Forever Family Day #6

THEN - 2003

NOW - 2009

Today, we celebrated our 6th Forever Day with our sweet Cara-Li. As we do every year, we began our day with me sliding into bed with her and hugging the bejesus out of her while telling her that I am the luckiest Mommy in the whole wide world. We normally try to take this day off of work in order to spend the entire day together as a family but this year due to many employees on vacation, I was unable to do so :( I did leave early so that we could head down to Chinatown where she was allowed to buy anything she wanted in any of the shops and, of course, we had the best Chinese dinner. It was soooo yummy as it was our first real meal in two weeks (more about this later). Our day also ended as it usually does on Forever Family Day. Cara-Li crawls on my belly and I stroke her hair until she falls asleep, just like we did 6 years ago in China. I love this day... it is my favorite celebration of the year! I love you my sweet Cara-Li!

Hepu Reunion 2009

This past weekend, we had the pleasure of meeting up with our travel group that we went to China with for Cara-Li for our 6th annual reunion. 7 of the 8 families made the trip to Stoneham, Quebec where we rented 3 beautiful cottages (complete with hot tubs!) in the woods. The accomodations were great and we all had a fabulous time together as usual! Upon arrival, Cara-Li was gone within minutes to check out the place and play with the other girls. Completely out of character for her but we couldn't be more pleased! Since our last trip, Cara-Li has now learned to speak French and can easily communicate with the other girls. Obviously made a huge difference as we did not see her the entire weekend! In total there were 12 little girls ranging from 2 to 9 years old. There were sleepovers happening for all the age groups in differenct chalets but Cara-Li was not ready for that. There's always next year :)

We arrived mid-Friday afternoon and settled in before some of the others started to tricle in. Once everyone was accounted for, we began our annual 'Wine and Cheese Fest'. Everyone adds what the want to the buffet table and then the party begins. This is always my favorite evening of the entire weekend as most of us have not seen each other in a year and there is always lots to catch up with. Needless to say that this usually goes on until the wee hours of the morning and We always get a late start on the Saturday which this year was not a problem as we did not have anything planned. We did end up have a group lunch followed by a swim in the pool which was around the corner. Saturday night was once again a BBQ smorgisborg but ended somewhat earlier due to the night before. A lovely brunch was made by all the next mrning before it was time to wrap things up and make our way home. Another year gone by with our lovely little girls from China. Who can believe it.

Here are some pics of our weekend.

The girls playing 'spies' with their flashlights

I think we need to get a hot tub!

The BBQ Dads

The Girls. Aren't they all beauties?

The Parents. Aren't we all beauties :) Photo taken by Cara-Li with my SLR. She does a better job in framing than Gord does :)

Our little family of four

The Four Musketeers... Friends Forver!

On our way home, we made a pit stop at Montmorency Falls.

Mission 'Almost' Accomplished

UPDATE: Our friend C. called mid-afternoon on Thursday to see if we wanted to join her and her lovely daughter, G, for a quick bite at the Bistro before going to see a bunch of people shave their heads for charity. So there... the mission was, in fact, accomplished!!

During the week last week, I had made plans to dine out Wednesday and Thursday of this week. As I was sitting on the dock last Sunday, I received a Facebook invite for dinner on Monday. Since we are going away this weekend, Friday dinner would be in Stoneham. That left Tuesday night to fill and I would NOT be doing any cooking! So I scrambled a little to find something and then I remembered that our town always has a theme night in the park on Tuesdays. Perfect... Russian night for Tuesday!

So this is how it all panned (and will pan) out:

Monday: Dinner at Vino Restaurant to celebrate Mortimer's Mom's birthday. I was invited by one of her friends via Facebook and joined her galpals for a very loud but delightful dinner.

Tuesday: Russian Night was rained out but since the girls were at our friend's house for the evening, Gord and I went to the local Bistro and had a renovation meeting, a do we or don't we kind of discussion. Lots of lychee martinis and wine were consumed and by then, we pretty much agreed to go all out on the renos.

Wednesday: Dinner at Tapeo (a tapas bar) with A and C, our dear old friends and neighbors. It was fabulous! Not only was the company great but the food was outstanding. Anyone in the Montreal area MUST try this restaurant!

Thursday: Problem. Our dinner with M and E to celebrate our 2 year referral day called to cancel. Now what? I am scrambling to find a solution. Help!

Friday: Wine and cheese with Cara-Li's adoption group in Stoneham. We are gettting together with all 8 families for our annual reunion. Sound be fun!

Saturday: BBQ dinner in Stoneham.

Sunday: Dinner on the road on the way home.

And finally, Monday is the start of Phase One of the South Beach Diet which will last 2 weeks. No starches, no sugars and no ALCOHOL! Yikes...

Happy Referral Day!

