Travel Tuesday: Fairytales Are True guest post

Hello blogettes, and blogbros. Does that sound cool, or what?  Anyway, before I go off an a tangent, I must introduce you to the beautiful Sarah from Fairy Tales Are True. This lovely lady gets to spend time with her hunk-of-a-husband as he gets jet-setted around the world. He is a professional baseball player. Lucky, lucky, you're so lucky.

Sarah has faced a number of adversities in her life, but she has never given up! She is truly inspiring and gives one courage and hope to live on everyday. 

Today, she will fill you guys in on the Wonders of Switzerland. And go check out her blog, she just got a layout makeover!

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Hello there!

I'm Sarah Tucker. 

I currently live in Switzerland.

The land of heidi braids, yodeling, alps and cheeeeese.

cheese is a main food group here.  

as it should be.

We've been able to travel a lot in Europe since being here.

thank you easyjet and ryanair for making it so affordable.

But I ADORE Switzerland.

It's simple here. 

The people, happy. The food, organic. The trains, on time. The landscapes, breathtaking.

I'm idealising as only an outsider can, but I like what I've seen so far.

hiking in Wasserfallen!

boating in Spiez.

castle de chillon in Montreaux

you must pet a Swiss cow (:

their parks are gorrrrgeous

the alps aren't bad either...

a different beer for every Swiss town

Vespas all around

the sort of thing you see on the train in some teeny tiny town

always making time for a Swiss treat.

Soooo...

come visit me?

i promise southern hospitality in Switzerland.

it doesn't get much better i tell ya.

see y'all soon.

xxoo

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Isn't she a treat? Go check her out

A moment, A love, a dream aloud

Sweet disposition,
Never too soon.

I learned something hard this weekend. No matter how sweet your life's disposition may seem, no matter how happy you are with your boyfriend, husband, house, dog, family, pizza or chocolate, life can still hit you with a curve ball. One that hits you in your stomach and blows the essence of life out of you. One that brings you to your knees and sends tears streaming down your face.

I learned that no matter how young you are, you should never take anything for granted. Every breath you take should be a tribute to God, for giving you strength, health, love, family and friends.


Oh, reckless abandon,
Like no ones watching you.

I learned that you should grab every moment with reckless abandon, you shouldn't worry about the latest fashions, the shiniest car, the biggest house. You shouldn't worry about what other people think about you, but live your life as it was planned for you and live your life like no one's watching you.

Songs of desperation,
I played them for you.

I learned that one of my best friends, a 24-year old girl, who had a hysterectomy two months ago, as a result of a very aggressive cancer, has gone into relapse. During the hysterectomy, the cancer was reduced to 1 cm. Small enough to treat quickly.


I learned that her cancer has grown four times the size, and has filled the hole left in her barren abdomen. She is now seeking alternative treatment, that is far beyond her financial reach. She has no medical aid, her parents are both pensioners as they had her at a very late age. I learned that she started a fund. If you think you can help her, check it out here.

A kiss, a cry,
Our rights, our wrongs.

I learned that I have never cried about someone as much as I have cried about my friend. I learned that you should appreciate the life you have and pray that your future is filled with health. I learned that praying is the mightiest thing and that God can achieve anything. You can help her by praying with me.

Phuza Thursday: Something special

Hello lovely people who like to read my blog everyday! I have a special surprise for you today, a guest post! Yay! But before we cross over to the very pretty mommy Haley from Life is Sweet, I though that I would give you some insider information to Phuza Thursdays. 

Did you know that it doesn't necessarily have to be an alcoholic drink? And that it can be anything from goat's milk to coconut juice? Blegh. That doesn't sound very nice. What does sound nice is this yummylicious recipe Haley is dishing up today!

Get your blenders ready! Go!

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Hi there Second Floor Living readers!!

 Megan was so sweet to invite me to share with you a favourite drink of mine.
 I was inspired by this recipe...I love smoothies.
 They're a breakfast, an after workout snack, and a dessert! This one has healthy carbs, antioxydants, and some great protein too...
and and it tastes awesome.

Win-win :)

Very Berry Tropical Smoothie

Ingredients:

2 cups frozen fruit...I used mangos, blueberries, & strawberries

1 cup coconut milk (I get the Silk brand...you can also use almond milk)

1 cup greek yogurt (Greek Gods honey flavor is A-MAZING)

Optional: sweeten with Truvia or Splenda

Directions:

Toss fruit in blender, pour coconut milk and add yogurt on top...blend!! If it's too thick: add coconut milk (little additions). If it's too thin: add frozen fruit.

ENJOY!!!!

Then sip it with your sweetheart, or your girl friend.

What is it about sharing food with the people you love that makes it taste even better? :)

Thanks again for having me Megan!! Happy Thursday Eve everyone!

xo,

Haley
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Now go check out sweet, sweet Haley's blog.

