So what did we do on Valentine's day?

Saturday morning we had a church group from Kameeldrif who came for a hike from us to Goodland where they had a braai and a swim in the dam.

We started with a walk up the "koppie".

My good friend Alet. We used to do choral dancing together. Now we just visit and sometimes go for a hike.

Crossing the "spruit". Fortunately it was not too full to cross. (A few days ago, it would have been impossible ! After all the good rains, the stream had been in flood as the flattened grass testified.)

Pretty footpath to Goodland.

After we have safely guided the church group to Goodland we returned. Frans and Thelwyn had a possible horse buyer and while they showed off their Arabians, we looked after Martelize.

It's great fun to stand on Oupa's tummy, especially when he makes "hiccups"!

"Look my goofy face!" ...Martelize's newest, but not very flattering, expression!

While I got going with the Valentine chicken pie (Wenresepte 2 - baie lekker) in the kitchen, Martelize had a great time tearing up newspaper ads. Besides crumpling it (and chewing it), she can tear it. It had to be ads - ordinary newspaper makes too much of a mess.

Martelize is getting closer to crawling by the day. She gets in crawling position and then rocks to and fro for a long time.

Sometimes she even lifts her bum high in the air, but then ploughs down face first if she tries to move. She moves forward a little, but still gets irritated because she cannot move fast enough. If put on her back, she immediately turns on her tummy again and tries to crawl - moaning all the time. Like a novice trumpet player who is determined to master the skill, but first has to make a lot of noise...

Franco: "Look, I can pull myself up against Oupa Jan's old army chest - after first pulling off Ouma's linen cloth!"

The L's came in the afternoon to celebrate Jan's birthday and Valentine's day. However, the birthday boy was up in the koppie when they arrived! Neighbours had noticed a thief: he appeared from nowhere on their farm and grabbed a handbag from a parked car and then ran away. The community was alerted by radio and a large number of men spent all Saturday afternoon scouting for this guy. He was seen from time to time again (from a distance), and at one stage it was believed that he could be on our koppie! Unfortunately, despite everyone's efforts, he got away. Fortunately, he did not come to our house to cause problems!
So instead of a nap and a peaceful visit, Saturday afternoon was spent in "Hide and seek" or more specifically another episode of "Cowboys and crooks"!

"Look I can climb on the army chest!"

"I eat my biscuit like a mealie!" Franco is very fussy about what goes into his mouth. Unlike other babies, new objects do not automatically go to his mouth. I gave him a chicken bone, but like the biltong a few weeks ago, he just stared at it!

Crawling: Franco is not yet the fastest crawler, but when I opened the fridge door, he was there in a flash!

Finally Martelize woke up and we could take photos of the two cousins. Here Gert has his hands full with the two babies and a jealous Faraoh (big black Labrador left) and Jakkie (golden Labrador right).

At last we were ready for our Valentine cum birthday feast, bur first the babies had to be put to sleep. Uncharacteristically, Martelize did not fall asleep right away and Thelwyn tried to rock her to sleep in the guest room, when she suddenly gave a little shriek....


Ten guesses why Thelwyn is staring into the room on her hands and knees...

and why are Jan and Hendrik turning the guestroom upside down? We had another case of hide and seek! This time it was a snake and like the thief earlier, this one too got away. Fortunately no-one had to sleep in that room last night!

After all this commotion, Martelize was wide awake! (Franco slept like a baby!)

Here are the three generations all in red for Valentine's day!

Martelize was intrigued with the rose Oupa had given Ouma, so she "inherited" it... It didn't last long in her little hands of course!

FINALLY we could sit down at our Valentine table. First Jan had to open his birthday gifts and guess what I chose for his Valentine's basket. What goodies did he think I would choose as his favourites? He guessed Imperial mints and chocolate. Of course he was right! I had included those among other favourites like raisin bread, rusks and honey.

Frans, Thelwyn and Martelize

Gert and Dorette.

And then we dished up the Valentine pie, sweet corn, carrot salad and green salad. The mixed vegetables were left out, because they had burnt: I just wanted to reheat them when the snake hunting started and a friend arrived and...I forgot the plate was on high! Gert and Dorette made us very special dessert: we had a choice between English toffee and Espresso volcanoes. Jummy!

How did we end this eventful day? Jan and I have a little secret and I will tell you about it sometime, but it involved pushing furniture out of the way and putting on a C.D. Very special! Jan you will always be my special Valentine! Thanks for a great day!