My happy Place

What is your happy place?

Paint!

I am totally happy and having the best time every when I hold a paintbrush full of paint .

It does not really matter what I am painting.

It might be a door or a wall or a painting, no matter what it is,  It is my happy place.

I have another happy place too.

This is my unexpected God happy place.

This is where God, the creator of life,

author of my life and designer

of all things,

paints unexpected and beautiful things on my canvas.

It might be a chance meeting of an old friend who I had prayed for many years to meet up with.

It might me that opportunity to love someone who is not really very lovable.

It might be that chance to reconcile with someone who was thought to be totally lost to reconciliation.:)

It might be that abilty and opportunity to forgive and go on forgiving.

It can be a word ; a verse ; a smile , unexpected gift.

In all of these  I feel God fill up my happy place with his continual, never ending ; ever increasing love and kindness.

 What a happy place it is.

There are more happy places in my life but for now these two will do.

What kind of fun did you have?

 I am the kind of person who likes to plan things to do in the holiday. This holiday was no different . We began by making a general list of things each of us would love to do. High up on the boys list was - having friends to visit and sleep over. This one we can definitely tick off. Other things included going to the movies and going to play at the school grounds. I love the simplicity in their desires for the holidays. I had set might sights on things much higher :) like The Iziko Natural History Museum and Rhodes Mem or The Disitrict 6 Museum and Slave Lodge. I have to say we have only managed one of these and it was hide and seek fun up at Rhodes Mem, which was glorious for the children and gloriously cold.

 Lots of Lego and Play Mobil and reading has been done. Lots and lots of Minecraft and the like. Some hockey and running and some outdoor stuff too.:)

 Tomorrow we are going to visit Rondevlei with some friends. I love Rondevlei. it is full of birdlife and leads one to feel as though we have escaped from the urban and entered the rural. Much of Cape Town is actually like this. Take Silvermine or Tokai Forrest for example. A moments drive away and it really is another wonderful world.  This cupboard photograph was one of my many holiday tasks. We wanted to try and make a space for the older two to be able to write stuff. A good and fun place to express those pre-teen and nearly- teen things. As I finished with the black board paint doors , my birthday neared. James wrote his first and hopefully not last words on the door , as a birthday card for me. Just wonderful!!

We also rediscovered our own back yard. The sandpit has been re-visited and the boys have had endless, wet and sandy fun building and creating. I guess this beats any visit to a museum for a 6 and 8 year old - well perhaps. After all jet did choose his birthday visit to be a visit to the natural history museum.

As these holidays draw to an end, my heart grows heavy. I love having time with the boys around more. yes it is busy, messy and noisy but it is also much, much more. A very precious time to build memories of times spent together. The things that belong to childhood. Fun!!

Mandela Day

 Lets all give back a little

 The 18th July is Mandela Day. it is a day when people all around the world are encouraged to give 67 minutes of their day to doing something for someone else. See the officail website for lots of ideas and more information.

Mandela Day

My brain is buzzing with trying ti think of what we can do in our local area and how we can get other children and families who would like t, to join us. I think I have one that might work. Lets get cracking....

Can I invite you to give back too!!

The speech, the Road and Real Life

The Birthday

This week I celebrated another birthday. It was farewell to another year of my life and hello to the one that lies ahead. I celebrated with some friends and I decided to say a small speech. Those who know me know I seize any and every opportunity to say something. I really wanted these friends to be blessed and know that they are valued by me as they have blessed me and my family in many ways.

So I began to think about what to say......

I am a visual sort of person and so I had a picture , a story in my mind. It was a road with heavy bush and greenery on the side but also at the same time a dark and dangerous , almost black pathway. On the sides were lights to shine the way in the dark bit and the lights clearly defined the edges. Jesus was there too.

I was taken back in time to another speech I gave. It was at our wedding and I remember it almost word for word. I told a story about a storm and a journey and a long and desolate road. I was alone and although Doug and Jesus were there too, Doug was ahead of me waiting and Jesus was a way off too, calling and beckoning me along to him.
So I decided to speak about the road and journey of life a little with these friends. A friend recently shared a new word which I just love. it is a made up word describing the rich and beuaty of this life and also the dark and awfulness of it.  She called it - The Brutiful Life.  I think this so describes the life we have. At time it is rich and full and at times it can be bleak and full of sadness and fear. It can be both of these at once; beauty and brutality becoming friends - standing side by side as we journey though them.

So I decided and began. I hoped to share a little of the impact that friendship has on us as we travel on. Having a good friend who is faithful and kind and cares is a real blessing. Each friend in my life brings their own uniqueness which enriches me and us as a family. A good friend is a blessing, a gift from God and sometimes we forget to see this and so forget to acknowledge to them that each is loved and each is valued. I wanted to share this too.

I shared the few and simple words but am certain I fell way short to express fully. Words sometimes do not explain what the mind and heart hold.

So, when I look back and then look forward I see a similar story unfolding in my mind and yet the picture is quite different.

