"An invisible red thread connects those who are destined to meet regardless of time, place or circumstance. The thread may stretch or tangle but it will never break." -Chinese Proverb



28.11.11

Angry Birds



For Christmas this year I crocheted each of my nieces and nephews hats. The 5 older kids are getting Angry Bird hats.....the baby is getting an Everything Rosie themed hat after her name.

It's funny, I'm so proud of these hats as I made them from stickers without a pattern....though I am more excited to see their reaction when they get them. Pictures with kids to follow!

25.11.11

PRIDE....we are done

we survived 9 sessions of PRIDE training......we get our certificate......will it make us better parents? maybe.....did it change my view on anything? no, not that I'm perfection, but I already had ideas around loss suffered, open adoptions and other things that we discussed.....was it a waste of my time? NO.....I met some geat people that I hope to see more of.....do I think there are HUGE flaws in our Child Welfare System? ABSOLUTELY!!!!!!!!!!!! And the people working there, who claim to be empathic and sympathic are sometimes the biggest hypocrites around. They are suppose to be the front line workers, they are suppose to protect these children with a mandate to keep families intact and it was the same workers who were disrespectful to their clients, talking about them and overgeneralizing them as druggies and alcholics with mental health issues...they don't know my son's story and I resent that they lump his mom in with the others (and if she's not the stereotype, that means that there are many others who also don't fit the stereotype)...the only worker that I found to be respectful of all parties involved was (thankfully) our case worker, her presentations were amazing and I loved how respectful she was while talking about sensitive and delicate topics.....I'm so glad it's done and over with.....and now we just wait for a call.....

Disney Cruise- last post, Misc Pictures

























































Disney Cruise- Day 7 Castaway Cay

We arrived at Castaway Cay at 9am.....the ship reversed into port giving us the best spot to see the island from our balcony......we got off the ship and ran into Donald Duck....it was the first time all week that we had seen him and got to take a picture with him.



A tram took us to the beach.....



At Mount RustMore we caught up with Pluto.......

.......and Goofy!





Once we found some chairs and an umbrella for hubby, Adrien and I headed to the water.....it was beautiful....I can't even describe how clear and clean the water was....was frolicked and swam and kicked and played until a fish swam by Adrien's foot....at which he screamed "A FISH" and ran out of the water.....I guess it never dawned on me to explain to him that fish lived in water....as he was so grossed out by how salty the water was!





He loved laying and swinging on the hammocks....just like at Nonno's house




The view from our verandah








Disney Cruise-Day 6 at sea

we spent the day playing in the water, at the splash pad, in the pool.....Hubby still wasn't feeling better and was grumpy from missing out on all the fun though the boy and I managed to have enough fun for him!

We walked around on Deck 4, checked out the store and ate!



Each day Adrien got to pick something he wanted out of the gift shop, nothing too expensive but a memento that he could have. One day he picked a Flounder, another day he picked a Mickey, then a Minnie, a t-shirt, a pin etc.... and my sister gave him a gift card for Christmas so that he could buy whatever he wanted (great ideas!!!! Thank you Seca!) Anyways, on day 6 he picked out a Peter Pan set with Captian Hook, Mr. Smee, Wendy and Tinkerbell. He played with that set the whole time I was getting ready for dinner, changing his voice and going on adventures! (side note, his favourite thing to do on the boat was go on adventures and explore!)

Dinners where tough, they were long and his food always came out with our apps......and then dessert would come out with ours.....so we started bringing things for him and our table mate to play with....he liked to pretend he was a waiter and would take our dinner orders...


That day, our British friends (P & M) started Adrien a Disney Pin collection, getting him the lanyard and a Mickey pin.....when it was all said and done, they had given him 3 pins....needless to say, he now has 6 and is well on his way to becoming a Disney Pin collector.....


It was an awesome......



24.11.11

Disney Cruise-Day 5 St Thomas




We awoke very early the next morning, in time to watch us port into St. Thomas. I was excited because I had a friend who was on another cruise that was also going to be in St. Thomas that day, so there was a mission for me to find her on the beach. The night before we also found out that we weren't going to have to "tender" to the island and that we would be docking at a different place. From my understanding "tendering" means water taxis have to take you off the boat and it is a long process. Anyways.....since hubby was still in a lot of pain, he choose to stay in bed (though very disappointed because he was missing all the fun!) and Adrien and I went to have breakfast on the back of deck 9 with a beautiful view of the water. After breakfast, (since it was only 7 and we weren't allowed off the boat until 9) we decided to hit the Mickey Pool

There was a single father in the pool with his three little boys (all older then Adrien)....and as the three boys tried to engage Adrien in shark chomping play, all he wanted to do (influnced from 4 nights of shows) was put on a show for them....so as they chomped around him, he yelled at the top of his voice "Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, please take your seat as the show is beginning......Introducing......ADRIEN" My heart soared with pride and from the joy on his face as he performed for these little guys and I know in my heart that this kid will be a performer of some sort.......I digress. At about 8:45, when his fingers had turned to raisins (side bar: on the second day hubby pointed out how pruned Adrien's fingers were from all the water play and kept calling his fingers raisins. Adrien didn't understand what was happening and was so upset that his fingers had turned into raisins that he would cry and beg for me to wipe the raisins off.....) a bolt of lightening lit up the sky, the thunder started and so did the downpour.....we high tailed it out of the pool and headed to the room to change and tell hubby about the excitement. We decided (Adrien and I) to explore the boat instead.

