The Adventures of the Garden Sprites

The kids were up before the sun just about and I kept thinking, this is payback for all the times I had my folks sitting around the lounge all bleary eyed while my brothers and I opened all that Father Christmas had delivererd! Mackenzie couldn't believe her eyes when she spied the eaten mince pies and the letter that was left addressed to her and Reagan! She kept asking how did Father Christmas know all these things! Simple, its magic! So here we are, our first Christmas in our new house! Merry Christmas to all our friends and family and may we all be as happy as we are today and think back on the magical feeling we get from watching excitement light a childs face, from having family who care and friends who will always be there...

We have been in our new house for exactly a week and I must admit, I am so glad its not this time last week! We have settled into the house and aside from 2 boxes that have my stationery in, everything else has been unpacked. My paintings and photos went up as soon as possible to turn a house into a home and of course, being Christmas, a few dozen batches of mince pies were baked. Peter and the kids have got stuck in so I have hidden the last few as Father Christmas deserves a few mince pies before jetting off to the next house! We are slowly getting to know our new home and I am pleased to say that I have a mall with everything I need in it a few hundred metres from the house! The kids are enjoying the bigger garden and spend most of the day picking wild flowers through the fence or playing in their splash pool, needless to say they both are starting to look as though we are at the coast instead of the middle of the Free State. Here the kids are sitting on the steps leading down t...

So many new things are happening to all of us and the kids are growing in leaps and bounds! Mackenzie has become such a responsible child and takes Reagan off to the potty every morning and also dresses her! We are going down to Bloemfontein in two weeks to meet her new teacher and get her school clothes, my little girl is growing too quickly! Then Reagan is off nappies and has subsequently learnt to swim! She is a terror in the pool and as she just jumps in with no thought to how deep it is I bought her a pair of water wings. These keep her from drowning herself as she follows Mackenzie around the pool!    Then on our last visit to the farm, an absolute downpour the day before left the road full of mud puddles and the kids were like bees around a honey pot! It took us ages to get them cleaned up afterwards but it was worth it. My Grandfather always said the best toys for a kid are sand and water! There also happened to be a poor songololo who was part of the entertainment!...

The kids and I are settling in nicely and enjoying the time spent with Grandma and Grandpa as well as our cousins on the farm. The weekend trip even had the added entertainment of two veld fires and a visit to the chicken houses where Uncle Michael had just received a batch of day old chicks! My sister in law and I took the kids for walks in the evenings and there was nothing to beat the peace and tranquility along with the evening sounds of the guineafowls and the pheasants. There is just something about being close to nature, maybe because you get to see the dawning and setting of each day, or the devastation a fire can wreak, but it reminds you that nothing in life is ever certain or constant. Life is short but life is what it is and its up to us to realise our goals and dreams and sometimes to just let life sweep you away where it wants to. I read somewhere that you should enjoy life like a child, its true. When we grow up we often feel the wait of our responsibilities but nothing...

After a harrowing few months, the Williams' are all packed up and searching for a house in Bloemfontein! Peter has already moved and the girls and I are visiting in Kroonstad until we have a house! Now, I am able to share a lot of secrets with you all about packing up a house by yourself with two very busy kids running around and a birthday party!! So, firstly, it is easier to pack at night as you dont have little fingers taking out what you"ve just packed, never mind that you are exhausted by 7! Then, Woolies has a range of ready made food that just needs a few minutes in the microwave and Pick and Pay also has ready made food that needs no warming! The girls and I survived on that and a range of meals consisting of viennas, eggs and toast! And then, I have some very special friends who, if it weren't for them, I would not have made it! They cooked for us, looked after the kids when I couldn't, packed a few boxes and generally gave me the, dare I say courage, to tack...

