Shopping Trip

Today Sydney had a day off of school for Shavuot, the Jewish holiday that marks the giving of the Torah on Mount Sinai.  Ever since Sydney has started preschool a whole day off together has become such a precious thing to me.  I love the feeling of waking up in the morning and knowing that we can just hang out together in our pajamas and do whatever we'd like with our day.  I always try and think of something special that we can share.

I love seeing what Sydney does with her time when she's not being rushed to get ready in the morning!

Today we decided that we'd take a little trip across the line and do some long overdue shopping in Bellingham.

We headed to Target first, Sydney absolutely loves it there.  I always let her choose her own box of bandaids and a special hand soap or body wash for her bathroom, she talks about it for days before we go, it's quite cute.

We had such fun wandering up and down the aisles looking at all of the fun summer stock that Target has right now.  We ended up getting some very cute things for Sydney for this summer, shirts, shorts, a dress and the cutest pair of sandals ever along with, what else, but a Hello Kitty bathing suit!

Sydney was so hillarious in the clothing section, thumbing through rack after rack looking for things that were in her size and then exclaiming "Oh Mom, this is SO cute!"  She literally pulled off a dozen boxes of shoes to try on too before deciding on the silver sandals that we eventually bought.

I even got myself a couple of things, a very cool beach tote and a bright orange sun dress.  Love it!

After all that shopping at Target we had worked up quite the appetite so we decided to stop for a little lunch at Olive Garden.

I love this restaurant.  I can honestly say in all the times that I have eaten there in the past I have never even entertained getting an appetizer as their portions are so huge and between that and the bottomless breadsticks and salad or soup....So today I thought I'd try something a bit different and ordered two super yummy appetizers as my lunch.

I had some amazing risotto balls in marinara sauce and a mozarella bruschetta which was so so delicious!

(Photo courtesy of Sydney, man does this girl take great shots, check out her own blog here)

We had a lovely time together over lunch and left refreshed and ready for round two of shopping at Trader Joe's.

We left with heaping bags of things, mostly our old favourites but always a new thing or two to try.

Before we left for home we stopped and picked up takeaway from Panda Express for dinner, it's always a nice treat to not have to cook when I get home from a day on the road.

It was a very fun shopping day together with my girl, I love that she loves to shop with me and so look forward to keeping up this tradition with her for years to come!

Why I Love Being a Mom

In the days leading up to Mother's Day I have been spending some time thinking about how much my life has changed over the past four years or so since I first found out that I was going to be a Mom.  I can honestly and wholeheartedly say that I love being a Mom so much.  I was destined to be a Momma, ever since I was a little girl I dreamed of having a baby of my own and there are days I still can't believe that I have her!

Being a Mom has taught me so many things and enriched my life in ways that are hard to express.  When I think of all of the things in my life that bring me the most joy, nearly all of them stem from Sydney.  I am so blessed to have so many amazing friends in my life, all Moms with kids the same age as mine.  It seems strange to think that if I hadn't become a Mom at the exact point that I did that none of these incredible people would be in my life.

For as many challenges as the days with a young child can present, there are so many things that I love about being a Mom.  I love waking up in the morning to Sydney's sweet voice, the way she snuggles into me for a cuddle, the sweet conversations we have throughout the day about things both trivial and important.  I love working together with her to complete projects or get a task done.  I love being in the kitchen together and seeing how happy it makes her to legitimately help me get dinner together.  I love how much she loves me.  I know that sounds funny, but in all the world there is not one other person that loves me with such raw, pure intensity as Sydney does.  Except my own Mom, of course.

And speaking of which, what would Mother's Day be without a tribute to the woman who I call Mom, my very own sweet mother.  I am blessed to have such a loving, strong, loyal and hardworking Mom who loves us beyond measure.  I can only hope that I can be as good a Mom to Syd as she was to me.  Thank you Mom for your unfailing love, for every little thankless thing that you did for me when I was a little girl and for always being there for us with a listening ear and a tender heart!  We love you!

We had a full and fun day today!  Our friends Mike and Sarah came over to share a very special Mother's Day brunch with us this morning.  Sarah and I have so bonded over our similar experience with motherhood so it felt very fitting to spend the day with her!

We drank mimosas, ate scones and fruit and a lovely crustless quiche, chatted and had a great visit.  It was fantastic!

Sarah brought me a beautiful french linen apron today along with a homemade card from Emma, love it!

After brunch we headed over to Bubbie's house to spend some time with her.  It is our Mother's Day tradition to bring her a huge bouquet of lilacs, one of her favourite flowers.  This year we managed to find the most fragrant white and lavender lilacs.  She loved them!

Paul pulled out Zachary's old Tonka firetruck for Syd today, she absolutely loved it! 

We topped the day off with a fantastic steak dinner at home with Zach tonight.  It was a great day and I was so glad to be able to spend the entire day with my girl just enjoying being her Momma!

Happy Mother's Day!

Settling into our Weekend

We are a comfortable half way through our weekend and already it feels as though we have made so  many nice memories.  I love this time of year, the weather is getting to be great, flowers are blooming, everyone's spirits are lifted and our social calendar is full.  Life is good!

Here's a few snapshots of our weekend:

Busy Girl

Sydney has been so enjoying her crafts lately.  We have pulled her splash mat out several times over the past couple of days so that she can play with playdough and glitter or do some painting.

Along with her love for art, Sydney is so into her baby dolls right now.  This morning I heard her singing and cooing to her baby in it's stroller and found it like this:

I love how she swaddled the baby and put it's own teeny-tiny teddy bear beside it.  She told me later in the morning that she no longer wanted to call this baby Emma but Mikaela instead.  When I asked her where she heard that name before she told me that one of the little girls in music class is named Mikaela and that she likes the name.  Too sweet!

