As yet unnamed!

Tired tired tired!

No photos to share today unfortunately. We did have a play date at our house starting at 10:30 until just past 2pm. 7 kids, 5 nannies and 3 Moms. 5 of the kids were Noemie's nursery friends, then Charlie and the younger sibling (12 months) of one of the little girls. They had a great time playing in the sand pit, bouncing in the bouncy thing and then they all ate lunch sitting around some little tables we have here. I bought 2 sets of the gorgeous Cath Kidston children's polka plates, bowls and cups. Then I found some matching children's cutlery on ebay so bought them as well. Made 2kg of spaghetti bolognese this morning so that there would be enough for everyone. The nannies don't always get a chance to eat but this was easy enough for them to be able to wolf down while still helping the little ones. They also took turns helping each other out with the kids and helping tidy up, etc. I sat upstairs with the two other Moms. We've all met several times before and get along great so that was fun. Mimi was so excited, she was in our bed by 6:45am today asking when her friends would show up. I gave up at 7:15 and brought her downstairs and proceeded to make a batch of red velvet cupcakes. 

It was really fun to see everyone having a nice time! We have been invited to a playdate next Thursday morning in Chelsea which will be fun. And Tuesday we are meeting up at Gambado for a couple of hours. Mimi has such a little social life, it's so cute! I spend more time coordinating her stuff than my own. Just wait until Charlie is a bit older and starts meeting his own friends. I'll be coordinating 2 sets of playdates. At least I have an excuse to need nanny help for a long time to come, lol! 

Will try for some photos of the kids tomorrow. Planning on having a bit of a pajama day! 

Another year goes by!

I celebrated my 39th birthday today, can't believe next year I will be 40!!! I remember turning 29 and flipping out as the following year would be 30. Then when it was time to turn 30 I was totally over it. Didn't care one bit. I wasn't overly fussed about turning 39 today. I feel like I'm much younger though after a sleep deprived night I feel much older. I guess that I'm not all the stressed about it as my life is where I want it to be. Married, 2 cool kids, tight knit family, time to do things that I want to do and a house and kitty that I love. Not much more to ask for really. I'm in a good place. Kirk got home extra early today and brought me a delicious chocolate cake. It was moist and was much like red velvet cake without the coloring. Delicious cream cheese frosting. Yummy! 

My parents came over and we all went to sushi for lunch. Noemie, Charlie and Suzanna came as well. Noemie loves Japanese food and Charlie is going through a bit of a food phase where he refuses most things. Afterwards we went to Baskin Robbins for some ice cream. In the afternoon, Alice popped over for a little bit and gave me the most gorgeous handknitted pair of socks. I will take a photo tomorrow in proper light and share. Then I did tons of tidying up as we have a playdate here tomorrow... 5 little girls, 5 nannies and 4 Moms. Charlie and then the 1 year old little boy sibling of one of the girls. It's going to be a full house!

Garden

Can't believe it took me nearly a week to blog about our new garden. Kirk's birthday present to me this year. Here are the before shots. The two guys came and totally turned the soil in preparation for the new plants. I had a ceanothus added next to the one we already had. I had 2 camelias planted behind the pond and then a few days later my parents came over and brought me a third one so now we have three of them. I also had 3 Pirius which are pretty cool plants. They are green year round and their new growth is red leaves which eventually turn green. They flower little downturned white bells. Hundreds of them. I love that they have the red leaves for new growth as that adds some pretty color. We also had another plant under the big tree but I can't for the life of me remember what it's called at the moment. I'll have to look at my receipt. It nicely fills the gap. Then we filled the remaining spaces with impatiens, some african daisies and then geraniums went in a few days later so aren't in the photo. I also have a hydrangea from last year that is making a comeback and then Mimi and I planted some sunflower seeds and 6 of them have started to grow. This week I will rehome them in a bigger pot and give them some space as they are a bit clustered at the moment. Just a few geraniums to plant in front of our house and we're all set. I've been good about watering daily though today I didn't have to as we got a fair bit of rain throughout the day. Can't wait until our builders come in June and remove the pond so we have more space and I can worry less about kids in our garden! Anyway, here are some after photos. Will take some more to show the geraniums as well.

 

Togetherness

Too tired to do a proper post but here's a cute photo from the weekend of the kids washing their hands together in the kitchen sink. Charlie is just tall enough now to reach the plastic bowl I fill up with water for them to wash their hands. I was surprised that Noemie was willing to share her step stool with him but they happily splashed around together for a good 10 minutes. 

He is so into washing his hands that before dinner yesterday while Noemie was at school, I let Charlie wash his hands for about 20 minutes. It gave me a nice break from his mad dashing about. The kid has endless energy and constantly needs to be on the go. 

Back tomorrow with photos of our pretty garden.