I am sure every parent the world over has had to admire their childs art work on their lounge chairs, or the diningroom wall or even on an important paper that just happened to be lying around and our first reaction has been anger. Now I read somewhere that we have to give something positive and not reprimand your child because it is negative and you are breaking your child down. Then you have to explain to him/her that we only draw on paper and not on the walls! Well, I recently walked into my office to find that Reagan had very nicely scribbled a picture in black permanant marker and coloured it in with red chalk! Mackenzie had taken advantage of the fact that she could blame Reagan and added her signature to the mural! Now I ask you, how am I supposed to praise my childrens handiwork and then explain very nicely that here is a sheet of paper, please draw on that next time? It doesn't solve the problem that the wall probably has to be repainted and from what I know of both girls...

Reagan is now 21months and counting and I have never come across a child who is so busy and into everything as she is! Mackenzie will be quietly wayching one of her stories and Reagan will either pull her hair, or change the channel or whatever just to irritate Mackenzie. Last week she somehow managed to get the fish out of its bowl, when her daddy came to see what she was doing, she went on and on about the fishy and he realised it wasn't in its bowl! Needless to say, he yelled for me and we found it under the wash basket. I popped it back in its bowl and its till alive! I must add though that the fish bowl is on the bookshelf which is attached to the wall above the changeing table! So word of advice, keep all pets out of sight, not just out of reach!! Last weekend we were lucky enough to have the family under one roof again! Mackenzie couldn't wait to see Uncle Iain and I could hardly tear the kids away for bedtime, especially when Uncle Iain is sitting right in front of th...

After spending Friday night hunched over the toilet bowl with a bad case of food poisoning and feeling like death warmed up on Saturday, could the weekend get any worse? Unfortunately it did. Reagan woke up with a very bad cough on Sunday and although she's been coughing on and off for weeks, this was a typical croup cough which she is prone too and my heart just sank. By the time 1 o'clock came, Peter and I decided to take her to the emergency room where we sat until after 4. In that time, she had a chest X-ray which came back worrying wether she had some bronchial infection, then they had to do some blood work which came back negative for an infection but with a recomendation from the doctor that its not serious but please see your peadiatrician and here is a refferal letter for him. Now I ask you, what exactly are you supposed to think when they say "Its not serious but..." Then we came home, had supper, bathed the kids and I eventually fell asleep with Reagan as e...

And so another year has passed since Mackenzie's birth and she has a year and a half to go before she starts big school. I keep wanting to shout to the world to stop because I want to get off! We always hear about how life is so short you need to appreciate your kids, your husband and life in general but the truth is, we have the good days when we do appreciate all we have and then we have our bad days when we would give our kids away to the first person who walks past, we would gladly send our husbands to Timbuktu and complain loudly to anyone who is willing to listen how life sucks! I do believe that we are allowed these days as we are all made up of the good and the bad and thats why when you choose to get married you have to promise sincerely that it is for better or worse as you cannot always just be happy... My mom always told me that good things come to an end so the next good thing can come along and so too do bad things. So life is all about good and bad, happy and sad. So...

So many of my friends seem to have problems with their children going to sleep and staying asleep. As we all know, there are various "solutions" to this problem mostly involving a cry it out approach and the so called "self soothing". Now I ask you, how can a baby be expected to self soothe after spending nine months in the womb and all of a sudden being cold and alone in a strange place! As adults, a lot of us read or watch TV as a "self soothing" approach, for want of a better word. But a baby or toddler cannot read yet and TV is not exactly the optimal self soother. When Mackenzie was born, I really tried putting her to sleep in her cot but I used to put my hand on her and sleep in a very akward position to keep it there. It wasn't long and I had her in my arms in my bed and there she slept for the first few months of her life and then graduated to just lying next to me. I breastfed her so it was just so much easier to feed her when she was next to...

After spending 10 days in a quite Free State town, the thought of returning to the busy city has the whole family down in the dumps. I keep wondering why it is that the city is so claustraphobic and I have come to the conclusion that because of the high crime rate and the amount of people in the city, there is no way we can allow our children in the streets or just going round the corner to their friends, so the result is kids that spend most of their time indoors, watching TV or playing computer games. It cannot be healthy for them and I often think back on my upbringing on the farm which was 35km from the nearest town and our neighbours were a good 20 minutes drive away. We were never inside and permanantly ran around bare foot, come rain or shine! I would love to give my children that kind of upbringing and because it is not possible at the moment, I try to do the next best thing - go for as many walks outside as you can, show your kids the tiniest beetle or the biggest snail you c...

