One Word Sunday: Small, Smaller, Smallest.

Whilst visiting our family in New Jersey, a few years ago, our smallest granddaughter Taylor,

presented me with a drawing that she’d made of us all. I thought it was so cute how she’d lined us all up with granny and granddad being the tallest, then her mom and dad, slightly shorter, followed by herself, her older sister and then her younger brother being the smallest. It was also good to see that we all had smiley faces.

To join Debbie’s ‘One Word Sunday’, just click the link.

Wishing you all a very happy February, which happens to be the smallest month.

My Sunday Photo: Ravioli is on the table.

A favourite spot for my daughter’s cat ‘Ravioli’ to pose.

We are enjoying a wonderful weekend with our daughter in Johannesburg, before flying off the the UK on Tuesday.

Happy Sunday to you all.

WPC: Family Having Fun

The Weekly Photo Challenge ‘Fun’ made me think of my grandchildren who really know how to have fun.

Here they are with their mom in a wind tunnel machine at the South Florida Science Center , being almost blown away. Not my idea of fun, but they so enjoyed it.

Sienna’s happy smile says ‘I’m having fun.”

My oldest granddaughter Tamsyn had lots of fun at our Christmas lunch with Great Grandma in England.

On the way home, I inexplicably got caught up in a bit of fun with two court jesters at Heathrow airport and hubby captured the moment.

If you have any fun photos to share, just click the badge and be sure to have a fun Wednesday. 🙂

I participate in WordPress’ Weekly Photo Challenge 2016

 

 

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Home again, jiggety jig.

How could I abandon you all for so long!!?? I felt somewhat bereft without my laptop, but  our visit up north was so packed full of activities that we barely had a spare moment to  catch our breath.

There was of course the birthday party for little Taylor which spilled over two days. First at home, with a pool party for friends and parents.

The cake was HUGE and tasted really delicious. I ate quite a big piece, and still had room for salmon, steak, shrimp, salads and ‘Keenwah’ which is apparently the latest health fad up in NJ.

The following day there was another party at the local Gymnastika just for the kids. The foam pit was very popular,

as were the pizza, macaroons and cupcakes afterwards.

We attended Taylor’s school talent show, where she got stage fright at the last minute. She was all set to sing ‘Castle on a Cloud’ from Les Mis, but couldn’t go through with it when she saw all the people in the audience, even with dad there to hold her hand.

Sienna proudly showed us her ‘Potato Clock’ exhibit at the school Science Fair.

She also had a part in a kid’s musical ‘Milan’, which was excellent. She’s the one in the middle. The only problem was that we were seated directly behind the grandparents of the girl who had the lead role, the girl in the white dress, and the whole family were busy videoing the entire show, so I had to peer around their cameras the whole time.

We all went to ‘Build a Bear’ and Max got a dog,

whilst Taylor chose a rainbow bear named ‘Sweetie Pie’.

On Thursday night we went to see Chris Isaak in concert at the Wellmont Theatre. He was amazing and was on stage for the whole show which lasted for almost three hours. My favourite song of his is ‘Wicked Game’. How many of you remember that big hit from 1989?

On Friday, Hubby and I visited the One World Trade Center and Observatory Tower, which I’ll show you pictures of in a later post. Then it was sadly time to come home again.

Before we knew it, we were back in Florida.

Hubby of course is back to work on the house renovations, and after I’ve done the laundry and food shopping, I’ll do my best to catch up with you all over the next couple of days. Hope you’re having a great week.

 

 

 

Thursday’s Special: Inflated to the Max

This week, Paula tells us:

Inflated is a word that lends itself to quite a few interpretations:

1. Blown up, puffed out

2. Raised, escalated

3. Exaggerated, overstated, embellished

4. Pompous, pretentious

She invites us to “Use these or some other meaning of inflated to show it in picture.”

Outside the Håagen Dazs ice cream parlor in Key West was this huge cardboard cutout. Of course 4-year-old Max couldn’t resist climbing up there and peeping over the top. It certainly inflated him in size.

To see more inflated images, visit Paula’s blog, by clicking the badge below.

 

 

Thursday’s Special: Mom and Eve

Time Warner Center is one of New York City’s many iconic destinations. When I saw that Paula’s Thursday Special this week is ‘Tall’, I was reminded of the extremely tall

 Fernando Botero bronze statue of ‘Eve’ which greets visitors as they enter the Great Hall. My dear mom who was visiting New York for the first and only time in her life at age 83 years, was quite taken with it.