Our non weekend of sorts

The weekend wasn't all that great as K had to work ALL day yesterday, literally 9am-midnight. So we didn't get to do much all together. I had a nice time with the kids though it was a long day. Noemie was up at 7:30am and Charlie refused to go to sleep until 10:15pm. In fact he was such a nightmare that I had him watching a DVD and sitting at the dinner table with me just so *I* could eat dinner. He's a bit of a pickle these days, must be some developmental thing as he's trying super hard to talk. We spent the morning at the corner playground where Charlie spent quality time on the swing and Mimi played with other little girls that were there. They did a lot of see-sawing and giggling. In the afternoon the kids played in the garden both in the bouncy thing and in the sandbox. I took this video of the kids in the sandbox being naughty. You'd think I never fed them or something but I had to laugh at Charlie. Nom nom (or perhaps yum yum) is his latest thing. Noemie of course just plays along and encourages him. I can't imagine this tasting good. Blech.

Today the kids got to spend more time with Daddy while I tried to catch up on tidying the house up from the bomb site that it was yesterday. Noemie was in a funny mood today. At first she wanted to shut her bedroom door and kept saying "Charlie go away". Then when he finally lost interest in her, she decided she wanted to play with him so was insisting he "hold Mimi's hand, Charlie!" while she led him to our bedroom from hers and back. She moves a bit faster than him so he sort of gets dragged along a bit and the poor fella even ran into the door on one round. He soon recovered and they continued on holding hands and walking back and forth. Cute when they get along like this. Not so cute when they fight. It's more the screeching that gets to me. Anyway, here's another video:

Charlie's Babbles

Charlie's been saying a few words here and there for several months now but lately he says things with intent rather than just forming random words. He said Mummee last night for example when he woke up at 10:45pm and refused to go back to sleep until 2am. Had I not been so tired and grumpy I'd probably have melted at hearing that word. He's managed Daddy, Mimi, Kitty and Nana ages ago but Mummy was sadly lacking. When he sees kitty upstairs he giggles his special kitty sighting giggle and runs after a frightened cat, shouting "kitteeeee". When he knows it's nearly time for Mimi to come home from nursery he starts chanting her name.Oh, of course he can say his favorite word "meh" for milk. Noemie said it that way too. The other thing I remember Mimi saying is "Ta Ti" for thank you. Nana was the one who figured it out. Well, now Charlie says it when you give him something he likes. Very sweet. Anyway, considering how late Noemie was to start saying anything, it's fun to hear Charlie say stuff sooner. I took a little video of him while he was on my lap yesterday (which explains why my arm has to reach over him at the end of the video to turn off the iPhone). I said words and he repeated them. What a cute little voice too!

Sandpit

Isn't this just the cutest sand pit? It was Charlie's gift to Noemie for her birthday (or so we told her as I forgot to get something for her from him). She was so excited she said "thank you very much Charlie" and hugged him and tried to pick him up, they tumbled and he hit his forehead on the kitchen door. Poor fella, he's got 2 bruises on his forehead now. Anyway, the sandpit was set up today with 6 bags of play sand and I came home from my knitting group to find both kids happily playing together. What I didn't notice until I downloaded the photos was how close they are sitting to each other despite the fact there is plenty more space in the pit! Charlie of course tried tasting the sand and I thought one bite would be enough so I had to laugh when he went back for seconds. Hopefully they get good use out of the sandpit this summer. During the day we have the bouncy "castle", the sandpit and when it gets warm enough we'll have the padding pool in the garden. Pretty soon the kids won't have to leave the house as they have just about everything right here. 

I'm still plowing through photos from Easter week and also have a cute video of Charlie saying a few words. Will share them another day though as I'm off to do some knitting before I go to sleep. Off to the nursery tomorrow morning to finalize plans for our garden landscaping. And our builder is coming here on Sunday to discuss our next bathroom renovation along with the removal of our pond from the garden and building a garden shed in the back for some storage. Busy times!

Garden Time

We had pretty good weather last week so the kids spent a lot of time in the garden. Charlie loves to sit in the dirt and dig. He also likes to throw sand but is slowly learning not to. Even when he's at a playhouse he spends quality time in the sandpit. As I had a landscape gardener visit our house last week and we're going to have stuff planted all around pretty soon, I had to come up with an alternate digging site for the kids. We had a cute sandpit arrive today and the play sand is due to arrive tomorrow. Will share photos once the kids are playing tomorrow. Noemie also insisted on having most of her meals outside so they both sat at their little garden chairs and had lunch and sometimes dinner. The only problem with Charlie not being strapped in is that he likes to walk and eat. They both love being outdoors so much that Charlie wails when it's time to come inside for bath time. I hope we have a decent summer as I'd love to host some playdates with all the fun toys we have for the kids to play with! I think everyone has a nanny too so the Moms could even go out and have lunch and leave the kids to play. 

