If you want to be creative, stay in part a child, with the creativity and invention that characterizes children. ~Jean Piaget
I am imagination.
I can see what the eyes cannot see.
I can hear what the ears cannot hear.
I can feel what the heart cannot feel.
~Peter Nivio Zarlenga
Lilah loves being outdoors. From the minute she arrived home from China she's being an outdoors girl.
Some of her favourite activites on a daily basis include:
: finding and collecting rocks
: sticks and twigs - generally she has several of these in her backpack, which I believe she picks up on her walk between school and kindercare
: bugs, finding and capturing them in her bug cage - yes, she totally picks them up with her fingers..ugh!
: gardening and watering the flowers
Today, as per her usual routine, she had thrown her school bag through the front door and was out on the front porch watering the flowers, chasing down some poor harmless bug for her bug cage, trying to catch flies with her butterfly net and playing with her rock collection...
These sunny days are just perfect - winter is thankfully, a very distant memory!
Today marks Baba's 41st Birthday.
We celebrated with peanut butter and banana cupcakes - and some delicious gelato to top it off.
I get the feeling that he never feels in want of anything, especially since our Lilah Grace arrived on the scene. Not that we weren't happy as a couple, because we absolutely are! But Miss Lilah has brought a new dimension to our lives: new love, new laughs, new experiences, new contentment - she is making us better people. We adore our Baba boy so very much - he's so good to us. He's funny and silly and smart. He's our rock.
Happy Birthday Baba Boy! We love you to the sunshine and back!
This past weekend was Victoria Day weekend.
It was a lovely weekend, on Friday I volunteered in Lilah class in the morning and afterwards my hubby and I went out to a little local restaurant and celebrated his birthday, which is later this week! On Saturday and Sunday our Church had a conference and we had a wonderful time, listening to God's word being ministered and enjoying fellowship with other believers.
This morning there was a soccer game arranged, Lilah and I went along to watch Baba play, but ended up playing in the park, which was much more exciting, of course! The weather was beyond amazing and by the time we got home from the park it was around 31°C. Indeed, that calls for some emergency cooling off! ...so I pulled out the paddling pool and filled it up with some sleepy lavendar bubble bath. The bubbles were a big hit and they led to even more bubbles! I did a spot of gardening and later on that afternoon Lilah got to jump into a much deeper pool - our (very kind) neighbours invited all the neighbourhood kids over for a splash in their pool and us adults got to dine on some delicious pizza! It was the perfect end to a holiday weekend, seeing 10 little kiddies splashing about in the pool, laughing and having the time of their lives. I wish I'd taken my camera along to capture the joy.
Sigh. Such a perfect weekend. I'd just love to hit the 'repeat' button!
And I wonder how and why and where all the tissues disappear?
It took 16 to make this bed for her 'brothers'! Yes, I counted them!
On this special day - I couldn't be happier.
Happy Mother's Day to all the women in my life that have guided me down this path, that have mothered me and taught me by example - I love you. And to my daughter - you are one of the greatest gifts God gave me. Today we talked about how you have two Mamas... we talked about how you might resemble your birth Mama. We pray for her every single night, we pray that God will keep her safe, we pray that she'll know you are loved, so very much.
There was some "Top Secret" stuff going on at school this week! You would come home and tell me a little bit about it, and then say "Shhh, don't tell anyone!" - I know it's terribly hard for you to keep a secret my sweet girl, and to be honest, we've taught you the motto: "No secrets in our family!" - we talk about everything together... so I can tell it's hard for you to bottle this "Top Secret" stuff up inside. You did wonderful, you brought that little package home from school on Friday and hid it inside your pillow case cover. It was the perfect hiding spot! This morning you came running into our bedroom waving it in the air, wishing me a Happy Mother's Day! You showed me how to open the little ribbon, in fact, you opened it for me, and then you told me that I could tear the tissue paper if I wanted, it was okay... you were just so eager for me to open it. I was absolutely thrilled with my first Mother's Day artwork - I love that your teacher lets you express yourself in your own way, I'm glad it wasn't something that was dictated to you... I mean really, I wonder if any other child in your class wrote: "I love you in a tree, Mama!" It was perfect, it was so you, and if I'm perfectly honest, Baba and I had a secret little giggle at you loving me in a tree!! You are such a special girl Lilah... I love you beyond words. I love you to the moon and back. You are beyond precious my child, you have brought so much love and happiness to my life - thank you for being my daughter.
