TRANSITIONS

Greetings from South Africa!
Maxmom here...

Its a beautiful morning here in South Africa (Johannesburg). We had another thunderstorm last night and the world has been washed clean. The surrounding foliage is shimmering and wet.  

Our thunderstorms are huge, flashy events - lots of lightning and sudden buckets of rain. Flash floods can also happen during these storms and I have grown progressively more scared of them.  The dogs, too, huddle with me at these times.  All the rain, however, has made the world very green and beautiful. My veggie garden is flourishing (or should I say the Guinea pigs' vegetable garden is flourishing? After all, it was planted for them!)

Its Saturday today, so the world is quieter. Only a small drone from the highway across the hill. The traffic never goes to sleep.

Both my girls are home this weekend, and the Boss is also free, so I can look forward to hearty companionship.  

I'm going through a quiet, philosophical life-change at the moment after a major turn of events this past week.  This has left me very guarded with my internet activities and my writing. (Even writing this blog post is making me nervous)  It appears that, once you are on the Internet, your personal claim to your own blog, and what you put on it, is redundant in reality. 

Instead, I have been focussing on moving all my "stuff" in the house into one of the spare rooms.   (I am extremely creative and have so many 'crafty' projects going on.) I am converting this room into a 'den' for myself and am loving the feeling of independence and creative freedom.

  I've been making beads, sewing advent calenders, sorting out wool, scrapbooking, quilting, etc,etc...anything to take my mind off the recent disillusionment. I know I must get back to writing, but my heart is simply not in it. 

Above: Toby testing the chair in my den.

My latest project is a sewed/quilted advent calendar. It's a gift for someone who is working in appalling conditions - long hours, immense stress. Opening small gifts, every day, in the lead up to Christmas, will hopefully remind this person that they are greatly loved and valued. It's been fun planning it and buying the small gifts. I'll give this treasure gift towards the end of the month. It's still not quite finished yet. Hopefully it will remain a surprise.

My  Scrapbooking storage corner.

Today, the Boss and I are going to buy a large bookshelf for my den - to create more space for all my books, etc. and hopefully inspire me to write again..

Above: 12-year-old 'Tammy' barking at the neighbour's cat..."Looking good, girl!"

Toby and Tammy are very well. So are the Guineapigs. Toby is a real hooligan. He is so energetic and so strong, and we still battle with trying to encourage him to be calm. Tammy is getting really old now. She struggles mainly with her progressive arthritis and dry eyes, but then comes to life when the hooligan demands a game. She is a pretty amazing dog, but is starting to battle on our short walks. She enjoys them, however, and loves interacting with other dogs and 'reading the news'.   I know she will deteriorate over time and perhaps may not be with us for much longer, but she is twelve years old now and comfortable in her old age. I couldn't ask for more - at least she hasn't suffered like Max did.

The Guinea-pigs (Twix and Bonnie/Tinkie) are at such a cute stage. They respond to me as if I am one of them.  Their house/palace (in the kitchen) is such a fun place for them to be living in. They are always hanging out together and come to their balcony/loft whenever anyone is in the kitchen. It's like the "Romeo and Juliet" scene with the two of them hanging out the window, going "Wheet, Wheet, Wheet...." and calling for a treat.

I've been taking them to the vet every week now for 6 weeks to get their injections for mites, which they picked up somewhere.  Thankfully, I caught it early. They've stopped scratching now and are looking quite beautiful. Although Twix is about 3 months older than Bonnie, the two GP's are the same weight. Bonnie, however, is going to be a much bigger piggie than Twix. Poor Twixie had such a hard time in the beginning - with the pregnancy and all - that I doubt if she'll ever catch up in growth. But they love each other's company...it's really cute to see them happy.  Here is a video of my sweet piggies:

Free Background music by Jewelbeat 

Sending lots of love to all my friends across the world.  

Toby, too, sends lots of licks - so long as you don't take his throw toy away.
"Mine!" he says.  :)

Have a happy weekend!