My sister-in-law and my niece and nephew were visiting this afternoon and they arrived as a thunderstorm hit. It wasn't long and we had blue skies and sun again so we decided to sit outside with the children. The three girls started playing in the very muddy puddles and Kirsty and I just watched as they got dirtier and dirtier. As you can imagine though, it was great fun and kept them busy for almost an hour! Us mothers know how it feels to have to try and get those clothes clean and mine are soaking as I write but when it comes to "educational toys", you cannot get better than mud and water. So moms, let your children play in that muddy puddle, it is far cheaper than anything you buy in the shops and I can assure you, the kids enjoyed it more... Abigail, Mackenzie and Reagan

Since I last posted, two things have come to pass. Easter and the arrival of a cold wet winter. We had Easter at my parents house in the Free State and the Easter Bunny had to hide the eggs inside this year as it was raining outside. Not sure how he made it inside but well, when Mackenzie woke up she came running back to the bedroom shouting "he came, the Easter bunny came"! Peter has gone back to an equally cold and wet Pretoria and myself and the kids are staying here enjoying a well deserved rest. This morning I was so upset with Mackenzie as she has lost a piece of her magnetic dolls set and she cannot "memember" where she put it. I asked her for the tenth time where she had put it and she spun me some story about it being on top of the chest of drawers. When I asked her how could it then not be there anymore, she said, "Magic made it disappear Mommy"! How could I still be cross with that and the lesson I learnt today was that even though we have to ...

Our trip to the coast was a HUGE success and I can honestly say that the trip there and back was not the ordeal I thought it would be. We arrived in East London on a windy Friday afternoon and of course could not wait for Uncle Iain to get home from work so we could hit the beach! Reagan was absolutely enthralled with the BIG sandpit and kept picking up the sand and letting it blow all over her, she was sandy from top to toe. Mackenzie just ran and ran, the freedom of having so much space went straight to her head! Both kids however, were not too impressed with the waves and Mackenzie climbed up Uncle Iain like a monkey so she wouldn't get her feet wet! Saturday morning we headed to the beach again and we had to tear both kids away or we would not have made it to the wedding. There were such interesting things to see and Uncle Iain was kind enough to explain the ins and outs of a hermit crab and knew just where to find one! They also discovered a dead parrot fish, something I ...

My cousin in East London is getting married next weekend and we are leaving on Thursday on the first leg of the trip. Two and a half hours to Grandma and Grandpa's house in the Free State and then about 8 hours to East London. We are all looking forward to seeing all the cousins on my side of the family and of course my kids' favourite Uncle Iainy is also there!!! So how much beach time will we be able to cram into so short a weekend? As much as possible seeing as we are real Vaalies, Reagan has never even seen the ocean and Peter and I can't wait to see what she will do with this HUGE sandpit. Mackenzie I think has also forgotten just how vast the ocean is so we are all really looking forward to digging our feet into real sea sand! Wish us luck for the looong trip and watch this space for an update...

My friend Lee-Anne and I have known each other since we started high school. And at the risk of giving away our ages, that would be approximately 18 years! When we still lived on the farm Lee-Anne was a regular visitor and we went horse riding, walking and skinny dipping with the sun setting over the dam... And if I had to choose a moment in life to go back to for just a day it would be to one of those carefree days when all we worried about was having to be back in the classroom come Monday. On Friday she and her little girl Gioia are hosting myself and my two girls for our first ever sleep over! I know for a fact that Mackenzie can't wait as she is counting the sleeps and wants to skip one or two so it can be Friday already! And for those of you who would like to follow this interesting evening, please refer to http://gioiabean.blogspot.com. The topic of this blog is Friends, so who of us mommies have time for friends inbetween all the kids activities and keeping them all clean...

