Our new housey

Here are some photos of our new housey. It's coming along bit by bit. We've got some exciting ideas but will have to roll them out over time as the budget allows...

Home sweet home

Been a while since I wrote but much has happened. As of last Friday Brad and I officially own our own home. This is both exciting and scary. Exciting because it is essential that we purchased our own property and started paying our own bond off instead of someone elses. Scary because of the current state of the South African Economy. Yesterday it was announced that the prime lending interest rate would rise by another 50 basis points (half a %) and it is now at 15.5%. There have been 10 increases in the interest rate over the last two years and economists predict that things are not going to improve for the next 2 years. As they say in Afrikaans we must just "byt vas" - which means to stick it out. We bought at the right time as the prices of houses are cheaper than they've been in years, so it is a buyers market at the moment. With the latest interest rate increase it is putting so many South Africans in a risky position where many people are going to lose their homes as they just can't afford the monthly repayments on their mortgage bonds it anymore. Costs are continuously rising with the price of petrol (gas) increasing every month which drives up the price of food and commodities. A decision is going to be taken next month as to whether the price of electricity is going to rise by about 50% or not. It's a scary time for us here but we need to keep going, trusting that if we're prudent in our spending and good stewards of what the Lord has blessed us with that we'll be able to pull through this economic recession.

Let me tell you a little bit about our new place. After about 4 months of viewing various places and seeing approximately 20 flats (apartments) we came across a lovely place on the Internet. Turns out it was just 5 doors up from where we have been staying for the past 2 years. It's in the same complex. In the beginning of the year we'd received a calendar which was marketing material for a real estate agent. It had her photo and contact details with a magnet at the back so we'd stuck it up on our refrigerator. This very same lady turned out to be the agent for the place we ended up purchasing - she'd been on our fridge looking at us every day since the beginning of the year. We were staying in number 13 and our new home is number 26 - the reason I'm mentioning this is because as you know 26 is double 13 and this is very symbolic in that we feel that we have been blessed with 'double' what we had before. The townhouse is 14 square metres bigger (it is 65sq metres and the previous place was 51 sq metres) AND it has a garage. This has meant that all the clutter that drove us insane is no longer a problem. Each room is bigger and the drawers and cupboards are bigger. It's delightful not tripping over things anymore. Of course Brad is delighted about the garage because now he can park his car there and do all his guy stuff there with his tools and stuff. Also, it's the place where all the camping stuff, tools and golf clubs can be stored.

The townhouse has two bedrooms with a full bathroom and an en-suite bathroom on the main room. The kitchen is lovely with plenty cupboard space and a double wash-basin (makes washing dishes much easier). The 2nd room is about double the size of where we were staying previously and this is good since in a few years time this will be where a little new Kirsten will be staying. The living room is bigger and we've now been able to bring in the 6 seater dining room table which has been stored in my dad's garage for a few years now. Only thing is that we don't have any chairs yet so that's on the list of priorities because we can't have people over for dinner until we've got some chairs. The outside area is similar to the previous place in that it has a braai area.

I've taken the 'before' pictures and I'll be taking the 'after' pics soon and then I'll load them up for you all to see.

The great thing about moving within the same complex is that we merely had to carry the stuff over to the new place. Thanks to all our friends who helped us move - we really appreciated the help.

Yay that it's Friday. Brad has got to work tomorrow for a while and my cousins are coming over to have coffee with me. Then my folks are coming over as my dad and Brad are going to put in some down-lights in living room. Monday is a public holiday so I'm looking forward to catching up on sleep, spending time with my folks (esp since it's Fathers Day on Saturday), making our housey look lovely and of course spending time with my gorgeous husband :)

Till next time...take care and keep smiling

Weddings and important birthdays!!!

The last few months have been a blur of weddings and events. Let me share some pics with you so you can see what we've been up to. You can double click on the collage images if you'd like a closer look.

Last Wednesday, 30th April 2008 Brad and I celebrated our 2nd wedding Anniversary. Brad and I first got together 5 years ago and the journey has been such an adventure. The past two years of being married have been spectacular being able to spend everyday with my best friend and man of my dreams. Life has thrown its curveballs at us - but it's so much easier to handle when you've got someone who stands by you no matter what. I thought I'd post a pic of the two of us which was taken at Michael and Helen's wedding on Saturday, 2nd February 2008.

Saturday, 8th March 2008, we attended the wedding of Nikola Smit and Ben Jenkins. This was held out in Stellenbosch at the Swiss Club which is basically in a forest next to a river. The setting was perfect and it was a sweltering hot day. Jules and Scott were down from the UK so we got to see them as well.

