thenewsindisosdiary: April 2016

Colourful But Muted

By sindisosdiary.com - 04:40

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Reflection 1: Importance Of Having Time To Yourself

By sindisosdiary.com - 23:00

Reflection and Solitude should be a part of every being seeking to be a better version of themselves. This year I am making it a habit to include reflection and solitude moments as I do a life and lifestyle audit. Finding time when juggling family, work and life is a challenge but I try to do this at least once a week or whenever I can. We are living in times where it is easy to lose focus of what is important due to the competitive nature of humans and the love for finer things. No one can honestly say that they have not looked at that one person next to them and wished if only some part of their life was like theirs. I am guilty of this because the more I feast on social media, the more I think of things and ways to change my life. Not that I do it with the intention of being like them, but doing it to make me feel good inside. Some of these things honestly are meaningless and don’t even hold any weight to what I have going well in my life.

With having some Sindy time, I am realizing more and more that I am maturing spiritually and emotionally too. I can differentiate the needs from the wants. During this time of which is normally an hour or 2, I keep my phones at bay and just be alone, yes alone away from everyone and my usual distractions. My journaland pen become my most cherished and priced possessions. Having a moment of solitude should be something that everyone invests in. Don't you want to know what good you are doing and what you should be working on? I am sure your friends and family can help you identify areas of improvement if you cannot do it on your own.

On this particular day, the weather was gloomy but perfect enough for some alone time. There was this beautiful bench overlooking Brenton On Sea Town. It is unfortunate I did not take pictures of this beautiful place just off Sedgefield and before Knysna Town; hopefully you can still see a snippet of it on some of the pictures. The view was breathtakingly beautiful and peaceful too. The water was also as blue as the clouds.

3 Main Reasons why we all need to have some alone time:

Perspective- You can see where you are in your life and what is working well for you. In all honest truth you cannot progress in life when you do not know what it is you must work on; and how much harder or what more you need to work on in order to get there (your desired space/place)

Vision– Where you would like to be. Be it in your relationships, work and personal development. With this in mind, you will know what you need to weed out of your life because it will hold you back in your progress

Goal – What you need to have and do to get to your vision. You can even track your progress and if the same goal you had in the beginning is still relevant today

I hope you have enjoyed this piece. So I am finally committing to having 2 posts in a week. New posts will be published every 3-4 days from date of the latest post.

Outfit Details

Cardigan: Jet Store

Dress: Jet Store

Stockings(Extra Sheer): Woolworths

Shoes: The Fix formerly known as Fashion Express

Bag: Dune London

Scarf: Pick n Pay Clothing

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African Blogger

It Is Continued...... What went down this weekend through pictures

By sindisosdiary.com - 22:10

First let me apologize for the sudden hiatus. Sometimes life happens and you have little to no time to sit down and to think or do even certain things. When this happens, it is a sign for me to take a break and just go and unwind, resting without influences of our social media etc. The only thing I or we do around this time is to just reconnect. Well at least that was the plan!

This past weekend, on the 17th of April 2016 was our 4^th year wedding anniversary. Yeah it sounds surreal as I think of it. Sometimes we take for granted the blessings that we have until you see your own life through someone else's eyes. I often ask those closest to me to help me understand the stage I am in and many a times they come up with a different perspective than what I actually see for myself. This series is basically a diary I am documenting for my kids and grand kids which they can download and cherish forever. I will be documenting it at different and significant stages in my life.

So how did we end up at this point where we are celebrating 4 years of marriage? I am taking it back 5 or 6 years back… As mentioned in my previous post, Benjamin and I just hit it off hey, lol. I remember having a conversation with him about meeting my late mother in law. I plainly refused because to me it was a little too soon. I did not really know how to react to him wanting to introduce me to his mom at that point. We were only a few months into our relationship. For me you needed to be in a serious relationship for at least 2 years or so in order for you to meet the parents. For him to ask me was unheard off. For months I refused. One day he said to me that his mom was asking him if he was actually seeing someone or just making it up so that she does not bother him about it anymore.

One day as we were driving back home to Phalaborwa, of which he normally drops me off at my house (mom's house in this case), he changed the direction and said lets pass by his house (ours now J) because he needed to go switch on the lights seeing it was already dark. At this time I had been on the road for about 9 hours, I was tired so I was not up for going back and forth over this minor delay. I had been travelling since midday that day, from Mafikeng to Kempton Park, then he came to pick me up and we started our journey to Phalaborwa. I was at my Kempton Park place for 10 minutes at the most, dropping off clothes I came back with from Mafikeng and packing my weekend bag. Me being me, I could not deny him that as I was too tired to fight it off and he had been a gentleman enough to wait for me and give me a free ride to my family home.

