An ode to Elrich

I love you so much it hurts
I live my days in fear and hope
You have taught me to be unconditional
You show me how to look at the world through new eyes
You are teaching me to trust anew
Your cheeky personality makes me laugh
Your love for me helps me love myself
Your love for dad brings us as a family closer
Some days I want to run away and hide from you
mostly I want to keep you from hurt
I know that you will grow apart from me
but for now, can the world just stop turning
so I can hold you tight and forever cover you quietly at night.

Loosing my cool

Ack, today we had a public tantrum. I threw the tantrum and E ignored me, well actually, I threw a tantrum because e ignored me....then he would not push his trolley at all (this is in the local super market buying nappies and nanna milk.)

First, he ran around at the speed of white light, screeching around the corners into unsuspecting, but very patient shoppers (Cari was it you that said Cam did this to you? and here I was thinking we had some time still to get to that). So I told him if he cannot walk nicely with the trolley, I am gonna take it away from him. Then he refused to move even an inch - just imagine shoppers piling up on both sides of our little tableau in the middle of an already overcrowded, after work tired isle. E just stared at me through angry lashes, if I touched the trolley - a loud screech with "los uit mommy, los uit (leave it)" and more glaring. Well, stalemate was had until I took a five litre box wine of the shelve and proceeded to the checkout point - hell if I can't have copious amounts of good red, what is the point?

E tattled along and joined me in time to offload the stuff I bought, including some matchbox cars I did not put in the trolley. When I asked him if he brought his money (I was just taking a chance here) he looked very concerned and said that his money is gone. Believe it or not, but he took the car off the counter and deposited it on another shelve as he could not find 'his money'. Mommy bowled over completely, again. Maybe he just enjoys keeping me off balance at all times.

Some fun photos

The weekend at the elephants - unfortunately most of my photos did not come out as my camera was on the wrong setting. I almost feel as if I have to whisper when I admit to this autrocity (yikes). It is the ranger, E, my mom, dad and myself on the lefthand Ellie - named Themba, and Phil is on the younger and much more feisty Mabitisi. Here Themba is going through his exercises, kneeling down on command and getting a reward for his obedience. (The game ranger is rewarding him with some cubes which is why he has his trunk on his head)

Getting closer to this gentle giant - the softness of their seemingly coarse skins is just mind blowing.














A lazy Sunday morning - E watching his all time favourite 'The incredibles' . We have to rearange our lounge so the couch can be parallel in front of the screen for him to watch in comfort.

Sleeping all cuddled up to Kia And he is just LOVING his swimming lessons. Today the teacher said that he is just a water baby - like a little fish in the water. I am soooo glad, he definately share the genes

Getting my act together

When I brought my newborn home from hospital, I was armed with the little packed of chemicals that (together witht he b/f) would keep my fertility in check. A couple of months into this new life, I could not stand the chemically induced dryness of my cervix anymore and ditched the whole lot. What a relief to have my 'normal' (well as normal as a new mom's body can be) body back. In stead we opted for condoms, mind you not that we had any real need for anything as dh was hardly ever around......

We have talked often about going back onto the normal pill, but for some reason I am really hestitant bombarding my body with anything chemical. I have a real desire to get to know my body better, my emotions, my biological and physiological workings, all those mysteries of the mind and spirit. I think body rhythms and the flow of energy connects us all to life and forces of life - I want to BE, rather than be controlled. I want to function and to know me. I want to work together with who I am.....but when all is said and done. I do not want another babe - not just yet. I have too much still to accept, I have too many emotions to work through. Maybe I will never be ready and that will be fine as well.

Back to fertility and my body - I opted to find out more about NFP, I like it. I like learning about me and observing my natural body rhythms, the mysteries of emotions and hormones. I have just started a chart. This is not my first attempt but previously I was still bf and it was all over the place.

