Wrapping Up January and this week...

Wanette had her birthday this week. Whoohoo! Congratulations again buddee! And I popped over on Wednesday after gym (yes…I’m still going) to give her her present and to wish her well. I didn’t have to sing (poor Wanette’s ears) as I did it earlier on the phone. She was out with her parents earlier for dinner but look in her other birthday suit (white linen I think…hahahahahah!).

This week was a lot more easy-going and I have to say that I felt more and more subdued the closer we got to Friday and my grandfather’s funeral. The funeral was held in Thabazimbi on a lovely sunny (34’C) day. It was of course a very emotional day especially seeing my grandmother’s grief. It was a long and sad day. My mom went through on the Thursday already to help out and spend some time with my gran so she asked me and my brother to drive her car back for her on Friday (my mom hates driving herself anywhere!). These are some pictures of the beautiful sunset that we saw on our way back…there was a storm brewing and initially the clouds looked like big purple bruises before the sun set them alight with shades of pink and gold. It was a good end to the day I think.

Saturday I spent with my old boarding school roommate Tania (a.k.a. Lofty) and her husband Hennie at their house in Pretoria for a prawn cook-out and some much needed girly talk. We have all been so busy that I haven’t managed to see them since their wedding middle of last year. This is a picture of Tania and another of her friends cleaning the prawns (I was supplying the moral support and wine). During the course of the day some of the conversation led to Tania and Monica who are both trying to get pregnant…I don’t know if it’s just my age group or what but it’s a conversation that I seem to be listening to a lot these days no

matter where I go. It feels like half the people I know are trying to have babies at the moment and almost all of them are having difficulties it seems. I sometimes wonder if this is a problem in general or if I just have a skewed impression because I know so many people who are having problems conceiving at the moment? Don’t get me wrong – I can get as broody as the next girl, but at the moment I just know a lot more about myths, gyenies, hormone treatments and sperm counts than I actually ever wanted to know. I think the husband may have felt a bit over-exposed talking about this because they took a two hour impromptu road trip to go and look for a cat that’s been missing for almost two weeks already. It a sensitive situation…luckily we did talk about plenty of other things too and had loads of fun playing rummy cup and 30 seconds! The girls ruled…of course.

Monthly update on resolutions:

One… Laugh…Love…Live

Difficult to give specific examples on this one but I feel that I did manage to do this quite well this month.

Two…Walk as often as possible…look at the sky ofte

n…enjoy the simple things…plan less and experience more…breathe deeply

I have walked a lot in the last month but I feel that I can still bump that up a notch or two so it’s on my to-do-more-seriously list for February. I looked at the sky often (and took photos mostly – what can I say I think the sky is beautiful), I enjoyed the simple things…I planned almost nothing and experienced loooads and I breathed deeply. So except for the walking I think this one is also under control.

Three…Study hard…be passionate in my thirst for knowledge again.

Although I have made some progress here I also feel this one needs more attention in the next month

Four…Listen

My ears are practically burning from all the listening I’ve done – this one is well and truly checked for January.

Five…Do enough yoga to master the four-legged-table position.

Yes…uhm…well. I have done no yoga whatsoever I have to admit. I actually considered trying to catch up before compiling this summary but I figured you can’t rush these things and I would probably just end up hurting myself and ruling it out for February too that way. Well that’s my story and I’m sticking to it. On the to-do-more-seriously list too for this month.

Six…try new things…be unafraid

I’m trying to think if there was any occasions where I could live this one out and all I can come up with is that I was tricked into stating my resolutions in my broken (extremely broken…borderline sacrilege really) French on Les Malin, and instead of turning tail and chickening out I did it. Okay the group’s gone almost entirely silent so I may have shocked them all into silence with exactly how incomprehensible I was – but still I tried. Another occasion that comes to mind is when we were down at the coast when I went walking on my own despite numerous warnings about how dangerous it is. I feel it was a calculated risk? Nothing happened and I did try and avoid very isolated stretches on the beach and even though I never encountered anything more threatening that the tiniest line of bluebottles I felt a moment of pure panic just before I trotted out along the sea on m

y own…but I still did it. Yay! Here’s to not being afraid of your own shadow or crime statistics in SA. I should probably try and keep a more complete record of this one because I specifically remember turning down any new experiences so far? So far so good…

Seven…Host an awesome theme party…make time for old and new friends.

The first party of this is still to be done, but the second part is well and truly checked. For my next trick I will attempt to balance better between this resolution and number three.

Well, that’s my wrap up for this week and this month! I hope everyone is having as much fun with 2007 as I am? Have a great week!