An almost white Christmas

With a thin layer of snow covering the yards and rooftops a couple of days before Christmas, we clung to the hope that our family would experience the first white Christmas since settling in North East Ohio. However, the people at the Weather Channel did not share our optimism as temperatures rose and rain fell on Christmas Eve, dissolving our hopes for that elusive Christmas dream!

But that in no way diluted our Christmas celebrations!! On Christmas Eve, we continued our annual German tradition of Bunte Teller. This tradition (a personal favorite), involves us distributing international chocolates, home baked Christmas cookies, marzipan and more to each family member. This plate of divine delectables is meant to last you at least until New Year's day - however I have yet to make it more than 3 or 4 days!

Our church has two services on Christmas Eve which celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ. We usually attend the first service at 5pm. The beauty of this is that it leaves our Christmas Day open, and allows us to relax, open presents, and eat copious amounts of Christmas foods! After the Christmas Eve service, we came home, lit a fire and enjoyed each other's company - before retiring for the night and allowing Santa to come and do his thing :P

I was awoken on Christmas Day by Nathan who jumped on my bed shouting, "Ho! Ho! Ho! Merry Christmas!" That was the start of a leisurely morning for us. Nathan, as you can imagine, was highly entertaining as he liberated his new toys from their wrappings. He kept on saying, after opening present after present, "Just what I always wanted!" That was hysterical, and we are not sure where he picked up that little phrase. He most likely remembered my mom saying that when she we opened our presents with her in 2007!

Nathan got a multitude of presents, all of which he loved. I even get to play with a few of the presents which can become slightly addictive :)

On Saturday, North East Ohio was blessed with unseasonably warm weather! Temperatures of 65F (17C) saw many people re-emerge from their houses to experience the outdoors. We too, took advantage of the weather, and Gabi and I drove Nathan to a local playground! Nathan just loved being able to run around again, go down slides and climbing up hills! We also took his bicycle along and had an enjoyable walk behind him along the bicycle/running track!



The lovely warm weather left Cleveland as quickly as it arrived, and soon the temperatures were diving back down to acceptable levels for the end of December.

For those of you (Robin) who need to see pictures of Joshua, here are a couple of him at 5 weeks old!

The McCarthy Christmas Letter 2008

As 2009 edges nearer, and the sound of carols are being drowned out by the sound of the cash register, we need to escape the madness around us and spend time together as a family. It's this family time that is most precious to us, and we are blessed to have Liesel's mom, Gabi, here with us to celebrate the birth of Jesus!

For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace. (Isaiah 9:6)

This is also a great time to look back on 2008 and see how God has been present and prayers have been answered!

As a family (of 3), we had many moments that we cherished together. Some of the memories included:

• Starting 2008 in sunny South Africa, as we wrapped up our Christmas vacation. We would soon be swapping the glorious sunshine, golden beaches and hours of swimming for the snow-covered landscapes of Cleveland!


• In June, Craig drove for 5 hours from Toronto, Canada and spent a weekend with us! Nathan loved having his uncle around and you could see how quickly a bond developed between the two of them! You can imagine how Nathan reacted when Craig gave him an early birthday gift, a 2 man dome tent!


• We celebrated Easter with the Lipperts in Detroit.


• Our summer vacation to northern Michigan was amazing. We stayed with the Lipperts at their timeshare in Boyne Mountain. Nathan still speaks about our visit to Mackinac Island on the jet boat!


• Nathan and I finally met the Staley's, again at the Lippert's in Detroit. The three families had a wonderful time together, catching up, and building new friendships! Gavin and I even got an opprortunity to fell two trees in Andreas' yard which was great fun for us!


• In September, Nathan and I had a fantastic, yet deafening time at the Annual Cleveland Air Show.

Individually, we also ventured into new territories, as God opened new doors for us.

• In May, I graduated from my 4 months of intensive training in the Java language at my company. I saw this as a great opportunity to learn new skills and make myself more marketable, which is vital, especially now as we are gripped by the weakening economy. The timing, as it always is with God, was perfect!


• Nathan donned his Spiderman backpack for the first time as he started preschool in September. He has been loving attending it twice a week, and we have loved seeing him come home with new knowledge, and new hand-made creations! He has been particularly fond of his extra-mural music classes. He has already learned to play a couple of simple tunes on the keyboard and is slowly learning to read music!


