Bluebird's Nest

Ok, I’ll admit it – I haven’t blogged in AGES. But I’m feeling inspired to put together what happened for us this year in photos as I did last year.

Robin at Farewell Stranger has inspired me yet again to sweep away the bloggy cob webs and start anew. Nothing like trying to win a contest while you’re at it.

January

We came home from Switzerland after being gone for one month across Canada and then 5 months in Switzerland. My baby turned one, back to work for me, a new daycare for the wee babe, half way through grade 7 for the tweenager, and a new job for the hubby.

First steps are always really cool (and I shed a tear) so I think that this will be my memory for January.

February

February is a big month for birthdays in my family – mine included. My highlight was the Murdery/Mystery party my husband threw for me. It was flapper themed and so damn cool!

I don’t really like the photos of me that were taken so I’m going to post one of the two handsome blokes from the party. The guy on the left is mine. Hands off ladies.

March

March we were settled back into life around here. And the drab drab weather that the Wet Coast is here. When looking back on the photos I took in March, I found one wonderful day that I took some photos of my girls around Easter. This photo makes me smile.

April

Once again my tween competed in the Concours d’art oratoire and this time she won it in her age group! Definitely the highlight of my month.

May

We can’t have mind blowing things happen to us every month. So this month we just began to enjoy outside a little more and partake in welcoming in Spring.

June

I started a new job. I was freaked out, excited, nervous, elated, joyous, and thinking I was downright loco. A little like a new born goat. We visited goats during this month, so this photo is appropriate.

July

Two largish things happened in July so I can’t just post one photo.

My 20 year grad reunion happened. I got pretty drunk at the dinner cuz that’s what you’re supposed to do at a grad reunion party right? (sshhhh… don’t tell anyone) and then the next day we had a big family BBQ at Beckwith Park. I don’t look a day over 17 if I do say so myself.

AND… my in-laws and my husband’s aunt and uncle came from France and Switzerland. We ventured to Parksville where the weather was crap. The stayed for only 10 short days… I hope they stay longer next time.

August

In August we travelled down to the States to visit with all of our cousins. After a cold trip to Parksville, it was beyond hot in Seattle. But we had a great time visiting all our family down south.

September

In September I was bound and determined to get my baby on the front cover of Island Parent by winning the baby contest at the baby fair. Unfortunately, she didn’t win but don’t you think this is the cutest pic ever and that she should have won? We’re just waiting for someone to “find” her and make her famous. She’s not just a pretty face people. She knows two languages. Any day now….

October

In October we headed to Pender Island for a get away. Another rainy get away. Oh well, we had a great time. We also headed to the pumpkin patch to take some anual photos with the fall colours. I couldn’t resist putting in two family shots for this month. The first is a photo on the Pender Island Disk Golf Course.

November

At the tail end of October was my hubby’s birthday and at the very beginning of November the Tweenager turned into a teen. I can hardly believe my once little sweet pea is now moving into her next stage. I love this photo.

December

Welcome to the end of the year. We took some nice photos of the girls but I’ll put the Christmas card photo of the teenager in here as I just love the colours of her hat. Joyeux Noel and Bon Annee tout le monde!

It’s been a while since I’ve done a wee babe update. Gotta catch up all up to what she’s been up to lately.

As you know, she’s been a walking machine for about 2.5 months now. She’s on the verge of running.

She easily goes up and down stairs (and makes me nervous every single time I might add).

She got up onto the couch the other day for the first time, grabbed the tweenagers iPod, got back off the couch, and then proceeded to try and plug it into the docking station for about 5 minutes. She’s definitely persistent. She likes tables too. She’s starting to walk up small stairs standing up.

She gets off the bed backwards no problem.

She still loves to play with doors, but mostly the kitchen cabinet doors so we have them ALL locked up. Lately, she’s been working at opening doors with door nobs. I’m sure this will come soon.

She’s not saying many words yet (mama, papa, JJ) but can sign more, hungry, thirsty and all done. Her delay in her speech must be caused by the fact that we speak to her in French, she is spoken to in English all other times, and we have been signing to her. 3 languages in not too shabby!

She’s big into dancing, and loves to sing a little song.

