Month: January 2010

A few weeks ago, we had the pleasure of having the Friesens over for a little dinner. The thing that makes me smile the most is how much Dayla loves her friend Ellie. Although they only see each other about 1/3 as frequent as her other friends, Ellie definitely remains one of Dayla’s favorite friends.

So naturally when Ellie wanted to teach Dayla a few things, Dayla was EAGER to learn. That night Dayla learned how to put her own pants on for the first time, and also how to catch (she has actually learned to catch from us…but really enjoyed re-learning from her friend Ellie). Now if only I could convince Ellie to tell Dayla to always listen to me and behave, I will be set.

Here are some pictures from our “how to catch” part of the evening.

Daniel and I both love to cook/bake, so you can imagine our excitement that Dayla has already taken quite an interest in the kitchen. She already understands all the “rules” to the kitchen (knives are sharp, you have to ask before you come in …cause our kitchen is the size of a pea, etc) and asks to “help” almost everyday. She is actually a pretty great helper too. She can make her own sandwiches, is great at mixing things, and can even crack eggs without getting any shell in the bowl. It seems to makes sense that she would have an affinity to cooking since Daniel and I both spend a lot of time in there. Whatever the reason, we are loving it.
Daniel and I have both enlisted her help in the kitchen many times, and love to have her as our “sous chef”. The other night though was a little “first” that we had to document. We baked cookies all together, our first kitchen task as a whole family and our first time baking cookies with Dayla (usually I am baking bread or muffins). It was SO much fun and at the end we had delicious snicker doodles! Here is the documentation:

Enjoying her first set of beaters (above) and then attempting to role dough in a ball (below)

She enjoyed the dough so much, I caught her sneaking some out of the bowl!

Then Dad joined in on the fun!

Checking out the finished product…unsure what to think

The consumption. I think she liked the cookies….I was pretty sure I was going to get a smile on camera after she tasted them, but instead she just kept asking for more!

Especially at New Years we find our self making goals, thinking about what we want more of next year or what we can do better. I have been thinking a lot about the new year this year, and since this blog has become (for me anyway) my journal of things I want to remember about life and motherhood and Dayla, I am going to share with you.
The other day we were spending time with a little girl who is about 2 years older than Dayla. She was sweet and smart and eloquent. But being with her gave me a HUGE realization…that is going to be Dayla in just a couple years! I saw for the first time what I hear all the other parents talking about; this little baby/little girl stage is going to fly by quick. That this strong willed little toddler who dances to trance music, who says “foots” instead of “feet”, who calls sunscreen “some-scream”, who laughs with her belly uncontrollably and doesn’t feel any smidgen of self-consciousness; this little girl is going to be just like that other little girl in just a couple of years. In a couple years her “terrible two’s” will seem like a shadow of a memory. Her words will one day be perfect and eloquent. She will start to be self aware and self conscious. At that moment of realization I was able to pull myself out of my life and just look in, as though looking and seeing myself through a window, seeing all the WONDERFUL things about this challenging stage of my toddler’s life, and it made me happy.
So many conversations in our daily life are about the future. In our personal life it is about what and who will Dayla be, are we going to have a house, are we going to have more children. It is so easy to get caught up in that, the dreaming, the guessing, the goal making. Don’t get me wrong, I am a goal person. I love making goals and lists and I get a strange little high when I cross things off my list. No, I am not judging goal makers. I just think for me and my personality it is good to stop making goals sometimes. It is good to just pull back, pull out of the daily routine, the monotony of life, and think of all the things that are going right and the blessings of this moment.
I feel like I could list all of the blessings I have and the things that bring me joy and I could go on and on for pages until your eyes were bleeding and you were bored to tears. There is no need for that. So today I am just going to share my thankfulness for that sweet little girl, who gave me a window to my future, who gave me the opportunity to pull myself out of the hum-drum daily routine of life and look into it from the outside, and feel happy for today. Who helped me see past the challenges, the tantrums, the “no’s” and “mine’s”, and see so much more.
My hope for you as you enter this new year is that you get one of those windows, some kind of moment this year that helps you to stand back and, for just a little while, forget the future and the goal making and the stresses of the day, and just feel the joy of today and the perfection of where you are in your life right now (whether it is where you thought you would be or hoped to be, or not), and feel blessed.
[Cliche or not, every thorn does have a rose at the top…you just have to force yourself to look up sometimes.]
Happy New Year!
Dayla loving some playdough from Nana. Cause these are some of the great simple moments of everyday life I want to savor.