All shook up....

Autumn is making her presence felt......

I was all shook up this April - in a good way...April was so so good to us this year....it came and went in a flurry of activity...mostly playful, mostly fun, very indulgent!  I LOVED every minute of the chaos that came and went with the time I got to spend with friends and family...it was soul food to say the least!  Although business was quiet everywhere...it kind of felt like our whole country had "permission to play".  The stress, trials and tribulations of our modern way of life, are condusive to more work, less play; I just felt so GRATEFUL for this chance to just colour OUTSIDE THE LINES for a while.....be frivolous....reIMAGINE...

Sights like this just make me giddy

My soul is so restored that I feel ready to invite the seriousness back in, with no hard feelings.... sometimes my serious side holds me back - it's a funny thing, but my children are looking at me through new eyes lately....that's what happens when your eyes have time to take each other in, when your words are unhurried, kind and thoughtful, and when your soul shines.....

  

Below are some pics to remember the happy times.....

There's a 'ROYAL HIGHNESS' in ALL of us

Our 'Royal Wedding High Tea' table made me swoon......... 

Camping restores my soul – it’s where I’m happiest.  No hotel lobby could match the contentment I feel when our little van drives out of our driveway on route to 'camp happy'.  When I know our children are outdoors from early morning, until late into the night, without any pressure, expectations and the trappings of modern life and society, I can't help but just smile all over.   I know my little chickens will remember these holidays forever…

Just as their Dad and I will.......

Just be...and play

Sweet sweet memories are made of this......

Just January.....

I.do.not.know.where.January.went.

Just when I was getting used to saying her name again, she was gone.  She left us with some great memories though - she blessed us in ways we just weren't expecting, but she made us sweat every time:-)

First the rain, which was delightful - my garden just blossomed and FLOURISHED...but then...maybe not so fun anymore:-/.....when I stopped being able to count the number of times we uttered that word - always questioning when it would end, and then, almost as if it was too good to be true, the day before we left for our Drakensburg camping holiday with friends.......things like this started to happen ....  

And oh Lord, then this......!!!!

And life was good, and we revelled in every minute of it!

As we prepared to enjoy the outdoors, doing crazy things like this, in the glorious January sunshine :-))

And we did soooo much of this..... we forced ourselves to languish in heated pools until 10pm at night...sigh...i LUURVE a heated pool...anytime, anywhere, any season!!

Watching our children outdoors from sun up to sundown, sigh...made my heart so very grateful for every ray of sunshine:-))

And when the evenings came, they pulled out all the stops, and challenged those beautiful summer days to beat that magnificent sunset and open star spangled skies...

Sipping my tea in bed, whilst I took in the view from my caravan window every morning reminded me how much i LOVE summer, camping, and green open pastures - with little tractor ploughing the fields in the distance to complete the picture, and I would just smile and think.....does God know how to push my buttons or WHAT!?!

We would get crazy...oh how I looove crazy.....

Our children took great delight in watching this little fledging trying to spread his wings, day after day - he found himself quite content on Savannah's head..

 ok...i don't know how this pic snuck in.....men, beer, bush..not much else to say, except that eeeeveryone's happy...

And last but not least, this very simple shot of our 2 chickens at breakfast just makes me smile....everything from the clothes they are wearing, to the bikes in the background, camping chairs and their favourite enamel camping mugs are a wonderful reminder of how good January was to us, and just how much I appreciate it at a time where chaos reigns elsewhere in the world.....and seriously, i mean I'm reeeeAAAl appreciative, seeing as we don't have a boat...

**SIGH**

I LOVE, I WISH.....once upon a time, I lived in a vintage little caravan like this...

After a lovely weekend, Sunday afternoon bliss for me has been spending time in my QE2... our little holiday home on wheels:-).....she's called Elizabeth - Lizzie for short:-)

She's not brand new....she has a history, and I love that about her. She does however, have everything and more that we had ticked on our wishlist, and it was a pretty specific wishlist. She came at a time when we said "we'll never find her" - "THE ONE", but if we did, then we'd know, it was meant to be. My heart led me to where we would find her, and when we saw her, we just *KNEW*.

So her and I hung out this afternoon - just seemed like an awesome way to spend a lovely chilled Sunday afternoon. I decided today, whilst I packed her full of goodies in preparation for next weekend's camping trip, that somewhere in the future, I want to make her ALL MINE. Time spent with her always restores my soul....she's one of my pink things, a happy place, a place where our family get to do things differently...a place where we chill...hangout, shoot the breeze....

she deserves some loving like this maybe??...

I would love to do this.....i would i would i would....(is this heaven???)

sigh...sigh...sigh.....

because then I would ALWAYS WANT TO be here.....

Not that I don't already....:-)...SIGH......

I have been counting the sleeps since .......waaaay back when.....until six awesome families will spend quality time together....outdoors from sun up to sun down....and beyond:-)....around the braai.....heavenly....roll on next Friday....sorry...I know that's being cheeky, since you've only JUST come and gone.....but a girl can dream can't she???....giggle..