Fun in the sun...

 Last weekend was Jake's best friend, Michael's birthday.  His folks organised him a super cool sand boarding party.  Jake has never been sand boarding and was so excited about it.  The sun was out, but typically for this time of the year, the wind was blowing too.  That did nothing to stop the kids having tons of fun, nor did it stop me taking tons of photos.

After a brief lecture, the kids greased their boards up before heading up the dunes to test out their new ride...

 Strapping in...

 And down the first training dune...  It was a small one and the kids quickly progressed to steeper, far scarier slopes.  Kids are fearless...

 Hey my cool dude..

 Jake took the instructions fairly seriously.  Except the lean forward part...

 He had the sticking out your rear end part pretty waxed though...

 Sun, sand dunes and busy, fast-moving kids made for quite an exciting and challenging photographic session too...

 There's Jake on the bigger slope...

 And the long slog back up the dunes.  I've come to realise that kids also have limitless energy supplies.  I wish I could be a kid again...

 Hey mom, check me out!  I'm pretty good at this.  Hey, take a photo...

 You have to go forwards, Jake, not sideways...

 Whoa!  Watch out, Jake!

 It all happened so fast, that I didn't even have time to stop taking photos and rush on over to break his fall.  That and these photos are kinda very funny...

 And when I look at them now, I'm actually not sure how Jake didn't do some serious damage to his spine doing this.  His face is in the sand and his feet are nearly touching the back of his head...

 But this photo is the winning picture of my day.  It cracks me up like I can't tell you.  Check how much sand is pouring out his helmet!  Not to mention the gasp for air.  I don't think he could actually believe that he was still alive.  Then I put my camera down and rushed over to check that he was OK.  He had a blood nose, but nothing was broken.  My little rubber band boy.  Sorry I'm laughing Jake, this photo's hysterical...

 My boy's tough and it didn't take long, not even water to rinse the sand out of his eyes, before he was back on the board at the top of the dune to try again...

 And believe me that first fall wasn't his only fall of the day, I managed to get a couple of these too...

After a while he learnt that if the board feels like it's going skew, it's best to get as close to the ground before it kicks you off...

 Funny enough, it was his arms that were sore the next day.  He claims the board was heavy... my legs would have just about fallen off with all that "hiking" up the dunes the kids managed to do...

 As they got braver, the slopes got steeper and faster and they tried new moves...

Don't worry, he's not dead, he's just trying to get my attention...

 Sitting down on the board is far easier.  I went behind Jake on the beginner's slope and it was loads of fun...

Jake's still got sand falling out of places he didn't know he had.  I'd love to do this again on a less windy day.  It's not too far away from home and not madly expensive for a treat every now and then.  I'd maybe be brave enough to try this properly if I didn't have quite so many grown ups watching me.  Must be pretty similar to snow boarding, except I imagine snow tastes nicer than sand.

Otherwise, work & life has been unbelievably busy and I'm looking forward to the weekend.  We're in for a big storm, with flash floods and gale force winds predicted, so perfect for staying indoors.

Love,

Sue XXX

Busy Cubs...

 We've had quite a lot on with cubs just lately...  Jake loves it and so I try make the effort to attend the outings and competitions that the group has organised.  The kids learn so much by attending and they get to meet so many people.

2 weeks ago we attended the Edward Shield Competition at the scout camp site Hawequas.  The weather was a bit iffy when we got up, but the slight spitting was much appreciated during the day - it got really hot.

We arrived pretty early and the kids had fun exploring Hawequas, which is any cub/scout's paradise.  There's just so much to see and do.  Out kids discovered a pile of chopped wood and converted logs into chairs for themselves...

 Before the competition had even begun, Jake was a filthy mess and in need of a new pair of jeans...

 And he was sweaty...

 The kids then decided to put war paint (ie mud) on their faces...

 Even I was starting to get bored - we were that early...

  Finally it was time to begin.  We took a little walk up a gravel path and ended up at this dam for the first round of questioning...

 Jake was a little nervous... my little pyromaniac was asked to answer the fire-safety section...

 And do some pretty tough knotting...

 He loves trying and was eager to get to the next section.  I love this photo...

Pretty poppies.  This picture is totally unedited...

 Jake checking out the poppies... This is called the chapel, for some reason...

 The kids had to make a little flag for their group.  We joined on with another small group from Muizenberg, so the kids had to think of somethng to represent everyone...

 Once all the hard work was done and we'd all had our picnics, the kids had time to play and ended up building a bridge across the stream...

An exhausted, dirty, but very happy little man...

 They all just collapsed in the grass before we headed home...

 We had a divine sunset braai with Marius and the boys, before collapsing into bed.  On Sunday morning, we woke up to the most beautiful weather and headed off to the beach.  It was great to lie in the sunshine and I went home a little pink that evening.  Thanks for this picture M, I love it...

 Happy days.  I love this one too.  I really need to start printing some of these off to hang up around my house.  I'm so bad with printing pictures...

 This last weekend saw us at another cubs event.  This time, the senior citizens of the retirement village that neighbours our cub hall had invited our kids over to spend the morning with their residents.  It was lots of fun and the turn out was great.  The weather was divine.  They had a piper, who led the ceremony through the village...

 The cubs & scouts donated an indigenous tree to the village and had to help plant it...

 One of the residents made a little plaque for the tree too...

 As part of a community outreach programme, the local police attended too.  They set up a mock crime scene and the kids had to try solve the mystery behind it...

 Jake was given a bullet proof vest to wear.  Do you have any idea how heave that thing is???

 He didn't seem to mind though...

 Afterwards, the kids were shown how the police deal with a crime such as this out in the field...

 They were even allowed to hold a real gun...

 

 And were shown where the bullets are put in.  I thought Jake was going to come home and tell me all about how cool the police are and that he no longer wants to be a safari vet, but thankfully, he still wants to be a safari vet...

 Last up was a little treasure hunt...

 We do a few things with the pensioners and it's great for the kids to know that older people are interesting to be with.  It's also good for the oldies to know that our kids aren't all revolting brats.

As for the rest of the weekend.  It was pretty quiet.  M's boys were with their mom and I always find it very quiet when they're not around.  It's good for them to all have a break from each other, but Jake is lonely when they're not around.  We had the most divine braai on Sunday afternoon with my parents at M's house.  The weather was too gorgeous to do anything else.  This is the view from the deck - look at that gorgeous blue sea, inviting, but freezing...

Aside from that, Jake took part in the semi-finals in the Math's Whizz competition on Monday morning.  It was so tight that they had to go to a tie breaker.  Unfortunately, Jake didn't make it through to the finals, but he has done so well and I am so, so proud of his achievements.  To make it into the top 5 out of about 180 kids is quite something.  He was rewarded with a certificate and a medal and we'll be taking him out for supper to celebrate over the weekend too.

And that brings you pretty much up-to-speed.

Sending lots of love,

Sue XXX