I'm super tired today as K was on an early flight out so I woke up when he did at 4:45am, then Charlie cried a few times at 5am, then right when I was about to fall asleep at 6am, Charlie was up for the day. 15 minutes later and Noemie joined us in the kitchen. Grand total of 4-1/2 hours of sleep for me so I took a short nap this afternoon and will go to bed early tonight.

Charlie gets a haircut

Charlie had his first haircut this past week on April 7th. We went to a kids only salon in Chelsea called Tantrums. They have 6 different "rides" that your little one can choose to sit on while they get their haircut. Charlie went for an airplane. Or maybe it's more like Noemie decided he had to go on an airplane to get his hair done. They put on a video for him (In the Night Garden) on his own personal mini TV and he was all set. The first photo is his "before" shot. Tons of frizzy curls from where he had bed head. He did pretty well although he refused to wear the cloak thing to stop his hair getting onto his clothes. They put product in his hair and blow dried it and I have to admit I might have to buy some of that product next time he gets a haircut as it smelled SO yummy. He wasn't entirely convinced that he liked the blowdry but he went along with it anyway. The salon took a photo of him for us and we received it the other day but I don't have my scanner set up at the moment so went with one of the photos I had in my camera. The one from the shop was really cute though! 

Noemie sat in the red fire engine (though it looks more like a red car to me) though there was no chance she would agree to a haircut. She spent the entire morning on our way to the salon saying "Charlie haircut, Mimi no haircut" and despite us confirming this to be the case at least 5 million times, she was still worried. She sat in the car/truck and any time anyone walked near her or anything she'd get a worried look on her face. She could use a bit of a trim but I'm not going to force the issue as it's just not worth it. 

 Next haircut for Charlie this summer will be a mohawk. I think it would suit him, be fun for the summer and then I'd have an excuse to buy the hair product for him!

Happy 3rd Birthday to Noemie!

How is this possible? Feels like less than 3 years since she was born yet here she is, officially 3 today! Amazing what a great little person she is growing into. Very polite and well mannered (if I do say so myself!), a little bit crazy, a little bit screechy at times but also quite sensitive and sweet. She's also a little bit bossy but also really helpful and has an incredible memory. She knows her way around the neighborhood even when I'm confused. She knows where everything is at the grocery store and at home. She loves her grandparents, her brother and K and I and is super affection. I get tons of cuddles through the day and she spends lots of time on my lap. It's also amazing how much changes in a year. She chatters non stop now using complete sentences, words we didn't even know she knew but uses them in the correct context as well and is so inquisitive about everything (which can be annoying sometimes). She has a little English accent developing which is sweet but cracks me up as K and I both have American accents.  She's so much fun in general though that I love being her Mom :) Perfect little mix of a little bit of everything.

She climbed into our bed at 6:40am today which is about 1-1/2 to 2 hours earlier than her usual wake up time. Combination of her room was freezing cold and she was super excited. She has spent the last few days asking if it was her birthday "today?" "after dinner?" "After bathtime?" So she was thrilled when she asked if it was her birthday today and we said "yes!" She sang Happy Birthday to herself a few times, loved telling everyone she was 3 and seemed to have a really great day. 

Baba, Papa and Alice came over for lunch and Nana has been here since last Saturday. Unfortunately most of her little friends were away on holiday. Next year though we'll do a proper kiddie party for her outside of our house. Gives me all year to find a good venue. Nana and I joined forces last night and baked a robot cake for her. Actually it's more like 3 square cakes that I cut up to make a robot. A ton of buttercream frosting with plenty of red and blue food coloring to make purple (her favorite color) and we were ready to go. I will admit I was decorating it this morning at around 10am though. Next birthday cake will be done the day before. I've never baked a cake before so totally misjudged how much time to allow. Not to mention a novelty cake! It was fun though.

She really enjoyed her birthday presents though we had a bit of an oops with the charger cord for her quad bike that was a gift from my parents (the bike, not just the charger). I need to order a new one tomorrow so we can charge up the bike some more. She did get a little ride in after lunch though so that was cool. She also got some fun dress up stuff from Nana so she paraded around with it for a bit. Then last but not least I bought her one of those enclosed bouncy things from the ELC and several packs of the balls. It's now in our garden (will have to bring it into the kitchen at night I suppose) and seems to be Charlie's new favorite toy though Noemie likes it as well. I have one more thing I wanted to get for her but it was out of stock so I will just get it for the kids when it's back in stock. A cool sandpit for the garden. They both love digging around so I'd rather they dig in playsand than the garden sand that the neighborhood cats pee and poo in. 

I have loads of photos and stuff to share from this past week. I got my new router on Thursday but it's been super busy around here so not much time to blog. Hopefully life goes back to normal this week as our nanny is back from her holiday! Sad my MIL is going back to the States though. Been really nice having her here with us and the kids have had a blast too!