This weekend we…

So we take Aidan to a restuarant with awesome play area and he goes for play dough, REALLY! 
Aidan starts day care again today so I stocked the snack cupboard, it makes for easier mornings
The staples are, cracker bread (dry please) , these little gluten free crackers he likes , kinda like goldfish crackers (he has no problem with gluten just loves them) plain pretzel sticks and laughing cow cheese wedges to dip them in,  safari fruit sticks, raisins, and squish veg puree oh and these tiny little 100% juice boxes and on a Saturday he gets Oreos with his milk, we share those little packs,it’s become our thing πŸ™‚ and a calorie shared…..
Had a very emotional weekend…my stars feel out of sync I think… Rob got me a little car package, gotta love the man even if he chooses to ignore diets πŸ™‚
Aidan helped me make a birthday card for my sister/his Godmother
I just LOVE beautifully packaged gifts LOVE IT… the brown paper is for my friend Trudy’s daughter and the card and glass jar filled with goodies for my sister
Aidan decided he wanted to get into the crib after months of wanting nothing to do with it…
It’s Caleb’s now so lets see how that plays out
We did a sundae bar for my sisters birthday πŸ™‚

My weekend and an almost instant smoothie recipe

Aidan LOVES stickers “stickies” I noticed he got a thrill from taking stickers off clothes and putting it on things
I bought him a sticker book and it’s been quite the hit πŸ™‚
LOVE these by woolies, where were they when I was pregnant or breastfeeding
I can’t decide which one is my favourite….
This is how I saw Aidan most this weekend…uppy mama uppy ….think he realized work was about to get full time again
Went bowling with the in laws of Friday-here Robin’s brother Allan shows his daughter how to bowl
Allan happens to be Aidan’s Godfather
I love this pic πŸ™‚
Aidan’s aunts, on the right it’s Allan’s wife Kim and on the left Robin’s sister Mandy
Me and Kamryn πŸ™‚
Just chilling with a blow up pool, because we can πŸ™‚
Seeing these two together is good for my heart
A little smoothie tip:
Freeze a banana and a handful of other fruit of your choice together in a container
When you want a smoothie just blend it with a glass of milk (the frozen banana makes sure it’s nice and thick)
I add a little fun sized yogurt (when I use soya milk) and am able to change the flavor by changing the yogurt
EASY PEASY
I do this every time I go grocery shopping (whatever fruit is on sale) and can whip up a smoothie or two with minimal effort πŸ™‚

Merry Christmas from our family to yours

Merry Christmas all, may God’s grace rain down on you this festive season. We had an awesome day full of spoils, love and laughter. We started out at our house, then my parents, then Rob’s mom…. here are some pictures….

Christmas 2014….US
My gifts from Rob… This man gets me! I can’t wait to use my glue gun πŸ™‚
nail polish sets and dark chocolate, need I say more!!! 
So amazing to see Aidan’s excitement over gifts…. “Oh wow”

Dressing up your kid is part of the fun of parenthood…am I right, hehe
Our gifts
Christmas selfie
Aidan LOVES his wack a mole game
Working up an appetite
With Uncle Clayton
With Aunty Anthea
I love love this photo
Someone had fun
A little Larry Kingish
Food glorious food!
With Aunty Nicole
Wouldn’t be Áidan without an impromptu nap
This cracker knows me!!! needlework set nogal
More gifts! ‘From other gran
Lucky boy
Kid didn’t know what to play with first,
 at one point he was on his plasma car while playing building  blocks and cars
His oldest cousin Kamryn
Oh how I love personalised gifts
Pretty necklace from my mom and sister
These two charged me 10 million 19 rands (seriously) for a plastic burger
With Ouma Helen (Rob’s mom) she loves him to bits
With my Dad…Oh how matchy matchy
FAMILY LOVE

What I’ve been up to…in pictures

If you follow me on INSTAGRAM you probably saw these pictures before…but if you didn’t here is what I have been up to since our last “picture check in” . . . Also the truth behind the happy snaps

 

My aunt and uncle renewed their vows after 25 years…They are still crazy in love after all these years and I only pray that my own marriage can stand the test of time like this…. Oh and Aidan was the ring bearer and in true Aidan style decided it was nap time not photo time…

I was photographer, but don’t judge by these pictures as Instgram lowers quality, and my son is not about the photo taking… here are some pictures I took. . . HERE

LOVE his face in this picture, Aidan through and through…It’s very “what you talking about Willis”
Also don’t you just LOVE his shoes? later that day he snuck them into his sandpit to use as shovels…so ja that

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I had the week off so spent loads of time with Aidan: we  played with play dough… He loves the stuff says “I pay dough mama” and fetches his play dough in his room- he needs to be supervised though because he will grind it into your carpet when you are not looking….

We painted some wrapping paper for his dad’s Christmas gift… The next day he brings his paint to me to open (surprising already because I put it all away in it’s storage bag in his cupboard) I told him it was not painting time, but when I went to put paint back I find that he had set up a little “paint station” he had taken out bowls, brushes and  paper and only needed the paint open…. I was both impressed and freaked out at this.

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We built a fort… Aidan calls it a blanky house . . .

We took out Aidan’s “Big Christmas Gift” early because with no day care for a couple of weeks he needs something to burn off some energy, HE LOVES IT!

Taylor received her design from PRETTI YOU she LOVED IT. 

