Happy Valentines day to you all, so hope you all had a helping of love in your day today. 

 At the end of the day write down a list of all your blessings and all the things you have to be grateful for

 remember to give thanks for the  pleasure of being  loved  by your  partners, or your children, grandchildren, friends or even our pets,  is always a wonderful  thing to  experience, is love and it can be found where least expected.  

I have been spending the last two days with my daughter and our twin grandsons. 

The love that I have for them is startling and the love that  I receive  from then is unconditional  and breath taking .  I often wonder how I can love so many people so much. My husband, my children, my grandchildren, all have such a huge chunk of my heart.  Then there are other  members of our family, close friends all loved and cherished and again I wonder how  hearts have the capacity of so much love.

 

Baked some golden cheesy scones  for breakfast today

I love baking. 

My  darling daughter loves Cheesy scones and what better gift than scones,  hot  out the oven for  Valentines day. 

The ritual of  getting everything together and  measuring ingredients, has a satisfaction  of its own,   not to mention the smell of the scones backing in the oven!

The best though is the lip smacking sounds as  the scones were  being devoured!

 I wish you all a wonderful love filled Valentines day! 

Hugs

Cheryl

xxx

Let it snow, let it snow....

Sooo  exciting , waiting, waiting,  knowing it is coming, but just not knowing  when and then at about 9 o clock last night, after looking out the front door at least 20 times it started to fall!!  Snow, beautiful snow.  Woke up to a wonderland  of white this morning. 

 Not a huge amount of  snow, well not as much as I expected after all the weather warnings , but enough to make it all look wonderful. 

The only disturbance of the pristine snow was the foxes trails - I love that you can see evidence of their well beaten path around the garden.  

Our village is  tiny,  no gritting or salting of roads here and I  definitely  couldn't drive my little car in the snow, so I have been in all day.   

 I have been doing  4 hour shifts at the Nursing home every day looking after my lady and I felt at a bit of a loose end  and eventually decided to do some crocheting. 

 I managed to make 30 hexagons today while watching old movies and drinking loads of  hot tea.  Now that I have started making these little hexagons,  I am so excited to make more, I love the way they look!

 As far as I am concerned  one of the most comforting quick meals is Heinz Cream of Tomato Soup, so what better for supper  than toast for dipping and hot Tomato Soup, swirled with cream, yummmmyy!

Been a good day today!

Hope you are all wrapped up warm and safe  tonight....

Hugs

Cxxx

The last of the South African photos .....

These are the last of my photo from the Gauteng province and most of these landscape photos were taken out of the  car window while we were driving soo, please bear that in mind if they are slightly out of focus.....

 In the opposite direction to the Game reserve, on the other side of Johannesburg, is a totally different landscape. 

 We  took a drive out to Hartebeesport Dam

The road goes all round the Dam and then along the Dam wall and through a tunnel that goes all the way  under the mountain. 

I remember coming here and driving along this same wall and through this same tunnel when I was a very little girl and it is still here and such a good condition still!

This is a very  expensive area, with luxury homes,  mostly holiday or weekend  houses

almost everyone owns a  boat of some sort. 

 There is a snake park which is a huge tourist attraction.

Tortoises of all shapes and sizes were around the restaurant area,

 A variety of Turtles

A large family of Meercat entertained us with their cute antics  

and some larger reptiles were luckily behind glass

 The 'Flea Market',  that is what they call it, but really it was huge and a permanent structure

consisting of Huts selling a huge variety of  African curios. 

This is when you need a few thousand ££ £ or $$$ notes to indulge in an orgy of spending. 

On our way home we came across an old trading store, Tant Malie Se Winkel (Aunt Malie' s Store) established in 1921

one of the first  in the area and it has been kept immaculate and  looks like the day it was built. 
They even sell home made bread still made in the original ovens and have cool houses outside (original fridges) and dried fish and biltong (dried meat) hanging everywhere. 

 It was like walking into a time warp back to the Voortrekker days!

And another very satisfactory day ended with an exquisite African sunset!

Endings

I have come back from my holiday  to such sad news  - the dear lady who I have taken care of for 16 months has taken a bad turn and has been given weeks to live. 

 She is  in a Nursing home  and I spend 4 to 5 hours with her ever day.  

This is so sad and I am feeling a bit lost!   

I am not supposed to get emotionally attached, but how can I do this job without caring? 

She is such a sweetie, not a bad bone in her body and I have grown so close to her........

Even more Africa....

There are loads of photo's in this post, but I really didn't want to leave any out at all ......

A few days of our holiday in South Africa  was spent on a game farm owned by my Niece, her husband and his family, in the
 Dinokeng Game Reserve.  

 We stayed in a game lodge that had literally been completed a couple of days before we arrived.  It was originally an old barn that was converted into a  three bedroom lodge. 

 We were the first guests to stay and it was very luxurious and spacious. 

I  am African, and have lived in South Africa for all my life, but I never ever tire of seeing animals in the wild,  so when we went on our late afternoon game drive

 I was thrilled to see so much  - it doesn't matter how often you see animals in the wild it is always exhilarating. 

We saw so many different species of buck,

Tsessebe,  Nyala,  Impala

and a large family of Warthog (my favourite animals) 

 We also caught a glimpse of Zebra in the distance,  so exciting.

The only trouble with going on a game drive is the low branches that you have to be aware of, not just because of the danger of the branches  scratching  you  badly,  but because of the spider webs and the spiders, specifically Golden Orb Spiders,  that  land on you  - it gave me the heebie  jeebies.

The evening brought  heavy clouds and a thunder storm that you only get in Africa. 

 All the rooms of the Lodge had large French doors opening out onto the wide open veld (open fields) and luckily they were all fitted with security gates and the large windows had substantial  burglar bars, so we could leave the  door and windows open all night.

 Mostly on the Highveld the nights are a little cooler than the day and there was a cool  breeze  through the room, which made sleeping a little easier and really what better than  falling asleep to the sound of thunder and rain on the zinc roof and the Jackal' s coughing   close to the house, it was lovely.

 It was seriously hot while we were there.  The day we arrived it was 35 degrees and climbed daily until it  got to 38 - very hot indeed!

 Friday morning dawned bright, fresh  and clean after the rain so we went off  really early on another drive,  this time we saw the Zebra close up

and the three young Giraffe

 The only thing we did not see were the Lions and resident Elephants.

Such a wonderful few days

Hugs

Cxxx