Few more pics with Sabina & family

We said goodbye to Sabina, Derek and Rohan at a dinner hosted by Shradha and Anne (thanks for all the delicious Indian dishes you prepared!). Below are few photos, one with the group to follow...

Rohan playing peek-a-boo



EM's new friend Alisha Butle

jumping play with Alisha

me with Sabina, hope you'll like the cds we gave you...

Maarten and Derek with the two cuties

Me and Lillian at the playground

While papa Maarten was away, mama and auntie Selvi brought me and Lillian at the playground in Hess street, just walking distance from where we live. It is a small area with a slide, elephant and a "merry-go-round" rides. Although at first it was not easy to share a ride on the elephant with Lillian (i still have to perfect this virtue), we both enjoyed the ride together, see our cute faces on the photos.

It is already getting cold in Haifa, but still we are enjoying a nice sunshine as well.

Papa is far, far away...

Two nights ago my papa Maarten left for his trip to Peru. After a nice, simple dinner we had, Oom Martijn came to pick him up and brought him to the train station. My parents already informed me about this work-related trip couple of weeks ago and they said it is too far from where we are. Anyway, this is just a short posting to let papa know that we are missing him a l..o..t (especially me as I kept on saying: "go...papa"--let's go to papa; "papa...work"--papa is at work), but we will see him soon...that is next week!

my drawings so far...

Here are few photos of my drawings lately. I think I am trying to draw some eggs, see the circle ones I made. Most of the time I play around with my magic pen and these are my creations so far...hope you like them!

drawing one, daddy is showing to all of you as I wanted to play with other toys.

close up of drawing one

drawing two

drawing three

Sabina and Rohan are here...

Our dear friend Sabina and her son Rohan are in town and we visited them at Shradha's place. Rohan's dad, Derek will soon join them and the whole family will be on pilgrimage. It is soo nice to see Sabina with baby, we talked about how busy motherhood is and life in general in the States. Rohan is such a cutie, happy baby, always ready to give us his gorgeous smile. We hope to see them again as their schedule permits it before they leave.

Twenty-three months old pics...

Babysitting Elfida...

Elfida was such a behaved baby when we babysat her this week, she was all the time happy and smiling. Enna-Marie was also happy and excited to spend time with her. It's kind of a practice for mommy Menchie doing this (he..he)...and of course a practice too for Enna-Marie to be a big sister. We can't wait the next time we babysit her.

Celebrating Ariana's 100 days

Baby Ariana has turned 100 days old recently. Mommy Farzana bought a delicious cake that she shared with us, some moms came with their babies/children and joined the celebration. She also invited her friend Rochelle Brader from New Zealand who was in town. She is a very good singer and puppeteer, so we had a nice entertaintment as well. Below are two photos from Kami's camera, thanks for sharing these with us.

Meme tagging

My friend Selvi has meme tagged me (<<--pls. see the meaning of meme from wikipedia on the link provided). She was tagged by Leila and now it is my turn to name seven random and/or weird facts about myself. I have been blogging for over two years now and this is also my first experience to be tagged. Honestly, it is not so easy to do this and it took a day or two to know what to write here.

Anyway, I was able to name seven of them:

1. I am a "crumb picker" whether it may be a bread, cookie, chips, small piece of chocolate, or rice, pasta, meat, etc. Whenever I see or step on any of these, I right away pick it up and throw them. I may do this many times during the day and I don't get tired!

2. I put salt on green mango (yes we have lots of sour green mangos back home), mandarin or orange (or "dalanghita" in Tagalog), and strawberry...yum!

3. I also put chocolate sprinkles (or "hagelslag" in Dutch) on top of cheese and bread. I think my Dutch family still wonders why I eat like this :-)!

4. One funny experience I had was that one shoe flew out of the stage while on a dance practice during my dance workshop college days. Good thing it wasn't the real break-a-leg performance yet.

5. When Maarten was new in the office - he was my coordinator at that time - a friend once teased me while we were driving together that next time he will see me riding in Maarten's car (meaning I'll be dating him and so on). True enough, I did not just ride in his car, but also married him!

6. I just LOVE arranging my daughter's wardrobe and buying her clothes. I feel like I am dressing up a doll!

7. When I was a child, my nick name was "meme" from my real name "Imelda". My sister baptized me later with a new name "Menchie" because "meme" didn't fit me anymore as I was approaching ladyhood. As far as I now, "Menchie" doesn't have a meaning. It's weird that this tagging is actually called 'meme' as well...!

This meme tagging entails tagging other friends of mine...So I would like to tag Ailsa, Martha, Sieni, Negeen, Edward, Maxwell Eblaghie and my new blogger friend Bev! But only if they feel like doing this...:-)!

Birth of Bahá’u’lláh

"All glory be to this Day, the Day in which the fragrances of mercy have been wafted over all created things, a Day so blest that past ages and centuries can never hope to rival it, a Day in which the countenance of the Ancient of Days hath turned towards His holy seat." - Bahá’u’lláh

"Render thanks unto thy Lord, O Carmel…Rejoice, for God hath in this Day established upon thee His throne, hath made thee the dawning-place of His signs and the day spring of the evidences of His Revelation…Call out to Zion, O Carmel, and announce the joyful tidings: He that was hidden from mortal eyes is come!…Ere long will God sail His Ark upon thee…"
- Bahá’u’lláh

Play time with Lillian

This is my friend Lillian who is a year and 3 months old. She and her mom Selvi visited us today.

We missed each other's company as we didn't see each other lately. She lives down the street. You need to get down the stairs to get to her house coming from our place. I know exactly where she lives, everytime we pass the street I always point it to my mom and say "that's Lillian's house".

So now I want to play with her or first I say..."hello Lillian"!

...and oops...I want to lean on you...

...or hug you...!

...I want to touch your hair...

...and touch your chubby cutie cheeks...!

Weekend at Caesarea

"On the site of what was once a Phoenician town, Strato's Tower King Herod (37-4 BCE) built a resplendent city and named it Caesarea in honor of his patron, Augustus Caesar. It's inhabitants Romans, Samaritans and Jews enjoyed the pleasures of the Romans: water in plentiful supply, bathhouses and places of entertainment. In 6 CE Caesarea became the seat of the Roman governors. The status of the city's Jews deteriorated, and in 66 CE they rebelled against the Romans. When Jerusalem was destroyed in 70 CE, Caesarea became the Roman provincial capital of Judea. The city reached the height of its prosperity in the Byzantine period (fourth to sixth centuries CE). It retained its status as an important center of Christian Scholarship and its harbor became the gateway to the Holy Land for thousands of pilgrims. The Jewish community grew, and religious academies, where famous sages taught, were founded in the city. After the Moslems conquered the land in the seventh century, Caesarea's status diminished in 1101, the Crusaders captured the town. Eighty-six years later, Saladin conquered it and destroyed its walls. The present fortifications were built in 1251 by the French king Louis IX. Following the Mameluke conquest in in 1265, the city was abandoned. At the end of the nineteenth century, the Ottoman authorities settled a group of Bosnian Moslem refugees there. The remains of ancient Caesarea attest to the city's illustrious past. "