Birthday Post

Hello again. It's been a while since I last posted here, so I thought I would give a quick round up of what's been happening in the last little while.

It was my birthday 2 weekends ago and I was lucky enough to have my parents and grandparents in Cape Town to celebrate with me. We stayed at Yellow Wood Cottage in Kleinmond and I'm sure we'll be back - there is tons of room and it's within walking distance of the sea, which is great! I managed to convince a few friends to come out to the cottage for a braai on the Saturday afternoon - it was so lovely to introduce newer friends to my family and have them re-connect with my older friends.

Birthday Lunch with the Family - thanks Dad for this pic!

On the Sunday we went for a stroll around the Harold Porter Botanical Gardens, in Betty's Bay and then headed off to Hermanus for a delicious lunch before heading back for a relaxed afternoon. After a simple dinner, Frosty and I said cheers and headed back to CT and the rest of the family got an early morning delayed-by-a-few-hours flight back to KZN later in the afternoon. The joys of delayed flights!

This last weekend, I used two of my birthday gifts. One of them a Table Mountain Cable Card, to take the Cable Car to the top of Table Mountain and then, once on top and away from the millions of people who had the same idea as us on a sunny winters day, I was able to use my Roberts App to play calls of the Orange Breasted Sunbird to get them to come close, which allowed me to get some awesome pics!

Pretty pink flowers on top of Table Mountain

We found a Rock Kestral too! He (she?) was in the middle of their meal.

Nestled safely in the rocks

Silhouette of a sunbird 

Male and female sunbirds perched on some dry fynbos

Checking out the competition

Yay for cool apps that bring birds close to you!

A quizzical look from this guy when he couldn't
see who was making such a noise.

Don't you just love the colours on this chap?

A rather uncomfortable looking pose!

These guys are everywhere on top of Table Mountain. 
If you keep your eyes peeled you'll see them!

I was stoked to get this one of him just leaving his perch!

View into Hout Bay - pity it was a hazy day, but still a pretty view.

Goldfish Bowls to Puddles

Hi everyone, I know I've been quiet lately, but I have a good excuse, I promise. I've been sick and didn't have the inclination to blog. Last Saturday felt like I had an entire large goldfish bowl, glooping it's way around my head, resulting in constant post-nasal drip and nose blowing and watery eyes. By Sunday, it had shrunk into a medium size goldfish bowl. The rest of this week I have been taking it easy which has helped. I'm now down to a teeny-tinny puddle and able to breathe through both nostrils again, yay!

I'm still busy finishing off the last Namibia post, so keep an eye out for that. It's also my birthday month. My parents and grandparents are coming to visit Cape Town over the time of my birthday so I'm looking forward to having them here!

In the mean-time here's a little pic of how my head felt on Saturday...Has anyone else felt like this recently? 

Practical Cookie Turns 1!

It's been a year since Practical Cookie first started. This is a major milestone. And when I mean major, I mean that I tried blogging in high school and stopped. I tried blogging in varsity and stopped. I tried blogging again in varsity and stopped again. Finally, when I was bored in the evenings in Benoni and Bokburg, I took to blogging as a way of keeping myself busy.

Now that I've moved back to Cape Town I'm no longer bored, however I find myself spending more and more time thinking about posts to share with you. Sometimes I don't post as often as I hope, but at the beginning of this year, I decided to try and post twice a week (or 8 times a month) and I think I've been sticking to that goal, more or less.

I've been told it's good to take stock every now and then, to assess where you've come from and where you're going. My 1 year of blogging seems as good a time as any to do this, so here's my list.

• Learnt: I had missed writing, until I started writing again. I like sharing my thoughts, pictures, recipes, random ramblings.
• Achieved: blogging more or less consistently for a whole year!
• Enjoy: planning my posts, sharing the places I've been, trying to figure out what path I want to take Practical Cookie.
• Future: Try to blog twice a week, do a bit more blog planning and have a few blog posts "on tap" at any one time.

My Practical Cookie mascot that I designed earlier this year!

I hope that you've enjoyed the journey as much as I have! If you want to keep up with my posts, feel free to go and like my Facebook page. Or follow me on Instagram.