Who of you mommies out there will ever forget that first moment of holding your first baby in your arms for the first time, or your second or your third because I don't think it becomes any less special even if it is the second or third time you've held your newborn. I will never forget the first time they put Mackenzie in my arms, I was shaking so much I was scared I was going to drop her. But after so many months of waiting to hold her it was something not easily described or easily forgotten and although she is already almost 5, I still get the same pleasure from just holding her. And it was the same with Reagan three and a half years later. Unfortunately there are many ladies who are unable to experience the joy of holding their own babies in their arms for the first time and it is these ladies to whom my post goes out tonight. There are also so many women who have babies so easily but don"t appreciate them or neglect them and I often wonder at the unfairness of that. ...

I am unfortunate to live in a different town to both my brothers and my parents and it is rarely that we are all together. We recently had one of our almost yearly get togethers and I took as many photos as I can, especially of the kids with Uncle "Iainy" as Mackenzie so lovingly calls him. The weekend we spent with him she followed him around like a little puppy and did not lose an opportunity to sit next to him! Uncle Iainy! Here are the Roberts' and the Williams' all together.

I have inherited a box of all the family photographs and have been systematically sorting them out and trying to find out whos who... not an easy task as a lot of the photographs are from the early 1900"s and before. All my ancestors. Somebody once told me that you'd be lucky to be a face in somebody's album one day but its amazing how genes come through the generations and appear when you least expect them. I studied genetics at varsity so I understand all the science behind genes and heredity but genetics is not just science. It is also your sister or brother or son or daughter, the people behind the genes... While sorting through these photos I came upon a picture of my paternal grandmother at about the same age as Reagan and I was struck by the similarities between them, in fact it could be a photo of the same toddler. Reagan is the only grandchild on both sides to have brown eyes and both my grandmothers had brown eyes too. But I found myself wishing that they could ...

It has been raining and raining and raining, so this afternoon, my friend Lee-Anne and I braved the weather, which fortunately had cleared a bit, and took our 3 girls to our favourite playdate meeting place. It has every conceivable jungle gym you can think of, geese, goats, chickens and even a pony to be ridden. Absolute heaven for a child! So for 2 hours they played, we had a quick cup of coffee and then we took them for the much anticipated pony ride! While driving home with my two girls happily singing away to their favourite songs, I realised once again just how important it is for a child to be able to play. When I go shopping for my 4 year old, I am always amazed at the clothes that are available - dresses so full of bling even I wouldn't wear it, bras for toddlers and shoes with heels! I mean come on, why are we not allowing our kids to play with dollies and dinky toys until they reach high school instead of dressing them up as though they are adults. These days its the in ...

Mackenzie has always been an avid watcher of anything on TV that even remotely resembles ballet, she has been taking lessons for the last year and thoroughly enjoys it. Over the holidays she discovered ice skating and has been nagging me to take her! Reagan is much bigger than Mackenzie was at her age and I was sure she would not be into ballet like her sister, but lo and behold, I have just walked into the living room to find her copying the ice skating as avidly as her sister! Arms up, twrling around as if she's been doing it for years - so I suppose I better phsych myself up to be driving 2 little girls all over the place for ballet recitals, at least until Mackenzie gets her license!!!

Happy New Year everyone, none of us mommies can believe that another year has passed. There is a saying that goes: nowhere else is the marking of time so evident as in the life of a child... you've just found out you're pregnant and before the excitement of the actual pregnancy has worn off, birth day arrives and you bring your tiny precious bundle back home, then they start sitting, crawling, walking, then they're off to nursery school and then comes big school - and then the next thing you know, you're watching your kids bring their babies home from hospital! Its a neverending cycle and the trick is to enjoy it and never wish any time away, even the bad times, they all help shape who we are and its they way you handle things that counts. So here's to a wonderful year, whatever it may bring, may we all get to know ourselves a lot better and to remember to spend those few seconds listening to your toddler go on and on about the tiny ladybird she saw - In her life it...