Happy Memorial Day

Happy Muver's Day

My mummy who is watching me from up above...   

It's the end of the day and as I began posting my daily photo for the Instagram thread Photo a day May, so many thoughts and emotions came flashing by as I thought about Mother's Day and motherhood. Warning this may get a little sappy...

I first was woken with "Mummy, Happy Muver's Day, check under your pillow!" I guess I was sleeping on this card the entire night and didn't even notice. She's so sneaky. 
While we were getting ready for Sunday service she practiced the song that the primary children would be singing later that morning. I always melt into a blubbering ball of tears every year that I hear the primary children sing. I get so overwhelmed with emotions of how blessed I am to have been given such a precious and wonderful gift. 

We live so very far from our birth mothers so while I called mine on the phone, Maribel made this special card for hers. We delivered it the fastest way possible, posted on her facebook wall. Gotta love technology and social media.

After tucking my little red head into bed safe and sound with her favourite stuffies and sweet music, I recluse back to my room to take one more look at my Mother's Day goodies. 
I can't help but be grateful for this wonderful gift of motherhood. 

Today in one of the talks a mother related a story about how a mother was in a shopping line with her kids and while being typical kids in a checkout and a lady behind her says, "Aren't you just loving every minute? Treasure every precious moment because they grow up so fast." 
It's so true. As I look at how much my little onion has grown in these short years I really do try to enjoy as much of it as I can. I mean, I'm not perfect and yes there are days that I countdown til bedtime, but overall I have heard and have been told that they grow up so fast so I am doing my best to really enjoy this journey. I have been given this gift. Such a special gift she is to me since she was literally given to me to raise as my own and to love so deeply.
Adoption is just another word for More to Love. 
And so now I will bid you all a wonderful Mother's Day or "Muver's Day" as Maribel says it and take to bed a very full and happy heart. 

apples to apples

Apple #1
She's 5:

She loves to play outside.
She has a pretend pony named Chili (which really is body pillow.)
She rides Chili until he bucks her off so she can flop on the floor.
She wears boy scout shirts because it’s her favourite colour.
She has a cat named Milo and loves him bunches and bunches and bunches and lots.
She torments loves Milo and decorates him with soap and glitter and antiperspirant.
She wishes she had a sibling she could torment love.
She likes to cut up blankets and sheets with mommy's scissors.
She loves painting with nail polish, especially bathroom doors and furniture and her legs.
She likes to hide things like honey under her bed.
She also loves the smell of perfume and spraying as much of a brand new bottle as possible within a two minute time frame.
She really loves driving around on her scooter dreaming about when she gets to drive a car.
She's 5!

Apple #2
When I was 5:

I played outside all day.
I had a pony named Bye Y’All.
I would ride Bye Y’All bareback around the yard till I either fell off or got bucked off.
I lured Bye Y’All into the foyer of our home because I realized that I wanted an indoor pony instead.
I wore bellbottoms because I was cool like that.
I used to dress up in my mom’s clothes and play “Mommy” to my Siamese cat HoSann. She bit me a lot.
My little sister was too little to torment play with.
I used my mommy's scissors to trim my own bangs. And slpit ends.
I rode my tricycle down the back stairs and cracked my head against the wall.
I used to sneak bottles of vinegar and hide them under my bed to drink later.
I drove my mom’s car off our driveway into the ditch while she was unlocking the property gate.
I lit our couch on fire burning old comics in an ashtray.
I was 5.

Soooooo I guess it's true what they say about apples that don’t fall far from the tree. I shouldn’t complain anymore. She could’ve been just like me…

beach bums

There's one thing to be said about living in Florida and that is you gotta love the beach! Either way you drive (other then north-ha ha) you are bound to hit sandy goodness. I guess it's only natural that Maribel loves the beach as much as she loves blueberries. I mean she's a Carlberg and it comes with the name.

On Saturday I loaded up the car and my little onion for a little trip to our family favourite, Cocoa Beach. We love this beach with all of it's natural beachy goodness of shells, sea weed, sea foam, jelly fish, crabs and feathers. And I can't forget to mention the perfect sand for turning anyone into mermaids.

Luckily we never got hit with any rain so we were able to catch some decent waves and sand time. Even if it did rain nothing was going to spoil our special mommy/daughter date. We had a nice picnic on our blanket. I filled the Tiffen box with sandwiches, crackers, pretzels and some delicious strawberries and grapes with yogurt for dipping.

My niece Sherry sent me her little Flat Stanley for a little vacation so this is him enjoying what Florida has to offer. So naturally you can't go to Cocoa Beach, Florida without paying a little visit to Ron Jon Surf Shop.
This lucky fella gets to accompany me everywhere I go like the beach,church,  my place of work, I even have a little Disney planned for his visit which will be fun to document.

I only wish that when it came time to send him home that I could go with him. I'm running out of Canadian Smarties and yes, I do eat the red ones last...

Happy Earth Day

For Earth day I thought it would be fun to make some reusable bags from old tees since I can't seem to throw anything away. Hoarder? Possibly. I found this super duper easy tutorial on Martha Stewart that shows you how to make them. They were soooo easy to make. If you can sew a relatively straight stitch, then you can definitely make these!!!

I even made one from one of M's old t shirts that is too small and too stained to donate or give away. She loves that she has one too.

Of course we had to take them out for a spin. Maribel used hers at the beach to hold her select beach toys. She kept asking me if she could get it dirty or wet and because they wash like any old tee it didn't matter what she did with it. She liked that answer.