She’s a good sleeper. She goes to bed at 7:30pm and up at 6:30am without waking (usually). No crying when she goes to bed either – usually a smile.

She’s has 12 teeth. She’s working on her eye teeth (ouch!).

She adores swimming. It’s like she’s had about 4 red bulls when the water hits her skin. Legs moving, arms waving, and moving around like a fish out of water. I guess you can imagine that she loves baths too.

She picks up anything and everything that is the same size as her or bigger and absolutely must share it with you.

She likes most food. Not too picky.

She has an never ending cough and it seems that she gets better, then a random fever, then worse, running nose, cough, better, worse… Ahhh the joys of daycare and having a +1 year old.

She woofs like a dog when she hears a dog, blows raspberries, and tweets like a bird.

Up until just yesterday, I didn’t know she loves to garden (toddler gardening) but it was kind of a given since she adores to be outside. She likes to mow the lawn with her daddy.

She likes to show her tummy when she’s not in a onesie.

She likes to rearrange the shoes frequently and won’t hesitate to give them too you when she wants to go outside. You might even go as far as saying she has a shoe obsession.

She will give you a diaper if you ask her for one but still cries when you try to change her.

She’s beginning to be interested in books.

She likes being a menace, sitting on the tweenager’s stomach, punching her in the face, and she’s cute (so says the tweenager).

She likes to twirl her hair (like her mama).

She helps clear the table after dinner.

She’s obsessed with buttons. Phones, remote controls, VCR’s, washing machines, dishwashers, computer keyboards, etc… if it has a button, the wee babe needs to push it.

Detests her bike helmet (more on that tomorrow).

She gives great hugs and kisses.

She 98% joy, 2% handful. We love her to bits.

The wee babe started walking the day AFTER the big birthday party here, so January 22, 2012. That makes 12 months and 18 days.

It was a fantastic moment for our family. All of us just happened to be hanging out in the living room. We had a CD playing that our friends Kelly and Sarah made for her for her birthday the day before and it just happened to be a Bob Marley song playing.

She was holding two small board books – one in each hand – that our friends Jeffery and Lisa had given to her at her birthday the day before.

She took 3 steps.

My hubby and I cried.

We had a moment – our baby was growing up right before our eyes.

What were your baby’s first steps like? Did you miss it? Did you cry?

Reflecting… reflecting on leaving that part of my life behind. Not having a house to come back to, to pick up where I left off when I get back there. It’s really the end of one thing which is sad but also thoughtful.

Leaving

I enjoyed spending the time and watching my wee babe grow and learn everything that she had to learn from 6-12 months. I loved seeing her with her grand parents, aunty, family, friends, etc… She might not remember them soon but they sure will remember her. I’m positive that they will live on in her heart somewhere and there will always be a part of them with her. A familiarity when she sees them next. It was so utterly sad leaving my in-laws house knowing that we were taking her away from them. I couldn’t hold back the tears.

For the tweenager, I always say she had the most beneficial time. Growing her language skills, having to make new friends in a new school system in a foreign language. I’m so proud of her for all that she has done. Thanks to her, we have about 10 songs that are our theme songs for that time in our life so I will always remember that time when I hear them. She has grown up so quickly in the last 6 months and is not the same girl that left on our trip across Canada.

I’m so happy for my hubby to go back home and see his family and friends and show off his new littlest girl. You could see the joy in his face and the skip in his step when he knew he was heading up the mountains to go snowboarding. Who gets to take 6 months off and then head back to a better paying job?

As for me, I loved every minute of it. It was cleansing, rejuvenating, inspiring, fulfilling, motivational and challenging. I would highly recommend anyone to try to live in another country for 4+ months. It’s a lot of work, research and commitment to get there, but it is so absolutely worth it. I miss it dearly and I would be lying if I didn’t say that some days I just want to go back to our little apartment overlooking the lake and the mountains. We have plans though… plans to one day make it back there. Plans to get the wee babe in school over there because there is a lot more $$ in Switzerland for education then there is here. A lot. I keep asking my hubby if we can buy a house over there so we can move back and forth and then it doesn’t seem quite so over when it’s over. We shall see what the future holds for us.

