Reading Time

When my first three children were younger, I used to read to them in the evenings. It wasn’t always a regular occurrence, but over time I managed to finish entire books including the Narnia series by C.S. Lewis.

With Amanda, our reading time is usually at naptime. Not only is reading to her a valuable part of her development, but it’s also good quality time for just the two of us.

“I have never known any distress that an hour’s reading did not relieve.” ― Charles-Louis De Secondat Montesquieu

“If you want your children to be intelligent, read them fairy tales.” – Einstein

"You're never too old, too wacky, too wild, to pick up a book and read to a child." – Dr. Seuss

When do you read to your child?

Don’t forget to follow me on Pinterest where you can read more great quotes that I’ve pinned and other cool stuff.

I also recommend that you read my post Introducing Your Child to the World of Books.

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Wordless Wednesday - 4

Amanda taking Benny for a walk.

Recommended post: Why We Don't Have a Cat (funny)

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A Big Day for Our Daughter

Sunday was a big day for our daughter, Jessica. She had the opportunity to perform with her dance group at the Artscape Theatre in Cape Town at the Jazz Dance Festival called Azishe, which is Zulu for “let it burn.” It was not only a big day, but also a long one. She had to be at the bus before 8 am and they only got back after 10 pm. I personally felt sorry for the bus driver, but they did buy him a ticket to watch the performance.

Jessica doing an over-split

Jessica is the youngest dancer in her group. She used to be a rhythmic gymnast and decided at the beginning of this year to try contemporary dance instead. We all went to watch her performance. Only Amanda was too young and couldn’t go. When Robbie, my hubby, explained to her that only children five years and older were allowed at the event, she replied, “That’s rude!”

Jessica practicing dance moves at home

She got to have her own fun night out by staying with her grandpa instead. It was his first time babysitting her alone. That’s because her grandma came with us. My father-in-law was happy to stay behind to watch the end of the men’s final Wimbledon match between Roger Federer and Andy Murray. I think it was very brave of him, because he had to keep her entertained for five hours (this included our traveling time to and from Cape Town along with the jazz dance show).

Amanda with her grandparents

Related post: Missing My Girl

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Amanda and Me Time

Most of the afternoon and evening, Amanda and I had the house to ourselves. Since it was just the two of us eating dinner, I asked her what she wanted. She chose chicken noodle soup, but I only had cream of chicken soup, so she went with that. It’s wintertime in the southern hemisphere, so soup was perfect for a cold rainy night.

The two of us built puzzles, watched Disney Junior, played with wooden blocks called Planx and then made cinnamon sugar popcorn. The popcorn was delicious and I had four small helpings. Amanda kept track of how many servings I took, because she wasn’t sure if it was fair that I had four helpings while she only had three. I told her that I was bigger. That answer usually works.

After getting her ready for bed, I let her snuggle under a blanket with me on the couch while I watched the Style channel and Home channel. We only recently started paying for a few more channels; mainly so that Robbie could watch his sports, but we knew that there would be a bigger selection for all of us. Up until about a month ago, we had four South African stations plus a few on religion and news.

One of our new favorite programs that Robbie and I like to watch is Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives. The food always looks so amazing. I’ve been really out of touch with what goes on in my home country of America. I watched a bit of Extreme Couponing and I was impressed. Coupons are hard to come by in this country and the savings that they offer are very low. If we ever move to the States, I’ll definitely take advantage of coupons.

I’m leaving you with an original piece of art by Amanda. She drew and painted it all by herself. I think for a future Wordless Wednesday I should post more of her work.

By Amanda Morley age 4 (July 1, 2012)

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Wordless Wednesday - 3

How I Spent My 4th of July

Standing in a line outside the South African Revenue Service

Reading in the sound room at the Blind Institute, South Africa

It was just a normal day here in South Africa. I only remembered it was my 4th of July once I read the time and date inside the SARS building. Robbie (my hubby) braved the cold wind and slight drizzle with me while we waited outside in the cold for an hour. We got there 20 minutes before 8 am to get a good spot in the line and they only began letting people through the door at 8:15 am. I guess that's Africa for you. The tax man was a friendly lady and she processed my paperwork quickly. That was a huge a relief.

Shortly after, I went to the Blind Institute where I volunteer for about 2 hours once a week by reading in a sound room, which gets recorded and distributed to the visually impaired. It can be anything from novels to Christian religious to text books and exam papers.

For dinner, my hubby surprised me with a 4th of July treat for his American wife. He picked up American-style chocolate chip cookies at the store and served it with vanilla ice-cream.

P.S. My Wordless Wednesday has 195 words not including the captions or this message. I guess it's not that wordless!

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Baking and Counting

Amanda loves helping me in the kitchen, especially when I’m baking, because there are things that she can safely do. The other day we made pancakes together. (I know, technically it’s not baking, since we use a frying pan.) Her job was to add in the ingredients once I’d measured them and then to help me mix it all together.

The recipe that I used is from the Better Homes and Gardens New Cook Book. My mom brought the cook book with her from the States some years back and I’ve used it more than any of my other cook books. I usually like making the buttermilk pancakes, but when I don’t have buttermilk in the fridge then I just make the regular milk pancakes.

Since I have a big family, I tripled the recipe. Tripling the recipe meant that we got to add more of everything, which meant more fun for Amanda. I had her count the quantities as we added them to the bowl. When we got to the sugar, I used a teaspoon instead of a tablespoon, which meant that she would have to count that much higher.

I can tell that Amanda is getting more confident with her numbers and simple math. The other day she asked for two slices of avocado on toast. (We mash them up and add a bit of freshly squeezed lemon juice with salt and pepper to taste, but leave the pepper off for Amanda.) I didn’t think she’d finish two, so I tried to make one slice look like more by cutting it into four squares. I was unable to trick her. She said, “Mom, that’s not two slices. You cut one slice into four!”

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Text Messaging

My eldest daughter is 14 years old. At the moment she is going out with a well-brought up boy who is 2 years older. They hardly ever see each other, which suits us as parents just fine. They go to different high schools and he plans to become a professional golfer, so he’s always jet-setting inside South Africa from one golf tournament to the next. Also, his parents don’t allow him to socialize much, because they want him to focus on his grades when he’s not playing golf.

About a week ago, he sent her a text message at night. He asked her what she was doing. She texted him back to say that she was on her laptop (not literally, of course) and asked him what he was doing. He said he was on his way home and he could hardly see his mobile phone. Being the no-nonsense kind of girl that my daughter is, she asked him if he was being driven home by car. He replied that he was on his motorbike. She quickly sent him back another message, which stated that he must get off his phone immediately and not reply until he got home. Thankfully, he listened to her and later sent her a text to say that he had arrived home safely.

It just goes to show that young people, even the ones with strict parents like her boyfriend’s parents, still do foolish things. Recently, I’ve seen two different images on the internet of car accidents where the car was completely written off and a caption that read, “Hope the text was worth it.”

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