This year there was no getting away from it. Brooklyn’s mind was made up on the party she wanted… and she wanted FROZEN. Believe me when I say I tried to convince her otherwise (Yes I knowww it’s herrrr party and she must have what she wants…) but I am not a big fan of throwing ‘commercial’ parties so for me Frozen was not high on my list of themes that excited me…
Continue reading “Brooklyn’s Winter Wonderland 5th party”My little girl turned FOUR in Feb this year (2021), and she knew exactly what she wanted for her party. She is a real little lady who loves all things pamper & beauty, and so a Pamper Party was the perfect fit for our princess B.
Seeing as we are still amid a global pandemic we took care to keep her party small, inviting only the children she plays closely with in her class, a couple of her besties-since-birth outside of school, and their mamas. This meant no siblings allowed – not even her brothers. 🙁
Continue reading “Brooklyn’s 4th Birthday”DON’T THESE SOUND DELISH?! IN HERITAGE WEEK THESE ARE THE PERFECT SA MUFFINS! THANKS @DISNEYCHANNEL FOR SENDING THROUGH
BILTONG, DROËWORS, CHIVE AND CHEESE MUFFINS
RECIPE: CHRISTINE CAPENDALE
Continue reading “Heritage Week muffins”On 2 June 2020 we stood together in unity and blacked out our social media with a movement that was, in my opinion, a well overdue deep-dive into issues that still plague our world. Being a white, priviledged mama raising white children in South Africa I have, especially in the past months, felt an incredible need to learn as much as possible, to enable me to share as much as possible so we are all empowered with knowledge and the know-how to DO better. That little black square that on the 2nd helped me feel like I was supporting, by the 3rd of June brought with it a deep guilt that I wasn’t doing enough. So on June 4th 2020, after wracking my brain on trying to figure out a way to be part of the change that we so need, I decided to ask for help. I reached out to a woman of colour who I highly respect and have grown to love; the gorgeous Leanne Dlamini.
Leanne graciously accepted the challenge and I received her message to us white mamas in my inbox today. It really touched me, enlightened me, and given me some pointers to help me do right by my children – to open their eyes and hearts, in order to do right by ALL children, here and abroad.
Before we get to Leanne’s open letter to all white mamas, I want to share an experience I had with Jackson. You will see that Leanne roasts me in her piece 😉 the back-story to that is; Long-story short, month-end May, just ahead of 2 June black out, our business’ driver drove our Gogo (nanny) and domestic workers both home for the weekend. As they drove away Jackson turned to me and said something that stuck me and made me feel as though I had failed him. He said, “Mommy it is so strange to see three brown people in a car”. He adores his Gogo more than anything in the world – his second mother, and even though his comment was full of naive innocence, my heart literally ached as the words left his lips. He has friends of colour at school. His best friend is coloured. But it was clear to me that from his observation, through his eyes, he was not seeing enough diversity. I knew instantly that needed to change.
Continue reading “An open letter to white mamas”It’s #WorldBreastfeedingWeek, and over this past week my inbox has been flooded with emails entitled or including the #breastisbest slogan. Instagram has been filled with {beautiful} breastfeeding pictures and controversial discussions around the topic.
While I personally have never been one to share any {revealing} images of me breastfeeding, prior to today of course ;), every #breastisbest hashtag has pushed me a little more to share my feelings on the topic. But before I share my feelings on the matter, here is some background on my three b/feeding experiences:
I wrote this for all the moms who have moments of feeling completely overwhelmed, under-qualified and downright fearful of this massive task of motherhood, because I am one of those moms too!
Continue reading “MOMMING IN THE FAITH THAT I AM ENOUGH”
I was made aware of the fact that April is caesarean section awareness month, and because I have been promising to share my birth stories with you, I figured – what better time than now? I say “now”, yet it has honestly taken me at least 40 attempts of sitting at my computer for any length of time longer than 7 minutes before being interupted by my life of 3 beautiful c/section-born babies! It has taken me 3 days to get to this point in the writing…
This is a 3 part post, starting at the beginning, of course – our first-born son; Jackson.
Continue reading “Birth Story | Jackson”
What a hot topic this has been!
Since posting a video of Jordy (3) emphatically defending his brother Jackson (5) at the announcement that his older brother needed chilli for his bad behaviour, my Insta inbox was flooded on questions, opinions, and not unexpectedly, a few disapproving remarks. It was requested that we run a poll to see what worked for parents when more serious methods of discipline are required.
Before getting onto the results of the poll, I thought I would touch on a few things, and answer a few of the frequently-asked questions I got: Continue reading “Discipline.”
In the hopes of trying to be a bit better at regular posting {now that my life is starting to become more manageable again!!} I thought I would share our weekend in pix 🙂
FRIDAY:
Jordy, still in his PJs, came in with flowers for me – no idea who’s garden he took these from 😀 :
Justin & I ran to MICA to get a few things for the house and tried this little barista, hiding inside MICA – such a vibey, happy lady named Bule – WOW! One of the best Flat Whites in Ballito:
Got home to find that Jordy gave himself blue “tattoos” ALL OVER his body: Continue reading “Our weekend in pix”
It was the perfect ONEderland for our ONEderful little girl x
I will let the gorgeous pictures taken by the very talented Samantha Maber do most of the talking, but our little princess’s first birthday party was just the most special and wonderful day. She was in her element and loved all the attention – far more than either of my two boys on their 1st birthdays! I think she is going to be quite like her mama and live for celebrations 🙂
My favourite moment of the day was without doubt watching her face light up as if a million fireflies started glowing inside her soul when we all started singing Happy Birthday to her… she loved every single moment of it <3
Theme: ONEderland
Venue: Brooklyn Estate Clubhouse
Cake & gorgeous biscuits: Toni Seery from T and Cake
Photos:Samantha Maber Photography
Welcome Sign, Cake Topper & Bottle Labels: Danielle Barrie SmithThe main table decor was simple but worked out perfectly. A special friend helped me put the flower arrangement together, which was initially supposed to arch around the table, but I ran out of time to put the arch together, and also felt it actually looked prettier on the table itself. I need to add that it is also very special that I got to use my Nana’s lace table cloth on the main table. My Nana’s name is Fay, and I was named after her (Shannon Fay), just as I have named Brooklyn (Brooklyn Fay) after her too, and so very special to use this for the first time at B’s special first birthday!