Syd has also been busy snapping shots for her blog.  A regular chip off the old block, she and I just can't get enough of those lilac bushes these days.  Here she is getting some amazing shots of it and one of my faves that she took on her own:

And Speaking of Lilacs....

Paul came home from an early morning bike ride this morning with a bouquet of the most beautiful, fragrant white and lavender lilacs for me.  I just adore them!

I am loving my lilac bush too and take such great pleasure in knowing that it's exactly as old as Sydney is.  Paul and I planted it the year that she was born and as I've said before, like Sydney it gets bigger and more beautiful every year!

Mother's Day Surprise

Sydney's preschool class had a little Mother's Day surprise that they had been preparing for all week.  All of the children lined up for the Moms and sang songs.

Then they gave each of the Moms a very special present:  The kids made tie-dyed scarves for us, they are so beautiful!

I love the card that Sydney gave me too.  Jen and Carmen asked her what she loved doing with me before they typed it out:

I was fully in tears when the children sang the song from the famous "Love you Forever" book:

'I'll love you forever, I'll like you for always, as long as I'm living my Mommy you'll be'

Dinner Out

Last night Sydney headed off to her buddy Jack's house and Paul and I had an evening to ourselves.  What a special treat!  The weather was amazing and sunny so we found a patio down on English Bay at the beautiful, funky Cactus Club there and drank wine and had dinner and so enjoyed an evening together.

When we got back to Jack's house to pick Sydney up his Mom, my dear friend Christina, had made a homemade strawberry rhubarb crisp for us for dessert and we all sat out on the patio and enjoyed some time visiting together.

What a lovely night!

Saturday

Early this morning I got a phone call from Sydney's piano teacher saying that she was at the emergency room at the hospital with a suspected heart problem and that, understandably, she wouldn't be able to see Sydney for her lesson this morning.  We love Maureen so much and hope that she is feeling better and while we missed our time with her this morning we sure enjoyed having some extra time at home to get a few things done around the house and just relax!

This afternoon Paul, Sydney and I had the pleasure of sharing in the third birthday celebration of Sydney's buddy Weston.

Our friend Michelle made the most amazing cake to go along with the car and truck theme of the party.

We had such fun visiting with our friends and playing with the kids and sharing in Weston's special day.

Goodbye Cookie

When we got home from the party we discovered that Sydney's beloved fish Cookie had gone to heaven while we were out.  He hadn't been doing so well the past few weeks and I knew it was just a matter of time until he went so I had been chatting with Syd about it trying to make it easier for her.

She seemed a bit sad when she saw the poor guy face down at the bottom of his bowl today.  She told me that she thought he had gone to heaven to be with the angels and swim with the other fishes and then asked me if we could buy a new fish and pick out some different coloured rocks for the bowl this time.

I think she recovered pretty well.

Goodbye Cookie, we loved you!

Looking forward to sharing a wonderful Mother's Day with my Paul and Sydney tomorrow!

Under the Sun

We enjoyed yet another beautiful spring day together in the sun today!  Minutes after Paul had gotten in the door from the office, we were off for a family walk into Kerrisdale for ice cream.  What a nice treat mid-week!  For all the times that I actually miss my old job and being in an office, today was one of those days that I was so grateful that I had nowhere to be and nothing to do but soak up the sun and enjoy the time with my two favourite people!

On the way walking back home Sydney and I collected a bucket of huge pine cones.  Syd had the best time playing with them in her sand table and then decided that she wanted to paint them so we hauled her splash mat and paints out into the back yard and sat and painted in the sun.  Such fun!

We found a bunch of dandelions that had gone to seed today and I showed Sydney, for the first time, how to blow them to the wind.  She was fascinated with being able to do this and had so much fun practicing her new talent.  It was very cute!

We decided to work on a couple of Mother's Day projects for some of the amazing Moms in our life this afternoon.

We whipped up a batch of gingersnap cookies and packaged them up along with some cards to take to Jen and Carmen, Sydney's beloved preschool teachers who are not only amazing teachers, but amazing Mommas too!

And I finally got all the pieces together to complete my homemade slate cheese boards for a few of my closest Mom friends.

I love that it includes a box of chalk so that you can write the name of the cheese on the board!

We are so enjoying our garden these days, things are blooming faster than we can keep up with!  My lilacs finally decided to come out in full bloom this week:

I am so sentimental about lilacs.  My Grandma had two lilac bushes in her front yard and when I was a little girl we would wait in anticipation for them to bloom just so that we could bury our noses in the blossoms and take in that sweet fragrance.  Even now when I smell lilacs I am instantly transported back to that moment in time in Grandma's yard with her.

Just had to include this shot too, especially for my Mom because she loves this tree in our garden so much!  It's in full bloom right now Mom, it is gorgeous!  Wish you were here to see it in person!

Got a lovely little treat today from my friend Christine, the most delicious wee box of chocolates from Chocotas.  They are divine!  Sydney couldn't get over the one with the bumblebee on top.  I, of course, had to let her eat it!

Happy Thursday, hope you had a wonderful day!

Geraniums

Today was planting day!  I finally got around to getting all of the geraniums for our backyard and Sydney and I planted them together this afternoon.

We decided to go with all red this year to match the new Adirondak chairs that we got.  They add such a fun splash of colour to our back yard and I couldn't resist getting a bright yellow lantern to rest on the table in between them!

I think we may have the backyard complete for the season.  Now all we have to do is sit back and enjoy the weather and the space.

Bring on summer!