Keeping Busy...

The kids have finished the first term (of three) and now they get a break for a few weeks, we are heading to the beaches south of Durban.  We look forward to burying Charlie in the sand and if the weather cooperates the girls will try a surfing lesson.

Our last few weeks were busy, with lots of school activities, Katie had a school play, they had an outdoor movie night, it was Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, if they dressed up they could win a prize, so Violet Bouregard and an Oompa Lumpa were spotted, they both won a candy prize!

They also had literacy day at school and Katie dressed as Miss Viola Swamp (from Miss Nelson is Missing) She carried the book around too because they didn't really know the story here.  Her friend is Hermoine from Harry Potter.

Our other fun event was a trip to the Rand Show, which was this giant expo at the Johannesburg Expo Center.  The kids LOVED this one booth where it taught them how to make a healthy lunch, they had real food and containers for every kid, they got to go around and pick their items, come back and make a sandwich and pack everything.  At every children's museum we have ever gone to they always loved the play food and shopping for it, so this trumped all of that because it was real food and they got to take it with them!  I think there is a business opportunity for a kids restaurant if any of you are ready for a new career!

We also saw the "Naked Scientists" Show which is a group out of England that came down to perform at the Rand Show, they did some cool experiments, here is the ending one where they mixed Liquid Nitrogen, Bubbles and hot water...you see Katie & Charlie run up after the explosion!

The kids also liked this turtle that collected donations in the animal area.

On our ride to school Charlie got to see a "real life Matchbox car", a Lamborghini pulled out in front of us and we followed it for few blocks.  I'm not sure how a guy drives that past the people on the side of the street that ask for money or food?

The avocado trees are blooming around town, they are spectacular, here is Katie near the one at school.  I had never seen an avocado tree before...they didn't have those in the Midwest or New England!  This is a tiny one, some are huge.

Our final activity of note...a failed attempt at trivia...they had a trivia night at the community center, we entered a team and they gave us an exemption for having 7 on our team rather than the max of six.  Charlie had some funny answers to some of the questions!  Without Paul to anchor our team we didn't do very well, but we did have a good time trying!  

We are excited to go see more of South Africa this coming week!

Making Easter Memories

On the local radio station here they have a campaign called "Lead SA", which encourages people to make a difference to make South Africa a better place.  They feature stories of amazing things that people are doing every day.  It got me to thinking what we could do, and we ended up going to a local orphanage (where we had visited at Christmas with the Embassy) and we did an Easter egg hunt for the 75 kids that live there.

We had plastic eggs we had brought and we shipped in a few more (good old Amazon) and put the neighborhood kids to work stuffing them.  The girls spent the morning baking....

Hundreds of sugar cookies being made..

A rainbow of frosting colors...

We loaded all the eggs, cookies decorating supplies, a pile of soccer balls, fresh fruit and we headed to the orphanage.

Katie & I kept the kids busy with cookie decorating while Greg, Kelly and Charlie hid the eggs out in the yard.  The kids loved decorating their cookies, eating sprinkles, and frosting of course.

The hunt begins!

I am happy to report that the kids got the best of all of us for a few hours:

• Kelly was playing with the little kids and getting them to smile, they loved when she would lift them onto the back gate of the car, they thought it was fun to sit on the tailgate! She even picked a thorn out of one little guys foot.
• Katie was adopted by a group of girls her age, they wanted to do her hair, they even brought out their own comb (with half its teeth missing) to comb it for her.
• I was perfectly happy in a room full of kids & mess everywhere-frosting, sprinkles, after the egg hunt I held as many of the little ones as possible, they liked just sitting on my lap.  They liked playing with my hair too, with their sticky fingers!
• After hiding all the eggs, Greg handed out extra chocolate ones to kids who didn't get that many, he was nearly attacked for the rest of the eggs in the box, his sprint to get away with the box of chocolate was his warm up for a soccer game with a group of the older boys.
• Charlie was a enforcer in the little kid hunt area, he kept telling the big kids to get out and he helped some of the little kids find eggs.  He also joined in to help Dad in the soccer game.

