Angry Bird Birthday

Yesterday was my eldest monkeys birthday and it was so amazing I felt so incredibly blessed to have the day shared with so many people and everything just went so wonderfully, Loghan said it was the best birthday ever!

I even baked people, I baked and I was super proud of it in the end!

Spoils from nana and oupa

My cake before it was cut

after it was cut...

33 Party backs... I was done

Cupcakes made by Aunty B for school

 

Another cake by his other nana

Lessons and a guitar one very happy monkey

 We started off with dinner at my moms on Sunday, cake and presents, Monday morning his actual birthday started with chocolate chip pancakes, we then took party packs and cupcakes to school and then last night we had a surprise mini party at his other grandma's home with more cake and more gifts even his own guitar which made Loghan so happy, it was nice to have everyone together and Loghan fell asleep with a huge smile last night... a very happy angry bird =)

The stages of being a breastfeeding momma

I was lucky enough to breastfeed Jess past the 2 year mark it is still a journey I cherish although it wasn’t at times the smoothest or most enjoyable ride, the bond and time I got with Jesse was something I hold very dear to my heart and even though I know I did my best with Loghan and Gabriel sometimes I do wish I had been able to carry on further but they were fed and healthy and that is what matters in the end. 

Through my journey I found specific phases as I went along and I thought it may be fun to share them with all of you and see if you had the same experiences or milestone feelings as I did so here we go…

Smash Cake Shoots.. Are they worth it

Growing up I always envied my friends whose parents allowed them to be the first to dig into their birthday cake, my mom always saw it as a waste so a neatly cut slice was how it was done in my family and parties stopped all together when I reached 5 as friends rubbed cake into my moms carpet and couch whilst playing....

Anyway the boys came along and in my exes family the first birthday was when your baby got to dig in, I'm sad that that I didn't take the time to take more pictures so when Jesse came along I really wanted to do a Cake smash around his first birthday, was it worth it?

In my opinion it absolutely was I asked my gorgeous friend Roxanne Du Preez to do the shoot she does really wonderful shoots and also did our wedding and maternity shoots so I was really happy to have her do this one for us.

I know many people think that a smash cake is a waste of money but I don't think so, I made my sons birthday cake to send to school, I had purchased cake toppers and special candles and when I cut his cake at school I removed those so it was easy to make use of them again for the smash cake so the cake decor did not cost me much at all, I also really enjoyed making the cake from scratch myself, it gave me some reflection time on the year past and I just loved that I got to do that for Jesse, it also saved so much money, and a smash cake really doesn't have to be that fancy, its the memory you are capturing after all, I just had the toppers etc already otherwise Jesse's would have been very plain.

I highly recommend doing this and if you really don't know anyone who takes good photos you can always take them yourself again you want to capture the memory, I'm really glad I have these photos to look back it really was such a wonderful experience.

  

 

Marriage the second time around

If you had asked me just after I walked away from my first marriage if I ever wanted to walk down the aisle again my answer would have been a definite no, after the heartbreak and the ugliness that was my divorce I wasn’t willing to go through that or put my children through that again, I told my now hubby that at the time and he said he was happy with whatever my decision was…

As time wore on my mind-set began to change when I realized that my hubby was it for me, I could never see myself with another partner because he is so much more than just my husband, he is my partner, my best friend, my solace in sad or hard times, my light in the dark, the water to my fire, literally he is my perfect balance and every day with him is one that I am grateful for, in the end we planned our wedding in 5 weeks, it was small and intimate, everything I hoped it would be and as I look back at the pictures now even though I was not at my best body or health wise it is very clear how happy I was that day and so I decided I would like to share some of the pictures with you all.

Its the small things...

In light of what has happened this past while I spent this weekend trying extremely hard as tired and frustrated as we were to just flat out spend time with the boys, play board games, read and talk and it really made me realize just how terrible it actually is to be a parent in today's age...

Everyone is always busy, we are always busy there is always something that needs to be done or something to worry over and by the time we all get home we are tired and quite frankly just want to fall into bed and get a bit of sleep before it starts all over again the next day.

Is it any wonder why things have become the way they are, why kids and adults both struggle emotionally or are emotionally crippled in some or other way, its not as if most of us don't want to spend time with our kids its just when we do we are present in person but we are not really always present emotionally if you know what I mean.

We have had to make an incredible amount of changes this last 2 weeks and I truely feel that although this situation or what has happened is not something I would wish upon any child or parent in many ways it has done our family some good.

I now get to drop my kids off at school every morning and as I hugged and kissed my kids goodbye this morning after physically walking them into the gate, I felt great; as a mom my heart swelled with joy and love as they waved good bye ecstatically until they were sure I could no longer see them... it may be something small but I feel even this will make a big change within our family dynamics and I will look forward to having this extra time with them every morning.

Its a terrible thing that sometimes it takes something tragic or terrible in order to wake us up to the small gestures, the precious time that we have to spend and truely appreciate those around us.

A games night is something that a friend and colleague actually suggested she was even kind enough to send some games our way and the kids had an absolute ball... no tv no interruptions I highly recommend it.

We are all so incredibly blessed but I think sometimes we just need to stop and truly wake up to our surroundings truly pay attention instead of living day to day in auto pilot so to speak.... our kids are only kids for so long and every year the time just seems to pass even more quickly than the year before...

Boy's Photo Shoot with Lauren Pretorius Photography

Some time ago I was lucky enough to win a photo shoot on Caffeine and Fairydust, I was very excited for this shoot as I had heard so many great things about Lauren Pretorius Photography and I was not disappointed.

Lauren met us out Southern Suburbs side she took the time to actually ask me about the kids what their likes and dislikes were she put together a Pinterest board and threw ideas around for a few weeks which was just that little extra cherry on top especially considering I had won the photo shoot and wasn't paying for it.

She took us to an amazing location, she was great with the kids very patient and kind, her assistant was amazing as well and I feel terrible because I suck at names and cannot thank her formally in this post, she even shot in the rain and we left knowing that we would end up with some amazing photos.

We collected the disk today which was gorgeously packaged even the disk was over-layed with one of our pictures and the photos made my heart swell with such joy because they honestly embody the boys personalities so wonderfully.

So I decided to share some of my favorites with you, I absolutely hundred and fifty percent highly recommend Lauren if you are looking for a photographer who puts the time and effort into what she is doing and I do plan on using her again in the future =)