Bakerman Riley

Today it was Riley's turn to play Bakerman at school. This means that he had to have helped to make a batch of Bikkies for his classmates. They are then all given some money and they have to line up and ask the Bakerman (in this case Riley) if they can purchase a cookie. Riley then takes their money and gives them a bikkie. He really enjoyed helping me to make the bikkies (we made Jam Drops) and he was actually really helpful, he sifted the sugar and the flour and he used the beaters to mix everything together. When we were assembling the bikkies it was a bit late in the evening so I made the balls and the holes for the jam and then Riley put the jam in for me. He was trying so hard and actually did an excellent job. He was so excited to be Bakerman today although the photos don't show it (perhaps he was trying to remain cool in front of his friends). I had an Obstetrician's appointment so I was unable to stay and watch so his teacher, Margi, took the photos for me.

Cooking Class

Last week I made some museli bars for Riley and decided to try them out on both his freinds and mine. Well the kids could have taken or left them (most deciding to leave them) but the mums all really enjoyed them and wanted to know how to make them. In particular Carolyn and her mum Mai Ling really enjoyed them so I went to Carolyn's house to show Mai Ling and Carolyn's Maid Noomsa how to make them. In return I am going to have Mai Ling show me some of her yummy recipes. There is one that she calls ABC soup, as it is supposed to be really simple to make but being me I still need it written down and then Noomsa is going to show me a chicken casserole that she makes regularly, again it is supposed to be really simple but I am going to need to write it down also. This is a pic of Noomsa and Mai Ling in the kitchen under my instruction (poor girls).

It's funny to think that anything I make in the kitchen would be worth duplicating but I really can't take the credit as all I did was follow a recipe in one of the cooking for kids cookbooks that I have. I am looking forward to learning some nice new recipes from these lovely ladies though....

Girls Day At The Spa

Last Friday I got together with my girlfriends to celebrate Shelley's 22nd birthday. We spent the morning at the spa where we were all treated to massages, facials, manicures and pedicures (we didn't all get everything of course!). We then met up in the Presidential Suite for what I swear is the best chocolate cake I have ever eaten and of course what is a birthday celebration without champagne. From there we moved on to the on-site dining room for lunch. All up it was a lovely morning which went way too fast. We have decided to make it a birthday tradition so we are now all eagerly awaiting Michelle's birthday in September, although we have realised that Carolyn had a birthday in early March when we were all just meeting each other so we are thinking we really should make it up to her and celbrate at the spa - it's a non-selfish good-friend thing to do of course.........

Caving Under The Pressure

A lot of you back home have been wanting to see pictures of my baby belly so here it is in all it's glory....

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Riley at play

Recently Riley has been getting into playing with Lego. We have bought him a few sets now so he has a Fire Station (with 3 garages), 2 Fire Trucks, 2 Helicopters, 1 Hovercraft, 1 Police Car and 1 Ambulance plus basic Lego to build things like houses etc. This has proven to be really good Daddy & Riley time.
Not long ago Brad and Riley started a project together to build a play table that Riley could set up his Thomas The Tank Engine Train Set and his Slot Cars Track on. This has been a big hit in the toy room whenever his friends come to play. When I say 'his' friends I mean both Riley's and Brad's.....LOL

Riley's bedroom. Not very exciting but there it is......

More Recent Around Home Shots

This is Riley near the front entrance to our place, you can just see his blue bike in the background as we had not long come home from a little ride around our immediate area.

This is just a shot of the pool and house from the front yard.

Even though it was a nice winter's day today the pool water was still freezing. Riley was thinking seeing as how it was a lovely day it would be nice to go for a swim. He is sitting here with his feet in the water trying hard to pretend that it's not cold. This photo was taken from upstairs on our bedroom balcony.

Brad and Riley on the stairs going up to our bedroom.

Around our place

This is Riley taking his new bike for his first ride around the golf course across a few weeks ago. Notice he is not wearing winter clothes yet, so it was back when the weather was much nicer. This photo was taken pretty well directly opposite our house.



These are a few pics taken on the same day out the front of our house. I will try to take some more inside the gates and post them soon too. The gardens are not as nice just at the moment due to the frost in the mornings but when we first moved in our roses were beautiful.

A few weeks ago Riley's school held a Seniors Sports Day. Each class was allocated a country to represent. Riley's class was AUSTRALIA!! This is Riley with a couple of his friends decked out in their aussie stuff. They all had to take a white shirt to school and they painted their own aussie flags on the front. They all marched on to the sports field to the national anthems of their respective countries and their teachers carried a flag of the country they were representing. I think our teacher was a little confused as Riley's class marched under a New Zealand flag! How embarrassment.....

It was a very cold morning and so Riley decided to do the whole obstacle course with his hands in his jeans pockets (I think he should have got a medal for not falling flat on his face). In one race they did the children had to run, crawl, skip and hop between different markers. Riley took one look and realised he could do it faster and with less effort if he just ran through the bits he didn't want to do.....not much of a cheat.

At the end of the day all of the children that took part recieved a Gold medal from the headmaster. The Gold medal was not only fun for them all to get but it was actually a chocolate so that just doubled the fun.

Take Two - Let's See Some Pics....

First Post - New at Blogging

So this is my first post on Blogger. I am sure I will get the hang of it eventually. I think I will have to steal ideas from my friend Carolyn as her blogger is really good. Just a couple of pics of what we have been up to lately here.

Last week we visited the Elephant Sanctury with Carolyn, Kai Kai and Por Por. Riley and I both enjoyed ourselves and it was so awesome to be able to not only see the elephants up so close but to be able to touch them and interact with them. I was lucky enough to get a big wet sloppy kiss (and I do mean WET and SLOPPY) from one. Riley was going to but then changed his mind at the last minute. Riley did enjoy feeding them with Kai Kai though.

Yesterday we went to visit the Rhino park and Wondercaves with Carolyn, Kai Kai and Por Por. The caves were great and although Riley was a bit hesitant about going underground at first he soon warmed to the idea when he realised that Batman lives in a cave. So he spent most of the tour not only looking for but calling out to Batman. We didn't see Batman but we did some some impressive Stalegtights. We were lucky to see a lot of sleeping Lions too which was nice and a few more common animals like Zebras and Springbok.

Poor Carolyn seems to get stuck having to organise everything which makes me think I should get off my bottom and try to find something fun for us all to do.....maybe.....