It was hard to leave and know that there were so many kids there that just wanted some love and attention, if only for a few minutes.  I wish I had rolled in with a bus full of Moms to hold all the little ones!  

Don't you just want to give them all a snuggle?

Back of the car was the "hot spot" to sit on!  At one point there was about five more kids squeezed on the back!

We drove away happy that we brought some cheer to the kids and already planning what we could bring for them on our next visit!

Easter Bunnies!

The embassy hosted a kid's Easter party over the weekend.  The Easter Bunny that visited was our very own Kelly.  She was a trooper for wearing the hot costume!

Charlie got inspired and made his own costume when we got home and an egg carton basket, no plastic Easter grass to be found here so he cut up green paper.  

An awesome package of Easter goodies arrived from our friend Mary in the states-she sent some grass!  (thanks Mary)  She also sent egg dye, the only problem is the only eggs they sell here are brown eggs, Charlie asked if she sent any white eggs?  

In addition to her debut as the bunny, Kelly also turned 14 and we had a great Paris themed party for her.  Katie did all the decorations and wanted it to be super fancy, I think we could actually be one of those people that posts photos on Pinterest with this one!

Kelly had a great party and is happy to have a new group of friends here, although she really wanted all of her buddies at home to come to her party!

One last party photo, Katie got invited to a Great Gatsby themed birthday party, we had fun dressing her up, it turned out the girl needed no decorations, her house could have been the set from the movie, she really lives in a beautiful castle! Katie once read a book about a girl who had an amazing birthday party, I told her she now lived the book!

We hope all of your Easter preps are going well!  I'm gearing up to make my Greek Easter bread!

Chariots of Fire!

Charlie had an Athletics day at school which was a mini track meet.  When he put on his outfit Greg said, "Its Chariots of Fire".  The last race of the day was a long loop around the school for some of the older boys, what warmed my heart was when a bunch of boys ran out to help the last runner finish.  The announcer pointed out that is the WHiPS spirit...it really is a very special school.  As you can see from the photo Charlie is now in the blue house, he was sorted just like Harry Potter...no sorting hat though, our notification came home on a sticker.

Another cool event at Charlie's school was the family camp out, it was an entire day affair with bounce houses on the field all afternoon for the kids, then families pitched tents in the field and cooked out for dinner.  We brought S'More ingredients including the giant campfire marshmallows we ship in, the kids had never seen giant American marshmallows, they were a big hit.

Kelly & Katie setting up camp...better after a run home, the first attempt we realized we left the tent poles in the garage!

Settling in for the night...only Dad, Charlie & Katie slept over, Kelly and I got to sleep in our soft beds!

First Hockey Goal!

Both Kelly & Charlie are playing hockey here, its very different than hockey in the US, one reason is they only have a few teams so they play full 20 minute periods, so the games go on for an hour and a half! Another difference is because there are so few kids Charlie plays on a U12 team, Under 12, last season Kelly and Charlie even played in the game together...here is a photo...

One nice tradition they have is at the end of the game they choose an MVP this Sunday, Kelly and Charlie were both chosen as MVP in their respective games.  Kelly in the U14 game scored three goals and played fabulous defense.  (her game was at 6 am)

I almost didn't attend Charlie's late afternoon game because how many hours can you really sit in an ice rink? However at the last minute I went along and was glad to not have missed it!  In his previous games Charlie really just skated around and wasn't in the mix very often, it was exciting if the puck came somewhere near him.

Sunday however was a different story, he said he was going "jet speed" and he figured out he could be part of it all.  Fortunately for me, some parent taped the entire game and put it on youtube... skip to minute 49 and watch for #2, with red socks...you'll see Charlie score his first goal- so exciting! If you skip ahead to 1:04:14 you'll see him get chosen as MVP for the game and he has his helmet off so you can see his face!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ekCFvhaUBQ4

So I don't get in too much trouble with Katie (we are trying to get her to switch to hockey and hang up her figure skates)...she had a few good school successes recently.  She participated in a kids literature quiz and her team won second.  She was hoping they could win first and go to the South African Championships. If they had won that it would have meant a trip to the US to the world championships in Connecticut.  Greg and his trivia team would have felt right at home in the Lit Quiz!  Her other competition was a math one and again she came out on top...her prize was a new calculator...her she is with her prize.