Coming back

I’ll blog about the airplane trip(s) soon so I won’t get into that, but let’s just say it was about the worst experience on a plane that I’ve ever had. I was worried for the wee babe but I think I should have been more worried then I was. It was a terrible horrible no good very bad thing.

My feelings on coming back. It’s so damn easy to slip back into your life after only 6 months. You just unpack boxes, schedule appointments to get your life back into order, reconnect with friends and family, start working again and voila! You’re back at it.

The wee babe has gone through some changes with a new daycare, being sick, a new language, bad cheese (we are still buying expensive (was cheap) Swiss cheese as she really only likes that compared to the orange crap we have here), a new house, new bed, new time change, more rain than she’s ever seen, and she’s handling it all quite well.

The tweenager has fit right back into school, she’s top notch now in French, and has been building her life here. We spent so much time together that I feel ok with her spreading her wings.

The hubby started up his new job in a new building with new co-workers. Even before we got back, his schooling at Royal Roads had started and he was fully into the swing of school life as soon as we got back. I don’t know how he works all day and then studies all night. Must be because he has such a supportive wife He’s dying to go back too but has to finish school first. We have a 5 year plan.

All in all, things have morphed quite smoothly. People ask me if it was hard to transition back. Not really. The hardest thing is when you know the sun is shining over there and it’s raining here. It’s enough to make you wonder why you live here. I’m not sure who coined the phrase “Best place on Earth” but they might have been smoking something funny at the time.

I miss the friends I made, the family that touched our life, an everything that Switzerland is now to my family.

Writing this has given me closure and has been very therapeutic in feeling like that part of my life is complete.

And after 3 months I can safely say – we’re back!

Robin at Farewell Stranger had a wonderful idea. Write a blog capturing the moments from last year by using one photo from each month. Since I take a lot of photos and I had a pretty memorable year, I thought this was a splendid idea.

January

Well, January definitely didn’t go unnoticed with the birth of our beautiful baby, Violette. It was a hard delivery (C-section) but our family was so ready to welcome her into our family and our hearts.

February

Even though February is FULL of birthdays (even mine), I could only find photos of Violette as we were well into getting to know our wee babe. (Yes those are bags of bread on either side of her head) and we had a freak Victoria snow dump as well.

March

In March we headed down to Seattle to spend some time with all the cousins on the Howe side of the family. Ok, not all of them were there but we had a great time introducing Vivi and also getting to know my cousin’s new baby, Ashleigh, who was only born 2 weeks after Violette.

April

In April I started this blog!! I had meant to start it when Violette was born to capture all the thoughts and feelings that I had been having as a ‘new’ mom (ok, I’m not new but after 11 years, I was definitely rusty). We also went on a hike up bear hill and managed to snap some great photos of my girls.

We also went up to Cowichan to spend Easter with one of our favourite families. Definitely a time to remember.

May

In May we took a trip off the island to Vancouver for the tweenager to participate in the “Concours”. Her speech was on bottled water (and delivered all in French) and she did a wonderful job. She says that next year if she makes it to the semi-finals again, she will do her speech on Switzerland!

June

We were madly getting ready for our big trip across Canada. One of the things we needed to do was plant a tree that the hubby had received when it was just a little sapling. It was now big and in a pot that was too small so he wanted to plant it somewhere memorable. We took him to the spot where we got married in East Sooke Park and named him Xavier. One of the things I want to do when we get home is visit Xavier and see how he’s doing.

July

Wow, July is an entire month filled with photos of our trip across Canada. How ever will I pick just one? I think we only have one photo of us all together so I’m chosing this one. We were on the beach on PEI watching the beautiful sunset. PEI is an amazingly beautiful place (dare I say the most beautiful place that we saw?) so I think it’s right to have this photo depict our journey.

August

August was no slouch either for getting out and about. We started our 5 month adventure in Switzerland at the very end of July so we tried to pack in as much as possible for the one summer month we had before the tweenager started school. We journeyed to the Mont Blanc in France, Valbella in Switzerland, Zurich, Thun, and to the Gewürztraminer area of France, Alsace.

Again, hard to pick just one, but this photo really speaks to me. We were in Zurich and it was so freakin’ hot. There is a really cool ground-fountain thing (I don’t know how else to explain it) but it’s jets of water that come up from the ground and you never know where it’s going to spurt up next. We were so relieved to have the water falling down on us.