• In November, Liesel entered her eighth month of her pregnancy. After contracting a slight cold, she visited our family practitioner. The doctor found that Liesel’s blood pressure was unusually high, and recommended that she visit her gynecologist. So Liesel followed the doctor’s orders and went to her gynecologist, who promptly told her to make her way to the hospital. So that Monday, Nathan and I took her to hospital, where she was to be monitored overnight. It seemed like the rest and relative comfort of a hospital bed, and the medication did the trick and brought Liesel’s blood pressure back down to acceptable levels. Nathan and I were jubilant to find out that she was being discharged on Tuesday with instructions to keep monitoring her blood pressure. Our jubilation came to an abrupt end when on Wednesday night, the blood pressure spiked again, and after a call to the gynecologist’s office, it was back to the hospital. Liesel was put into a room for observation, and after getting some medication intravenously, her blood pressure stabilized and we were free to go home at 2am. On Friday, Liesel visited her gynecologist again, and again she wanted Liesel in hospital. Liesel’s gynecologist had a gut feeling that our baby would be arriving very soon, and therefore didn’t want to take any chances. That evening, Liesel’s blood pressure rose again, but this time her gynecologist told her that they would be taking the baby out, even though he was four weeks early. Once I had made my way back to the hospital, I joined Liesel in the theater. It was not long after that when little Joshua announced his arrival with a loud cry! This was a great relief for us as we were concerned about whether his lungs would be properly developed. He weighed in at a decent weight of 6lbs 6oz (2.9kg) considering how early he was. We praise God that Joshua was perfectly healthy, and didn’t even need to spend any time in the ICU, and that He had his hand on Liesel the entire time!

As can been seen throughout the year, God has been with us through every heartbeat. So the McCarthy family (of 4) wants to give thanks to our Father for his protection over us and all He has blessed us with in 2008. We pray that you and your family may have true joy and peace this Christmas and may God bless you in 2009!

Grant, Liesel, Nathan and Joshua

Week of Wintery Wonders!

Gabi has been with us for one week so far, and the Ohio weather systems are putting on an impressive show for her! For instance, as I am typing this, it is -17C (-32C with the wind chill) outside! If you take -32C, there is a temperature difference of 73C between us, and Liesel's dad's house in Botswana which was 41C today when we spoke to him! So it was not the wisest thing to go outside barefoot to plug in the Christmas lights! But hey, I am from Africa and have really tough feet!


On Tuesday, I took Gabi and Nathan to a stunning location, thanks to a tip from a colleague. We went to Finwood Estate, which belongs to a local town council. Each year around Christmas time, they string millions of lights together and make a magical place for you to bring your family to walk around. Firstly, there are beautiful scenes created with these lights and paths set out for you to explore. Secondly, as you approach the house, there are approximately twenty trains running on cleverly laid out tracks in the front yard. This was Nathan's favorite and despite the freezing rain and snow that was falling, he stood in awe of these miniature machines making their rounds! After a while, I managed to get Nathan to come with us inside the house. As you enter, you see the living room, when a jolly old fellow named Santa was sitting there and listing to children's "want" lists. Each room had the Christmas theme applied, even the bathroom that had a Christmas tree, and some blue lights hidden amongst the "foam", causing a magical glimmer.


After the house inspection, we went to the closed-in garage where we had some free hot chocolate and cookies!

Friday was Gabi's birthday, and again God decided to decorate our yard for her. This time though He didn't choose snow, but rather the rare beauty of an ice storm! So all our plants became encrusted with crystal-like coating. Fortunately it was a mild ice-storm so there was no damage caused. But none-the-less, it is still a beautiful sight to behold and a once in a lifetime treat for Gabi!


Later that morning, we took Gabi to the Cheesecake Factory for lunch. This restaurant always lives up to its reputation for serving up incredible meals, and never disappoints! Gabi had a Thai Chicken dish, Lee had a pizza and a salad, and I had the orange chicken dish. We all ordered Cheesecake for dessert, but had to take it home with us to enjoy later as the serving sizes always deny us the opportunity to partake in post entree delicacies!


The temperatures started their nosedive through Saturday, so we wisely chose to stay indoors for most of the weekend. This gave me some time to become creative with Nathan's Lego, and made him a very cool fire engine (even if I do say so myself). To me there is nothing more satisfying than having a picture in my head and then using the various Lego bricks to bring my imagination to life! Needless to say, Nathan loves it too :)

On Saturday night, we took a drive through Crocker Park, to show Gabi (and Nathan) the holiday lights and huge Christmas Tree! It was another worthy display of lights that we love at this time of year!