On the 30th March 2008 my dad celebrated his 70th birthday. We got together for a family lunch at the Welgemoed Golf Course (thanks mom what a special treat). This was the first time (that I can ever recall) that we had the whole family together around a table for a meal - this has been my dad's dream for many years and eventually we could make his dream come true. My three brothers, their wives & partners, and their kids. This was followed by a further get-together at my folks place where they rest of the family joined for late afternoon snacks and drinks (including cousins, uncles, aunties etc).

Deon Visagie and Trudy Thomas were married on the morning of Saturday 26, April 2008. They had a lovely service at Emmanuel Church (same church Brad and I were married in) where Deon's brother, Andre, performed the ceremony. This was followed by reception at Durbanville Hills Wine Estate - a venue with a stunning view of the winelands and the ocean. Trudy and Deon looked lovely - Trudy's dress was really stunning. Brad was the Master of Ceremonies.

We had to pace ourselves at Deon & Trudy's wedding as we were attending another wedding at 4:30pm - and Brad was Master of Ceremonies at this one too!!! This was the wedding of Leanne Sinclair and Pieter Nel. They had the wedding ceremony and reception at Lagoon Beach Hotel. This is a lovely venue which is situated on the beachfront with spectacular views of the ocean - great for photos and watching beautiful sunsets. We had another 3 course meal and danced the night away - this time also a reunion of friends from Taiwan days as Bridget, Schalk & Summer flew down from Johannesburg. Leanne & Pieter made a beautiful couple and Leanne really made a lovely bride. We danced and danced and danced till near mid-night when the newlywed couple departed for their presidential suite at the hotel - can only imagine how stunning that must have been.

On Saturday night we got together with Bridget and Schalk to celebrate Schalk's 30th bday which was actually in April. We had a do-it-yourself Mongolian braai.

Lastly I wanted to share some pics from a trip out to the botanical gardens which we did back in February:

Photos of our holiday at last

I eventually got around to sorting through all the photos I'd taken since the end of last year and wanted to post them for you to see. Here are some snippets from our holiday:

Some photos from our trip to Johannesburg between Christmas and into the new year.

The house we stayed at in Mabilingwe Nature Reserve:

Stopping for refreshments at the Oasis pub in the reserve:

Flowers at Mabilingwe
Some of the animals we saw:

More animals

Pizza and playing Cranium with friends

Brad's 30th birthday party - potjiekos and friends

End of year madness

I thought it was time for another catch up to let you know what we’ve been up to and what’s happening on our side of the world.

I’ve enrolled in a 4 week “Photoshop” course and have just completed week 1 of the 4. It means that life is REALLY hectic at the moment but luckily it’s only for a month and I have an incredibly supportive husband who has taken over most of my household functions for the next while (don’t know many men who’d do the same so I’m very appreciative). My day involves waking up at 5:45, going to gym, working from 8 – 4:30 and then heading through to Cape Town where my class runs from 5:30-8:30pm and then getting home around 9:15pm. Doing that for 4 days in a row has left me quite exhausted but I’ve got the weekend to look forward to and I’m going to get some good rest so that I can start it all over again on Monday. The course will end Thursday 13 Dec and I finish up with work on Dec 14 (which is actually the day we have our end of year staff function so no work anyway) and then I’m on leave for a month – yippeeeee!!!! In the 13months that I’ve been at my company I’ve only taken 5 days leave and I have accumulated 26.

The course has been really cool and I’m learning so much – it’s very tricky though – and I’m excited about all the things I’ll be able to do by the time I’m finished. Here’s an example of what we learn’t to do on our 2nd day. We were given about 5 different pictures and we were instructed to ‘remove’ certain parts of each picture and bring all the ‘removed’ pictures into one new picture. Eg: the frog was hanging on to a leaf in the original picture and the daisy was on a black background.

The weather has been quite bizarre. Technically it’s the end of spring, with Summer starting 1st Dec but the winter seems to have made a reappearance. The past few days it has been quite cold and raining – really hard. So hard that certain areas have flooded. See below for pics of the flooding in Sedgefield along the Garden Route. My aunty said that although her house isn’t flooded, the 2 roads leading into the residential area are flooded and the only way they can get food and stuff is if it’s delivered by boat. Then I also read that there were flash floods in Johannesburg somewhere. Very bizarre indeed. Here are some photos:

Montage Village

River mouth

A month tomorrow, Brad will be celebrating his 30th birthday. I’ve got a few suprises up my sleeve but won’t reveal anything yet… but be sure to watch this space.