September

We spent the majority of September getting to know our new digs and our new Ville, Vevey. We explored around the town, walked Jaedyn to and from school twice, sometimes three time a day and spent a few evening (and days) at the lake enjoying the afternoon sun, having dinner lakeside. This is a photo of Violette on one of these afternoons.

October

October was filled with a much anticipated visit from my mommy from Canada for 10 days and a lifelong wish to tour around Egypt. When my mom was here we walked to Montreux and enjoyed a traditional Swiss event, Desalpes.

November

In November we celebrated Luc and Jaedyn’s birthdays in addtion to Luc’s sisters. Luc had a crazy dance party and Jaedyn had some friends to our favourite restaurant, Pizza Taxi. We also visited with friends. The highlight of our month was spent during a weekend away in Bretaye, high in the Swiss mountains eating crepes and raclette. It was deliciously wonderful.

December

We were in full swing Christmas mode during the month of December making crafts, baking, checking out the festivities in Vevey (JJ skated at the local skating rink), and visiting Santa in Rocher de Naye. We spent Christmas with Luc’s family and then heading back up to Valbella to ring in the New Year under a lot of beautifully falling snow.

I loved being able to recap the year in photos. It sure was hard to pick the one that represented the month the best since our months were filled chock-o-block fullness.

Looking back on the year of 2011, we had an amazing year filled with some of the most memorable experiences I will ever have.

Not too much new to report on the developmental side of things.

She’s eating almost the exact same things as us now save for the few things that aren’t right for her age (strawberries, honey, nuts, etc…) but she like chicken curry, olives, and salmon to name a few.

She’s seems to be more on her feet than on her knees these days. The hubby is sure that she will be walking within the next week and a half (her first birthday if you do the math).

Other than that, she’s seen and felt snow which she didn’t like that much, she seems to be getting a little more of a temper these days and we’re on day 5 of completely being finished breastfeeding. No turning back now.

I’m looking forward to her first Christmas in just 2 short days.

Happy Holidays to you

6 weekends. That’s all we have left.

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about coming home. I feel like I’ve been gone for so long and it feels weird on all sorts of different levels.

I think about leaving here. I have a life here now. Ok, so maybe I don’t have a lot of friends – to be honest with you, I’ve enjoyed being alone and just spending time with my family. I think I may wish or regret that I didn’t put myself out there a little more than I did but at the same time, I’ve really enjoyed watching my tweenager grow (let’s face it, she’s not going to want to hang around with us for much longer) and spending time with my wee babe in her first year. You know what they say: time flies by in a rush so enjoy every minute of it.

I think about leaving my hubby’s family. I really feel like the relationships that I have with his friends and family has grown as well. Especially his parents. We Skype with them almost every day and it seems like we’re spending every weekend at their house for sleepovers. It makes me think about how we won’t be spending as much time with them in 6 short weeks and how they will only get to see their grandbaby through Skype. This makes me sad.

I think about how it’s hard to have two people come together who are from different countries and raise a family together. I think it’s maybe more difficult for the grandparents as one set of grandparents miss out on the grandchildren more than the other one. In a perfect world we would live 6 months in Canada and 6 months in Switzerland. But the world is not perfect.

That gets me thinking how lucky we are to be able to come here for 5 months and to be able to provide the grandparents here, a strong memory of their grandbaby’s first year. It makes me happy that they got to enjoy that. And hopefully a memory strong enough for the wee babe to remember them when she sees them on Skype from the other side of the world.

And then I think about going home. What is life going to be like when we get home? I go back to my job, the hubby starts a new one, he goes back to school full time, the tweenager is in middle school, the wee babe in daycare… Same old same old? In a way I hope not. And then I ask myself, how do I want life to be like when we come home?

I think about what this adventure means for our family. Are we destined to travel the world with our kids? We sure have shown ourselves that it’s something we can do; we all are adaptable. How has this experience changed us? me? I don’t know if it’s possible now for me to stay in one place for the rest of my life. I want to be able to experience different things, challenge myself, push my comfort zones, give diverse experiences to my children.

