Thanks Be To God

Just had to get a quick post in to capture this story...

So today is Amanda's 3rd birthday. Yay Amanda! At church on Sunday, our priest Father Joseph asked us to come over to the rectory and gave Amanda a couple of beautiful art puzzles - one Noah's Ark, and the other David & Goliath. It was very nice of him, and Amanda was very good about saying her thank you's, etc.

Last night, we spent some time making thank you cards for everyone who gave Amanda birthday gifts. Again, she was great, helping me come up with the wording to go in each card and colouring in the pictures. After she was in bed I put them all in envelopes to pop into the mail today, and even remembered to put them in my purse so I'd remember to take them (a minor miracle in itself!).

This morning, she walked past the dining room table where we'd been doing our colouring and asked what happened to the cards, so I told her I was going to take them to work to mail them. Then her brow furrowed and she said "Hey! We didn't make a card for God!". I was a bit flustered, thinking maybe I'd misheard her, and trying to figure out how I was going to deal with a big theological discussion at 6:30 in the morning. Then again, "But what about God? We didn't make him a card!". Jeff and I looked at each other, puzzled, trying to decide how to even begin this conversation. Then the light bulb went on. "Do you mean Father Joseph?" I asked, and Amanda smiled and said yes. Aha! And yes, she was totally right - we did forget to write a thank you card for him. As I think I've said before, the girl has a memory like an elephant.

I can see where she was coming from with this, since we've told her that the church is God's house, but now I'm groaning inwardly as I think about all the misconceptions that probably need clearing up...oh well, to deal with another day I suppose!

Birthday Portraits

Here are the portraits we had done for Amanda's 3rd birthday (we cheated and got them done several weeks ago so they'd be ready for her birthday):










And, just for fun, here is another photo we had done a few weeks ago at Ikea! Bopomo Pictures did a special promotion where you could get free pictures done for Mothers' Day. I decided to have both of us in the picture since there are so few photos of the two of us together, and I'm quite happy with the final result:


I quite like the photos on their site - maybe we will go down and have a real portrait session one of these days!

Update...

Another month, another lack of blog posts...sigh.

Oh well, here's our month in a nutshell. Although we're always busy, this month has been perhaps even crazier than usual - I started a new job! The company I started working for only last February basically ran out of money (yes, the joys of working in biotech) and laid off their entire staff. Did you know you can be "temporarily" laid off with no notice and no severance for up to 13 weeks? No? Well, me neither, until the middle of April. I was very lucky in that I was part of a very small group who were brought back in on a consulting basis, and I continued consulting until I got a new job after 4 weeks. So things worked out very well for me, although I know very well I'm extremely lucky.

So, now I have moved out of working in biotech - this experience really encouraged me to consider other options that aren't so shaky, and biotech is just not a great place to be these days in Vancouver, with a lot of companies laying off. So I've made a move into the other side of research and drug development, dealing with the grants portfolio for a major research institute here in town. I'm now working downtown for the first time in my life and I love it! I take the West Coast Express in and it's such a relaxing commute...plus, I get a couple of short walks in every day, which helps keep my energy up (especially important since I'm now up at 5:30 am to get to work by 8 am).

But enough about me...Amanda has adjusted surprisingly well to the earlier wake-up time and has been generally quite cheerful over the past several weeks. And, in other big news, she appears to have finally made the leap into staying dry during the day! She's been quite unusual in the potty department, as she has been fully #2 trained for many months now, but resisted #1 training (she would pee in the potty no problem, but wouldn't initiate it on her own). We knew she could, because she would have really great stretches or even full days when she was completely dry and would ask to go when she needed to, but then she'd lose interest again. All of a sudden something seems to have clicked and she is wearing her "big girl panties" and staying dry all day! We've had only a couple of small accidents all week, and both times she was just a bit too late (as opposed to completely ignoring the urge to go). So great progress! We're so proud of her...can't believe how grown up she seems all of a sudden. She also stopped using her potty seat all of a sudden and insists that she's a big girl and can sit without it. She hasn't fallen in yet, so I guess that's a good sign. :)

So, what else...well, we went to Denise & Danny's wedding a couple of weeks ago and got some great pictures. Amanda got a chance to wear her beautiful dress from Mike & Cristina's wedding again, and of course she felt like a princess. Here are a couple of pictures:






On the Victoria Day Monday, we headed out to the Aquarium, one of Amanda's favourite places. Here are a couple of pictures from that day:





And finally, big excitement - Amanda is turning 3 on Tuesday!! How is it possible that she has gotten so big? We had a small birthday party for her on Saturday and it was a big success (well, at least we thought it was). This was the first time that we tried inviting actual kids to her birthday party, which added a level of stress (since we had to make sure we had activities for the kids), but it all worked out great. We didn't tell Amanda her friends were coming, and the look on her face when they arrived was worth the lack of sleep in preparing for the party. She had a fabulous time playing with Isabella (Cristina's cousin, Amanda's co-flower girl from the wedding) and Maddy (her friend from daycare), as well as Isabella's younger brother Alexander. The kids were all extremely well behaved - no fighting or crying at all! They immediately set to work playing with every single toy Amanda owns and had a great time. We went with an "under the sea" theme, with cut-out tuna sandwiches, a goldfish cracker snack mix, blue finger jello in sealife shapes, and shrimp dip (courtesy of Mom). For dessert, we had a fish cake. The kids had a great time putting together foam picture frames with foam cut-outs and real shells glued on, and decorating sealife-shaped sugar cookies. I was really happy with the way everything turned out. Amanda received a pile of really amazing gifts, including a beautiful bike - she is so lucky to have so many friends and family who love her! It was a great day all around. Some photos...
