Next year, all being well, I'll have two girlies on my knee - two little hearts to love. I'm blessed beyond words.
: slept in
: played at the park
: smelt the tulips
: walked through the neighbourhood
: fed the ducks
: lunched at 'wild oats'
: grocery shopped
: a little nap
: supper time
: chalked the driveway
The Canadian Tulip Festival is upon us once again, here in the Nation's Capital.
Last Tuesday, after work, I picked Lilah up from kindercare and we headed over to Dow's Lake to breathe in their beauty, the scent, the colour of the tulips. They are always so beautiful and this year, yet again, they bloomed really quite early. I love Spring in Canada, mostly because I'm thrilled that big bad old Winter is over for a while! But also because it turns into Spring overnight around these parts. It almost seems like things pop up overnight - one day the trees are bare and the next day they are heavy with leaves. This past week, and even the day we visited the tulips, it was wet and warm... the perfect weather for Springtime growing!
Lilah enjoyed herself immensely - meandering around the little walks, checking out the tulips, racing me from one set of tulips to another and counting them of course...trying to, I should say! There were a few hundred more than she can handle right now!
Here's a little history on our annual Tulip Festival...
The Canadian Tulip Festival is a tulip festival, held annually in May in Ottawa, Canada. The festival claims to be the world's largest tulip festival, displaying over one million tulips. Large displays of tulips are planted throughout the city, and the largest display of tulips is found in Commissioners Park on the shores of Dow's Lake, and along the Rideau Canal with 300,000 tulips planted there alone. As well as tulip displays, the festival also includes music performances, speakers and exhibits of international cuisine.
In 1945, the Dutch royal family sent 100,000 tulip bulbs to Ottawa in gratitude for Canadians having sheltered Princess Juliana and her daughters for the preceding three years during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands, in the Second World War.
The most noteworthy event during their time in Canada was the birth in 1943 of Princess Margriet to Princess Juliana at the Ottawa Civic Hospital. The maternity ward was declared to be officially a temporary part of international territory, so that she would be born in no country and would inherit only her Dutch citizenship from her mother. In 1946, Juliana sent another 20,500 bulbs requesting that a display be created for the hospital, and promised to send 10,000 more bulbs each year.
Taken from Wikipedia.
Every night, without fail... as I walk past her bedroom, I stop by for a last kiss on my sleeping beauty's face, before heading to bed.
How can I resist her? She is precious beyond words.
1. What does allergies mean?
2. What are clothes made from?
3. What does personality mean?
4. What does disappointed mean?
5. How does the food fit when there's a baby in your belly?
(PS - she doesn't have a real dog, just a stuffed one... and REALLY wanted me to buy her the shirt!)
This morning Lilah and I went downtown to the National Gallery of Canada.
I've been meaning to take her to the art gallery for a while and I'd seen advertisements for Van Gogh's art coming, so I was super excited and blurted out to Lilah that we should go to the art gallery to see Van Gogh's art. Of course, I only learned when I went online (after the blurting part!), that Van Gogh's art isn't actually coming until the end of May. Anyhow, I had already spoken the word and even tempted her with the idea that there would be a craft, so there was no backtracking for me!
As we were leaving the house, Lilah ran back in, saying she'd forgotten something and came back out with her binoculars dangling around her neck - they definitely set the precedent for the day! The gallery in itself is an incredible state-of-the-art building and the inside is fabulous. I have to admit, my favourite part was the Chapel inside the building, there was recorded music and singing - it was very powerful - I felt a real sense of calm and peace standing there listening. Lilah on the other hand, had her fingers in her ears, telling me it was too loud! Her favourite part was the craft, of course! Today they were making butterflies with a type of tie-dye. Basically they had this special textured paper that absorbs water, you coloured on it with markers and then painted over it with water, which created a tie-dye effect. Lilah really enjoyed it.
It was a fun day, filled with the warmth of Spring - we went to the Gallery, had crepes for lunch and did a spot of downtown shopping. Just the perfect relaxing Saturday. Ahhh, I wish there were more Saturdays in the week!
dress by 'mani mina'
