Time with the kids

Despite wanting to spend every moment I had with this little one:

I did spend some time with my own.

We went to the Fair with some friends. The kids cannot get enough of farm animals.




The girl is always fascinated with water.


The girl was being served by two dudes. Our Fair adventure was quite a production. 5 adults took care of two wee ones. We were only there for 2 hours and yet I was exhausted by the end of it. Thanks for all your help, Leung's and Geoffrey!


The kids were pretty tired and grumpy by the end and I wanted to get them some mini donuts to sooth them. Unfortunately, the line was a mile long. So I ended up getting them kettle corn. Yum!


Later that day, we got the three kids together and we played at Por Por's house.

Ready...


Set...


Race!


The girls:


Some quiet reading time with the proud new parents. Yep, I think they are ready for more.

Kitties

My aunt has two kitties and they were my kids' the target of attack. Actually, the girl had a great time with them. The boy thought he wanted them but when presented with a cat, he was skeptical at best.

Shall we dance?


"Why are you touching me?"



Here is a video of some close encounters.


The boy wasn't so sure about the cat but he sure was fond of the cat toy.


Thanks for entertaining us, Colby, Bobo and E-por!

姑婆 & 公公

While I was enjoying this:


My two little ones spent some time with 姑婆 & 公公:


They were treated to rides:


They dined and received first class service:


And spent lots of quality outside time:


Actually, from what I heard, they stripped all the fruits off of my aunt and uncle's blueberry and golgi berry trees.

Kiki & 希希: "唔該公公! 唔該姑婆! 快啲買機票來探我哋啦, 下次再玩過!"

Old Friends

We got to visit the girl's "old friend" while we were in V Town.

I wish I could find this picture on my hard drive. Seriously, click on this link and see how far back these two go. This was August 2006.

This was Feb 2007.


This was July 2008.


This is August 2009.


"Em... should I kiss him?"


"Wait, someone's looking, look shy."


Listen Kid! As soon as the girl's daddy saw this picture, he spotted you doing the arm over the shoulder trick. He is watching you!


The boy was thrilled to play with a Gor Gor.


All the kids.

New Princess

We just came home from a trip to see this princess:


The girl thought it would be awesome to have a little girl to play with.


The boy said, "no thanks!"


For more proof of the boy's reactions, see this picture.

Feel Good Crafting

I jumped off the sewing wagon when we went on vacation. It's hard to become motivated and start sewing regularly again. Plus, I keep telling myself that we'd be on another trip soon so the sewing will be interrupted again. As a result, I needed some feel good crafting. Something I can start and finish in less than a couple of hours. More than that and I loose my patience with it. I also want something that I can use. So, here are some random stuff I made in the past two weeks.

A couple pairs of long overdue boxers for Hubby. These each took a little over half and hour.


A couple of new hats. Neither of them are for the kids but they had fun modeling. These hats are very easy to make. Took about 30 min each. I don't think they fit very well though. I have to try altering the pattern again or experiment with straps/elastic.


I am not even sure if this counts as crafts. I just added more pictures to our wall of pictures. When I say "I" added pictures, I meann Hubby did all the work while I pointed my little finger and various parts of the wall.


A little dress for little baby Ali.


A whole bunch of onesies for baby Alison, baby Mary-Kate and baby Emily. Two of these are not my design. I saw it on Made By Rae and replicated it. Can you tell which ones aren't mine? (Hers look like this and this.)


Then I made a super easy skirt based on this tutorial. I have enough of this fabric to make one more clutch and then I am all out. Do you remember the top and the dress I made with this?


In the midst of all this, the girl tried her hands for the first time at quilting. It was a combination of her pushing the foot pedal on the sewing table with her hands and me stepping on the pedal while holding her hands and showing her how to maneuver the fabric.


It's nothing fancy. This is the other side of the K quilt. She decided to give it to Baby Ali because "all babies need lots of blankets".


