GOOD MORNING!

Good morning everyone!

Man! last night was rough!

Was it a full moon or what? It was hard to put the girls to bed, hard to make them sleep and even harder to get through the night. I couldn't figure out what was wrong.

Just got my coffee shot and hopefully it will get me through the day.
I feel like this since i woke up:

Have a nice day!


Love,
      Angie


Stay healthy and beautiful!

gardening

Last week we did a bit of gardening. Nothing too scrumptious. But i have to say that this year my veggie garden looks better and we also made a spiral of aromatic plants close to the house this way is easy access. When we have a bit of breeze the scent of fresh mint and of fresh basil is carried in the house and you find yourself enveloped in this multitude of mixed aromas and all you want is to relax and enjoy, sometimes next to a glass of mojito, virgin one for those who don't consume alcohol.
Armed with shovels, and compost, and plants and tools and ready to go crazy. We lost our little helpers on the way to the veggie squares, too busy to play and jump around.

A while ago i saw this idea of aromatic plants spiral on a diy website, you can find it here  . I found it so cool that i told my hubby that we have to do it too. Its not the same as on the website.
We added the cardboard at the bottom.We used wood to create the spiral. We added compost inside the spiral.
We planted: lemongrass, chamomile, thyme, lemon thyme, pansies, oregano, basil, mint, flowers - to bring it a bit of colour
there it is:

 planted a yucca as well :)

Nice weather is back and i was able to take some lovely pictures of my veggie garden. Happy to share them with you.
As we are like rabbits, we love to eat fresh greens such as lettuce and salad, tomatoes and courgette we added them all to our veggie square. We all know that fresh veggies are good for our health and the more the merrier.
So happy to see that all of them are growing and soon we will start enjoying the results of our labour. yummy
I know two little girls who will munch on the cherry tomatoes, picking them right from the plant as soon as they are ready to be eaten.

Happy gardening!

Love,
      Angie


Stay healthy and  beautiful :)

to Italy and back!

Today we went to the market, in Italy, its like 30 km away from us.
There is an "everything" market where you can find everything from food to tools, to clothes and shoes.
The food you find there just makes you drool, the cheese, and spices and colourful pasta that looks so good that you almost feel bad to cook it.
There is a veggies market too.

Aujourd'hui, nous sommes allés au marché, en Italie, C'est à 30 km de nous.
Il est un "tout" marché où tu trouves à partir de la nourriture à des outils, des vêtements et des chaussures.
Les aliments que tu trouves la te fait juste baver, le fromage et les épices et pâtes colorées très très jolie et que tu sens mal à cuire.

Il y a aussi un marché de légumes frais.

 they look sexy good!

 

 

Like I mentioned: plenty of shoes. I haven't photographed them all. Just one stand. I am a shoe addict so it was very hard for me to resist not to buy those lovely green pumps that you can see in the far background. It looks like the woman from the picture is mesmerised by them too. :) I felt like i was doing window shopping, but this has been twice as hard to move away from them because there was no window between us to stop me. But I was strong enough to stop myself.  

Comme je l'ai dit: beaucoup de chaussures. Je ne les ai pas tous photographiés. Seulement un stand. Je suis un accro de chaussure, donc c'était très difficile pour moi de résister à ne pas acheter ces belles chaussure vertes que vous pouvez voir dans le fond a cote les bleus. Il me semble que la femme de la photo veux ces chaussure eux aussi. :)

Love,
      Angie




Stay healthy and beautiful

BIG mess! ;)

This happened couple of days ago and i haven't had the chance to post it. ;) ;) ;)
Sun is shining, spring is here with the nice weather, we feel good and happy and ready to have MORE FUN!
And when i say having fun, i wasn't talking about jumping in the trampoline or play outside to enjoy the nice weather, i was talking about what you will see in the following pictures.
Don't worry! Its not a hurricane pass through my living room. It's just my girls! :) And I'm sure you mommies out there know exactly what I'm talking about.

Let me know about your big messy days :) (with pictures if you feel proud about it ;) )


Cela s'est passé il y a quelques jours et je n'ai pas eu la chance de le poster. ;) ;) ;)
Le soleil brille, le printemps est là avec le beau temps, nous nous sentons bien et heureux et prêt à avoir plus de FUN!
Et quand je dis s'amuser, je ne parlais pas de sauter dans le trampoline ou jouer à l'extérieur pour profiter du beau temps, je parlais de ce que vous verrez dans les images suivantes.
Ne vous inquiétez pas! Ce n'est pas un ouragan qui a traversé mon salon. C'est juste mes filles! :) Et je suis sûr que vous les mamans là savez exactement de quoi je parle.
 

in the middle of it there is the daddy!

 lots of fun!

Love,
       Angie



Stay healthy, happy and beautiful!

Sleep training

We reached the BIG 1 year. Yay!

Between all the milestones that surprises us everyday we also have some major setbacks not so "enjoyable " , if you can call them like that. It happens when you sleep so good in your big cosy bed you hear the baby crying for you to wake up, to feed her or just to have a cuddle every night at the same hour like a Swiss clock not a minute late nor a minute earlier. And you are like: OK this could work, I can wake up 3 times per night at same time but then it escalates into every 2 hours and then into every hour and i feel like pulling my hair out.
I realized that my lovely little baby has sleep associations hence the waking up so often during the night. The sleep association would be me and my breasts. She developed this sleep association due to breastfeeding. She would wake up during the night and i would be there to comfort her.
Not to mention that i moved her in the same bedroom with my 4yr old and if it was fine at the beginning its not the case anymore.

The baby sleep website i founded really helpful. I read many helpful articles. Many advices from other parents that were going through the same baby sleep problems as we were. Love this website. With the help of many advises from this website I was able to train my old one to sleep on her own. Now I'm going back to the website because I'm training my little one to sleep on her own too.
I'm still breastfeeding her once a night. I will breastfeed her until she will wean herself out.

