Raising Men at home. Sometimes. Well, mostly on Saturdays. Sort of.

This was a good weekend, which pretty much started on Thursday with interesting twists, friends, &Union and a hotel. On Friday I got home to my brother Paul’s arrival -and Kat too! The weekend was a rush of photo shoots, garden parties, dinners, lunches, mini trips, presents,  friends, visits and those two gorgeous boys that inhabit/rule the Raising Men residence. I fell in love with Kalk Bay & St James all over again. Octopus’ Garden is my new favourite kids and family lunch venue but I’ll talk about that another time. It’s been incredible having my brother here, and the boys are really enjoying him too.

On Saturday Noah and Benjamin were out, so Paul and a few friends came over. I made ‘photo shoot cocktails’ – vodka, cranberry: orange juice, red bull, fresh mint & chopped strawberries. We put on some 50s rock and really had so much fun taking these pictures. I made a nice little lunch of whole wheat rolls with camembert; red pesto; rocket; basil; cream cheese and avo – I really am really good at making sandwiches guys. Really! Seeing these pictures made me feel so proud of Paul – he is a good photographer with buckets of talent and energy. I have always been an insecure person when it comes to my appearance, so it was really nice to play and pose and see such a fun and beautiful result.

I don’t talk about this a lot, but when I was younger I had really bad skin (a nice little family heirloom if you will)... From about 15 to 21 I spent a lot of time on antibiotics, receiving treatments, acupuncture, reoccutanne. It's still a problem here and there, but manageable. My hair is naturally curly and in KZN it was pretty darn frizzy too. Having kids did weird things to my body ; I gained and (sort of) lost 20 kg with each pregnancy. I do sound a bit whiny lately, I realise.

So one day I’ll be old. One day I’ll be reading this when I’m in my sixties or seventies -when my appearance will be completely different. I’ll look at these pictures and say “You stupid girl, you were in your 20s and ‘gorgeous’  and all you did was complain!” My dad has this little saying for almost everything in life: “When you’re hot, you’re hot. When you’re not: Fake it!”

I am however, really proud of these pictures. I’m no Cindy Crawford, but I’m the best that I can be. Also, I sort of think that I look really beautiful here. This is what I wanted... Natural, easy going and fun with a little bit of sensuality and femininity. Thank you Paul x