Here comes the sun

....at least, most days :) Spring is here, one day it feels like summer and the next it rains all day. But all that sun and rain is in the end what's making Battery Park beautiful - all the trees are in bloom right now and we've been taking endless walks to enjoy all of those pretty flowers. I show Olivia the "baby leaves" in the trees and tell her that soon the trees will be covered in green. She smiles big when she realizes what's happening around her :)



And when it rains, well, we happily cuddle inside. We drink hot chocolate. Bake some cookies. Draw until we've used up our chalk - or rather, until Madeline ate all of it ;)

Sunny or cloudy, who care - we'll just try to make the most out of each day.

Jersey (NOT shore)

Usually when someone mentions Jersey, I get a little scared. Jersey Shore sort of ruined it for me, and then let's face it, the drive from NYC to Newark airport in Jersey is just not the most scenic......and that's me being nice here. So when my friend Nicole (and Olivia's little friend Maddie, if you remember) told me that they were moving to Jersey, in my mind I thought "Oh no! Jersey!".....

But we went and visited them last weekend, I have to admit that....they probably found the most perfect of places. The most beautiful house. A huge backyard with tons and tons of old trees - oh I love big old trees. Not the Jersey I had in mind at all.



We had a great day playing and relaxing away from the big city. I had forgotten what silence sounds like, as it turns out. The girls tried to take a nap together.....well I'm sure I don't need to tell you that they didn't do as much sleeping as they did jumping on Maddie's bed. Oh well, they had fun :) And we did too watching them on the video baby monitor.



Oh, and we had a little picnic outside in the afternoon - Nicole bakes the yummiest cakes!

We came back late that day and the girls fell asleep in the car, exhausted and happy. Thanks again Nicole for such a great day! We'll be back...even though you live in Jersey ;)

Favorite time of the day....

Hands down. No matter what, bath time always makes your girls happy. You swim around, splash water on daddy and laugh... it is your - and my- favorite time of the day.

Inspired

One word: INSPIRED.

In all its simplicity, the word perfectly describes how I feel after this weekend. On Saturday and Sunday mornings, I gave Oli, Maddie, and hubby the biggest kiss goodbye and headed off to the East village to attend "Blogging Your Way NYC" - taught by (the amazing) Holly Becker from Decor8 and (the oh-so-talented) Leslie Shewring from A Creative Mint.


The workshop was all about blogging, styling and photography, and gathered about 26 women ready to be fulled up with creative inspiration. During these two days, Leslie and Holly shared their stories and experiences with us, gave us tons of insights and tips so that we could find fresh inspiration to become better bloggers.


On Saturday Holly mostly focused on creative blogging. Everything she said that day resonated deep with what I believe blogging should really be about, and it was an amazing, intense day hearing her speak with so much passion.

On Sunday, Leslie taught about styling and photography. I was smiling inside (and out) when Leslie showed us her creative process, and taught us how we could create better images. Seeing her in her creative process was the most amazing thing for me. I get high on creativity, whether it is my own or someones else's - what do you want, I am a creativity junky, I can't help it :)

What I learned during the workshop is priceless as I am just starting out with This Little Street, but my biggest take-away from the weekend is this: the importance of telling a story through words and images. And not any story, YOUR story. Putting your eyes and hearts into everything that you are talking about - showing how you see the world.

Most importantly, new friendships formed this weekend. I personally feel so blessed to have met so many inspiring women at the workshop. I can't wait to see where the road leads all of them!

Thanks again, Holly and Leslie, for everything you did this weekend.

Franishglish - Part 2

Teaching and learning three languages is quite an adventure, but we didn't expect any less than that. I already talked about it a little bit a few months ago when Olivia was starting to say her first few words, and it is time for a little update on the topic :)

So on the positive side, we're super happy to report that Olivia understands - and speaks - all three languages. Well, "speaking" might be a bit strong here, but she says words in all three languages, and the more she learns, the more he goes the less she mixes languages in the same sentence. We still get a lot of "Mig poupee bye bye dodo" and "Viens, maman, spiser morgenmad", but hey, that's to be expected while she sorts all that out in her head :)

Touche pas a ma pomme.

I can stand!!!!

We trying to teach her about colors and numbers, and we end up with some funny thing - like, she will know that Groen in Danish translates to Vert in French.....but she can't always find the green object that we're looking for :) Or she will go "un, two...fem".

One of little "sorting colors" game. While I sew I let her play with the buttons, she loves being my little helper :)

For the longest ime, Olivia wouldn't say "merci" to me. No matter how nicely I'd ask, or if I was trying to bribe her with a cookie, she would just reply "tak" with a big smile. And "tak" again and again, and would go into an uncontrollable laugh because she knew that she was driving me nuts! Funny how they get it so early on. Anyway, over the christmas break I decide "that's it", and on the way to my parents I just said "You won't get your pacifier until you say "merci""....I had to work for it a bit, but 10 minutes I heard a little shy "me'ci"......turns out, I think she was mostly afraid of mispronouncing it - yes, even at here age! She practiced a little bit and I stopped my threats :D

Sometimes we feel that we are not speaking as much to Madeline - I mean, we still talk to her a lot, but you just put so much focus on your first child when they join your family, you try to do everything perfect, and then comes the second and you have to juggle so much more that you just don't have the time to do all of the things you used to do when you only had one child. But it's just the way the cookie crumbles, and I am sure we speak to her enough.

We read and we sing and we dance. ok, ok, the dancing part may not have much to do with languages, but it has a lot to do with happiness, and that's got to count for something :)