bed - very unusual for me!! I have had such a runny nose these last few days and was just feeling yuk. Slept until 8:00am then decided that I needed to get up and do some scrapping.

I had finished off My Family layout yesterday (I still need to take a photo and will send to you Tracy) and then got started on my next challenge which is about our fashion sense through the years. I finished that off and am very pleased at how it turned out. Again, I still need to take a photo and will send it through to Tracy to put on her blog.

Grant asked if we could go to Simply Fish at the Pavilion for Prawns. It costs you R98 per person and you can eat as much as you like. Between Lauren, Grant and I, we finished off 11 pans of Prawns. They were absolutely yummy. We liked the mediteranean sauce which was a bit peri-peri. Dereck had fish and then went off to Exclusive Books, while we carried on eating. even the waiter commented that Dereck had looked bored!!

All in all a nice relaxing day and a wonderful evening. Off to go and read my book.

Prawned out signing off ....