Happy Phuza Thursday.

Oh, and when drinking something stronger than smoothies, please don't drive. Ever.

My bucket List

I have been seeing quite a few bucket lists on some of the blogs I follow and I really love the idea of having certain milestones you would like to achieve before saying goodbye to the world. This led me to think long and hard about the things I would really like to achieve, things I want to witness, be a part of, aspire to.

I think that my bucket list will serve as a little reminder of things I have to work for everyday. I am terrible with budgets and saving money, it's there to spend isn't it? But having a bucket list might just inspire me to start saving money each month so that I can do the things on there.

Check out what I want to achieve right here:

I am also putting the button in the sidebar, so that you guys can check up on what I have achieved in the coming months and years.

What do you aspire to? What are some of the things that you would like to achieve?

When we are motivated by goals that have deep meaning, by 
dreams that need completion, by pure love that needs 
expressing, then we truly live life.
 - Greg Anderson

Travel Tuesday: The lion sleeps tonight

I went through the rest of the photos of our trip to the Lion Park, and thought that these are just to pretty not to share.

A game ranger once told me that giraffes are like nature's version of a woman, inherently curious. This proved true at the game park. This giraffe followed our truck all the way to the gate and stuck his head inside the canopy a few times.

It was much to the delight of the few foreigners that were also on the truck. They squealed every time the giraffe came close. I'm surprised that the giraffe didn't freak out, but it's probably so used to humans and their reactions by now.

They are truly beautiful creatures and just makes me think about how great our God is for creating such majestic animals!

Is this offensive?

The other day I was in Melville and as I was driving along, I came across this sign.

At first I thought that this is damn offensive and had a chat with my friends on the topic the following day. It went like this:

Me: So guys, I came across this sign in Melville and it warned you to look out for blind people. It's offensive!
Friend 1: No, it's not! They're blind, they can't see it!
Me: That's even more offensive!
Friend 2: Maybe there's a lot of blind people in the area and they walk around a lot.
Me: Yeah, I looked around, there were no old age homes or houses for the visually impaired, so it just doesn't figure.
Friend 1: Maybe there are just a lot of people that are blind and live in the area? And it's not offensive.
Me: Well, I can see and I find it offensive. I wouldn't even want to know how angry I would be if I were blind.
Friend 1 & 2: You wouldn't be able to see it, you're blind!

This conversation went on quite a while, and it kind of went in circles. It was actually quite funny and I find the sign funny, but somehow, not right. The same happened when I questioned braille in the lifts. But, what do you think, offensive or not?

Phuza Thursday: Mojito

Yesterday was voting day in Saffa, and it saw millions of people flock to the ballots to cross their t's and dot their i's. Hopefully most of them made the right choice to save us from the derelict, corrupt and pathetic ruling party we have at the moment. But enough of the politics shmolitics, let's move on to Phuza Thursday.

I have decided to make it an official feature on my blog. So every Thursday, will now be known as Phuza Thursday! And I even designed a little banner. Do you like it?

Seeing as yesterday was a public holiday, we had a chance to chill midweek! Oh my, I wouldn't mind if every week had a middle-of-the-week-day-off! What an awesome world that would be!

Flip's parents came over, and we braaied a snoek. The word braai (plural braaie) is Afrikaans for barbecue or grill. And snoek is an edible fish that is native to South African, South American and Australian waters. It is a silvery and oily fish, traditional to the Cape. 

Snoek

&

Salad

Now that the formalities are over, I can move on to the fun stuff! We had such a good day off and got to enjoy a few drinks.


Although I had mostly g&t's and Blakes & Doyle, which is an apple cider drink, I thought I would give you guys the recipe to one of my favourite cocktails. I seem to like drinks that tastes more like cooldrink than alcohol.

What's this drink you may ask? A mojito! It sounds so sinful. And partyish. Ole! 

I'm sure everyone knows the basic ingredients to make this delicious drink, but you might as well now know how to make it. So here's a recipe:


Ingredients for Mojito cocktail recipe:

2 tsp brown sugar
6-8 mint leaves
club soda
1 lime, halved
2 oz light rum
mint sprig for garnish

In a cocktail glass, crush mint leaves with simple syrup. Add ice and rum, finally on top spill carbonated water. Garnish with a sprig of fresh mint. And you're done! Enjoy your cocktail!

Enjoy Phuza Thursday!

Travel Tuesday: Lions!

The beau and I recently had our one year anniversary of being in a relationship and I wanted to spoil him. So we drove to the other side of Joburg to the Lion Park! Oh my! It's a game reserve, almost in the city!

We went on a game drive, got to play with the cubs, fed a giraffe and had such a great day!

To my love, I would like to say: Thank you for one amazing year together! You have shown me what real, true love is and you have guided me in so many ways. My heart is forever yours.