Normally my late mother in law would leave the house on Fridays when we were coming back home to go to hers in the village. On that particular day they had planned this story of closing the windows and switching lights on together just so she could meet me. He basically told his mom that I thought it was too early to meet me blah blah blah… He asked me to come into the house with him and we'll be quick. He will start in the bedrooms and switch the lights on the passage and I can close the lounge windows etc and we’ll be done in no time. It made sense right? You can imagine the shock of my life when I got to the lounge. I wanted to turn back but I was already in and he was standing behind me. My mother in law was sitting there smiling the whole time. She was listening to us the whole time planning how we’ll do it and be out in no time, i.e. about switching the lights on and closing the windows (get your mind out of the gutter joking). At that point I noticed that the windows were already closed, the light in the bathroom was on. It was basically deliberate that the passage light was off so that it would seem as if there was no one in the house.

In a nutshell, that is how I got to meet my late mother in law. It was a nerve wrecking yet beautiful experience. She welcomed me into her life and I got to know her for a period of 2 more years before God asked for one of his angels back. I do miss her dearly because I wish I had spent more time with her. Through her, I got to know more about my dear hubby and what makes him tick or mad. Through her I got to picture my life with a Maenetja man… And now I am living what she said to me years ago with her son, my bestfriend and confidant.

My Outfit Details

Dress: Marion Hall Edgars

Scarf: Mr Price

Sneaks: Woolworths

Lipstick: D for Danger by Mac

His Outfit Details

Hat: Harkerville Saturday Market (Plettenburg bay)

Shorts: Truworths

T-Shirt: Lacoste

Place

Beach in Plettenberg bay, Western Cape

Gosh this is going to be a 100 page book by the time I get to the 2016 Anniversary day story lol. I hope you will stick around to read more of what it basically takes to be where I am at today… Thanks for stopping by. I hope you have enjoyed this story as much as I did writing it.

Please leave your comments below with what more you would like to read in the next one. Love you all…

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African Fashion Blogger

South Africa Today, What Is Your Take On It?

By sindisosdiary.com - 05:25

These are trying times for South Africa and the future looks bleak for some of us. You cannot ignore what is happening to our political landscape and hope that is will just disappear. The political and economic scene of our country is scary to say the least. We have a party which we elected in good faith that it will forever uphold the standards and needs of the people very high and also protect the constitution no matter what. For a very long time we have always believed that no man is bigger than the constitution of our beloved country but more and more as the days go past we see that it is not so. I am so disappointed that what we were once made to believe to be is not the case. On the other hand, we have our trusted MPs protecting one man and the image of a party which is said to be of the people. This brings a question of what will it take for our leaders to stand for what is right than saving their own face!

We were not expecting our leaders especially our president to be perfect, but we at least expected him to be a man of integrity, honour and compassion. Writing this piece today I wish I could say otherwise about him. I was listening to some people on the train giving an analogy of what is happening now. One of them likened it to the story in the Bible where Jesus was crucified for doing good and everyone did so because they deemed him to be above all and he was not. Then the people chose to save a man who had committed so many evil deeds because they could not stand to face the truth of the change which was to come. They would rather live within the unhealthy and treacherous circumstances than do what is right. This was the choice made by our MPs when they chose to protect a man taking down our country to protect their wants and what they are currently getting from the corrupt deeds of our government. My plea to Mr President, like he so says in many of his speeches that he always has the best interest of this nation at heart, please do the right thing for the masses and step down. Stepping down does not mean he is a weak man, it simply means that he is a man not controlled by his ego and pride but a man willing to show his strength in a respectable way. We would all be proud that he at least had the guts to do the right thing at last.

This post might not reach the president or a lot of people but I hope there are many of us writing similar stories of the unjust of our leaders. Change must come and it must come today to protect the legacy of the people who fought for the freedom of this beautiful country and the continent of ours.

I have had to hold back on the planned posts for this week due to this post and the challenges my beloved country is currently going through. The country is running down the dumps very fast. Some may say that we are just complaining and being influenced by the western world to condemn and cry foul about our political stance today. That to me is showing that our own elected leaders are undermining us as a people and nation saying we cannot see and question the wrong doing in their part. Corruption comes and lives in so many forms. But does that mean we just turn a blind eye and not say anything?

Please note that the views in this post are my own unless stated otherwise. Thanks for stopping by. Do share your thoughts on the political and economic state of our country or continent or world as a whole.