it's been awhile

No blogging for ages and once again, not to make excuses but put all this together - enough work to keep me nicely busy but not that busy that we could not take an extra long weekend and have an awesome time at Fancourt with friends at the start of the month; then a tad of winter hibernation, lots of food and fires; together with a good balance of time with family and friends; fun times at birthday parties;  a few sneaky black and bitter americano's at various coffee shops in the neighbourhood; many wonderful early morning winter walks; a few mountain trails and exploring the Green Belt with Alfie; special times with lovely ladies in our weekly art class class and then stealing time on my own to experiment with pencils and shadows; bottles of wine and chili Old Brown; a love affair with a spunky Boston Terrier (Alfie) who has been my travelling companion this week and lastly not forgetting meeting two special little girls, getting to know them (even a feed in between) and taking them along with us, in pouches, on our morning walks

In words that about sums up the lovely time I have had this June

Some think I am crazy but I love winter!

Now the pictures

Fancourt at it's best

Beautiful weather and amazing skies

The spa to ourselves

Drive home through the Tradouw Pass

Soups and Stews

Sharpening our pencils

Walks with Alfie - How can you not just love him?

Drinks with the girls - How can you not just love them?

First people on the Boomslang this particular morning

Wine Delivery Dogs - my first "Salfie"

How precious? 8 weeks old, identical little girls

It comes back pretty quickly

Thanks for sharing Didi xx

be open to all possibilities...

I love the Graham Norton Show but unfortunately have missed quite a few of them lately. Dalene told me a while back to watch the show with Bill Murray and Matt Damon - she thought it was the best and funniest chat show she had seen. I went back in my PVR recordings and managed to find the show. I agree and I am sure for Graham Norton it must have been one of his best shows ever. The guests were all amazing.  Bill Murray is one of my favourite stars and this morning I read this article on the Huffington Post which reminded me of him and the show I had recently watched.

He has such a great philosophy on life.  He told a story on the show of how he took a train trip, late at night, to a city (think it was Vienna) just because he had never been there.  He got there before midnight - did a tour of the city and because it was one in the morning, he was a bit disappointed because the famous clock on the square only chimed once.  He got the late night train back to the city where he was staying and was on time for an early morning meeting and filming the next day.  I have also heard that he has joined fans at house parties and has even washed their dishes. I think he is awesome, wacky and wise (and he loves champagne (and vodka))

I loved this point in the article this morning the most:-

2. Be open to all possibilities.

In an interview with Murray earlier this year, Charlie Rose worried that the actor's life hadn't been "carefully thought out" or "planned." But Murray explained why he thought this was a good thing:

"I live a little bit on the seat of my pants, I try to be alert and available," he said. "I try to be available for life to happen to me. We're in this life, and if you're not available, the sort of ordinary time goes past and you didn’t live it. But if you're available, life gets huge. You're really living it."

So true. It is so easy to live in your own comfort zone (especially in winter). Accepting invitations, doing something a bit different all makes for exciting times and great memories. An invitation early last week, a change of our routine and plans led to a superb four day winter break to Fancourt last week. A whole blog post of the trip and pictures to follow.

Then tonight it would have been so easy to bolt the doors and shutters and warm up at the fire but an invitation to go with Gareth to a book launch, in a rather seedy part of town, was accepted.  A special couple of hours with my son, sitting on hard seats, in a wonderfully cosy bookshop and the opportunity to listen to and meet the real Ben Trovato was a great way to end a very busy day.

Bill is right.  Make yourself available.