Sorry for all the photos...hopefully this post won't take a year to load on everyone's computer. :)

In a few days, we are off on vacation for a week for Jeff's cousin Rosalie's wedding in San Jose. It will be Amanda's first plane ride, and she couldn't be more excited. She is going to be a flower girl at the wedding (her third time!) and we're looking forward to getting some relaxation time, too...maybe even a visit to the beach! We'll try to post while we're gone.

Rocky Point

Yesterday, it was such a beautiful day that I walked Amanda home by the river and we stopped at the local playground to play for awhile. This was all lovely...except that when Jeff picked her up today, she was insistent that she wanted to walk "under the trees" (like the river path) and go to the same park.

When I got home we decided to take her to the park, but since I had to go to the library to pick up a book, we figured we'd go to Rocky Point instead. There's a great kids play area there - last time we spent any time there, she wasn't really big enough to play there on her own but we figured this time would be better. It took awhile to convince her to try this new park (she kept insisting she wanted to go to the little local one), but once we got there she had a blast! It was a beautiful evening and it was the perfect time to go as it was still warm but not too busy.

It's amazing to see the difference in how she is at a playground in just a few short months. She ran around like crazy, climbing up everything and following the bigger kids around. The only thing she didn't do was slide down the firepole (probably mostly because it's a distance out from the structure itself - smart thinking, so only the bigger kids can reach it!). She's pretty good with the other kids, saying "excuse me" if someone is in her way. She really wanted someone to sit on the teeter totter with her and kept going up to other kids saying "do you want to be my partner?"...of course, they didn't understand what she meant and mostly ignored her. But the great thing about this age is that it didn't put her off at all - she didn't seem the least bit bothered and just continued along her merry way.

A few photos (click on any one to see more)...

Bad Bloggers

Once again, here we are woefully behind in posting. Such bad bloggers we are! (Why did I just get a mental "Yoda" image?!?). Will try to keep up better, really, we will!

Amanda has been quite the little monkey lately. She's going through a definite phase that I've been reading and hearing a lot about. Apparently lots of kids, like her, competely skip over the "terrible 2s", deluding their parents into believing they are perfect angels who are far better behaved than all those awful tantruming toddlers out there. And then, WHAM!!...they hit 3 and all hell breaks loose. That's pretty much where we're at these days. I exaggerate a bit, but it's true that Amanda is exerting her independence far more frequently and making things difficult for us in the process. She seems to constantly be putting us in our place - whether it's correcting our use of a word, or telling us off for remotely implying that she's "not big" or some such thing. A common phrase heard around here these days goes something like this: "Don't tell me I'm not big! I am big and you can't say I'm not! Don't tell me that!". Picture the sternly puckered brow and the wagging finger and...yep, you've got it.

Also making a frequent appearance at our house is super-clinginess and crying at the drop of a hat. Since it's a bit early for PMS, we're thinking she's just going through a very emotional phase. The flip side of this is that she's very affectionate as well, and wants lots of hugs and cuddles, and frequently tells me I'm her "best friend". No better feeling, I tell ya.

A story to illustrate recent happenings: this weekend she and I were out driving quite a bit in the car. As I've mentioned here before, I do tend to "talk" to other drivers quite frequently, but I am always very careful about what I say when she's in the car with me. Fast forward to evening, when she wants to play pretend. I get to be the kid (at least I've graduated from being a tid), so I sit in my seat (aka her Dora foam chair) and she carefully buckles me in for our trip. Then she gets in the front seat, buckles her own seatbelt (we're nothing if not safety-conscious in our make-believing), and drives us to our destination (picture a lot of hand waving in vague circles as she "drives"). "We're in the parking lot," she says, "but I can't find a parking spot." More circular hand waving as she searches for a spot. Then, "You must be kidding me!". Wracking my brain as I giggle from the "backseat", I realize that has become a favourite phrase of mine when exasperated by another driver and wanting to avoid saying something more rude, such as "Get the $&*% out of my way!". You hear it over and over again, but it's true - they are amazing little sponges, these preschoolers.

A few photos...we've been busy lately and taking fewer pictures, but these were from last weekend when we had a few brief minutes of sunshine and she was looking particularly springy in her cute yellow dress. (More on Flickr, as always.)