We went to the on board theater where Adrien watched his first movie (in theater) EVER....in 3-D....he loved Tangled, so well done!

Then we headed to the Promenade Lounge to do a craft, on the way there, you get to pass this awesome statue of Mickey at sea.....and we bumped into Peter Pan!

In the lounge, Adrien got to decorate a tote bag for him to keep (the previous day he made buttons, one for each of his cousins!)....he kept getting different colours and adding them to his bag.....it was quite the master piece and is now safely put away in his Disney Cruise treasure box in his closet!
The kid was so proud of his creation....he slung it on his shoulder for the world to see except the straps wouldn't stay on his shoulder so he put his hand to his head to keep the tote from sliding off. I thought it was the cutest thing ever and couldn't stop laughing!
As a family, we found a little "alley" of the boat on deck 3 called Beat Street. It was a cool place to hang out and we hung out there A LOT....They had these HUGE deep portholes that you could sit in and watch the water go by, read, relax and talk.....

Though before we made it to the porthole on Day 5, we snuck into this place (can't remember what it's called) they have show in here at night and do Bingo during the day. Anyways, we snuck in so the boy could do a quick little performance.....what a natural!



AHHHHHH, the portholes.....so peaceful and rest ful!



We took the front elevators and headed up to Deck 10.......we explored outside as the rain had stopped and we were getting hungry for lunch!

But first some foosball...... After lunch the rain started again......so the send off party was cancelled.....really people? are you made of sugar!lol..... We had a wonderful dinner, went to see a pre show and then headed to the nightly show..... and headed to bed....it was a LONG day!

23.11.11

Disney Cruise-Day 4, Pirates in the Caribean


On our first day on board, we had met a wonderful couple from Britian (Hi P & M!) that gave us some wonderful tips of what to do and where to be for different events. (They had done the same cruise the previous week). Though hubby wasn't feeling well, he dragged himself to dinner, deciding to return to the room after dinner as the pain was too much so Adrien and I headed up to deck 9. We sat in the same spot as our send off party the first day, knowing that the characters come down the side stairwell. We watched as the entertainment staff interacted with the big screen pirate, had group competitions and got the party started. Then the characters arrived....at this point Adrien was exhausted and just wanted to be held....I was sweating buckets from holding him and the night heat! Finally, we decided to go....and then we bumped into P & M, who encouraged us to wait it out, it was almost done and Mickey would be flying through the air to save the ship form the pirates and the fireworks would start. So with P & M, we went up to Deck 10, where we could still watch the show and would have prime spots for the fireworks. P took Adrien from me so that I could cool down and we enjoyed the rest of the show.











Disney Cruise-day 4, St. Maarten!

After three days at sea, we finally had our first Port-of-Call. St. Maarteen. As we were getting ready to go for breakfast, hubby injuried his neck (slipped disc) and was in so much pain, he decided to stay on the ship and recieve medical attention. So off Adrien and I went, into a different country, just the two of us......We got into a water taxi that took us to a beach. I didn't bring the camera to the beach and was able to just enjoy playing in the sand and water with the boy. As we got off the taxi there were tons of people trying to sell things as 80% of the island's income is from tourism.....so we rented two lounge chairs, an umbrella and got 5 ice cold drinks.....and we were off......we met two other couples from Britian on the beach that we talked to and they watched our stuff while we were in the water......every minute or two, someone was trying to sell me a message, get me to braid my hair or sell me a t-shirt. After a couple of hours, Adrien was hungry and wanted to go back to the boat. So we stopped at a shop (that night was our Pirates IN the Caribean Party) to buy some t-shirts and headed back to the boat. We had lunch, went swimming and headed back to the room. Hubby was sleeping after being given pain med and Adrien quickly fell a sleep....affording me some time to myself on the verandah to read!

Disney Cruise- day 3

We spent our third day on the boat exploring the boat, swimming, eating, napping, seeing characters and watching shows.



That night was our formal captian's dinner, where we got to dress up and have formal pictures taken with the characters and the crew on the ship. Adrien made such an impression (as he always does) on the crew/staff of the ship, and I was impressed with their ability to remember his name! After dinner, we saw Adrien's favourite crew member, the second in command of the ship. The crew member had taken a shining to Adrien the day before and ALWAYS stopped to talk to him, whether it was in the buffet line or at the splash pad. Anyways, after dinner, Adrien was talking to him and was grabbing at his shoulder thingy....anyways, the crew member asked Adrien to wait a minute and went into the Guest Services back room. When he came out, he had a Pluto stuffie for Adrien.



At that moment, Pluto became Adrien's favourite Disney character and he slept and dragged Pluto along for the rest of the cruise.