Fourways Farmers Market

In the last couple of years, Johannesburg has really caught the outdoor market bug. It’s not surprising either, given that for too long, relaxing away from your home was basically either limited to walking up and down a mall, or otherwise taking quite a drive out of town. Now, places like Arts on Main, the Neighbourgoods Market and the Bryanston Organic Market are stepping into this gap, and doing it Jozi style!

A few Sunday’s ago, we packed the kids in the car and drove to Fourways to have lunch at what, at least in our opinion, may be one of the best of the markets - the Fourways Farmers Market. It is located opposite Montecasino and forms part of the Earth Outdoor Living Nursery. The nursery offers a spacious outdoor venue under big trees, and with bunting all over and hay bales scattered on the grass, it all works together to create a lovely, quaint country setting. The stalls offer organic and local produce and we were super impressed with the variety and quality on offer. Add to that the craft beer and bubbles, live music and the kiddies play area, and you have the recipe for a lovely ways to spend an morning in Johannesburg!

You can read more about the market here, or like their Facebook page.

Baby massage

For the past four weeks Emma and I attended a baby massage class once a week. I loved it!! Of the five senses, touch is the one that’s most developed at birth. Therefore it is not surprising to learn that this form of sensory stimulation has a long string of benefits. It relaxes the baby and can help with sleeping. It can ease digestion problems and teething pains, helps with muscle development and improves immunity. But the best part is the lovely bonding and closeness with the small little body. I felt empowered by this new skill and can recommend it to all the new moms out there. 

Below is a video clip from the local TV program, The Dr Mol Show, that shows Tina in her studio demonstrating how to massage your baby. She also explains the benefits for the baby.

You can read more about Tina’s Child centre on her website or Facebook page.

Hartebeespoort Cableway

It is school holidays at the moment and I promised Daniel a few excursions. One of them was to the newly re-opened Harties Cableway. We took two of his friends along and drove the 75km’s to Magaliesberg.

The original cableway was opened in 1973, but fell into disrepair by the early part of the new millennium. An entrepreneur decided to open the cableway again last year with new state of the art cable cars. The old ones are on display at the premises and I cannot believe that I’ve been on them – they look seriously dodgy! However, the new ones took the five of us to the top of the Magaliesberg safely while the boys seemed fascinated by the cables, the pylons holding it all up and the way in which the ground below receded.

The top of the mountain really was a revelation. You can amble round a 1km Dassie Loop, with 360º views of the Hartbeespoort Dam on the one side and the Platinum mines on the other side. On a clear day you can see as far as Pretoria and Johannesburg. Points of interest are posted on information boards.

The top of the mountain also boasts a coffee shop, pizza-shack and cocktail bar, with a huge jungle gym for the kids. It is an ideal family day trip, and the fact that we appeared to be walking around with three blonde boys and a fourth clearly on the way generated quite a few semi-sympathetic comments!

 

 

You can read more on their website or like their Facebook page.

Sci-Bono

If you are a parent living in Johannesburg , ideas for how to entertain the kids are always welcome. During the school holidays a couple of weeks ago, I ended up taking Daniel not once, but twice in one week, to what is now my favourite recommendation for a kids-friendly outing in Johannesburg.

The Sci-Bono Discovery Centre is located in Newtown, in the Johannesburg City Centre. It is a giant warehouse filled with all kinds of scientific hands-on exhibits and games. Pressing buttons, pulling levers and flipping switches were never this much fun when I was a kid! I hated science, but this centre, the largest of its type in Southern Africa, is just the place to show the kids how much fun it can be. And let it be known, this mom loved the outing as much as the kid!!

One of the trips was with a group of friends, eight kids in tow. The highlight for them was the Murray and Roberts construction site where they could operate conveyor belts, push wheelbarrows around, lift buckets with pulleys and build with foam ‘bricks’ and ‘mortar’ blocks. The older kids loved sitting inside the cockpit of a fighter jet and Daniel only moved away from the virtual soccer game when bribed with sweeties from the cafeteria!

I cannot recommend this place enough. They do holiday programmes and even kids birthday parties. It is a world-class centre, and an incredible amount of fun to visit. So, GO! You can even take your kid along if you want.

You can visit their website here or like their Facebook page.

PS. Thanks to "the crew"!

The South African Lipizzaners

A couple of Sundays ago, on a freezing cold Johannesburg morning, I took my little boy to go see the South African Lipizzaners.

The Lipizzaner breed can boast that their ancestors can be traced back to Carthaginian and Roman horses at the time Julius Caesar was Emperor of Rome. Around 1562, an Archduke Maximilian started to breed the famous white horse in a small village in Slovenia. A few of the horses were rescued from then war-torn Austria in 1944 and were brought to South Africa. A Lipizzaner centre was started in Kyalami and close ties were kept with the Spanish Riding School in Vienna, the only riding academy in the world where the Renaissance tradition of classical horsemanship is preserved and cultivated to this day. Today the South African Lipizzaners, representing all six bloodlines of the breed, are the only other school of performing Lipizzaner stallions in the world to receive the official stamp of approval by the Spanish Riding School in Vienna.

The foals are usually born black and go lighter with each change of coat to become a silvery white between the ages of 6-10 years. Sometimes, a very rare and special stallion will remain dark in colour. They go through six years of training based on classical dressage.

  

  

Performances are every Sunday morning at their indoor arena. After the show, people are invited to the stables to meet the riders and, what turned out to be the highlight for my little boy, to feed the horses carrots. We ended up buying lunch and spending our morning sitting in the sun, warming our bodies after having our hearts warmed by the beautiful horses.

You can visit their website here for more information.

Image credits: All photography by me