On Sunday - we braved the frigid air and headed for Church. Afterwards Liesel treated us to a delicious roast for lunch! Shortly afterwards, I hit Nathan's Lego box again and made him a police car to accompany his fire engine, and ambulance that I had made him earlier.

Now I need to go outside (barefoot again) and switch off the Christmas lights!

Gabi's "Home"-Coming, Christmas Trees and our Cantata's

What a week! It started off with me heading back to work after being on and off for about two weeks. It devastated poor Nathan that his permanent play partner was leaving him to his own devices.... but I knew that a very capable "replacement" would be arriving on Friday! That would be Nathan's maternal grandmother, or Gogo as he affectionately calls her. She arrived after some unexpected drama at Oliver Tambo Airport(aka Johannesburg International Airport) when Liesel's grandmother's passport was confiscated due to an irregularity. Both Liesel's mom and grandmother were due to fly out to the USA together, but after this set back, Liesel's mom flew alone. But the good news she arrived on time and into the arms of Nathan who ran to meet her at Cleveland's airport!!! As a special bonus, God decorated the landscape for her with a fresh layer of snow. The funny thing is, there was no snow at all in Cleveland's city center, nor any of the suburbs I drove through on my way home! But as I turned the corner into my neighborhood, there it was - the fresh layer of snow making everything beautifully white!


On Saturday, Nathan, Gabi and myself went in search of the perfect Christmas tree! We found a place that sold a variety of trees, and we paced up and down finding one with the perfect shape. After a while, we decided that we wanted a Michigan Fir. It was conveniently netted for us and then tied to the roof rack of Liesel's Buick. When we got it home and into the tree stand, we saw that it was slightly bigger than what I expected! In fact, if you look at the photos, you can see that the highest part of the tree is actually bent against the ceiling! But Nathan, Gabi and I had great fun decorating this monster tree, and all Liesel was thinking about was the amount of needles that will fall off this tree in the next two weeks :)



On Sunday, our church had their annual Cantata which was simply fantastic! A choir consisting of 56 voices and an orchestra of 28 made beautiful, moving music! It was entitled "A Festival of Carols" and it really did lift one's spirit!
That evening, it was time for the children to perform their Christmas program! Nathan, along with many other pre-schoolers, marched confidently up onto the stage, shook his bells with vigor and sang his memorized songs :) We were very proud. Afterward, we took a slight detour on the way home, so we could enjoy some of the houses Christmas lights! There were some spectacular displays and one could see that some people spent a lot of time decorating their houses! When we came home, we put on our Christmas tree lights - and within a few minutes, Liesel spotted some smoke coming from the tree!!! One of the lights had shorted and started melting! Fortunately we never leave the lights on when we leave the house! So enjoy the photo's of the tree with the lights on, as those lights are now being taken back and some new ones will be bought :)

Freezing weather, Festivities and Flickering lights

This week I was fortunate enough to be able to take time off from work and stay at home with my new family! It was a fantastic week of getting to know Josh, playing with and making Lego creations with Nathan. And of course, I was there to assist Liesel wherever I could as she recovers from the c-section. This was also the time for me to catch up some sleep, even though Josh has been remarkably good- even at 2 weeks old. Most of the time he only wakes up once a night around 2 - 3am for a night time snack! What more could a parent ask for from their 16 day old child??

These past couple of weeks have been an incredible family bonding experience for the McCarthy's, and I will cherish the memories forever! Today (Monday), I head back to the office and try to return to some form of normality again!

It was quite fitting that for my last two days of leave, the weather gave us our first taste of snow, which transforms the dry, barren landscapes into a beautiful, clean canvas that is so beautifully accented at night by the various lights decorating the neighborhood houses!

Ever since Thanksgiving, people have braved the elements (freezing temperatures, rain, sleet) to attach strings of various lights to the exterior of their houses! I, too, did my duty and headed onto my roof and dangled lights from the the precipices of the roof! At times, my prayer life increased dramatically as my shoes were not getting sufficient grip on the steep incline, but luckily my hypothermic hands managed to keep me in position long enough to get the string of lights secured to the stupid little plastic clip! Anyway here is a picture of the final result (which took several trips onto the roof to repair some broken bulbs and re-arrange the lighting patterns.)