Finally, I made this bag. Let me just say that it was way more than two hours and there was lots of swearing involved. However, I love the look of this bag and I love the fabric. It is the exact amount I cut off to make the chair. How perfect is that?


Here is a random picture. The kids are watching TV together. Two interesting things: 1. The baby shows a lot more empathy when watching movies. For instance, he is quite concerned when cars crash into each other while the girl couldn't care less. This picture shows him worrying about the movie while the girl is quite relaxed. 2. The chair the girl is on is a Craig's purchase and I meant to slipcover it. I still have to do it. I guess I will try and work on it in September.

Circus

We went! I must be old because I was only mildly amused. Hubby and I went to see the circus a few years before we had the kiddies and I was wildly amused. This time, though entertaining, I found the performance insincere. The jokes were too well rehearsed and the dance movements were sloppy. My favorite from last time, the contortionists, were missing. However, I was quite impressed by the number of animals they had. I expected, literally, 3 - 5 elephants and 2-3 tigers. We saw at least 10 elephants, 12 tigers, I don't even know how many dogs, 10 horses and 6 zebras. Wooohoooo!

Baby managed to fall asleep in the car 10 minutes before we arrived at the Circus. So we had to push him in the stroller. You'd be amazed at how much noise he can ignore when he is sleeping.


The girls had a chance to go up close and personal to see the animals before the show. I caught this picture right after they saw the animals. I guess they were not sure how to feel about it.


We woke the baby up just before the show started. "Huh??? Where am I? Costumes??? Weirdos???"


After the show the girl was quite impressed. She started acting out the scenes with her toys.


To get a sense of how awesome the girl thought this was, we had this conversation:

M: Did you like the circus?
K: Yes!
M: Is the circus more fun or the playground more fun?
K: Circus!
M: Is the swimming pool more fun or the circus more fun?
K: Circus!
M: Is dancing class more fun or circus?
K: Circus!
M: Is the zoo more fun or the circus?
K: Circus!
M: Is (insert her BFF's name)'s house more fun or the circus?
K: Both!

I don't know if it means the circus ranks really high or that I should just pay her friend's mom an admission and send her there instead. Sigh!

... All Through The Town

Sunshine Kids

We spent a day at the waterfront last week. What beautiful weather!

Moving Out, Moving In

Yep, after 40 long months, my room if finally baby free. We moved the baby in with the girl so my room is mine all mine again. Wait, then the hubby moved in. Em... so in celebration of our new found freedom (I can sew as loudly as I want after the kids go to bed!), I sort of redecorated. Really, I only redecorated 3/4 of one wall and it's not even done.

Anyway, here is what that 3/4 of a wall looks like now. I think I need something on the wall itself.


A little further left to the other wall is my sewing table.


To my new room, the kids have this to say:

New Chair

Check out my new chair!!


Gorgeous, isn't it? My six year old Poang just got a face lift. I found this tweed Wonderland fabric when I least expected to find it. Actually, I wasn't even looking for it. I was looking for something with strawberries on it and this just popped out. Ah... little unknown fabric stores. It has Lauren clutch flowers, butterflies, mushrooms, trees, birds, bees - what's not to like. This fabric is called Wonderland Tea Time in the color scheme Sugar. This one is a little heavier than the fabric I used for the clutch. I really like it and I have some left so I am sure I will make a clutch or some other bag out of it soon.

So now, I have a new little reading nook in my room.

Indian Princess

The girl got this dress for her birthday and I really like the simple cutting. She told me it's a pretty comfy dress so I tried to recreate it. I did use a pattern and modified it a bit.

Here is the product.


The biggest modification is in the back. The pattern uses a zipper and I didn't have any on hand. So I made two fabric covered buttons and made the closure of this dress the same as the original.


This fabric is actually some upholstery remnant. Someone is sitting on one pretty couch. As a dress, it reminds me a little bit of an Indian Princess, like in "A Little Princess". So here is my little princess posing with her new pet, Cleo the cat. You have to zoom in a lot to see Cleo.