I want my life not to be mundane and ordinary.

And then I think about my hubby and I’m happy that I married the man that I married because I think in the same way that I feel, he maybe feels a little like I do. I hope he does at least.

And so we’re coming home. We’re going to be adding on a bathroom when we get home. My hubby’s family will be visiting in the summer which won’t seem like that long away until the wee babe sees her maminou and papinou again in real life. Life will continue to go on, we will celebrate the wee babe’s first birthday when we get home and my 37th in February.

But I refuse for life to be usual and predictable. I choose for life to be full of experiences, adventures, and worthwhile relationships. I choose for it to be stimulating, nurturing, and above all else, I strive for it to be amazing.

I haven’t been a good blogger lately. To be honest, I’ve been working on other things on my computer (Christmas gifts) and the wee babe can only take so much of mama/computer time before she flips her lid.

I seem to have finished up with my projects (for the time being until I need to send out electronic Christmas cards), and I have a plethora of things I want to blog about. Things that have happened in the last little while that I don’t want to forget about. After all, that IS why I have this blog.

I’m going to start out with a wee babe update.

The wee babe is 10+ months old now and she’s getting a real personality these days! She’s an action packed power house. Go go go from the moment she wakes up to the moment she goes to sleep. The other night (while at a birthday party) she was pushing around a chair that was crazy heavy and 2 times the size for her but nothing seemed to stop her. She crawls faster than I can walk, pulls herself up on EVERYTHING, opens all the doors she shouldn’t, pulls everything out of the cupboards… She’s actually driving me a little insane with how much trouble she gets into (opened a bottle of olive oil and dumped it all over the floor, opened a Tylenol bottle and dumped it all over the floor. As soon as I heard the Tylenol spill all over the floor, I was on her so fast but unfortunately, the oil was a little more quiet. She ate a spider on Halloween.

She’s cruising the furniture… god help me when she starts walking. She’s got 8 teeth. Oh and she just climbed 15 stairs yesterday from bottom to top. She keeps us running. It’s a good thing there’s 3 of us here to entertain her and watch her… she’s a full time job. She’s been practicing blowing out a candel, getting ready for the big first birthday LOL!

She likes to walk while holding our hands. She’s makes so many different faces – all of which crack me up. She loves to be held upside down and loves it when I dance with her – especially when I spin! Doors are one of her favorite toys (we’ve definitely had some pinched fingers but how else does a baby learn?). She loves it when you get down on your hands and knees with her and chase her around the furniture… or is it her chasing you? Hard to tell when you’re going in a circle.

I’ve been a bit slow to offer her finger food. I think I’m nervous that she’s going to choke. We’ve also had our fair share of gagging… And as of today, I’m going to start offering her a sippy cup with formula in it to encourage her to drink more from the cup and less from me and the bottle.

Today I’m posting my first video blog or vlog. I’ve been wanting to do one for a while and I thought I better capture the wee babe crawling and sitting up before she’s onto something else! Everything for her is changing so quickly.

I hope you enjoy.

I’ve been reflecting lately on perspective and how one gains perspective. I’ve always thought that gaining perspective has a lot to do with removing yourself from the situation. Being able to be an outsider looking in. Taking a break from what’s happening and giving yourself time to reflect and rejuvenate.

But I guess you could also gain perspective by being in a different environment. If you go to a third world country, you would gain the perspective of how fortunate we might be with running water for example. But then it also might give you perspective on how superficial we are. A stick may be a little boy’s toy in Peru, where we need (insert fashionable toy of the minute here).

I think gaining and getting perspective is so important. A chance to see things a different way.

I’m beginning to think that gaining perspective also builds on growing you as a person. Because if you think about it, if you can look at something differently, doesn’t that help you to change and perhaps grow just a little?

I’m thrilled to be able see how my baby grow and thrive in the next 6 months of her life. Changing at the same time as I write this blog. But what I’m even more looking forward to is seeing how my tweenager grows by gaining perspective.

Seeing a different way of living in a new culture, meeting new people, missing old friends, learning new things… if I know her I think she’s going to embrace the differences and this in turn, will help her to see life just a bit differently. Not that there is anything wrong with the way she sees it now.

Just differently.