I used mine at the grocery store. The cashier and bagging associate loved them and kept asking about them and how to make them etc. After quick instructions I overheard, "What a great use for all those old t shirts I have." Cool! Now I feel all close to Mother Earth and green and stuff which reminds me, I forgot to pick up some granola, ah nuts...

On another note...
Tomorrow I am beginning my journey of documenting our everyday life for the Week In The Life with Ali Edwards. I did it a couple of years ago and really enjoyed the journey. It can be viewed here. Last year I only managed to snap a few photos so I never did finish creating the album. This year I have my album all set up and the journal pages printed so all that I have to do this week is be snap happy and have fun.Yay!

There's nothing like having a plethora of pictures to get my scrap mojo going. I just hope I remember my camera tomorrow morning since I have a tendency to forget little things like that...

natural

There are times when I look at this girl and I am in awe that I was chosen to be her mother. When ever I am glum she brings sunshine with her and knows just how to perk me right up. She really makes the best friend a mommy could ever have.

That's all I have for today, short and sweet just like she.

superhero t-shirt cape

For the Superhero activity the kids were instructed to come dressed as their favourite superhero. Maribel doesn't have any superhero dress up stuff so I went web surfing and found this uber easy tutorial on how to make a super cape from an old t-shirt. If you don't have a sewing machine don't worry, this one is no sewing necessary.

I already had tee that I picked up from a thrift store months ago and all I had to do was snip and sew on the lightning bolt and mask. I also hemmed the edges for a cleaner look but it's not necessary. You don't have to but my snipping skills (or lack there of) were showing and I wanted clean edges.

When she was asked which superhero she was she would tell them that she was Superman and Supergirl's kid.

The mask I just used a leftover Pin The Bow On Hello Kitty blindfold from her birthday party (that we forgot to play-oops) as the template and just sewed the two pieces of felt together. But I cut out the eyes of the top colour first becuase I wanted the bottom colour to show through. I reused the elastic from the blindfold since it was already measured out. Hey, it's just one less step.

This is her trying to smile after crying. I guess this super girl's weakness is shrub thorns. Poor thing, her legs got all scratched up playing in the bushes or the "woods" as she calls it but still had a smile for me...well, sort of. Okay, now I just want to go and give her another hug...and poke her dimple. ^.^

I can't help but recall the line from The Incredibles where Edna says, "No capes. Do you remember Thunderhead?"

I also created a movie for this activity. You can check it out here if you haven't seen it yet. It was a high budget film *sniff* totally.

superheros are righteous

Saturday was our church’s primary activity celebrating superheroes and how they choose the right. I was asked to help with one of the activities and because I love primary so much I jumped at the chance to assist. I was given a story to reenact about choosing the right and instead of trying to round up a bunch of friends I went another route. Take a look...

Of course there are outtakes…that's half the fun of film making isn't it?

Thanks to my awesome sister in law, the video was a hit and I haven’t laughed so hard in so long. I mean, the soccer ball never moves during “game play” but their feet are going a mile a minute. It makes me laugh everytime and the kids loved it too. After Maribel's group watched the video she said,
"You're awesome Mommy!"
Gawsh!

Naturally I think she's pretty awesome too.

Brownie points if you can guess who my ALL TIME favourite superhero is. Your clue is in my costume...

one more day

I figured since it’s Easter Monday back in Canada I would carry the Easter celebrations over one more day with a bunny inspired bento that I made for Maribel last week.

For the top some yummy grapes ripened for nibbling along with some cherry Jell-O in a flowered cupcake cup.

And for the bottom box a little bunny cut from a classic pb&j with a few fruit leather carrots surrounded with bunny tails-aka mini marshmallows. 

Funny tale about these fluffy little balls of confection…when I went to add them to M’s lunch the bag was nowhere to be found. I mean NOwhere. I searched high and low quite literally and even in my #1 suspect’s room while she still slumbered only to come up empty handed and a little defeated. So when the little sneakerella woke up I had to ask…

Me: Maribel, do you know where the marshmallows are?

M: No

Me: Are you sure? I wanted to put some in your lunch today

M: Oh wait! Maybe they are in your (bed) room.

(after a brief moment and some rustling coming from under my blankets at the foot of the bed)

M: Oh here they are. How did they get in there?

M'yesss how did they get in there???

As pictured here we had a similar instance with the parmesan cheese that mysteriously disappeared. I still haven’t found the empty container.

surprise Easter egg

Happy Easter! 

Last night while walking and talking with her Grandpa about Easter then Maribel said, "Grampa, Easter candy and stuff is nice but Easter is really all about Jesus".

It brings my heart so much joy to know that she gets it. Lately we've been talking a lot about my mother and how she's busy doing the Lord's work on the other side and how we all will be reunited again. Such peace that knowledge brings. 

Of course she had fun with the Easter tradition of hiding/finding eggs scattered about the lawn and enjoyed the pleasures of her Easter basket. It's amazing that she ate her supper after filling up on copious amounts of jelly beans...that's my girl! 

After returning home from our Easter feast it appears that we haven't had our fill of eggs just yet, only this one didn't come from the Easter Bunny...

It looks like our turt Eloise had been hiding one last egg for us to find. I couldn't help but laugh while watching Joe scramble around setting up the incubator all giddy and hopeful. Eloise had already laid her eggs (that were unfortunately unfertilized) so this came as a complete surprise. In about 30 days we'll be able to see if it's a fertile one or not so I'll keep you posted if we're going to be grandparents or not.

I couldn't help but wonder after watching Joe walk in and out of each room muttering to himself and forgetting why he went into the room in the first place, obviously distracted, that this is just a glimpse of what he would be like if I'd ever be in labour and need to be taken to the hospital. It made me giggle. Out loud. 

I hope you had a wonderful Easter!