Live it!

My birthday girl

How did more than a week go by before I realized I never posted a Happy Birthday to my sweet seven year old: Chloe!?

Mommy has been busy I guess but we've been celebrating Chloe for over a week now... she likes the celebrations to go on over a long period of time - ha! On her birthday I pulled her and Keaton out of classes for a sushi lunch at Chloe's favourite restaurant. Nana L, Nana E, Debbie, Daddy, Keaton and Meg and myself all joined her and she felt really special.

Here are a few photos Lynn took at the restaurant:

Her official birthday party was put off til Saturday. It was a pool luau party but the weather man didn't get that message: he sent rain but that didn't damper the girls spirits. The seven girls had a blast swimming in the rain and running back and forth from the pool to the hot tub. Inside the girls made shrinky dink charms and beaded necklaces from my stash. Chloe tore through her gifts quickly and loved everything. The 2 hours flew by and just like that the party was over. I can hardly believe my little girl is seven years old. I wish time would slow down just a little!

H is for Handsome

I do believe that Henry is one of the cutest, handsomest, loveliest dogs there are. A handful at times - yes! I think that comes with him being a springer spaniel and in a rowdy, life filled house like ours.

Here is a photo I took of him the other day in one of his favourite spots: lying on my bed watching me work and edit on my computer. Aww, the loyal devotion of a dog is hard to beat.

Weekend with the MacDonald Family

We do love spending time together. Our kids get a long awesome and most the time think of eachother more as brothers and sisters than just close friends. I love Kerri's kids and I know that she loves mine. We spent Saturday night over at my parents trailer at Island Park. The kids love it there and I think the parents all managed to get in about 5 minutes of R&R each... the kids are always on the move it seems. Shaune and Matt spent their time fishing with the kids over the bridge and then they had a blast swimming in the Trent and jumping off the water trampoline. It equaled hours and hours of fun.

Kerri thought to bring her camera, I was lazy and left mine at home. Thanks Kerri for letting me high-jack some of your shots so I had a blog post with photos :)

 
 

Keaton goes for a 'fly' courtesy of Ben!

 
 

 
 

Family Day for the Lightfoots

Somehow I missed posting about our first Family day with Meg. Family day celebrates the anniversary of 1 year since we first met and held Meg and became her mommy and daddy. It is hard for me to fathom how fast this year has flown by. Meg still seems like such a baby and I guess part of that is because Meg was practically a newborn when we went to Vietnam - she had been so ill and at 6 months was only 10.5 lbs. She flourished quickly though and during our nearly 5 weeks in Vietnam really blossomed into a much stronger baby. She was a joy from the very first day and we love her so very much.

Monday, June 7th, 2010 it was one year. We celebrated by going out as a family for some chinese food (the local Vietnamese restaurant was closed on Mondays) and just reminiscing on what a year it has been. We are forever blessed. We are thankful to Vietnam. We think of Meg's birth mom and dad often and think of the sacrifice they made to provide Meg with a chance they must of felt they couldn't provide at the time. I will likely never meet or know them but I love them. Milestones like birthdays and anniversaries really bring them to my mind.

So... one year of little Miss Meg making us laugh and enjoy life even more than we already did. She completes our family in a perfectly magical way.

Hi readers! My family has booked a vacation down to the East Coast, Nova Scotia to be exact. We found a sweet cape cod style home right on the ocean and the count down is on. I will be available to do a couple photography sessions/family shoots while in such a beautiful environment... so, if you are an East Coaster and are interested - contact me for more info, dates I'm available, etc.

I've wanted to visit Nova Scotia forever. So excited!

TDH Annual Summer Picnic

It was a fun weekend at the Lightfoots. On Saturday we had the pleasure of hosting our friends from Toronto - these are the friends we made through our TDH adoption agency... the friends we made because we all travelled at the same time to Vietnam to meet our daughters. All the girls are from Vung Tau and I hope we'll always get together and help them form bonds that will last. We held our pool party on the anniversary of the day we all met in the airport and flew the long flight to Hong Kong and then onwards to Vietnam... the start of it all. It is hard to believe it has been a year.

Sadly, the 4th family was on their way down to celebrate with us when they ran into car troubles and had to head back home. We really missed seeing them and their five children... Quinn Anh (the eldest of our Vung Tau girls) included!

It was not the warmest day on Saturday but the rain held off so the girls were able to play inside and out and we all had a great time with lots of great food.

On Sunday we attended the annual TDH Sandbanks picnic over in Prince Edward County and we had a great time. When we left home for the picnic it was still raining and it looked bleak but by the time we got to the park the rain had stopped and the sun even shone a bit by the end of the day. It was chilly but noone cared. We met some great families and the kids enjoyed it so much - Meg especially. She loved the sand and the beach, and most of all - all of the children.

Here are some photos I took of the event:

Warning... there are a lot!

 

 

  

 

 

  

 
  
  
   

Most nights

Now that our pool is open, most nights you will find us outside and enjoying our pool. Tonight Shaune picked up some pizza because we are in dire need of hitting a grocery store... it's on my 'to do' list. I love eating poolside and we are loving this warm weather - it feels like summer already. The other day it got up to 33 degrees C if you can imagine and broke the record from the 1960's where the highest recorded temp for that day was 28.5 degrees C.

So, ya - right now we are liking that the pool is cool and refreshing. Meg has surprised me and doesn't mind the chilly water (it isn't quite at 80F yet) in fact she points to the pool and when I ask her if she wants to go in she gets big smiles and shakes her head yes, yes, yes. She likes me to get in and then count to 3 holding her hands...then she jumps in. Fearless it seems which is not her usual style. Keaton and Chloe are both little waterbugs and I guess watching them has given her the confidence to know it is okay.

A couple shots from tonight after supper: