Rosy Lady

Mother's Day

Last Sunday was Mother's Day in the UK.  My first mother's day, I felt so blessed.  We went for a lovely breakfast and as it was a sunny day, all I wanted to do was to have a walk in the park with hubby and our baby.  Spring has come early in the UK and I am loving every moment.

I am so glad that we took the camera and tripod along.  Hubby set the timer and then had to run like the wind to get into the shot on time while we try to look 'normal'.  It was quite funny and a lot of fun.

Of course I couldn't resist to take lots of photos of my little petal amongst the spring florals.

Isla slept through everything but, I don't mind :)

Hope all the mummy's (to my American readers, yes that's how we spell mom in the UK and South Africa) have had a lovely day.  I find myself copying my mum in many things that I do or say with my baby.  It makes me realize how important is the example that we set to our children, even in our parenting.  Hope I can be as good a mum to my daughter (and one day influence her parenting) as my mum was and still is to me.  I love you Mum and thank you for everything.

My parents still live in South Africa and I miss them dearly but they have continued to support and offer guidance to me via Skype.  It has been a way for me to show them Isla even if she always seems to be asleep.

I also got my first mother's day card and hubby completed it as though it was from Isla.  So special.

Thank you mummy's angel. xx

xx

My Custom Kicks

I bought these Converse trainers/sneakers/tekkies about two years ago with the intention to paint on them but, never got round to them and eventually forgot about it.  That was until I got the book Small Stash Sewing by Melissa Averinos from the yummygoods blog.  In the book, Melissa showed a pattern to make shoelaces from fabric and I just had to give it a go.  I wrote a bit more about Melissa and her book here when I recently met her in London.

I did not plan the painting as I just wanted to paint freely and see what happens.  I am pretty happy with the result even if it is a very colourful and hippie-like.  If you know me by now, in my world, colour is good.

Once I've finished the hand painting on the one shoe, I had to replicate it on the other.  Once the shoes were done, I made the shoelaces according to Melissa's instructions which were very clear and it turned out to be a quick and easily little project.

 

xx  

 

Birthday bliss

It is my birthday today.  I have had a lovely day with various cards and texts from family and an early phone call from my parents.  Hubby took me out for lunch and to see a film.  We saw Letters to Juliet which was right up my alley.

We came home to find two beautiful bouquets.  One from my brother-in-law and sister-in-law:

And, the biggest bouquet of roses from my parents-in-law:

While I'm showing you some flowers, I also wanted to show you these:

  

I picked them up for less than a fiver when we got back from Hawaii and since then, the orchid has been blooming his little heart out with no effort on my part.

Hope you've had a good day too.

xx 

Amish quilts and flowers at the de Young museum

I convinced Hubby to go to the de Young museum with me where they had an exhibition of Amish quilts.  I was ecstatic to find that they also had a flower show on the day that we went :)

 

You were greeted with this arrangement in the entrance:

Taking a closer look, I loved it:

Ribbons in various shades of pinks and purple  with orchids attached to some of the ends.  Looking up, it was wonderful to see the light streaming through.

A few of the other bouquets to see: 

 

It was wonderful to see the Amish Quilts but unfortunately, we were not allowed to take photos.

      

You can get a great view of the city from the top floor of the museum.

   

We had a brief moment in the Botanical Gardens.

 

We did not have enough time to explore all the gardens in the Golden Gate Park, I would've loved to walk around the Japanese tea gardens but, we only had time for a quick peek through the gates.

Afterwards we walked for what felt like miles through the city until we found a bus that took us half way back to our hotel.  Funny how things always look like walking distance on a map :)  Oh well, I did enjoy the opportunity to see more of the city on foot and to enjoy the architecture. 

xx

  

Sunrise on Haleakala

We were picked up from our hotel at 3 a.m. to go and observe the sunrise on Haleakala which means House of the sun.  Haleakala is a dormant volcano on Maui.  It is huge: 6.99 miles (11.25 km) across, 2.0 mi (3.2 km) wide, and some 2,600 ft (790 m) deep.

We did the tour with Polynesian Adventure Tours.  We found a great spot and then observed in awe as the beauty of nature unfolded.

 

It was freezing cold, but so amazing to look down on the clouds as the sun slowly raised his sleepy head.

Slowly the clouds moved away to reveal the rim of the crater. 

The silversword plant only grows on top of Haleakala.  It has been an endangered specie since 1922.

 

We even spotted a rainbow on our way back down.

We also had an unexpected stop where I had the opportunity to admire various protea varieties.

      

I loved the vibrant colours of the bougainvillea.

     

 

xx

Road to Hana

We had an early morning start for our escourted excursion to drive the road to Hana.  We went with Polynesian Adventure Tours.

We had a quick breakfast stop overlooking the ocean before we started our road trip.  The rain started to come down with force and determination and I have to admit that I started to wonder if this was such a great idea.  The road to Hana is known as a spectacular drive but, also a dangerous drive with lots of twists and turns, narrow roads, waterfalls, bridges and cliff edges.

