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Posts Tagged ‘family’

It’s Been A Year

Tuesday, October 15th, 2013

Maya 1 year

[Photos by Cheramie Cheung]

10/11/12 had been a whirlwind kind of day.
It started with a regular doctor’s appointment and ended up with me holding my Maya in my hands.
A few weeks earlier than expected.
It’s been an unforgettable year.
My Maya has grown and become the most beautiful, kind and intelligent little toddler.
I am grateful beyond words.

My Maya

I love you , Maya!
I love you to the moon and back.
I love you beyond the farthest star.
I love you deeper than the center of earth.
I love you dearly and infinitely.

Maya Is Eight And A Half Months Old. Oh. My. God.

Tuesday, July 2nd, 2013

Maya at 8 months

Somebody, please pinch me.
My tiny little Maya, whose head I could fit in my palm, is 8½ months old.
Oh. Em. Gee.
Her eyes are still blue.
Her skin is still paper-white.
She is still pretty small [just 14 pounds…].
She drinks fruit smoothies with a straw.
[This one is banana and avocado. Thanks for asking]
She crawls. She sits. She has 3 teeth…
[I have the marks to prove that.]
She smiles a ton.
She does tricks.
She captivates everyone who sees her.
I mean e-v-e-r-y-o-n-e.
She loves books.
She loves being outdoors.
She REALLY loves the swing.
The harder we push – the better.
She ‘talks’ herself to sleep.
She is my world.
My world is SO awesome!

What Motherhood Means To Me – New Mother’s Day Tradition

Saturday, May 11th, 2013

Motherhood

Today was the first time I celebrated Mother’s Day as a mom.
This is a great opportunity to start a new tradition.
Every Mother’s Day I will write myself a letter on what motherhood means to me.
Later I can share it with my Maya and also see how the meaning of being a mom developed throughout the years.

Motherhood, to me, means infinite love.
Motherhood means to constantly be at awe.

Motherhood is being sleep deprived and bitten (Yay for first teeth!!!),
but all I want to do is to gently stroke her delicate hair, caress her soft skin,
gaze into her big blue eyes and whisper in her ears how much I love her and how perfect she is.
Perfect beyond my imagination.

When I was pregnant with Maya I always tried to imagine how my little baby girl will be.
I dreamed up the perfect little face and the cutest little hands, legs an belly to tickle.
I pictured the smartest little girl with the friendliest demeanor.
Boy, oh boy, was I far from reality.

My Maya came out better than I have ever imagined.

She’s perfect!

Motherhood is reading stories and singing songs to her.
Motherhood is holding her until her sweet eyes fall to sleep (when her tummy aches).
It is waking at night to comfort her or to feed her or just to make sure that she’s sleeping soundly in her crib.

Motherhood means missing a heartbeat when you hear her laughing out loud.

Motherhood means taking the magic of her growth and development with ambivalence.
Motherhood means feeling sadness that soon she will only eat solids and we won’t have our intimate feeding time anymore.
Motherhood means feeling immense joy when she learns something new or grows out of her clothes.

Motherhood means the world to me.

It is the best thing that ever happened to me!

I am so grateful for you, Maya.

What does motherhood mean to you?

In 2013 I resolve to…

Sunday, January 6th, 2013

Maya and Mom

Enjoy my time spent with Maya.

I want to tear up when she squeals in joy.
I want to miss a beat when she learns something new.
I want to watch her start crawling.
I want to hear and listen to her first words.
I want to be there when she makes her first hesitant step.
I want to run after her when she doesn’t stop running around.
I want to read her stories.
I want to play with her.
I want to be there for her.
I want to be part of her present.
This is my present,
for 2013.

In 2013 I resolve to be there for my little daughter and to enjoy every second of it.

Maya

Despite the lost sleeping hours.
Despite the soreness of breastfeeding.
Despite the occasional frustrations
caused by sickness or unexplained crying.