Oh mom, what a lot of fun we had on that visit! I also remember that you didn’t want to have your photo taken with ‘Adam’ who was on the other side, because he didn’t have any pants on.  🙂

Treats for a special girl and our 50 happy years together

The WPC this week is ‘Treat’.

Two years ago when Sienna came with her dad to visit us in South Africa, it was such a treat for the family to spend time with her,

especially my darling mom who hadn’t seen her since she was a toddler.

We took her to the beach

and out to restaurants where she could have her favourite food, and she even got to design her own pizza.

Making her own hot chocolate with marshmallows was also lots of fun.

A really delicious treat to enjoy

We went to the aquarium in Durban.

On the London bus in the shopping mall.

Then we all drove up to Johannesburg to see Auntie Mandy,

who took us see the lions at the nature reserve.

She even got to feed a giraffe.

It was a really fun time, chock-full of treats, and a holiday I’m sure she’ll never forget.

Today marks 50 years since hubby and met at a Guy Fawkes night dance. Little did I know when he asked me to dance, that we’d still be ‘Happy Together’ five decades later.

https://www.google.com/search?q=Happy+together&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8#q=happy+together+turtles

It’s been a real ‘Treat’, and we’re going out today to celebrate, so I may not be around here again until tomorrow.

PS: Can someone please explain to me why my title for this post ended up at the bottom instead of the top, and I can’t change it?

This time last week……Delicious lunch and swinging benches

It doesn’t seem like a whole week has passed since we were on our way home from a fabulous few days in Key West. Our son and his family were headed to Miami for the weekend, and we all stopped off for lunch at the beautiful resort town of Islamorada, which is about ninety minutes south of Miami.

The waterfront restaurant ‘Marker 88’ looked very popular and the food was excellent. Here’s my scrumptious and super fresh shrimp salad, which I never wanted to end.

We ate inside, because there were no shady tables left outside and it was really hot. Afterwards, the children had some fun with one of the swinging benches. In fact, Max got that bench swinging so hard that we had to rescue the salt and pepper pots. ( I guess this qualifies for Jude’s colourful bench challenge.)

If we’d had more time to spend, and it hadn’t been so stinging hot, we would have sat here for a little siesta after lunch.

Hubby and I are thinking that we should return here for a few days out of summer season. It’s not as vibrant as Key West, but looked far more relaxing and is only half the distance to drive.

Wishing you all a great weekend. Have lots of fun.

Birthday celebrations in triplicate

Yesterday was the BIG day, and my darling Mom’s 90th Birthday party was a great success. My sister had organised balloons, a huge chocolate birthday cake and a very yummy snack platter. Mom’s 92-year-old best friend Marj, had rounded up some of her old friends from the church she used to attend, and of course the family were there in force, with cards and presents as well as hugs and kisses for mom. The weather was perfect and we sat outside under the trees which were shedding their tiny, dry leaves all over the food and especially the cake, so my sister spent quite a lot of time blowing the leaves off of it.

All the time we were eating and chatting, a merry band of monkeys were swinging in the tree branches, waiting for a chance to swoop down and steal some snacks. After a while, they decided that there were too many vigilant, hungry people around, so they went to play on BiL’s car instead.

My mom shares her birthday with her youngest great-granddaughter Taylor, who turned 6-years-old. She phoned to thank us for her new scooter, and we had a lovely chat with our son too.

In the evening, we and our daughter went across the road for sushi, her very favourite food.

Today was my sister’s birthday, so she came down to spend a few hours with us and we all had delicious Italian Bruschetta for brunch, and did some shopping, before taking our daughter to the airport. What a great few days we’ve had with friends and family.

I have to say that I’ve not been feeling too well since we arrived here, but of course I had to just keep going because of all the festivities and family visits. I’m sure you’ve all been in a similar situation at some time. This morning I woke up with a bad cold, and when I opened my mouth to speak I discovered that my voice had completely disappeared. I think I must have picked up a virus either on the London tube trains, or on one of the two overnight plane journeys, so I’m grateful to have a couple of days to just collapse in a heap and hopefully recover before the weekend.

Sorry I haven’t been around the blogs much. Life has been rather hectic, but I promise I’ll visit you when I get a chance.

Silent Sunday: Family fun in the sun