van der Schaafs down under

Tuesday, April 3, 2012

March celebrations...

Once again we had a very busy month of March celebrating birthdays and anniversaries.
Anya could celebrate her 3rd birthday on the 7th, then on the 11th Dad and Mum could remember 35 years of marriage and Marcel turned 21! We all went to their house that Sunday to enjoy coffee and cake together...

Marcel with his nieces - Anya, Naomi, Courtney and Olivia
(Chanel must've been hiding somewhere)

a fancy wakeboarding cake courtesy of Renee :-)

Then on the 13th Olivia turned 6 and had a few of the girls in her class over after school for a party.

Hooray for Olivia!

the birthday girl with her butterfly cake

playing pass-the-parcel

and pin the tail on the donkey

one spoilt girl!

On Saturday the 17th we had a BBQ dinner party with friends and family to celebrate Dad and Mum's 35th wedding anniversary. It was a perfect autumn's evening for it - no wind and not too hot or cold. The company was lovely and the food delicious.

Renee and Ingrid put together a photo board displaying
some memories over the past years

check out my trendy Mum and Dad!
not sure who the lady with the long hair is...

Oom Michael, Dad, Annette and Damon

Devon was quite obsessed with this chair all night

enjoying each others company in
Paul and Ingrid's beautiful gardens

the men cooking up a storm

Then on Monday the 19th we could celebrate our 7th anniversary and Devon's 3rd birthday!

he got a drill set and lawn mower and the trampoline was a present
for both their birthdays

a front end loader from Opa and Oma

a toy bin, golf clubs and colouring book from Anya and Damon

gardening stuff from Nanna, Pop and Rosie

hip hip hooray for Devon
Don't you love his shirt? Viv painted it for his birthday

and a close up of his cake - I had some fun using my new piping kit

and the birthday boy with all his presents

for dinner we got takeaway and went down to the park to eat it
They have a cool flying fox there which we had fun on...

On the 23rd Renee turned 18 and Courtney turned 6 so the following Saturday we went to Rockingham foreshore for a get together

sisters with the birthday girl - Charlene had to work
We also got told that morning the very special news that Paul and Ingrid are expecting
a baby in October! So there's actually 3 pregnant women on this photo :-)

and the men: Rod, Paul, Marcel, Justin and Damon

and just a picture of the little bag I sewed for Courtney's birthday

Monday, February 27, 2012

30!

Happy birthday to me :-)

Seeing as my birthday fell on a Saturday and in my pregnant state I can't fit much in at night, I decided to celebrate my birthday with a buffet breakfast! On the menu was bacon and eggs, pancakes, muffins, apricot danishes, muesli, yoghurt and fruit - delish!

I forgot to charge my camera battery the night before (something I usually always check!) so I didn't manage to get many photos of everyone, but here's a few anyway. Thankfully I still had a film in my SLR camera that had been in there for over a year, so we took a few pics on that one too and so finished the film.

Paul and Ed chatting, Rod, Justin feeding Damon, Quint and Paul catching up

Bruce, Renier, Marleen, Sarah, Renee, Ingrid & Charlene (on the wall)
Oom Jaap chatting to Dad vdS and Roseanne

ze cook and brother Paul

with all my lovely sisters
(Charlene's not really that tall - she's standing on a rock!)

At night we went to Fremantle with Dad and Mum vdS (who were staying at our house - they had to see the doctor up here again) and Rose. We checked out the boats and ships at the wharf and then had fish 'n' chips for tea at South Beach.

The camping chair and straightener were from Olivia and Devon, nice serving tray and piping kit from the van der Schaaf's, a book on Hebrews and a subscription to 'Practical Parenting' from the van der Veen's, a hanging basket and plant from Andrew and Marleen, a novel from Bruce and Sarah, set of yellow lanterns from Quint and Bertha, hooks from John and Hanna and the metal heart memo clip thing from Paul and Heidi (lying down so you can't really see it)

spoilt rotten!

beautiful standing mirror from my wonderful hubby :)

Saturday, February 11, 2012

Fonty's Pool

From Thursday the 26th till Monday the 30th of January, we enjoyed a lovely long weekend away with the van der Veen side of the family to celebrate Dad and Mum's 35th anniversary, which they hope to remember on the 11th of March.

We went to a caravan park called Fonty's Pool just out of Manjimup, which is about 300km south of us. The 'pool' is actually more like a dam, its fed by a stream, so it's nice fresh water, but still quite murky. We had nice hot weather Thursday, Friday and Saturday, so we made the most of the cool pool.

Thursday...