Today, July 6th, marks 2 years since we got Alexia's referral. We didn't get to see her little face for another week but we did find out that there was an 8 month old baby girl named Guang Yun Xia waiting for us in China. And anyone who has gotten this call knows what a wonderful day referral day is. Certainly a day worth celebrating! In fact, we are going out for supper with another family that we travelled with this coming Thursday. We will be dining at the same restaurant as 2 years ago when we sat there totally consumed with excitement and anticipation. What a feeling! We are blessed to have this little girl join our family and the last 2 years could not have been the same without her. We love you Alexia Yun Xia!

Playgroup

This was Alexia's first day at playgroup which she goes to one morning a week. She was too cute and so proud to be going to 'school' with her backpack and a snack. The dropoff went extremely well, too well in fact, as she did not even bat an eyelash when I dropped her off :( She was just too excited to be doing what she big sister is doing!

Happy Canada Day!

First off, I would like to wish all my fellow Canadians a very Happy Canada Day! This is a day that we should be thankful that we are Canadians and truly be proud of who we are.

This is what we did on this day to commemorate it:

Since Canada Day fell on a Wednesday this year, we decided to spend it in town. Montreal-West always hold a parade through town followed by a party in the park complete with BBQ, bouncy games, cotton candy, band and fireworks.

Here is a photo of the Farrell Family on this day. Do you think we are proud Canadians?

There was a bunch of special guests at the parade such as clowns, RCMP officers and the SQ (provincial police).

The girls had such a great time with all their friends and most espedcially Cara-Li who got to stay out until 11:30PM to see the fireworks with her Dad!

Recap

Whew! Time is certainly flying by and it's not because we're spending all our waking moments enjoying the summer. The weather has not been great but yet we are still busy with everything!

Here's what we've been up to:

Cara-Li finished school almost 2 weeks ago with rave reviews from her wonderful teacher, Mme. V, who mentionned to me that Cara-Li was the student that showed the greatest improved throughout the year. She started off hardly speaking any French and being very reserved and quiet to a a young girl who is no longer shy to speak French. As Mme. V put it, 'Cara-Li blossomed into a beautiful rose right before everyone's eyes.' It is soooo nice to hear this and after my 5 minute telephone conversation with Mme. V, I was certainly the proudest Mom on earth! Congratulations Cara-Li on your success in 1st grade!

For Father's Day, we went to Granby Zoo. Every year we go to a park of sorts with the girls on this day. It is a great way to spend the day. This year we packed a lunch as I didn't want to eat the usual junk available at these places. It was great fun! Granby Zoo has been totally renovated adding a waterpark which is always welcomed at the end of the day when it is really hot out. To end the day, we then had dinner at my parents' house.

These bats were NOT part of the zoo animals. They were just these wild things hanging up side down for a nap! They were HUGE!

Next... since Cara-Li finished school a week before most, we sent her to the Day Camp at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts with a neignbour of ours, S. There she discovered that a girl from her class was also attending. The day always started off with a visit to the museum, sketching what they saw and then followed by reproducing their interpretion of the art. They did some painting, sculpting, stain glass painting and watercolour. It all ended with a vernissage where we got to visit the museum and their art work. It was extremely fabulous and Cara-Li really enjoyed her week there. After the exhibit, we had 30 minutes to kill before picking up a frien, we decided to stop off at Pub Alexandre and I had a wonderful Kir Royale on the terrace just like in Paris! A great start to the weekend!

Cara-Li is now in the Mo-West Day Camp for 4 weeks and in swimming for 9 weeks. She seems to be having fun with the other 10 boys in her group. Yup... they assign 1 girl with 10 boys! Who was the planner here? I was going to ask to have her moved but apparently she likes her group and doesn't want to change. Should I start worrying yet???

A couple of weeks ago, I, along with some friends from the neighbourhood, started power walking in the evening. We do this twice a week and for one hour. We are a group of eight and although not everyone comes each time, you are always guaranteed to have someone to walk with. We meet at 8:30PM at a particular corner and whoever is there is there. It has been great and my legs are starting to feel it. This is part of my get fit and lose weight program that I am on. So I go to the gym 3 times a week and power walk for 2. I rest on weekends. Also, in two weeks I will be starting the South Beach diet. With this, I should be able to lose the extra pounds that i didn't lose in the crazy diet from a few weeks ago. I am proud to say that I have not gained any of that weight back either!

Last weekend was our first weekend at the cottage. Luckily, there were no surprises. Gord was with us which explains the lack of surprise! Gord mysteriously is never around when stuff goes wrong at the cottage ;) Well, we did have one surprise. M, who is the 7 year old granddaughter of our cottage neighbour, was up visiting. Cara-Li and M. have not seen each other in 2 years but did not miss a stride. They kept going back and forth from one house to the other the entire weekend. M. is 2 days older than Cara-Li and is also adopted but from Georgia (not USA but Russia) so they have a very special connection. Here are some pictures of the girls fishing. Too cute!

That is all for now. Will try to post more frequently instead of one huge one every 2 weeks.