On Saturday night, after Nathan's bath and reading some stories to the boys, I headed off to our annual Christmas party at my manager's house just down the road from me. It is at times like this when I am really glad that his house is literally 5 minutes away, since the fresh layer of snow made the streets quite challenging to navigate! At the party, we had some great food and exchanged some awesome gifts (I got a huge box of chocolate covered pretzels and a DVD!) The highlight for me came after that when most of us tried our hand at the PlayStation Rock Band! We had drummers, guitarists and vocalists, all striving to make it to the end of the song without too many mistakes. I was impressed by some of my colleagues hidden talents, and even their significant other's joined in the fun! A really good time was had by all!!

Giving Thanks!

After the past two weeks of our life, I do not think that's its purely coincidence that the USA celebrate the Thanksgiving holiday this past Thursday! A good friend of mine, Angie, reminded me during the drama, that "Nothing ever takes God by surprise!" So we had so much to be thankful for and we joined with the rest of the nation in counting our blessings and bringing glory to God!

This week, we welcomed Liesel and Joshua back to our house! It was great to have access to little Josh 24 hours a day. I have changed my nightly retiring routine, to now include a check on Joshua, as well as Nathan! Also, the fact that Liesel is now heavily outnumbered by 3-1, so hopefully the males will have more say in the household in future {wishful thinking I know :)}

The week also included a lot of brotherly bonding as Nathan got to know younger brother better. He is still getting accustomed to the cries of Josh, and now has his ear muffs (used for the Cleveland Air Show) close by and dons them at the first sign of a cry!



We are also learning about Josh's little nuances. It is also reassuring watching him feed for slightly longer each time. The one week check-up at the pediatrician on Friday confirmed that he is growing well, and has already gained 7 ounces in just 3 days! He also seems to be settling into a routine nicely, only waking up once in the early hours for a feed! We are so blessed :)



As for the weekend, it was a very laid back affair. My manager and his wife who is 34 weeks pregnant with their first, paid us a visit on Friday evening. They also brought Nathan a Playmobil Fire Fighter helicopter that he absolutely loves! We also went out and bought some Christmas lights for our house and I put most of them up when the weather was above freezing and dry (the best you ask for in Cleveland at this time of year).

Then on Sunday, Liesel and Josh made their first public appearance at Church. People couldn't believe that Liesel was looking so well after being her emergency C-section! Of course, everyone loved Josh (newborns have that effect on people)! Josh's photos were also displayed on the big screens during the announcements, which was great to see!

So as you can see, the McCarthy's have so much to be thankful for, and are looking forward to another year full of God's blessing!

The first US Citizen of the McCarthy Clan -> Joshua Craig McCarthy

When Liesel and I awoke on Friday morning, we had no idea what lay ahead of us in the next 15 hours! I went to work as normal, and Liesel had an appointment with her OBGYN to check her progress after recently upping her dosage of blood pressure medication.

On Monday, Liesel was diagnosed with pregnancy-induced hypertension, and was promptly sent to the hospital for monitoring! Her blood pressure was brought under control and she was discharged on Tuesday. So we went and bought a home Blood Pressure monitor and started measuring Liesel's blood pressure.
On Wednesday night - it got dangerously high so we called the Dr and she told us to go straight back to hospital. Nathan got picked up by a friend of ours and he spent the night with them. At the hospital, Liesel was given some medication intravenously and that seemed to stabilize the BP so after testing her BP every 5 mins they thought it was safe to discharge her at 1:30am.
Then on Friday she went for a regular checkup and her BP seemed normal at the Dr's office. Then a bit later her doctor phoned and said that she had spoken to the High Risk Pregnancy doctor and they were both not happy that she was in the hospital again this past Wednesday, so they ordered her back to hospital to be monitored. So I checked her in and spent a couple of hours with her and her BP seemed good and we didn't really know why they admitted her again. I left and took Nathan home to make supper and shortly afterwards got a call from Lee saying that her BP has shot up and is 160/100 and they have found traces of protein in the urine now - so her Dr wants to get the baby out tonight (4 weeks early). So Nath and I packed his bag (a friend would be picking him up from the hospital) and we drove in one of the worst snow storms of the season so far to the hospital - doing about 20 mph the whole way. (Amazing how Mother Nature times these things!) Anyway, we made it there safely and soon after Nath was picked up - I put on my scrubs and went into the OR. This time the OR experience was far more enjoyable for me, as I had been there before and my nerves weren't frayed. Also I knew what to expect and could savor the moments, rather than being filled with anxiety and unsure of what was to come! One of the best sounds I have heard was when little Joshua, barely out of his mother's belly, let out a hearty cry! We were concerned that a 4 week premature baby's lungs might not be fully developed, but that cry proved that this was not the case! Once he was out and lying in the bassinet, I had the fantastic privilege of trimming the umbilical cord! His APGAR scores were 9/10, 9/10 - so we are hoping that the rest of the scores he gets through life will be this good and better!

