Auditions, appliances, after-dinner delights and a little Afrikaans!

Well, the big news for this week, was that on Thursday I had my Providence Worship Team audition and interview! Without having too much time to practice beforehand, I was slightly apprehensive at auditioning. However, the audition went very smoothly and I am happy to say that I should be playing in our church beginning sometime in August! I am really looking forward to joining their team. I spent a bit of time at their weekly team rehearsal, and I loved it. I went into the Sound area, and was totally gobsmacked with the amount of technology employed by the church! The latest acquisition is approximately 10 personal ear bud monitors! Each band member will have headphones or ear buds, with a controller that can adjust the volume of every other instrument and vocals in the team. This means that if I was wearing the ear buds, I could turn up the sound of my own guitar, and say, the worship leader, while turning down the sound of the drummer, the backing vocals and the bass guitar! So I am really excited to be a part of this team!!

On Saturday, we hit the furniture stores again, looking for a new dining room and bedroom suites. We were unsuccessful this time, and couldn't find what we were looking for in at least 4 of the stores we explored. We reluctantly gave up the quest for Nathan's sake and headed home for lunch. After Nathan's traditional nap, we headed for the pool! We will really miss the use of a swimming pool next summer, when we are in our own place. After the refreshing dip, we headed out for a Mexican dinner. That always goes down well, and even Nathan enjoyed his quesadilla. On our way home we made a stop at the Sears next door to us, and found a Whirlpool washer and dryer at a very reasonable price.

So our only purchase for the house that day was the washer and dryer - not as successful as we'd hoped we would be! As we walked into the door, our friends, called us and invited us out for some ice cream. Since it was still about 28C (82F) at 7pm, we climbed back into our car and went to have ice cream to finish off the day. That evening I watched Blood Diamond on DVD, and I must say that I enjoyed hearing the South African accents again (good job Leonardo Di Caprio!), and loved the couple of sentences of Afrikaans in the movie!! I wished I could have watched this with an American, so I could feel all important and translate those sentences for them :P

On Sunday, we went to church. When we got home, it was pretty darn hot and humid, so Nathan and I made our 2nd visit to the pool this weekend! After working up an appetite in the pool, we came home and had lunch. Later that afternoon, we dropped Nathan off at a friend's house, so we could go look at one more furniture warehouse. Alas, nothing there caught our interest either, so again we left empty handed. The search continues!

We will have the keys to our home in 3 weeks and counting! The excitement is starting to build.........

The return of Nate the Great

Woohoooo! Nathan seems to have fully recovered this week and he shared in a wonderful "make-up" weekend! The week started off with a strange e-mail in my Facebook inbox! DJ had tracked me down and was desperate for Liesel's contact details. Basically, Liesel and DJ were best friends in high school and had made contact for about 12 years. One day, DJ was looking at some people who had previously gone to Treverton on Facebook, and she saw a Liesel McCarthy. She slightly recognized Liesel, and saw that Liesel was married to a Grant McCarthy. She then googled me, and found my blog (that you are reading right now)! Here she saw photo's of the family and that confirmed to her that she had found "her" Liesel! After an 80 minute phone call to Liesel, we learnt that DJ is also living in the USA, just two states away from us! She is also married and has a 9 month old boy, WHO SHARES HIS BIRTHDAY WITH NATHAN!!! Now if you don't find that amazing, I highly recommend that you go to the nearest Emergency Room and ask the Doctors to find your pulse!!

