A Wish-I-Had-My-Camera Moment

Yesterday afternoon I had the girls out grocery shopping. They were tired from the morning of school, but we had to go. Waiting in the taxi line afterwards, Jasmin fell asleep on the "shelf" under the cart! She had a good 1/2 hour nap there while we waited ;o)

We had a very eventful weekend, as after the exciting late night of Alli's party, we got up at 4 in the morning to join an office day trip to the beach! Ironically, only one of these pictures are of the beach... it was a resort really, with a bit of beach front. We really did swim in the ocean (Jasmin's comment: "...something didn't taste right") and build sand castles ...(Grace's comment: "...and that man helped me!" ) though! We didn't return after lunch as the waves were a bit too strong for little ones. Most of our free time was spent at the water park:

Grace enjoyed the slides the most - and having friends!

Jasmin, on the other hand, preferred to experiment with the fountain sprays:

They also got to watch Mommy and Daddy play a game of volleyball as they swung in a hammock with friends, eat "res-aurant food" for all three meals, ride on the bus (Jasmin was so glued to the window watching that she fell asleep there!), and make new friends. Grace did an amazing marathon of 4 am to 6pm of non-stop activity! Jasmin was more sensible and napped in the bus before breakfast :o) Needless to say, Sunday was a quite day at home. We were all thankful Monday was a holiday.

Princess Party!

Grace and Jasmin's best friend, Alli, had her 6th birthday, Friday. A very pink, loud, warmly chaotic time was had by all the little princesses!
Jasmin was very taken by the cake decorations:
...and the shirts were a fantastic replacement to "loot bags." It say, 'Yes, I am a princess; my Father is the King of Kings'

A glorious messy yes morning...
Jasmin asked if we could finger paint after seeing Boowa and Kwala mixing colors. Hesitation and then "yes!" from Mommy.After a quick search on the Internet, and some improvisation in this kitchen that doesn't cook...the fun commenced. At first it was clean-ish and absorbing....but then the experimenting got more adventurous...

and more, Mommy biting her tongue to stop it spoiling the fun...
and really, just in time/all too soon, the fun was done... and a smudgy line of brown tiptoe footprints led to the next scene for fun - the bath. And Mommy began the clean up. Why is the clean up always three times as long as the kids enjoy the privileges of a "yes"? Off to clean the bath :o)

New dresses from NiNi... thank you!

It's official! Grace and Jasmin are school girls...

We had to buy uniforms yesterday

Clava and the Monster story.


and a bonus video of part of one of the songs Grace sung and signed:

Last Friday morning, the girls' preschool, Kid's Brain, had a Family Fun Day. The girls were very excited to be going, but as it was loud and somewhat chaotic, they didn't enjoy it quite as much as they anticipated. Still, it was worth going.

Grace blended right in, and even though she'd only been to less than 10 mornings of practice, she signed and sung two whole songs with the other kids!

Jasmin backed out and sat with Mommy and Daddy - but she tried some out from that safe spot!
They had us come dressed in blue or red to divide us into teams, and we played some games:
a relay race that Grace and Daddy took part in - Grace was a bit bemused by the whole thing
and the cheering and playing got so loud our girls were in tears so we went outside and played hide and seek instead! After the musical chairs and other games were finished, we rejoined the group for mid-morning lunch and a "talent show." We presented a storybook that Grace and Jasmin wrote and illustrated.

I wish we had a video of that presentation, as Grace and Jasmin did a terrific job! The School thought so too: Next post is a video we made at home later, with much less interest from the girls, unfortunately

A lot of this has been going on here in the last few days. Both Grace and Jasmin are sick and don't do anything much more than sleep except for an hour or so in the mornings or evenings. We are waiting to see if it is chicken pox as their new friend got it soon after arriving a week or so ago.

Grace is content to stay in bed or on the couch, but Jasmin likes some variation...
Unfortunately, all the day sleeping means some pretty restless nights, and that is when the fever seems to spike too, so Mommy and Daddy are beginning to feel a little washed out.

Yesterday was "one of those days"... you know, the kind where you never seem to recover household equilibrium after one little disaster/adventure...

snapshot scenario: it is late supper time, but supper is still in the making. The girls decide to play with water. Grace in the bucket off the kitchen, and Jasmin in the bathtub. Both are happy and Mommy is relieved that they are not hovering for supper.
But, Grace doesn't take off her clothes first and then comes running to show the results. In process of cleaning that up Mommy discovers Jasmin took a roll of toilet paper into the bath with her... and, in trying to cover up her failed experiment, filled the bath with slimy white seaweed-like bits of paper.
I was impressed that Mommy's response was to want to try make paper or use the mess like papermache rather than exasperation.... But, since she was in the middle of two or three things already, she had leave Daddy the joy of sieving the bathwater to rescue the bath drain from a major clogging, and regretfully "waste" the opportunity for paper making - though we did form a ball with the first big handfuls...

More pictures from Michael's phone. This was an office fun day activity. The girls were beside themselves with the thought of bowling and pizza...

Although Grace still found it loud, she didn't totally back out like last time. She was quite ready to learn how to bowl from Daddy. They both took it quite seriously!. Jasmin was just so proud she could manage to carry a ball to the foul line even though they were much bigger and heavier than last time.
And this time she was more interested in actually rolling the ball and watching for pins being knocked over. Grace quickly caught on to score keeping - though her understanding was limited to running to see the numbers change after each ball, and continually asking whose number was higher! Both of them took home respectable scores - but then, all of us on their lane did as we had the gutter rails up!

A few Sundays ago we discovered a green space. Total accident on our part - we were out to explore yet another new mall in walking distance - but just on schedule on God's part. Our hearts all breathed a big sigh of relief, and we just stood there taking in the delight of sky and green space together. Then we all ran around a bit to celebrate.
(These pictures were taken on Michael's phone and it took me this long to remember at the right time and place get them off!)





Many plans to return, but so far we have not made it back. I don't think we can stay away for long though!

We were blessed with some "hand-me-down" clothes recently. One prize was a silk suit for Jasmin. Once we figured out that Jasmin would only wear it with an undershirt - she doesn't like the feel of silk! - they were excited to go to church "all Chinese." Grace even asked me to "make her hair all wavy" - something we read about recently in Little House in the Big Woods.

Just in case you thought "What sweet little 'china dolls'!"...
Unfortunately, Grace is fast outgrowing this dress. The one we have for her (another prize from the hand-me-downs) won't fit her until she's 8-10 years old, so we might have to find one for the meantime.