Even though Joshua is 4 weeks premature, he tipped the scale at 6lbs 6oz, 18 inches long, and he hasn't needed to go to any special care or ICU. Each night he has stayed in the nursery with all the other newborn babies! Praise God!

With Joshua out of Liesel's womb, her blood pressure is down and close to normal, and she seems to be out of the woods now too. We are just both trying to catch up on some sleep, before Liesel and Joshua return home in a few days time, to start a whole new chapter in our lives!

So as you can see, this was totally unexpected and but every turned out perfectly.

Nathan has taken an immediate liking to his baby brother and loves every minute together. Nathan has such a caring nature and it shows as he sings to Joshua when Joshua is crying, while gently caressing his soft brown hair! There is already a beautiful bond between these two brothers and I cannot wait to see how it will develop and strengthen over the years!

So there you have it, from high blood pressure to a beautiful baby boy in 5 short days! God is amazing and his timing is always perfect! We thank Him for our incredible gift!!

I want to apologize to anyone who has recently sent me an e-mail, or written on my Facebook wall, as I have not yet had the time this past week to respond. I will do my best to get to them! Thank you for all your prayers, encouragement and well wishes! It means a lot to us :)

First flakes and flu symptoms!

This weekend was rather uneventful, but it was intended to be... Let me explain: Last week, Nathan contracted pink eye, and had to be taken to the Dr to get eye drops for it. Thankfully, two days later, the pinkness had dissipated, returning his eyes to their natural color! Unfortunately, this week a second trip to the Doctor's office had to be made. This time he was treated for an ear infection :( But that is not where it ends, as Liesel seemed to have been touched by the sinusitis bug. Her OB/GYN prescribed some over the counter medication for her, but this in turn elevated her blood pressure! She paid a visit to our GP, who diagnosed the blood pressure issue and prescribed some antibiotics to deal the the sinusitis. So that sounds pretty miserable..... but wait, there's more! It was Friday night, when my wife discovered she had pinkeye over and above everything else that her heavily pregnant body was going through!

So I made it clear that Liesel needed to be on bed rest this weekend - which in my opinion would be the best method to kick start the recovery process. I did my best to entertain Nathan. One of the things on my to-do list was to fertilize the lawn, which I could include Nathan in. Also, knowing what weather lay ahead of us - a week of snow - it was the best opportunity to do that at that moment - despite the drizzle. Of course, Nathan saw it as an adventure after suiting up in his Wellington's and rain coat and together we braved the precipitation and spent some quality time in the puddles and on the swing!

That evening - after Nathan had drifted off, Liesel and I lay back and watched Get Smart. If the saying "laughter is the best medicine", then Liesel and I should be cured of every possible ailment! It was 'just what the Doctor ordered' - a lazy evening filled with laughter!

On Sunday morning, the season's first snow flakes started drifting to ward the ground. The air and ground temperature was still above freezing, so the flakes melted on contact with the ground. That meant that my snow thrower will not be used for a while still :( Liesel was still under my order of bed rest, so Nathan and I went to church without her. The afternoon consisted of a round of Wii Sports competitions between the boys. And that is how much of the weekend went.

On Monday, November 17, 2008 - Liesel and I will have been married for 7 blessed years. I want to thank her for completing me, and supporting me over the years. She is the main reason that our transition to the United States was as smooth as it was! She has made sure that I lacked nothing, at the same time as raising a smart and well-mannered son! She is simply : AMAZING! Happy Anniversary my love! Thank you everything that you have done for me and our family! I love you!!

"Camp-outs" and fellow countryman!

