Mad Science Party

Finally, the long awaited day of the party arrived with great excitement.  The children thought the lady was a real scientist and were engrossed by all the experiments.  The rest all went smoothly and everyone seemed to enjoy themselves.  They especially enjoyed the uncontrolled and crazy running around and playing afterwards.  We had balloons with lights in them, small static balloons and the screaming rocket balloons and they all ended up being popped with screams of delight.  The manic part is always my favourite part of the party and I always end up wishing it could last longer!  

The Feast

The Cake

Messing Around

The Experiment Table

Ping Pong Balls

The mystery egg

Helicopters

Gravity Teapots

Balancing Soda Cans

Making Slime

Rockets Blastoff

Coke Fountain

More Science

I let Nicholas choose what he would like to do for his day off school. Influenced by all the experiments at his party he choose the Science Museum. Unfortunately Danny wasn't very well but we managed to drag him to South Kensington and he slept in my arms most of the time while Nicholas did some experimenting.  The Launch Pad really is a great place to hang out!

Royal Albert Hall

As part of Nicholas' birthday celebrations we went to the Royal Albert Hall to see Classical Spectacular.  We started off with a sushi picnic at the Albert Memorial across the road before taking our seats in the rafters.  It was a great perspective and put us just below the cannons and right amidst the laser beams and fireworks.  It is always characterised by the popular classics, which the boys are familiar with, so there was a lot of conducting, singing along and waving of flags.  Not sure who enjoyed it more, us or them!

Mind the Gap!

The day we arrived in SA, the 1st of August, Nicholas lost his first top front tooth and almost exactly a month later the other one followed suit. The first one's replacement had already appeared and the second one's replacement didn't take too long to come out either. It feels like he was a 'haasbek' for such a short time.  I can't believe such a precious moment in my boy's life has come and gone.  Since then he has lost the little one to the right and the one on the left is wobbly too.  Now, 4 months later, he has two beautiful big front teeth with a nice gap in between.  It all kind of finalises the fact that he is a big boy!

7 December 2012

All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth

14th September 2012

The beautiful gap

1st August 2012

The rich Magogong Mouse gave him R21 plus £2

31st July 2012

The VERY wobbly tooth on the plane

23 July 2012
Things started looking imminent

School Portraits 2012

We just got the boys' school photos for 2012.  Last year I ordered this one where Nicholas had one of his most natural smiles, but as time has gone by I realised that it just didn't work as a school photo because his head was cropped by the frame and his school clothes were not really visible.  So when I noticed that last year's selection was still in our account I decided to order a different one and I am really really happy with it.  It captures his innocence perfectly.  Looking at it side by side with this year's photo makes me realise that my little guy has grown into a big boy since then.  It actually makes me want to cry!

And this is my Danny Boy's very first school portrait!

Rugby and Mud

One of Nicholas' favourite things at the moment is rugby.  Not only does he enjoy singing Nkosi Sikilela at the top of his voice with his dad and his bro before every bokke match but he has also started watching a bit too.  Every Sunday morning dad takes him to Warriors where he sees a lot of his school friends and burns a lot of his energy.  Being a rugby school, Donhead starts them early, every Wednesday they have a games session and at the moment they are focussing on rugby.  What this all means for me is mud, mud and more mud!

Perfect Sunday

The sun was shining though it was freezing and there was still frost on the grass at midday.  We went on our bikes to our local for a pub lunch with some of our friends.  A good kick around on the field afterwards finished off a lovely outing.  That's what Sundays are meant to be like!

 Couldn't resist some animated gifs

Place Kick

Punt

Up and Under

September 2012

The next few posts are of stuff we did in September.  With the mood of the summer holidays still in the air we had a lot of fun and did some of the stuff we didn't get to do before we went to South Africa for August.  It seems so long ago now especially on a day like today when there's frost everywhere and it is zero degrees!