Her mom and I meanwhile loved Rob’s lasagna and my sangria

I made these carb free 60cal date balls….
Stick 250g dates, 100g almonds and 100g raisins in a blender till finely chopped and sticky, shape balls and stick in fridge to “set” perfect guilt free “something sweet”

Picture my weekend

Happy Monday all… I had a pretty packed weekend, which ended with an exhausted little boy fake crying while saying “I crying, I crying” hehehe, too much funny.  This is what we got up to this weekend:

My beautiful (sitcom funny) friend Lyndall had a birthday on Friday so we went out to celebrate πŸ™‚ clockwise from left…  Lyndall and Marvin, Robyn and Ryan and Leigh and Rory… (These people could get you kicked out of a fancy venue for laughing too much)
Rob and I
Saturday morning we did our first of hopefully many, Saturday run/walks, with Aidan tagging along in his stroller
We stopped off at the park, Rob decided to show Aidan how to slide (sure, it was alllll just to teach him, surrrreee) 
Aidan and my good friend Jenine… Aidan calls her Nene and loses his mind every time she visits…
Rob and Ryan (pronounced Riaan) showing Aidan how other play ground equipment work…suuuurrrre
Jenine and Ryan are getting married next year…And the whole town echoes  . . .  ffffiiiiinnnaaallly πŸ™‚
Aidan was adamant he could climb this, we all stood around him freaking out…. has no one told him he is only 20months old?
This is the face we got for not letting him get on with it by himself – his independence is starting to scare me, like when he went into kitchen and got himself a snack all by himself yesterday…Two provita and a squish.hmmmmm
Aidan put the star on our tree this weekend πŸ™‚
This tree is kind of a mash up as our tree and dΓ©cor seems to have just DISSAPEARED it’s crazy… so if the tinsel looks a little “different” that could be because it’s Halloween themed
Saturday afternoon we visited our friends the Bhanas… Aidan LOVES their dog Zachary, who he calls zacky.. As in Zacky leave me alone, while running after the dog.
With Gabby (an awesome fashion designer) think he is trying to get in good with her to secure future modeling gigs, hehehe 
Fun in the kitchen for a braai,  Sal (in black) doesn’t do anything in half measures, so the braai featured so many yummy before snacks we could hardly eat when food was done resulting in Sal threatening to revoke our snacking privileges in the future, hehe … also it’s hard to stick to a diet when a delicious cheese platter stares at you… just saying πŸ™‚
We went to Spur after church yesterday and low and behold my parents and siblings walk in not to long after so it became an impromptu Sunday family lunch…. I got the make your own sundae for Aidan which at R18.90 is a bargain…he LOVED it, I lie , he loved the toppings, the ice-cream not so much (watch him give the ice-cream the evil eye)… his sundae ended up being jelly beans and sprinkles covered in chocolate sauce.
Working off the sugar… he runs into play room by himself…chanting, I play I play and proceeds to do all the “big kid” stuff… This child! my heart!
Then he comes back, after deciding that we are boring and sits all by himself at next booth….so there’s that, lol
Back home we did some water play, he was supposed to sit outside the basin and play but nooooooo we “get in mama”
The kid had a blast…. His blow up pool was stolen last year (who steals a kids blow up pool I ask you) so I think a replacement is in order
Ahhhh the little things in life

Hope everyone had an awesome weekend, I know I did, and I was once again reminded of how blessed we are to have so much love in our lives πŸ™‚

My “Real” Instaweekend and my digital kid

I’m inclined to believe that instagram doesn’t always give the full picture, no I don’t mean the fact that everything needs to be square, I’m referring to the “REAL” moment behind the pictures… here are my weekend instagram pictures and the stories behind them…
 
Aidan decided that riding his Y-bike backwards with hands sticking through the holes would be a good idea.
But by the time I grabbed my phone he was sitting on the floor like this.
 
 
My dad asked me to take this one because he recently opened a fb account and wanted a cool picture
Took a lot of me to post this picture, my sinuses were (are) acting up and my face is all swollen.
HATE the way I look, but couldn’t resist posting it because Aidan decided he wanted a nap in the middle of the pool

Aidan was not a fan of the water, it took us forever to coax him in and even after that he preferred to be in his dad’s arms because then he would be more than halfway out of the water.

This was taken at like 11 at night. He had taken like an eight hour nap during the day and was not about the sleeping after that. He insisted I get in house with him and then I proceeded to blind ourselves with the flash in that tiny space.

Rob has gun training (Army and police) and refused to stop playing till he proved himself.

My good friend Jenine just happened to be walking by as I was about to get a chip twisty/tornado fries/potato on a stick.
(Carnivals and family get togethers are hell on one’s diet) We took like 10 selfies before we were both kinda in this one. And then we went on this hectic playground ride which had me upside down for way longer than I care to remember.

This picture is cute and doesn’t show the mini fight me and Aidan had just seconds before. I was trying to tell him not to stick whole thing in his mouth he was trying to tell me to back off.

I bought like five corn on the cobs at the carnival, because I didn’t want to make lunch later
One fell in the street, it hurt my corn loving heart

Aidan fell asleep like this which started the practically eight hour nap… A sure fire way to wake him up is to consider a nap yourself

This cute pic was proceeded by tears from both of us. A trim ended up in a cut because he squirmed around so much and I don’t think I was ready for big boy hair. I’m so learning to cut his hair myself…His curls! his beautiful curls!
 
 
On a different note here are reasons there is no mistaking that Aidan is a “new age” digital kid.

– he brought remote into his room and tried to change picture on the wall
– he tried using laptop by touching screen (we not that fancy)
– he tried to put batteries into a non battery operated plastic stove because there were no bells and whistles
– he announced that his bear (giant one from this post) was broken… I’m guessing because  unlike Scout it doesn’t talk
– asks me to make videos of him and show it to him
 
… aidan seems to be very digitally aware and I’d be freaked out that it was stunting his mental growth if he didn’t spend so much time running around outside and playing pretend and chatting away. He is very balanced although he has a leap pad (controversial I know) and he watches TV(also frowned apon)  he also has blocks and play dough and parents who give him loads of one on one play time… so I think him being so into things that switch on is probably just signs of the times.