Relay 4 Life

Well it's been AAAAAAGES since I posted anything so I thought I might get my act together!

Relay 4 Life was great this year. We had an absolutely perfect day weather-wise. The day was pretty hectic especially with face painting during the day. We painted lots of little faces and big faces too. The Art Gallery was not as successful as we would have liked it to be. It was on the outside of the track for starters which didn't get a lot of traffic. But the main reason for the disappointing prices fetched by such great works was that I really messed up with the method of my silent auction. I'll know better for next year and hopefully we get some good donations again.

Having said that we still managed to raise $950 on the art and overall $2080. So it was not a bad effort at all!

Thanks to all who donated money, art or time. xxx

Relay for Life - Art Donations

In the Next Egistenze - by Yvonne
Wow, what a wonderful response to a request for Art Donations for the Relay! I asked my good friend Aisha to paint something for the relay but, understandably, having a 3 month old at home she really is pressed for time, so she kindly asked her art class mates to make a donation. So far we have three art works donated. Two from her teacher Yvonne
Abstract - Nina De Rome

and one from Dave's mum Natalie. I think there is one more coming.


Hydrangeas Dup - Natalie Dunsford

These works will be auctioned off on the day to raise money for the Cancer Council. So along with Jade's gorgeous quilt we should have some interest in these items on the day. If you would like to place a bid, please email me here.

Thank you so much for the kind donations Jade, Yvonne, Natalie and Aisha. :) xxx

Relay 4 Life - Penrith 2008 - Knitting Challenge

Well, it's close to that time of year again where the Boere Tribe get together and walk for 24 hours to raise money for Cancer Research. This year the Penrith Relay 4 Life is on the 10th May at Howell Oval. Most people know someone who has been fighting some kind of cancer or who has lost the battle. In our family it is way too familiar. Paul's mum lost her battle to cervical cancer at the young age of 42. My aunt recently passed away from ovarian cancer. My uncle died from prostate cancer, my grandmother from breast cancer and now my dad is also fighting prostate cancer.

A little bit further removed we have some friends that are affected by "c". Thankfully they are doing fine and continue to be vigilant in monitoring their health regularly.

So, this year we are going to try some different approaches to fund raising. We will ask for straight up donations which you can make by clicking on here. We will be face painting and colour spraying hair on the day. I have asked some friends to donate artworks which will be auctioned off. I am going to try and make as many scarves and beanies as I can to sell. It gets Bloody cold walking at 3am!!

So I have a request for all you crazy crochet and knitting buffs - if you want to help how about donating a scarf or a beanie or both? If you feel you want to help, please contact me and we can organise to get them posted out here. Anything will be much appreciated. Or maybe you have heaps of wool scraps around that we can knit into scarves?

So, help us support the Cancer Council.

:)

Driveway Progress

We had a very productive weekend on the driveway. Thanks to my mum and dad who helped us SOOOOOO much. Mum was housekeeper, cook and nanny all weekend so I could get down and dirty with Paul and get a good start on the driveway. We went pretty slow on the first two days as we were getting into the swing and working on fiddly bits. I even did some bricklaying on a small retaining wall!!!

Then on Sunday all the Boere's were here and we got the massive area in front of the garage done in one day. It looks amazing. We still have edging and retaining walls to build there and the rest of the driveway entrance to do but we did bite off a huge chunk and it feels GOOD!!!!

Getting Started on the Driveway

Excavation completed and road base down. It's already heaps better to drive and walk on!

Pavers arrive on Monday and hopefully in a couple of weeks it will all be done! YEAH!!!!

Holy Cow(s)!!

Here are our new pets, Daisy and Molly. No, this is no joke. We now own two cows who live at Loesje's place and keep her grass down. he he he We plan to start breeding them and increasing the "herd" if you can call two cows a herd ;)

New Family Member

Here is our new family member. He hasn't got a name yet, Hannah just calls him Little Kissah.

How CUTE!!!!!!

Bathroom is Finally Finished!!

Paul has finished the bathroom after quite a few obstacles and mishaps. I Love it, it looks so clean and nice. Shower screen will be installed in a couple of weeks. Woohooooooo!!!! :)

Family Tragedy

A sad blog today... :(

Our beautiful, crazy dog Kissah died suddenly last Sunday night. We took him to Paul's sister's place so he could share our holiday with us. We thought he would be SOOOOOO happy on a farm for two weeks. I drove him up there and he was such a good boy in the car and on our break. Wim was there too so Kissah had someone familiar to follow around for the first week while we went camping. We had to get him a tick collar and some flea stuff so he didn't get sick up there....

On the Saturday Paul went up for the day while I did some shopping in Forster with the girlies. When he got there Kissah was shaking and Paul noticed straight away. Then he noticed that he was bleeding from behind and he was also throwing up. I can't believe noone noticed anything was wrong with him before this! Anyway, he took him to th evt who didn't really know the cause of all this. He gave him some tablets and told Paul to watch him overnight but he said Kissah was a healthy young dog and he would be ok. He died peacefully during the night while Wim was watching him.

It's all a big mystery what happened to him. We thought it may be a snake bite, but the vet didn't think so. He suggested maybe ratsak, but we don't use it and Loes and Wim said they didn't have any there either. It's very frustrating not knowing what happened to him and we can't help blaming ourselves for taking him there in the first place. We should have left him at home. It was sad to come home today and see his kennel here and no crazy happy dog waiting for us. We'll have to get a puppy soon.

Hannah doesn't quite understand what has happened, she knows he was sick and went to hospital. She knows he died and went to heaven and he is with "Puppy" the Ferret. It's also sad cause Marc and Evelyn's dog Zeus died a couple of months ago too, he ate some snail pellets. So we haven't had the best luck with pets lately in the family.

Wim buried Kissah on the farm down near the dam and we planted some trees there yesterday.

We'll miss that crazy dog!

:(

Paul's Been Busy

Well it's been about 6 weeks since Paul resigned and the project management is going well. he he he. So far he has acheived A LOT! His first job was the retaining walls around the place. He built three in total, the front, the west fence, and the east side of the house. He also made a slab for the air conditioning unit.

Next he worked on the Built-In wardrobe in Hannah's room and finishing the architraves off.

He added an extractor fan in our laundry.

We FINALLY got a screen door for the front. Paul fitted it and I stained it. I LOVE it!

In between all these renovations he has been busy building "Hannah's" Go cart. It's pretty cool. He has made it Electric with a remote control so that the little kids can have a go and they just need to steer. And he has also made it so that it can run off a petrol motor off a little mini motor bike he bought off a friend. It goes pretty fast and he's excited about taking it to Loesje's place on holidays. He still has some tweaking to do as he's not entirely happy with it's performance.

Finally he has just started working on the main bathroom. He done the screeding yesterday and it will be ready for tiling tomorrow or the next day. Cannot WAIT!

Blogging at Last

Finally getting my act together and setting this blog up. I'm not as organised as some of my friends so this won't be anything useful or educational, just a spot to post pictures for family and friends to catch up with us online.

Currently we are ALL of us at home as Paul has resigned and is taking a few months off to get his head together and to finish off all the renovations. He is busy working on the retaining walls first... lots more to do after that.

Sunday will be Ailey's Christening so there is lots to be done before then. We have been slowly tidying up the backyard, hope it doesn't rain! The garden is looking very green actually due to the lovely rain we've had in the last few weeks.
Anyway, I'll post some pics now and more after the christening.

:)

Father's Day in the Gong

September playday at Desie's





















After St Finbar's Fete















Two little princesses

Swimming at Elisha's Playday.

Mum and the Girls















Tea party on dinner night. (November)