Take me back to your house- my parent's garden

In between our jaunt to Asia and our current stay in the US we spent a couple of weeks visiting my parents in Hoedspruit, South Africa. Visits home are usually rushed and chaotic and ends up with me being frustrated, but this time we took it easy and stayed for 3 weeks. It's the longest I've been home in years and it was very well worth it. I may have mentioned in previous entries how our time was spent on creative pursuits like sewing (me) and sketching and painting (Alexander) as well as cooking for my family.

While we were there Alexander took a lot of pictures of the garden. As long as I can remember gardens were always big with my family. Both my parents grew up in homes where gardening was a popular hobby and it is something that they both actively pursue. I believe that starting our day having breakfast on the 'stoep' with our view of lush garden (thanks to some very late rains) contributed to our time there being a very memorable one.

The 'stoep', pictured above, is spacious with some trophy antlers from my grandfather, dad and brother and other bits hanging around. Our house is very popular with toads who try to nest inside, much to my mother's frustration (they attract snakes and messes a bit) but we befriended them. This one hung out on Alexander's leg for a bit.

My parents have several aloe species growing just beyond the garden as part of their nursery, they supply indigenous plants to gardens and businesses in the area. We also have a variety of avo trees growing around the garden, sadly they none were ripe for the picking while we were still there. The dam is a couple of steps from the home with nice views of the hills beyond. It's home to some colorful fish.

A quiet spot in the overgrown garden. I have no idea what most of the plants in the garden are, but I really like the dark purplish ones in the bottom left frame.

I don't think I'll ever live in a house with a garden as spacious as theirs, but I do hope that we have the chance to live somewhere someday to carry on their love of gardening.

Vintage family portraits

While at home just now (did I mention that we arrived in the US a couple days ago?) I spent a lot of time over at my maternal grandmother's house. She's in her eighties and my last grandparent still around. Alexander and I paged through some of her old albums and discovered some fantastic old pictures, mostly of her husband when he was a young man.

She entertained us with some stories of him during the second world war and of her teenage years. I decided to borrow her albums and scan some of the images and also discovered some old family pictures from my dad's side of the family. It was an incredible trip into my genetic heritage and family's past, seeing resemblances and hearing about events that took place long before my time again. It made me kind of sad too, I never got to know any of my other grandparents very well, so I missed out on a lot of their stories.

Here are some images so long. I might post some more as I sort through them.

My paternal grandfather is standing second from the right. I forget what the event was.

And here he is many years later as a young man, I inherited his names- Jean Bordeaux. He also went by Bordeaux, or Oupa Bordeaux for me. He passed away when I was 7 so I never really knew him. But apparently I inherited his preciseness.

His wife, Ouma Tille. I adored her, she instilled in me a love of reading and the piano. Sadly my elementary school piano teacher ruined it for me. I stopped playing as soon as I went to high school.

My maternal grandfather, Oupa Johannes. He was (is it okay if I say this?) an incredibly handsome man and I think he was well aware of it. I thought he did not like me as a kid, but later found out that he told my mom on his deathbed that I was his favorite. My grandmother also told me recently how he basically told her I was going to be gay and he was being very protective of me as a result.

Ouma Isabel. There are sadly not a lot of pictures of her when she was young. She's still alive and very busy, always sewing or gardening, baking and cooking. Her father spent time in a concentration camp during the South African wars, she was born in a simple adobe house and I can spend hours listening to her stories about my family.

Here is one of my father as a kid. Love-love-love the outfit. He was adorable I think and there are several pictures of him dressed up in the cutest little outfits. I suspect my grandmother always yearned for a girl.

And this is my mom as a baby girl. I had the same deep brow as a baby and now my nephew's got it too. You can also see my sister as a baby in this one. A really sweet baby pic of her.

And finally me. I believe this was on the day I was baptized. The dress was the one my paternal grandmother was baptized in as well as my father. We still have it, an incredible heirloom dating back to the 1910's. It is a long dress with lots of lace and mother of pearl buttons. Everything was handstitched. It is exquisite, my nephew will be baptized in it as well.

The Littlest Martin

I briefly mentioned in my previous entry about my brother and his wife who’s had a case of the babies. Their firstborn, who shares my names but will go by Jean like his grandfather, was born on March 10th, about two weeks earlier than expected.

At the moment he is just a tiny bundle of sleep and adorableness. Seriously, that is all he does, sleep and look cute. And weird. He most resembles a baby tortoise at this stage with very oddly shaped skinny legs and a long neck that stretches everywhere. He’s also good at pulling faces, mostly serious or very worried and occasionally he looks a bit grouchy.

I did not think I would be as affected by his presence in our family as I have been. I’m totally in love with him and just want to look at him all the time. Did I mention that babies are highly contagious? Alexander’s antidote is to remind me of the babies that traveled with us on our last international flight. That usually works. But don’t you think we’d make a cute family?

We have a few more days here and then we’re off to the States to go visit the other apple of my eye, Alexander’s niece Maddie, who we last saw early 2009 when she was only 18 months old, apparently she’s turned into quite a sassy and sometimes silly little girl, so I’m looking forward to spending lots of time with her and enjoying her antics. It will be sad though to say goodbye to my family as it will be quite some time before we come back here again, I guess by that time Jean will also be old enough to start acting silly and will be a little more fun that right now.


Kind of unrelated, it was my birthday just the other day (well-wishes welcome and check my I Desire pages if you want suggestions) and Alexander baked me the most amazing cake. It was a simple sponge cake with a delightfully light crunchy crust, a caramel filling and a chocolate ganache frosting. Slicing into the cake it oozed caramel and chocolate. Incredible!