Happy Mother's Day

It has been a wonderful year of motherhood. I have been given the beautiful gift of rediscovering the world through the eyes of my little Adiel, and yet more, with her I knew the meaning of unconditional love.

Today I took some photographs of the two of us... I am rarely in front of the lens lately, and I do want her to have these memories.

This is my take on motherhood. A self portrait...

One day I will have a great editing software and good skills, and I will do a nice work with these pictures for her. I love the intensity of her eyes in this one.

And since we were at the beach, I also took some photos of her.

...one day I will learn how to use my camera properly and I will take much nicer photographs... Just imagine the day when the journey sisters start standing still and modeling for me!!

I hope you all had a lovely mother's day.

Until soon,

Mercedes

First day at school!!

She is the youngest one of all the kids (by a couple of months). It is a small Montessori kinder garden where they will encourage her to be her own person and to go for whatever calls her heart, to be considerate... and that there are consequences to everything and to wash her dishes! Even when we came in the first day all the kids knew her name (they would correct each other saying aDiel, with a D, jeje, so cute!).

When I came to pick her up she was covered in sand from the sand box, and she was happy, but as soon as she saw me, she almost started to cry... my darling little one!

In the beginning I am just taking her for a couple of hours a day. After the summer she will be going for longer time. So many things are about to open for her, and I look forward to all of them!

Mercedes

Adiel's rainbow party

We got home from Israel less than a week before Adiel's first birthday. I thought for a second to just let it go, and maybe eat out with daddy and her and let her blow out a candle on the restaurant's slice of cake to celebrate. She will not remember, I had no time to prepare and invite, and I certainly did not want to spend a lot of money. But the truth is I do want her to know and see how special that day was to us. So, I decided to invite a few friends and neighbors to a cake and sweets party, and take a couple of easy DIY decorating projects.

This is Adieli's first birthday and rainbow party:

I got her cake at a local bakery that we love and prepared an ice cream buffet with fruits and goodies. I also got cookies and lots of candy. Luckily for everyone there, Uri thought of serving margaritas and those were a big hit too.

For the decorations, I did a rainbow paper curtain (idea from here), some tissue paper pom poms, lots of paper flowers to decorate the cake (tutorial here), a rainbow paper garland, her pom pom birthday hat (another idea here), rainbow butterfly confetti, the mini garland cake top, and I bought and hung a "Felicidades" (Congratulations) garland and a bunch of balloons for the balcony.  It sounds like a lot, but everything was pretty easy to make (and I got a little help from my friends!).

Here she is with her uncle:

 

We sang Happy Birthday to her in her three languages and then I served her a big piece of cake that she absolutely loved.

It was a beautiful day and we had a good time. 

 

Feliz Cumpleaños mi hermosa Adiel! Que sea un gran año lleno de aventuras y descubrimientos en nuestra montaña, que hagas muchos amigos en tu nueva escuelita, que nos riamos a carcajadas, que hables y opines y me cuentes, que bailemos juntas, que leamos muchas historias, que puedas conocer y rencontrarte con toda la gente que te quiere, que aprendas mucho... que seas feliz amorcito mío! 

Show me some birthday pictures!
Until soon,
Mercedes

Mango

Nice Monday!

Today I am officially back to work. All this time I had been working from home, and that was so hard... at home there is always a different priority, and a little one that shows me more exciting things. But I do love the organization I work for, the people I see at the office, the passionate conversations, the mental stimulation! So, I am officially back at the desk, and I am very grateful for it. I will be attending only half a day, and do the rest from our mountain house. I am also happy because I got some new tasks that will bring a challenge and that will allow me to be creative (did I say I love my boss? he is just the finest person).

On more announcements, Adiel is starting Montessori school! She is so ready for it... I am sure she will love it, she will make lots of cute friends and she will learn so much.

We had a nice day and we celebrated with a mango feast in our patio.

 

She is one year old now. I am so incredibly proud of her! Last weekend I organized a little cake party for her. I did not have much time to prepare, but I love the way it turned out. I will show you pictures later. She got many presents, she's a lucky girl. 

We also decided to start a new tradition and do something good for someone else in her birthday. This year we are making a donation on her behalf to a local non profit that rescues dogs and cats. In the future, I envision some volunteer time and creative fund raising for whatever she wants to support.

Eating mango with her brought me back to my own childhood... we truly are lucky girls!

How are your days?

Until soon,

Mercedes