After seeing his favorite cartoon family enjoying a camp-out around the fireplace in their living room, Nathan has mentioned that he would love to do that too. So on Saturday evening, I brought the mattress from the bunk bed downstairs and put it in the playroom in front of the fireplace. We put a log in the fireplace and got our first ever fire in our house going in no time! Nathan was totally captivated by the fire, as it's flames licked the cool air and radiated its warmth! Liesel and I read him a few bed time stories, but we do not think he heard anything besides the crackle of the burning log. After story-time, Nathan basked in the glow of the fire for a bit before losing the fight to his heavy eyelids.

A few hours later, Liesel retired to the bed next to Nathan. Forty-five minutes later she re-appeared. Nathan is not a peaceful sleeper by any stretch of the imagination! He tosses, turns, snores and on occasion grinds his little teeth. With this combination, sleeping in the same room as Nathan will be a challenge, let alone in the bed next to him. So Liesel took her pillows and duvet and returned to the comfort of the master suite. Finally, it was my turn to hit the bed. After the first five minutes, I realized that Liesel had made a very wise decision in moving upstairs. But I stuck it out, and even though it felt like I was awakened every 30 minutes, I made it through the night. The important thing was that Nathan had a great night's sleep and wanted to camp out in the playroom again. Hmmmmm - maybe next year!

On Sunday morning, as the winter season came upon us, I had to be at the church at 7:30am! We had a good service and worship sets and was home again by 1pm. After the thrill of the previous night's fire, Nathan and Liesel wanted another fire, so I obliged and started up another one in the fireplace. You can actually feel the difference in temperature as you come downstairs and into the playroom! It was not long afterwards when we left to have supper at the Astifan's. They had invited another couple to their house, who have something in common with us. The wife, Shirley grew up in Pretoria, South Africa!! It was there where she met her husband, who was a US Marine on assignment at the US Embassy in Pretoria. They fell in love, got married in South Africa and then moved back to the USA, where they had their son, and moved to Cleveland! It was wonderful speaking to them and hearing the South African accent again!

Candy Comas and Sibling Celebrations

As can be seen in the video clip below, Halloween has descended upon us. Nathan's Preschool had a Halloween party and parade for the children on Thursday morning. It was very well organized with them requesting that parents refrain from dressing the children in any scary outfits (such as corpses etc). No masks and no weapons were allowed either! This way the children could enjoy dressing up without being exposed to the darker side associated with this event. Nathan had an absolute ball which can clearly been seen in the video below!

On Friday, it was time to hit the neighborhood sidewalks in search of candy for the first time ever! Nathan and I headed down our street at the allotted time, and I must say that Nathan fared very well! We only visited about one eighth of the houses in our development until we turned back home. It seemed that Nathan had more fun handing out the candy to our fiendish visitors! Unfortunately, he was only handing out one piece of candy to each child when we had budgeted for about 3 to 4 pieces per person. This left us with a surplus of candy (come to think of it, perhaps Nathan knew what he was doing!)


On Saturday, we took Nathan to the hospital that Liesel will be delivering his brother. They had a special course for big brothers and sisters, called Sibling Celebration. The instructor was a nurse, who works in the postpartum section of the hospital. She read the group of about 10 children a story, and showed them a video before demonstrating how to hold a new born baby on some life-like dolls. The children seemed to learn a lot and then the highlight was when the nurse took them to see a brand new baby girl born earlier that day. She made the children stand around the baby and got them all to sing "Happy Birthday" to her! It was sweet and Nathan thoroughly enjoyed himself. The fact that they gave the children cookies and chocolate milk only reinforced the positive mood of the group! At the end of the hour long "course" Nathan received his certificate indicating that he is a suitable qualified BIG BROTHER!

On Sunday afternoon - it was a beautiful Fall day, so we decided to put Nathan's bike in the trunk and drove to the Westlake Recreation Center. There is a lovely tarred cycling/walking/running track meandering through a tree-lined park. Nathan's confidence in bike-riding has grown immensely and soon he was almost out of sight as his little legs propelled him down the path! Today was also the first day after we have changed back to Eastern Standard time. This means that all our clocks were turned back an hour - which translates into sunsets around 6pm now compared to sunsets at 7pm on Friday and Saturday..... So as the sun drifted toward the horizon -- the temperature began to fall and that signalled that it was time to head home!