Zebra!

Here follows a little story. This is all true. The lions really spoke to each other.

Hey Mike, close your legs!

But why?

Because this happens when Megan is near

Amateurs!

That's so embarrassing. I can't look. 

Here ends the little story.

Chewy, sexy foot! Om nom nom

It was so much fun!

Dogs, clouds, roses

It was my faja's birthday last week Thursday, but we only had time to go say 'Happy Aging to you' yesterday. And instead of taking photos of the proceedings, I took photos of other stuff such as dogs, flowers and clouds.

At her most beautiful

An English Rose

His present

The faja (taken at an earlier occasion)

In anticipation of a small round object.

Flip always jokes that my dog's wheel alignment is out when she's running. Her hind legs are trying to overtake her front legs, it's very amusing, but very sad, because she has arthritis and it can't be helped. She also topples over when she runs after her ball. But otherwise she's still fit as a fiddle! And she's an ancient 11!

On another note, I was sitting on the couch this morning, drinking coffee, chewing a rusk and watching iCarly when the whole world started shaking! It was an earthquake! I soon phoned everyone, this means my friend Tracy who lives close by, and my beau whose work is about three blocks away from the flat, to ask if they felt it too. Nope. No one felt it. 

Am I crazy? And no-one else at work felt it. Maybe it was a mine that had caved in? Maybe I had a brain tremor and everything around me shook, but that wouldn't explain the couch vibrating, my coffee looking like a typhoon in a cup or the tv nearly shaking of its stand. Mmmm...  

On a final note: I was very angry at blogger for bugging out. Made me lose one post and quite a few comments. Boo on you! But all is forgiven, because blogger is back. Yeah baby! 

Have a happy Monday! 

Two birds came along

Once upon a time there was a girl. She liked making things with her hands, she discovered, and she decided to pursue this like. It had taken many forms in her life, ideas that would sometimes be too big for her brain and hands to comprehend and were given up halfway, such as the extra art classes in high school.

There is a legend that this girl once asked her mother to sketch her grade 8 art projects for her, only to help her pass, and that the girl failed a class project when asked to draw a twig with leaves (no help from her mother there, and it also resulted in a big red cross across the page, a large encircled zero and the teacher using this girl's sketch as a perfect example of how one must not draw.) This, however, is not a legend, it's my story. I often try to take on projects that I know for the life of me I will never finish...

And last week I showed off my perfect little strawberry. I say its perfect, so it is!

This had a couple of my friends begging, nay merely asking, that I create some creatures for them. This is the result:

It's not superman

Hoot hoot

Instead of Travel Tuesday I want...

A little bit of a blog discussion. Unfortunately, I am not able to bring you Travel Tuesday today, but I would like to give my two cents.


Last night I watched an HBO special: Lady Gaga's Monster Ball at Madison Square Garden. No doubt this woman is a powerhouse, packed with an incredible voice, amazing dancing skills and great onstage personality, except for the parts where she kept on wailing about how uncool she was in school and how everyone said she'll never make it. Yeah we know your sob story by now, get over it.

But something was just not right. I found it very disturbing.
Yes, she is supposed to have the shock factor and leave you with a few moments with your mouth hanging open, that's part of her stage persona, but I felt uneasy. I felt guilty watching it.

The opening scene of the show saw her wearing goat-like shoes. Disturbance number one.
Further, she said that she has no religion, but that she believes in Jesus Christ, which with later revelation, is her guitarist. That is blasphemous in my eyes.

Now, don't think that I'm a closed minded gimp that believes the rumours that she is the Antichrist and that she is a satanist or something like that. I don't believe it. When she got off the stage you could see a different side to her, and she greeted her dad who was backstage as 'daddy'. She's a good person.

What I do think, is that she is trying to shock the world so much, that she is misleading it entirely. And I don't like this. Maybe she should give the shock factor a rest for now. She is at the peak of her music career, and people love her. I am not saying she should give up on the brilliantly crazy outfits, but maybe just quit bringing religion into her shows or even songs.

What do you think?

Wow, that was quite a heavy post. So on another note, I watched Grey's Anatomy: The Musical last night. At first I cringed. I thought ugh, this sucks. But then I started to appreciate the talent of the actors, all being able to sing and dance and the raw emotion that some of them portrayed and I started enjoying it. And Owen's voice completely bowled me over. That man can sing.

Google just made my Monday!

Happy Birthday Mr Hargreaves!

Today is the birthday of Mr Men & Little Miss creator Ron Hargreaves and to celebrate, Google designed these lovely little logo's for the day and it made my day! I loved the books and the show when I was younger, and they still make me smile.

Little Miss Sunshine

Mr Dizzy

Mr Happy

Mr Rush

Mr Messy

Aren't they the sweetest?