I'm not in any way imposing this website to anyone. I know there are so many resources on the web with relation to the baby sleep problems and what to do about it. 

17.03.2014 sleep training start

When I started sleep training Tyana she would wake up 6-9 times per night. I decided to move my 4 year old in my bedroom. So the three of us co sleep together. I didn't want her to suffer because her little sister wakes up so many times during the night.

 You need to be armed with tons of patience. As everybody would tell you, your baby needs you to guide her on how to sleep without her mommy's arms/breast.
During the first week of training, when Tyana would wake up I fed her only when I considered that she is hungry, based on when i last breastfed her. The rest I would only try to calm her down by offering her water and sing her a song. Of course it was not on her liking and she would cry and scream. But i tried my best to stay calm as much as possible.
Talking to her in a calming and soothing way. Explaining her as much as possible about where she needs to sleep and how good and safe her little bed is ;).

On the fifth day, of the first week of training i started to see improvement. She would still fight and cry but would wake up less - around 5-6 times per night. Breastfeeding only when i considered that she might be hungry. I gave water and sang songs for the rest of the times she woke up and try to calm her down.

During the weekend, 22-23.03.2014, i have seen more improvement. less waking up but just as much fighting.

I have to mention that i also applied the same technique for the naps. Here we have long way to go. Its so frustrating that she would just fight and fight and refuse to nap. But, hey i wont give up :)
For the morning nap, after almost 1 hour fighting, crying a bit , talking and playing a lot she would give up and sleep.
The after-noon nap is another matter.

That's it for now in the baby land.


Love,
      Angie




Stay healthy and beautiful and especially ZEN

blonde ambition

It's crazy how the desire of becoming a blonde comes back over and over again. If in the past i only tried once to become blonde, and its been years since then, last night i decided that , that's it!
I'm doing it!
I'm getting my hair a blond. Everybody seems to say that the blonde girls have more fun so......
Will it suit me and my personality? don't know, i hope so though.

This is me as brunette :)

Being sick and not feeling well doesn't help very much. But because i have been so excited and i just really really wanted to make a change i decided to bleach my hair.
The end result i like it , but its not the expected blond.

I really don't mind the red ginger colour that resulted after my experiment. I actually like it!
This one was a good one. ;)

Love,
      Angie

Stay beautiful and healthy!

Baby and the milestones!

This is something I wrote almost 2 months ago, but haven't had the chance to post it.

Happy birthday Bushka!

I have to add that tomorrow tyana will be 9 months and everyday she is showing all of us how fast she grows. Already able to stand on her own without any support, pushing and walking object that are easy to move around such as foot stool, small chair, trunki, kids table. She has so much strength and energy that at the end of the day I'm so exhausted that it feels like I'm the one doing all that pushing and moving around.

Clapping hands, opening and closing hands, asking to be taken in the arms and waving goodbye are few of the things she can do right now.

My Inaya is growing too, way too fast. Dressing herself, choosing the clothes on her own she has became a little fashionista. 

Got to go to sleep.

love, hugs and kisses

xxx

Angie

------------------------------------------------

Tyana is now 7 month and 2 weeks and she can do plenty of stuff. And sometimes I wish she would just slow down a bit. She is growing way too fast

Tyana can do list:

Smile- She smiles a lot. She always has a smile to offer and I love her to bits.
Crawl- She can crawl on four.
Stand- She can pull herself up and stand next to a solid object, like a couch. She can stand holding herself with only one hand and sometimes she is not even doing that and only the gravitational force plus her own wait supported by object stops tyana from falling. But the experience of falling with the resulted bumps made her realize that the motion of pulling up has an opposite namely the descending which is quite safe so she has been perfecting that move too.
Talking about safe baby ...in 90% of the cases, tyana supports herself when standing on unsteady objects such as rocking chair or footstool, and that will probably give me a heart attack soon as I always see her falling and getting hurt. I' m a bit paranoid about this, but, I guess what mother isn't.
She is fast when crawling.
Love for share- She loves her big sister very much. When Inaya is not around Tyana is looking for her.
Eating- She eats paper. Yep. If u lost your paper and cannot find it well...do not worry it is in a safe place... in tyana's belly.
;) Note to me and to the visitors: do not leave your papers around they might disappear.

Being more serious, we've started solids and so far so good. She is a "gourmand".

She can feed herself. I guess my work is done!

Talking about eating I can honestly say that after all the paper munching she still finds some space in her little belly for some banana or anything else I give her. 
Drinking- She loves drinking water from a glass. Not a big fan of baby bottles though.

Grabing- She can grab tiny objects and move them from one hand to another. 
When you interdict her something She will give out to you with the associated slapping.
She is curios about the dogs and I guess that soon she will remove the gate that keeps the dogs away from the living room. Watch out Bugsy and Hayllee. Something new to munch on.

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little section!

starting kindergarden is always a happening of joy and happiness for kids that land into the unknown world with the satchel on his back, smiling face and a look of unbounded eagerness to a period of new knowledge, friends, songs and games. A teacher that welcomes them with opened arms. For parents, and here I'm mainly talking about those of us who were the center of their little world, it was only mommy and daddy into a close circle. its scary how fast she grows. First day at kindergarden she told us to go home acting like a little adult proving that being with other people it is not a problem for her. While other kids were clinging on their parents and crying cuz they didn't want to stay at the kindergarden our girl acted calmly coloring and playing with the toys, not bothered as if she has been doing this all her life. I felt pride because she was acting so mature and yet so scared because she no longer needed me.

so we left her there. I arrived at home just to let my tears run their course. 
 
PS:all went all and she loved it! 

love and kisses,
angie