This present  road and the journey I have in my mind  is far more rich and 3D. I am no longer alone . Though the road is dark at times and the light is unclear.  Though I stretch out my hand to feel the way and regularly call out , " are you still there Lord? How can you care about me, the sinner I am" .
Though the landscape might be full and lush and  also  dark and full of uncertainty and even danger.There is a very real richness and depth to the road - the journey.
Although my journey is not complete it has taken on depth and life. Jesus no longer stands way of but he walks beside me; carrying me at times and showing the way with his spirit and his word. His life fashions the pathway and the way to go. I have a feeling of safety and gravity that eluded the first"speech" so long, long ago.

So as I celebrate and enjoy my birthday, I celebrate and enjoy each person who has blessed me along the journey ; the Brutiful Life I have. God is so kind and generous in giving friends to us and I am especially blessed with people who are just lovely, kind, generous with themselves, wise and fun. Each has a uniqueness that they bring in relationship and each has given something of themselves that they might not even realise but that has blessed me and our family. So as I celebrate I truly celebrate life God has given in all its depth . Thanking him above all else.

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Skotness, dinner and celebration

It is my birthday. I am turning 43. it is an age I am both strangely comfortable with and yet at war with. It is odd how both these things can come to live along side each other. I have grown into my forties. It was indeed a life changing experience in many ways turning 40 and it was for me, a time of inner turmoil and reflection. I guess as these past three years have swept me up along with them, being "in my forties" has come to have a settled familiarity. We have become strange  friends.

Last night some good friends of ours took us out for dinner. It was one of the best meals I have ever eaten out and I thoroughly enjoyed ever part of it. I am no food snob but at times I really am surprised at what restaurants serve up and then charge for. But last night was different. The restaurant in this case is Catrina's in Steenberg Estate.   I am sure if you have visited it you will know what I mean by the special experience we had there. I won't bore you with the details of the food we ate but except to say each of us had something different and each of us had a gastronomically colourful experience. I know that the company and conversation went much of the way in making the evening an almost perfect experience.  God is generous and kind and blesses us in so many ways.

It was late and we were all happy and full. We get up to leave and wam I am shocked into reality. As I turn to the side I take in the art work hanging from the wall. A Am I seeing things? I ask the watron casually, " Is that a Cecil Skotnes? and original? ". As I ask her I know the answer. I have loved his work and in fact grew up loving one of his art works. We had some old great , life friends who knew him and so Jeniffer had a long, slender cat he had done on her wall. I grew up enjoying the cat all my childhood. The when I studied art at school and then in college we covered him in depth. I grew to love his strange human figures and earthy colours. So here, at the end of the perfect evening I am blessed to enjoy an original. " there is another over here"., she says.. I go to it and feel it with my eyes and then with my hands. A gastronomically delight to my eyes.. I leave full of good food ; filled up and encouraged by God's good gift of generosity and love ; filled up with good conversation and God centered debate  and filled up with gratitude because God blesses us end delights us and surprises us with small and seemingly insignificant detail. Once again I see Jesus standing there, invisible to the eye and yet so very clearly shouting in his gentle way. " I know your heart and want to remind you that I am here and I love you!"

The Refugee in me

Last Friday a friend invited me to join her on a local adventure. it was not the kind of adventure filled with thrills and colour. It was an adventure of quite a different kind. Our local car guards at our local shopping center have been given one days notice for the termination of their 8 year work.

My friend had been approached by one of the women who told her the sad story. would I join in the small protest and support these people? On the Saturday I casually gathered up the family and we set off. I had not given the who thing much thought to be honest. We met with a few other locals and the car guards were there too.

We spent a good 2 hours talking and thrashing out the story with another good friend translating the french. The sad and broken story that emerged began to be sifted out and with each new arrival and each new explanation more and more of the concern and fear from the " car Guards" and more and more of my own selfish thoughtlessness was revealed.

For all the years we have lived in Bergvliet and fro all these years having shopped at this local shop, I had given little or no thought to the people who stand and watch our cars. They are there every day and all week, come rain or baking heat. They smile and offer help with heavy trolleys and bags. year in and year out I have smiled and waved at times but never really stopped to give much thought.

But this Saturday , we shared in a slither of their lives; their fear of loosing all they have fought for and the lack of care or concern those who benefit from their labour have.  It was a good morning with some great and hopefully real help from a local councilor. It was a time of good will from us the residence and a time for our children to see something of politics and helping those in need but it was also a time for me to stop and really see the people who stand and wait and watch and hope that we might give them something  - even a small R2.

When we left theses people who we came to stand alongside and try and help hugged each of us - they hugged our kids and were truly, truly thankful.  and now when we park to shop, their is more than a friendly smile and hello. I am praying that the meetings that follow will really  be beneficially for  them and that in some more real and permanent way they can continue to serve us.

This whole thing gave us some opportunity to share with the boys something about the war torn countries these people come from. DRC, Somalia, Rwanda, Uganda, and the like.   It was a great reminder that for many life is a war and survival is not certain. Lord please have mercy! It was a reminder that I need to try and see the person again - may compassion and kindness rule my heart again.For I am the refugee, the alien in this foreign land and heaven is my home.