 

As it turned out, our drive was very experienced and careful while the rain made for the most beautiful waterfalls and rainbows.  Yes we got soaking wet, but throughout our holiday Hawaii has given us the perfect weather for each occasion.  It was so beautiful and I felt so blessed to be there.

The rain water formed various little waterfalls as the water poured down the mountain.

A black sand beach.

We had an unexpected stop that was a lovely little bonus.

      

The rain stopped to catch it's breath while I was given a moment to indulge in the beauty of this island.

We passed the property of various celebrities including Oprah Winfrey.     

We had one last stop on this tour at a winery and a ranch store.  I spotted these flowers and thought they were plastic until I touched them.  They are real!

        

We got back just in time for another glorious sunset.

xx    

Last day on the Big Island

By this time we have been going non-stop and the tiredness really started to set in so, we decided to spend our last day on the Big Island by relaxing at the hotel in the morning and then browsing some local shops in the afternoon.

We had the most amazing dinner at Sansei a very popular seafood restaurant.  They are on some of the other islands as well and I cannot recommend them high enough (this is coming from someone who is fussy when it comes to fish and seafood).

       

We had the chef's selection which, had plenty of tasters of various dishes that I wouldn't normally have tried and I would therefore have missed out big time.  Everything was tasty and cooked to perfection.

We finished the day with a walk on the beach.  The sand was soft like flour under our toes and the ocean was warm as it pushed out over our feet and the path back to the hotel was pitch black which meant we had to feel-feel our way back in the dark but, what an amazing time we were having.  Not once did we worry about anything.  Hubby never complained about any pain (except a bit of sunburn).  It really started to feel like a new chapter in our lives after the two years of cancer worries.  We experienced so much, we laughed so much, we ate so much and we loved it all so very much.  Next stop:  Maui.

xx  
 

Oahu Part 2: Diamond Head Farmer's market

I could not resist attending the farmer's market near Diamond Head crater and was not disappointed.  

I met this lady who has a nursery on Oahu and she 'breeds' different varieties of hibiscus.  We had an interesting chat and then she said I could pick a flower from the ones above.  A difficult decision but, I settled on this one:

Of course it was immediately placed above my left ear.

There were lots of flowers that I've never seen before:

Did you notice the detail on the leaves? Very creative.

         

And, a few more familiar ones:

I loved the casual use of Hawaiian textiles everywhere.

After some lemonade, we were ready (or so we thought) to hike up Diamond Head crater.

I will spare you the photos of my red face, it was a good climb and totally worth it (but I wouldn't do it again).  

 

 
Little did I know what was waiting as we climbed all the way to the top.

The view over Honolulu and Waikiki beach.  

Sharing a shaved ice with Hubby.  It certainly went down well.

xx              

Oahu Part 1: Flowers everywhere

The first thing that I noticed when we got to Oahu was that there were flowers everywhere.

Orchids grow in abundance in gardens, pots and in trees.  So many varieties and colours.

The Plumeria was also full in bloom everywhere.

We saw the hibiscus in so many different colours.

We saw so many different types of flowers that it is not possible to do one post about it all so, I will have to add a few more over the next few posts.  But, I wanted to share how I noticed that the flowers everywhere translated into everything else.  Like the public phone booths:

The shops:

We were wearing floral clothes.  Hubby is now the proud owner of several 'aloha shirts', while I loved wearing a flower above my left ear everyday.  Wearing the flower on the left indicates that you're not available, but wearing it on the right shows that you are single.

I could not resist adding flowers to my nails too:

xx             

Aloha!

Thank you for your patience while I went off to have the holiday of a lifetime.  

 

We had the most amazing time in Hawaii (Oahu, the Big Island and Maui) and San Francisco.  Just when we thought it was all coming to an end, we had an unexpected week long extension in San Francisco due to the volcanic ash over Europe.  We definitely needed the extra time in this beautiful city.  We got back on Monday and have been straight back to work.  We have both needed the last few days to process all the amazing experiences we've had and to get over the jet-lag.  SF is 8 hours behind the UK and Hawaii a further 3 hours so, I am wide awake at night and want to sleep in the day.  But, let's skip the boring stuff.  I hope you wouldn't mind, but I would love to share some of our holiday photos with you over the next few posts, I have been so inspired.  If you have followed my blog for a while, you will know that I love color, flowers, nature, my husband, sunshine and good food so, as you can imagine, Hawaii was right up my alley.  

I fell in love with Oahu the day that we arrived.  It was a warm sunny day, the people were friendly, we were greeted with a Lei (the floral necklace), everywhere I looked was vivid colors, flowers and the blue of the ocean, oh, it was sO blue!  That's when all the stress and worries from the last two years just melted away.  I felt a little teary eyed as I thought how we always wanted to visit Hawaii together, how that almost did not happen for us, and then felt incredibly blessed and humbled to stand on our hotel balcony and overlook Waikiki. 

I hope you will join me as I relive our journey and capture the memories that I never want to forget and all the design inspiration from these wonderful islands.

  

I hope life has treated you kindly?

xx