On Saturday, Nathan had a "make up" class of his Little Gym, so the 3 of us went there just after 9am. He has such great fun at these classes where he plays with other kids, explores gym equipment, plays with balls and chases his parents around! After the class, we drove to Legacy Village, an upmarket shopping area on the eastern side of Cleveland. We had a look at some furniture there, but when we saw the price tags, we quietly walked away. Later that afternoon, Nathan and I had a swim. After dinner, we met up with our good friends from Church at Mitchell's Ice Cream. This place has the best ice cream in Ohio, and the flavors are phenomenal! I had double chocolate chunk, Liesel had Raspberry Chip and Nathan had cookie dough. It was his first ice cream in a cone experience, and by the look of his face (and the evidence on his shirt), he loved it! After that taste of heaven, Robin and Brian took us to a beautiful park/playground on Lake Erie's edge! Here the boys could have fun in the playground, and then go and play in the warm waters of the Lake together!
(Photos printed with permission of Robin A - Thanks Robin!)


On Sunday I went to throw away some of Nathan's soiled nappies (diapers). At the dumpster, I saw some nice looking chairs there, so I called Liesel and told her to go have a look. She actually saw some even nicer Adirondack chairs, that would go perfectly on our house's porch! The chairs were in perfect condition, just a little dusty, so with a little persuasion from Liesel, I backed up her car to the dumpster and quickly picked up those chairs and loaded them into the back of the Rendezvous! Then we also noticed a classy 6ft standing lamp, which I returned for after church and put it into our garage! So now I can say that I am officially a dumpster diver!! Heck, you NEVER get anything of this quality thrown away in South Africa! But as they say, one man's trash is another man's outdoor furniture set! Nathan took an immediate liking to these chairs....
Later that day, Brian invited me to go hit some golf balls with him at a driving range. It was great to get out and do something different on a Sunday afternoon! It's a pity though that 40% of my balls didn't go in their intended direction........

That evening after dinner, Liesel joined Nath and myself went to have another swim in our pool, so Nathan had a blast showing his mom how he jumps into the pool now, and some other new tricks! And that was our weekend... about 600% better than last weekend! It's great to have Nath back to his normal self! 4 weeks until we get the keys to our house!! Bring it on!

Sick Days :(

Why do children tend to get sick on weekends, and specifically weekends that had plans?

It started on Friday, when Nathan seemed to be very miserable and lethargic most of day. Poor Liesel had to deal with his misery and shortened temper, as I was at work all day. When I got home that evening, I too, got to experience the poor, irritable child, formerly known as Nathan. Those of you who know Nathan, know that this is as far from normal for him as Jews are from pork. We have learnt, that when Nathan is not himself, then there is usually something wrong! Unfortunately we were right, and on Saturday, he started running a fever. We had made plans to go to our Bible Study's cookout that evening, and even discussed taking Nathan along and not telling anyone that he is sick, and hopefully the other kids could cheer him up. But as the time drew nearer, Nathan deteriorated, and I came to the conclusion that Nathan would not be able to fake being healthy, and that we needed to stay at home. We were both very disappointed as Liesel had spent most of the morning making koeksusters and Milktart for the cookout. We finally decided that since we had told them we were bringing a South African dessert, that Liesel would go and drop off the koeksusters and milktart and come straight back home. I would have loved to hear what the AMerican's thought of the South African food... I guess I will have to hear another time. I do know however, that our friends, Robin and Brian loved the koeksusters, so that was nice to hear!

On Sunday, Nath's fever had come down a bit, but he was still not his usual self. Liesel phoned the Doctor's room and they have a facility that if you phone after hours, that a nurse on duty in the children's ward of a local hospital, will call you back and discuss the "case" with you! The nurse put us slightly more at ease saying that his condition doesn't sound very serious, and we should just monitor him the rest of the day (duh!) and Liesel should take him to a doctor on Monday. So we monitored Nath, and we saw some improvement. Liesel took the opportunity to go to church while I stayed with Nathan, watching Dora, until I could speak spanish fluently, and drawing with crayons. His temperature seemed to return to normal, and he did eat voluntarily, but he was still very temperamental, and the slightest thing could start him screaming. Eventually, we made it through the weekend and put Nathan to bed. Liesel will take him to the Dr's and hopefully he will soon be his happy self and talking in his sing-song voice.