A colleague forwarded me a link to the most incredible "You Tube" video and I wanted to encourage you to watch it if you can - it is the most beautiful ballet performance - by a lady with one arm and a man with one leg. It is truly amazing to see what can be achieved despite the circumstances we find ourselves in. Give it a watch, and have the tissues nearby: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=LnLVRQCjh8c
Time to head off home and start my much awaited weekend.

From Rugby to seafood

Last Friday (2nd November) Brad and I were thoroughly spoilt. We attended a Rugby World Cup Breakfast at the Cape Town International Convention Centre. The tickets were R350 per person but we were given complimentary tickets. We had to be in Cape Town at 6:45am so in order to avoid the chaotic traffic that one encounters en route to Cape Town every morning we left home at 5:50am. This is certainly the earliest I've been up in a while. It was all worth its while though as we were treated to a scrumptious breakfast ofscrambled eggs, bacon, tomato and boerewors (I couldn't quite figure out how I'd be able to eat boerewors so early in the day but Brad had no problems with that!). Then Schalk Burger, Percy Montgomery and Jean de Villiers came up on to the stage and the crowd at breakfast (1000 people) got to put forward any questions to them. The event was MC'd by Nick Mallet. We thoroughly enjoyed it and got to shake hands with Schalk Burger and Nick Mallet afterwards. Needless to say my husband was thrilled to have met 3 of the Springboks.

On Friday evening we went through to the Strand where we enjoyed the Christmas function for the Radio station where Brad works on Saturdays - Radio Helderberg. Another meal out for the day - this time a seafood platter. Yummy!

I took this photo from our table at the restaurant:



I recently took these photos of some flowers in our garden. Aren't they beautiful? God is an amazing Creator:

I have also completed another painting which is up on display and for sale at Brad's mom's Bistro. I'm including a photo below. If you want to see my other paintings then you can visit: http://laurakirstenpaintings.blogspot.com/

Other exciting news is that Brad has been getting more and more into website design. We recently teamed up and went off to a guesthouse in Rawsonville where I took the photos and then Brad put a website together. You can see the website at :http://www.ledomaineguestfarm.com/ . If you know of anyone needing a website then give Brad a call as he's putting together great websites at really affordable prices.

Work has been really busy on my side but I'm thoroughly enjoying it. Can't wait for the holidays though. I'm going to be on leave from 14 Dec till 14 Jan. We're flying up to Johannesburg from 26 Dec - 6 Jan where we'll be visiting Brad's dad. Then one of my friends, Julie, will be visiting from the UK and I hope to see her while she's here. Can't wait for the holidays... relaxing, at the beach, spending lots of quality time with my gorgeous husband.

OOS

Last night a group of us (Brad, me, Dawn, Karin and Daniel) attended the book launch for the "Ek's 'n skrywer" (I'm a writer) competition. This competition was launched in 2004 in order to give young, unpublished writers an opportunity to get their works published. Our friend, Marion, whom we met in Taiwan, was one of the 5 winners in this competition. Marion has published his book "Oos" - and we went to celebrate and represent him as he couldn't be there (he is still in Taiwan).

The publishers flew Marion's mom down from Gauteng and she proudly attended the even on his behalf.

Here are some photos from last night:

Marion's book "Oos" amongst the other 4 books

Me and Brad with our new purchase

Dawn and Marion's mom, Mariet

Daniel, Karin and Brad

Go Bokke Go!!!

This blog post is seriously late but it needs to get posted. Last weekend our South African rugby team - the Springboks - made us truly proud at the 2007 Rugby World Cup where South Africa took 1st place. Last Friday, Saturday and Sunday saw South Africans proudly boasting their flags and Springbok rugby shirts. We were all encouraged to wear the rugby shirt on Friday to work if we had one - otherwise to wear a green shirt. On Saturday, driving around just gave me a lump in the throat as so many cars had big Springbok flags waving out the windows. Everyone was so excited about that evenings Final match in the world cup. Excitement reached an all time high at 9pm as the Springboks and the team from England kicked off the final match that would determine who would take that trophy home. Needless to say - the evening ended with a bottle of sparkling wine celebrating the Springboks success - and for once, South African's all around the country united over one common celebration.

Here's a photo of the group of us that watched the rugby together at a local restuarant, the Dros, and then headed back to our place for some bubbly:

Meryl, Simon, Chantelle, Nicole, Brad and me

If you look closely you'll see us proudly wearing our Springbok (my t-shirt, Brad's t-shirt and on Simon's scarf). The others are wearing green in support of our Bokke!

Next Friday Brad, Heilet and myself are going to a Rugby World cup breakfast at the International Convention Centre. Looking forward to it!!!