My very own Guitar Hero....

This year we decided to yield to Riley's pleas to buy him a guitar and see where he takes it. We started with an inexpensive second hand acoustic guitar, we found a local clinic and booked him in for lessons. They usually do not take such young children but they thought they would give him a go and then let me know whether to bother bringing him back the following week or wait another year. After just one lesson they said he was really good at it and they accpeted him as a student. He has been having weekly lessons for 4 months now and is still really keen and still really enjoying it. His teacher, Chad (who is a dead wringer for Toby Mcguire) is very pleased with his progress.

Hard at work putting in his 20 minute practice time.

Concentrating.

Not too busy to flash a gorgeous Riley Smile though :)

and of course never too busy to 'rock out' LOL!

So after a couple of months learning on the acoustic we decided to let Riley earn his electic guitar. He was very dedicated to his evening practices and quickly earned his way to his electric guitar....now of course it is all about the electric.....

The gig bag behind him was a gift from the owners of the clinic where he takes lessons as a reward for doing so well on his Grade One end of year report card! What a lucky and spoilt boy he is!

Easter Fun

My yummy easter inspired (thanks Nana) Hot Cross Bun Baked Custard!

Emily surveying the goodies in the easter baskets that were lovingly decorated by Riley.

Riley pretty happy with his score of some Chapters gift cards courtesy of Easter Bunny and Grandpa and Nana Yvonne.

Now a good reminder for next year of what happens when too much chocolate is consumed!!! (and yes this is 2 days later and they are still hyper LOL!!!)

Easter this year was pretty crazy. The day started well enough...chocolate, brekky etc and then just as I was getting dinner started I burned myself pretty badly with boiling water all over my arms, neck and face. A short ambulance ride and a long stay at the ER (where I left before seeing a doc as it was taking far too long and after 2 hours was told there was at least another 2-3 hour wait.....) we were back home getting ready for bed when I hear Brad calling out from Emily's room and when I walk in I see she has vomited EVERYWHERE. This continued every 5-10 minutes for the next 3 hours when we called the healthcare hotline and were told to take her in to the ER immediately. We called in a favour (as Riley was sleeping) and Brad and I headed for our 2nd ER visit that day. As we were sitting in the waiting room (again a VERY long wait) I suddenly became very ill and ended up with gastro.... so there we were Emily throwing up, me throwing up and running off to the loo every 10 minutes......it took another few days before we both came good again but geesh what an Easter to forget!

Cakes

This year, thanks to Cake Boss on TLC, I have been getting more into cake decorating. I have concentrated firstly on cupcakes and then who knows where I will go to after that??? My first attempt was a birthday cake for my good friend Lisa. I think she liked it and they sure did taste good!

My next project was for another birthday, this time my good friend Katherine.

And then for another Band Hero party that we had....

I think I might make these ones again at Halloween.....

Australia Day!

What would Australia Day be without Lamingtons? I made a bunch for a special morning tea that I had at home here with some girlfriends and when Brad asked if he could have some to take to work I said sure! So long as you ice them yourself.....and so he did! What a star.

And with a smile on his face too.....

Such concentration...

But look at the result! YUMMY!!!

Ice Skating

What would an adventure in Canada be without trying our hands at ice skating??? Riley had been wanting to try since our first winter and last year his class went on an outing to an ice skating rink so we bought him a pair of second hand ice skates and off we went. Considering it was his first time on the ice he did remarkably well. A few weeks later we hit the lake with some friends to give it another go.

Who needs a training frame when you have your little sister in a pram?? What a sweet ride she got.

And off he goes....

Mallick was never too far away to lend a helping hand :)

All smiles even when he hit the ice...

Out of the pram for some fun on the ice too.

Mallick helping Riley out.

What is an outing in the snow without a little snack break?

Or two??

Riley sledding!

Mummy and Emily giving it a go! The word "AGAIN" was used a LOT!

So once I got over my initial hesitation at stepping out onto a frozen lake we all had a great time and then ended off the day with some sledding in the park afterwards. We are all looking forward to some more of the same this winter.

The death of Frosty :(

Well it had to happen.....Frosty couldn't live forever and as the days got warmer Frosty started to fade. We would often drive in or out of our driveway to find an eye had fallen off of he now had no nose.....we would path him up and hope for the best but he eventually got to the point where we just had to let him go.....sniff sniff......

Starting to fall apart...

The lights are on but noone's home??

Can you see the devestation on thier little faces??? Nope? Yeah me neither LOL!

Ah well C'est La Vie....

Not looking so well here....

Looking a little vacant....

R.I.P Frosty until next winter!!! We have your eyes, nose, mouth, clothing and arms waiting for you!!!! Now if only we could get Uncle Dave and Aunty Mandy back to help rebuild you......hmmmmm......

Captain Underpants!!

I have been very slack in updating my blog I blame my sister Bec - and here is how..... I spend too much time on Facebook and have posted the bulk of my adventures in picture form on facebook. Bec introduced me to Facebook when she came to stay with us in Joburg in 2008. So therefore my lack of blog posts is due to Facebook time and Facebook time is due to Bec putting me onto it so it is all Bec's fault! On ya Bec!!! LOL!!!

OK so I have been going back through my pics and memory bank (yes I now have a headache thank you everybody) and the following number of posts is what I came up with..... Starting with this gem.

So Riley got a set of Captain Underpants books for Christmas which he loved beyond words and which were instrumental in his boost of reading abilities.

One of the things that the two main characters, George and Harold, enjoy doing is playing pranks and Dav Pilkey (the Author) has been very descriptive when writing in these pranks..... One such prank involves putting those little tomato sauce packets that you get with take away food under the toilet seat so that when somebody sits on the toilet their butt gets sprayed with tomato sauce. It is called doing a Squishy. So..... Riley was in the fridge one day and started giggling....he ran off down the hall giggling and then came and asked me if I needed to go to the toilet, thankfully I didn't and I also wasn't very trusting. He went to Brad who decided to trust him and went to use his toilet......here is the aftermath.....

Funny enough Brad was none to keen on my photographing his butt for the blog....go figure!