Short and sizzling

Sleeping, sandcastle building, sliding, swimming, snacking, shopping, sitting back and watching DVD's, singing, sermon listening and (as)sembling (Poetic License). That basically sums up the past 48 hours. It was a quieter weekend than normal, as we are still recuperating from our whirlwind holiday earlier this week.

It's been a hot weekend with the temperature around 37C here today! The photo on the right was taken at around 4:20pm today. So it goes without saying that we are very thankful for the air conditioned apartment and the pool!!!
On Saturday, I took Nathan out to one of his favorite playgrounds so Liesel could do some cleaning in the apartment. We also got to drive by the gorgeous blue Lake before heading back home to a sparkling home (thanks Liesel!!!) Later that day we went swimming, and then after dinner, we made a quick stop at some stores to get a few things and a DVD for the evening.

On Sunday, we went to church, and in the afternoon, I assembled a 2 drawer filing cabinet that we had bought yesterday. Then shortly after Nath woke up from his nap, the three of us headed to the pool to cool down! And that was it! 6 weeks until we get our house keys!!! YAY!!!

We're ba-ack!!!!

Last weekend and the first half of this week is all really a kind of blur to me! We seemed to do so much in such a short space of time!

On Saturday we met up with Adriaan and his son Jason for dinner. I know Adriaan from years back when he was my Youth leader at our church in South Africa, when i was still a teenager. He and his family emigrated to Canada a few years ago, and they are loving it there! Jason had some baseball games in Cleveland, so Adriaan looked me up, and we made some arrangements! We met at a local restaurant and had a great time catching up! It's nice chatting to someone with the same accent as yours, and talking about your home country!

On Sunday, after church, we drove up to Detroit for the start of our vacation! Liesel's uncle had timeshare in North-western Michigan and we were invited to join them! Nathan instantly renewed his friendships with his "cousins" (actually Liesel's cousins). The next day we drove up to Boyne Mountain, 3.5 hours away. This is a beautiful resort that is a ski resort in the winter, but also a wonderful summer destination with amazing lakes, as well as driving distance to Lake Michigan! Deer Lake is the part of the resort, and here one can go kayaking, canoeing, sailing, pedal boating on the lake, or putting, shuffleboard, volleyball or just lying in the sun on the land. I started off by kayaking, but to my surprise, Nathan wanted to join me, so I swopped the kayak for a 2 man canoe, and Nathan and I went gliding across the lake. We both loved it!


The next day, all 8 of us (including 4 car seats) climbed into Andreas' GMC Acadia, and we drove to the quaint town of Charlevoix. This town is nestled between Lake Charlevoix and Lake Michigan. There is a draw bridge in the main street of the town that opens every 30 minutes to allow the wealthy people in the yachts through. Nathan and was intrigued by this bridge that opens and shuts. We had lunch overlooking the marina, and then made our way back to the resort so we could all have a well deserved afternoon nap!


That evening we headed out to bay harbor for their annual fireworks display! This was in another beautiful setting overlooking the Bay Harbor Marina and Lake Michigan. Walking down the jetty past some of the yacht's kind of makes you feel insignificant.... as some of these yachts must cost over $1 million! There was one 3 story yacht that had a private chef onboard preparing the meal for the evening! Eish!
Nathan and Karl enjoyed running around on the grass with their new balloon hats! At 10:30 the fireworks started, and Nathan seemed to really enjoy the show (even though it ws way past his bedtime!)


On Wednesday, we drove into Boyne city (read small town) for their annual 4th of July Parade! We got ourselves a great position and watched as the bands, floats and people paraded past us. Nathan loved it as well, especially the fact that most people partaking in the festivities were throwing candy to all the children on the side! At the end of the parade (about an hour later) we headed back to the resort, where Andreas braai'ed (BBQ'ed) us some delicious steaks for lunch. After lunch, we reluctantly packed up and climbed into the car for our 6 hour journey back home :( It was a great break, and we will definitely be back to explore the area! Anyone want to join us???