Happy St. Patrick's Day

We wish all of you a Happy St. Patrick's Day, we wish were home to share a pint with everyone, but we will toast you from afar!  I've cooked up a big batch of Guinness Beef Stew and have baked my Irish Soda Bread, we have our compound coming to feast and a few other families as well.

We worked hard on a few dances for you, in case you haven't seen Greg in awhile, he has switched his look he now favors "skinny jeans" please click on the link below!

Our St. Patrick's Day Card

The second one is all from Charlie, please click on the Love Charlie link!

Love Charlie

No Internet again, so thanks to my neighbors signal I can do this post, however we can't call anyone with our Skype number, in case you were hoping to hear from us!

Swimming in the Indian Ocean

The kids had a half term break from school and we headed for a trip to Cape Vidal, near St. Lucia on the Indian Ocean.  We saw a great sign on the drive into the town of St. Lucia...

We LOVED the warm Indian Ocean, great waves, a beautiful beach and the water was so warm it was a perfect swimming temperature.  Charlie got cold but was happy to be buried in the sand to warm up!

We stayed in log cabins right on the beach, here is cabin 27.  

Before you get to the cabins you see this sign...

Kelly and Charlie became believers...as they sat on the couch, a monkey came in the window right next to them, stole a banana and ran out.  Here is a monkey getting a drink from the outdoor shower..

Here is a few of the thieves...they also managed to swipe a packet of chocolate muffins and a pack of breakfast biscuits, they were on alert as we packed out, they jumped in the car a few times to take what they wanted!

We went to see the beach town of St. Lucia and enjoyed seeing the hippos from the boardwalk.  We did not see any crocodiles (fortunately).

One of the reasons we went to this area of the coast is it is known for its sea turtle hatching that occurs between Jan-Mar every year.  We signed up for a turtle tour on Sat night and we drove down the beach for about 12 KM, hoping for a glimpse of baby Leatherback or Loggerhead turtles hitting the ocean for the first time.  We LOVED the ride, beautiful night, great sand dunes and the ocean waves were amazing.  Unfortunately the only thing we saw was an empty turtle nest, we at least got to see the egg shells that remained behind.  Katie and Greg had the guide stop at one point because they saw something, it was a very cool shell that Katie got to bring home.

We did not sleep well either night in the cabin because we had some unwelcome visitors..big bugs and lots of squeaking noises.  In the morning we confirmed it was bats, here is the one Greg found on the floor and carried out...he had a broken wing, Kelly things he hit the ceiling fan. So much for bat radar?

We were sad to leave the beach but headed back and stayed the night in Utrecht along the way.  Our spot was called Waterloo Farm, amazing spot at the top of some mountains...unfortunately the GPS sent us over the wrong mountain and dirt roads on our first attempt, but the second attempt was worth it..here is our Hunting/Fishing Cottage we stayed in.

The side room (to the left) was amazing, had a big fireplace and there was a big rainstorm, so the owner brought us wood and built a great fire.  We sat around enjoying the fire and talking, Greg, Charlie and Katie were snuggled under a blanket.  Then Katie and Greg saw something crawling and said, "Is that a scorpion?"..Sure enough it was!

After some speedy research we learned that although he could give you a bad sting, he wasn't a bad scorpion, the thickness of the tail is the indicator.  We were careful to check all the bedding before we went to sleep!  The scorpion spent the night in a glass and we released him to the wild in the morning.  Here is the cool room with the fireplace and lots of animal heads.

There were beautiful walks from the cabin, here is one of the fishing spots.

We enjoyed the drive home, through Kwazul-Natal Province, land of the Zulus and where many of the famous battles in SA took place.  There were traditional Zulu villages all around, here is one, I liked how they flew flags around their huts.  We could not believe the long distances we saw people walking to and from these villages!

Here is a soccer field in the sky...at the top of a very tall hill, here are the goal posts!  

We look forward to another trip to the hunting lodge and also back to the warm beaches of the Indian Ocean, however we won't be disappointed if we don't see the bats or scorpions again!