Nathan's Preschool Halloween Parade

Nathan's Preschool held a Halloween parade for the children and gave them the opportunity to sing a couple of songs for the parents! Here is Nathan the Dinosaur bellowing at maximum volume to ensure mom can hear him!

Baby or Blizzard : Bring them on!!!

This weekend we were due to take a trip up to Detroit to reunite Jacques with his sister (Liesel's aunt). Unfortunately a bout of sinusitis for Liesel and Doctor's orders, we had to cancel and spent a quieter weekend at home. But that was not a bad thing in the least. We managed to satisfy most of Liesel's nesting needs! This included my putting on the finishing touches on the nursery paint job on Friday night. On Saturday morning, we purchased the curtains for the rooms , as well as a side table and lamp that will accompany the rocking chair - for whoever is on baby duty! Liesel made sure everything for the baby was washed and sterilized. By Sunday, everything had dried and put back together, and then placed in the nursery - ready for use :)

So we went from this.......


to this!


Other weekend activities included going to church and a walk around the block with Nathan's sporting his brand new Spiderman helmet! We need to take advantage of these sunny days as we are very well aware of the cold, wet and icy months ahead of us!


Speaking of which, this forthcoming week has a couple of things in store for us. Firstly, on Sunday November 2, the USA moves back an hour as we bid farewell to the summer's Daylight Savings Time. Then secondly, our first forecasts of snow have already cropped up! There is a rain/sleet/snow chance on Monday night/Tuesday morning!! At least the weather is still warm enough that we won't see any accumulation of snow for a while still. The snow should melt as it hits the ground as the temperature is still above freezing. Our accumulating snow usually moves in near the end of December and definitely in January and February. This season, I do not fear any accumulations or even a blizzard! This is because I have hopefully said goodbye to the back-breaking work of shovelling snow off the driveway with my latest purchase. Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you my new snow thrower!!!

After some conversations with my South African family this weekend, I realized that they don't have the slightest idea of what a snow thrower looks like - which is which why I included the photo above! This little beauty should keep my driveway and sidewalks clear throughout the snow season, and I can't wait for a decent snow fall to fire this baby up! I think Nathan summed it up when he came looking for me at lunch time - and I was outside giving the thrower a test run. He shouted back to Liesel, " Mom, dad is outside playing with his new toy!!!"

Energy-sapping weekend II

Yet another weekend, where at the end of it, my reserves of energy have again been depleted! Friday marked the day that Nathan turned four - and it was full throttle from that morning through the rest of the weekend.

Liesel and Nathan headed to a local farm on Friday morning. The local MOPs group had arranged an apple picking morning and hay-ride! Afterwards it was back to our house for Nathan to continue opening and playing with his presents! It was around 4:30pm when I got home - and when Nathan could open his remaining gifts! His smile didn't leave his face for hours! He loved all his presents - especially his very own digital camera! This gadget has accompanied us on all our excursions this weekend!
For dinner that night - we went to Nathan's favorite restaurant, Moe's! Of course the camera came with :)

On Saturday morning, after a few morning chores, we drove out to Cleveland's Little Italy - where Jacques was treating us to a lunch at a renowned bakery. The food at Presti's bakery was fantastic! After my Ravioli, I had, arguably the best dessert that I have had in my 30 months of US residency! It was a miniature Chocolate Mousse cake - filled with decadent and delicious mousse! Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm!!!! Jacques had a Chocolate Cappuccino Brownie which came in at a close second!

Later that afternoon - we decided to go for a walk around our neighborhood with Nathan on his bicycle! We were amazed at how Nathan hopped on his bike and flew down the sidewalk with us increasing our pace to keep him within eyesight! After the kilometer long walk - Nathan was all ready for a second round, unfortunately the adults weren't and we headed inside for the rest of the evening!

Sunday morning had the boys heading to church - while Liesel stayed at home and rested. Lieesl has been feeling under the weather for the past few days as she has been trying to elude a head cold that seems to have set up a base camp in her sinuses! Even with her head feeling like a pressure cooker, she prepared an awesome roast for lunch! After lunch Jacques and I headed upward as we replaced some damaged shingles on the roof. This was not fun as the steep angles of the roof make it very uncomfortable! But we were successful (or so we believe) and by the time we made it to terra firma again, Nathan was ready for another bike ride. So Jacques and I obliged and made another round of the neighborhood before dinner time.