Service Project at Mazra'ih

This weekend we participated in a service project for Ayyam-i-Há at Mazra'ih. All the children and their parents got together to help picking oranges. Its amazing how abundantly the trees are filled with fruits! This was the first service project in which Enna-Marie participated, AND her first time to visit this beautiful Holy Place. Hopefully there will be many more to follow!

Welcome by Mace and some instructions...

On daddy's shoulders on the way to the orange trees...

Picking fruits off the ground...

...and collecting them in a crate!

Here ate Bahia, this one's for you!

After conquering the ground, now we're conquering the tree :)

Enjoying some well deserved rest with friends at the end of the morning. :)

Visiting Tara and Auntie Sieni

We had a short visit at Auntie Sieni's place to meet and play with my new friend Tara Lani who is now 5 months old. Beautiful Tara is a mixture of American, Samoan and Persian, she is such a gorgeous baby with blue eyes... See pictures below:

















She and auntie Sieni recently joined us in the Mother Goose on the Loose nursery rhymes class.

Our growing Enna-Marie...

Recently Enna-Marie turned 14 months old. So many developments we have seen since she started eating solid food, from crawling to walking-running-climbing, and from saying 'a-ba-ba-ba-ba' to mama, papa, cat, baby, apple, ate (older sister in Tagalog), hot (when passing by a heater) and lately saying her own name Enna and 'abba' (meaning 'Abdu'l-Bahá). Our growing baby is now becoming a young toddler who is soo active and mobile. She is adorable, loving, sweet, happy, playful and a strong-willed baby. We already bought a new car seat and a potty as well.

Here are some of the things she does now:

1. picks up the cordless phone and brings it with her until she gets tired
2. touches and plays with all remote controls
3. takes and drops all her books from the shelf
4. takes and drops some cds and papa's books from the shelf
5. carries her bag and lunch box like a real lady :-)
6. climbs in her toy box, also on the three steps leading to the laundry room
7. touches the soil of the big ficus plant
8. plays with mama and papa's shoes
9. climbs on the couch and knows how to properly go down
10. points to the Greatest Name and picture of 'Abdu'l-Bahá when asked
11. folds her arms while mama or papa is praying and says 'Abba' after the prayer
12. brushes her teeth before she sleeps at night

Visit at the Mercaz Zoo

My mom and I together with auntie Nancy Wong and a beautiful girl named Imani went to the zoo in Mercaz last Tuesday afternoon. My mom has been thinking of bringing me to the zoo but was just waiting for the right time, until one lunch time auntie Nancy asked her if we would like to join her. So there we went... We have seen lots of animals such as parrots, flamingos, geese, and also turtles, lions, monkeys, camel, snakes, tiger, leopard, bears, wolves, jackal, peacocks, etc. It's amazing: a zoo right in the middle of the city of Haifa.

Here are some photos. Please note that Imani who came with her mom for pilgrimage is also a Filipino, auntie Nancy mentioned that she's a quarter Filipino.

De Graafschap back in first place!!

Maarten's favourite football team, De Graafschap, regained the lead in the "Jupiler League" in Holland after beating rivals FC Den Bosch at home: 0-4.
De Graafschap is now 2 points clear of RBC Roosendaal that lost away at VVV Venlo. The players of De Graafschap are affectionately called the Superfarmers because many of its supporters are actually farmers that live in and around Doetinchem, Maarten's hometown in the Netherlands. For already some 24 years now, he has been a faithful supporter of his team, in good times and in bad times.

To see why he is so excited about this second division team (that hopefully next year will make a comeback in the Dutch "Eredivisie" (or Premier League) check out this brief compilation from last season!

Happy Birthday Maarten!

We would like to greet our daddy Maarten a very happy birthday. We wish you good health, strength and happiness in serving humanity. We celebrated his birthday by sharing a cake with some friends in his office. The next day we had a wonderful dinner with May and Martijn Kersten, it was also Martijn's birthday that night. We had a great time with them, enjoyed their company and food so much.

We will post more pictures soon.

Visiting Shiori and Auntie Amelia

Today we paid a visit to Shiori and auntie Amelia. It has been awhile since my mom and auntie Amelia got together, so it was nice to meet and be with them, Shiori and myself were also happy to see each other. Although we did not really play together for that one hour period, we knew each other's presence. Shiori most of the time was sitting beside my mommy and just listening to the conversation, while I played with some toys, moving and checking out the nice cozy house of uncle Shingo and auntie Amelia. The nice thing is that Shiori has learned to say my name "E-n-n-a", soo cute and she has been saying this over and over again. Later when I'm much bigger, hopefully I can say her name too. After the visit, we all went for lunch together and joined our dear daddies.

Here are couple of our pictures. I was a bit bored posing but Shiori was just cool sitting beside me.

Visiting Sheehan Parvaneh

After visiting the Shrine of Baha'u'llah on Saturday, we visited the Lengwe's family, Cllyv who is from the Philippines, Jonathan from Zambia and their baby Sheehan who is completely mixture of both parents. We have seen baby Sheehan right after her birth sometime in October, a cute tiny baby. We are happy to see her growing healthy with chubby cheeks, hands and legs. Wow she must have been drinking lots and lots of milk from her mom. Enna-Marie was glad to see her new friend who is also half Filipino like her. She happily shared her toys to her at that visit.

Union of Corinne and Kevin McLoughlin

We just want to post some pictures of our dear friends Corinne and Kevin who got married last October 28 in Palawan Island, Philippines. We remember Corinne together with couple of friends singing Menchie's favorite love song in our wedding four years ago. She just came to Haifa that time, but gladly accepted the offer to sing. We got to know her better while serving together at the World Centre, sharing stories, jokes and advices (esp. about lovelife!), meeting at dinners, sing-a-long gatherings, Filipino events and became truly one of our good friends. We are very happy for her recent union with Kevin from Ireland, whom she met at the World Centre.







For more pictures of the wedding, pls. check their website.

Special day...

Today is our Four-year Wedding Anniversary! We celebrated this special day by having a nice cozy dinner for three in "1872" restaurant located on Ben Gurion avenue with our dear Enna-Marie. This restaurant is in one of the renovated buildings that the German Templers used to occupy towards the end of the 19th century when they came to Haifa in anticipation of the return of Christ. It is surprising how time flies, I remember we just got married and now we are starting our 5th year! Yep I know it is still a loooong way to go, but I would say that I'm happy and contented having spent the last 4 years with my dear husband. Happy Anniversary Sweets!

Here are some photos...

Enna-Marie scared to walk on the glass floor

She brought one of her favorite books about grandma and grandpa cats

Eating and reading with papa

After dinner, Enna-Marie and papa played on the glass floor

Our yummy dessert, hot chocolate cake with ice cream, note the ice cream they gave for Enna-Marie

Mama and baby Enna enjoying the dessert