Now if I can just remember to take my temperature everyday (including weekends) maybe I will start to figure it out soon. Till then, latex will remain my close companion

Elephant kisses and call from school

We had such a fun weekend, My parents are up north on a week holiday and we went to join them for the weekend. I had to finish some work on Saturday morning (see previous post) but the three men went fishing and e even told us all long stories about the fish daddy cought. Not that it really happened - the kid has a huge imagination.

Sunday was just one big spoil. We went on an african elephant experience. Quite fun riding 6 meters of the ground on an enormous gentle giant. Temba and Mabitisi was our hosts and they both come from the wild and would have been shot if they were not adopted, trained and looked after by this game reserve. They are tasked to not only treat tourists, but to give therapy to disabled people, make movies (mad Mike from Animal planet was there on Saturday) to tell people about the plight of the African Elephant and believe it or not - to track poachers. Apparently they can run something like 80km an hour through the veldt and they have a sense of smell 14x stronger than that of a tracker dog. I do not want to be the offender if Temba comes storming down at me with all 8 tonnes and a game ranger on his back! E was very excited even if he was a bit intimidated by the sheer size of these animals. Whilst riding Temba, Mabitsi had his trunk come up all along Temba's back until he found little E sitting in front of granny, and gave him a little kiss on his leg. I told the game rancher and he mentioned that they always search out little children and have told on pregnant women even before they knew they were pregnant. It was amazing to experience the gentleness of such a huge and intelligent mammal. After the elephant ride we enjoyed a lovely bushveld lunch with Impala feeding on the grass not even five meters away!!

I really like this time of year

Oh and the call from school, was to tell me that E (the only little one still in nappies) was found sitting on the loo. He took himself of for a pee, took his pants and nappy of and was happily amuzing himself on the toilet seat! I am not throwing the nappies away as yet, but maybe we are getting there.

Do I gloat or cry?

So after we were rather rudely sidelined in favour of a politically more correct consultant to do the resubmission of a SLP to the Department of Minerals and Energy, we got roped back in today. Well, really begged to help since the big day is only 10 days from now and their repackaged and beribboned submission was thrown out, with a big question as to why on earth they thought it a good idea to change in the first place.

So yes I (we all) feel a bit smug, only thing is, that burning the all night oil will be our only resort for the next week or two!

It's not funny!!

E's vocab is suddenly expanding faster than I can keep up. Most of his sentences is in English, but if you ask him to name things he will give you the Afrikaans for it.

This weekend we went to a local trout farm to catch some sun and much needed fresh air (no pressure to bring home lunch) E loved it, he had his very own kiddies fishing rod and loved hitting the water and anyone in a meter radius with it. Phil rigged it with a proper barbed hook and a jellylike worm which apparently is irresistible to bass. I just gave this one look and hid the hook safely within the jelly worm so no one (especially not Elrich) got caught on the thing.

An enjoyable morning ended with an overtired little boy, so on the way out this was the conversation.

No momma (shouting)!!! Not doing dad....pappa, momma said sleepies (in this pathetic little voice- he loves tattling to us about what the other said or did to him) So daddy confirms that he is tired and needs to sleep. More shouting, Phil and me starting to giggle at him.....silence in the back of the car

Followed by this big angry voice 'Pappa, NOT FUNNY, NOT FUNNY!!!' so of course we could not help but giggle more. Shortly after the silence announced a sleeping little boy with a half grin on his face.

The little man also started with swimming lessons on Friday. He is set to go twice a week, on a Friday and Saturday. It is a big hit - he loves it. We swim with him and the whole lesson is made up of games, rhymes and songs, but they practice all the different strokes, holding onto the side, getting out of the pool and even swimming into and kicking away from the wall. E was in his element, definitely a little fish in the water. I am so glad, as both Phil and myself love water and swimming.

And I am going to look at a house today - to buy. It looks like the type of home Phil and I would really enjoy living in. It is on a fairly big yard, with a pool, 3 bedrooms, two inside entertainment/living areas with a paved patio and covered outdoor entertainment braai area.