Let the Celebrations Begin!

In the Lues-Household, Birthday-Season is Open! In the next two months we will have 6 birthdays!

On Wednesday we celebrated Danika’s 7th and Andrew’s 5th birthday! 

Danika’s birthday was on the 14th of June and Andrew’s birthday the 15th of June.  I can still remember the night Andrew was born. 

I was in labour the whole day of Danika’s 2nd birthday and by 23h30 my midwife commented: “Linnie you now have to decide quickly when this baby is going to be born, on the same day as Danika or on his/her own birthday!”  At that stage I didn’t care, as long as I could get the labour over and done with.  

Well, Andrew was born 00h12 - Typical of his unique personality, he wanted to have his own birthday, BUT considered his mother and entered the world shortly after midnight!  

Since the 16th of June is a public holiday in South Africa, we decided to celebrate their birthdays on the same day, when daddy would be home and we could all enjoy a day of celebration, without him rushing off to work after breakfast! 

And it was a delightful day!

The two days preceding Wednesday, were freezing cold days, we even had snow on Table Mountain, so we made a family bed in front of the fireplace in the lounge on Tuesday night.  We woke up Wednesday morning, with most of the children in bed with us - they added up during the night!

There is only a 16 months age difference between Andrew and David, so we always buy David a small present on Andrew’s birthday. This year we also bought Daniel a little present. While they are so small they don’t understand when they don’t have a present to open!

All the children in bed with Christo - opening the presents!  It almost looked like Christmas! 

The birthday boy and girl with the beautiful birthday cards Heidi-Mari made them.  Heidi-Mari has been making cards lately and entering them weekly in Card making challenges. She has been asked to be a Design Member for the Stampin for the Weekend Challenge for the next 6 months. 

Danika’s Card

Andrew’s card  

With this card Heidi-Mari was chosen as one of the top 3, in one of the challenges she entered.

Little Michael enjoying his first sibling birthday!  He is growing up quickly - so attentive to everything happening in his busy world.  Everyone just love and enjoy him so much!

Danika with the present Heidi-Mari and I made her - a set of 7 cards she can assemble on her own. 

Everything in this present was off-cuts from Heidi-Mari’s card making supplies!  

A few weeks ago Heidi-Mari helped Danika make a card.  Heidi-Mari cut the pieces of paper, Danika coloured the stamp on her own and assembled the card under Heidi-Mari’s supervision.  They then entered the card in a few challenges.  At one of the challenges they were so delighted to see her entry, that they choose her card as one of the top 4 cards and asked her to be a guest designer for this week! 

With the cards she received for her birthday, she will now be able to make her own cards on Monday-nights when Heidi-Mari makes her cards!

For Andrew and his little brothers, LEGO, airplanes and helicopters will always be a brilliant choice!  So they all got helicopters and LEGO.

Andrew and his helicopter

CJ helping Andrew build his LEGO helicopter.

Josua helping Danika with her LEGO helicopter. Yes, when you are one of only two girls in a house with 6 brothers, you play LEGO just as hard as a boy!

Daddy helping David with his LEGO airplane.

Daniel making just the right sounds for his DUPLO airplane!

And little Michael?  He fell asleep while being nursed and I sat back and enjoyed all the fun and joy around me, while holding him!

They played for the rest of the day with their presents, while Christo and I sat with them in front of the fireplace.

By 15h00 we had high tea and the birthday cake. Danika had her party the previous Saturday and Andrew had his this Saturday.  For both a special birthday cake were made for the party, so we only had a very simple decorated cake.

One half pink for Danika with 7 candles. 

The other half blue for Andrew with 5 candles.

And then Daniel wanted to blow the candles too!

We finished a very enjoyable day with our own homemade pizza and a MacGyver video in front of the fireplace! 

Do you remember the MacGuyver TV-series?

During the past two years, we bought all 7 of the MacGyver series, and we love an evening of watching an episode of MacGuyver.  At this point in time we cannot afford to let out children watch TV - we, purposefully, don’t have reception for TV, we only use it for DVD’s.  MacGyver is such a roll model for our sons - making plans all the time, hating guns and making a difference in his community - something you don’t see in modern day TV series anymore!

The pizza bases we make with spelt flour and top it with chicken/mince, pineapple, green pepper, onions, tomatoes, mushrooms and mozzarella cheese - Christo and CJ add chillies... 

You’ll need to search far and wide to get a pizza as delicious as the pizza made by Christo, CJ and Heidi-Mari!

This truly was a blessed day!