I want to be there for my Maya,
and I want to enjoy every second of my time with her.

Maya

This is my New Year’s resolution.

What is yours?

Around Here

Friday, November 30th, 2012

Story Time

This is my 24/7 as of late.

Pretty darn cute!

I would say…

Hello, my name is Maya and I am awesome!

Monday, October 29th, 2012

Maya

For all of you who were wondering where I have been, here is the precious little reason.

I had just had my first baby.

An amazing little baby girl, named Maya.

Maya was born a bit unexpectedly.

See, Maya was extremely anxious to come out before reaching term, not to mention her due date, which is still in the future 🙂

This early delivery gave me the most fabulous gift for my birthday, as she was released from the NICU just in time to celebrate with my husband and I.

Having said that, it also threw me off schedule and I wasn’t prepared for the time away that I needed and still need to take care of my tiny baby.

But don’t worry, I am still around and still planning very cool stuff for the near future.

I hope you will stay tuned too 🙂

[P.S. More than half of the Everyday Hexagons stock have been pre-ordered already. If you want to secure a set too, pre-order now.]

A Fleeting Moment In Time

Monday, August 29th, 2011

fleeting moment

[Digital washi tape: by Karla Dudley; The rest of the elements are by me…]

I wrote these words as a comment on a blog post on Write. Click. Scrapbook and thought I must share the memory and actual photo with you guys!

Unleashing The Creative Child Within You
Back when we were kids creativity came naturally to us. Everything was possible and our prolific imagination was the only limit we knew.
Through the years we have grown apart from our inner creative child and along with that – have lost our pristine and utter joy of creation.

In this e-book I will pave your way back to your inner creative child, brick by brick.

“Unleashing The Creative Child Within You” will explain why you became distant from your core creativity and will reveal the secret to getting it back.

With exercises designed specifically to help you find the inner child within you, regain its confidence and unleash it – you are bound to get your mojo back faster than you think.

Your inner creative child wants to come out and play, so click here to get “Unleashing The Creative Child Within You” now.

Grandma, This Is How I Remember You

Thursday, May 5th, 2011

Grandma, This Is How I Remember You

[Fonts: Little Days, Hobo and Adler.]

In the left photo you can see my grandma holding her first born, my mother (circa 1948) and on the right you can see me and grandma at the park near her home (circa 1988). 40 years apart – still beautiful.

Let me tell you some more about my grandmother.

She was born in Poland to an affluent family of merchants and Jewish scholars.

Her family was ultra-orthodox, Chassidic. Her parents had 10 children in total.

When she was a young adult she started questioning her parents’ Chassidic ways and had secretly joined a more secular Zionist group.

She was very careful not to hurt her father’s feelings and would leave home wearing long sleeved shirts and long skirts and then change into more modern apparel and meet with her Zionist friends.

Not long afterward she fell in love with a beautiful young student who shared her modern viewpoint and after awhile they got engaged.

Sadly, her beloved fiance was caught “in the line of fire” in an outburst against the Jews in the community and was hanged then and there in the center of the neighborhood.

She was heartbroken but determined to keep on living.

Just a couple years later, WW2 started and Hitler occupied Poland.

My grandma remembered the day the Nazis came to her neighborhood and started lining up all the jews. She and her family members ran out into the chilling evening and into the woods.

My grandma had blond hair and blue eyes and was well educated [thus fluent in Polish and Russian] so she could pass for a non-jew, which was what had saved her life and prevented her from the destiny of most of her other family members [very unsettling but true].

She was hidden for about a year, working as a potato peeler in a remote peasants’ inn until someone found out she is Jewish and asked for things she refused to give in return for his silence…

She took off immediately and ran towards the Russian border, where she was caught as an enemy of the country [being Polish…] and sent to a hard labor camp in Siberia.

In Siberia she had to stand all day with light clothes and thin soled shoes and cut trees, in the burning cold (up to minus 40 degrees in the wintertime). She received a portion of 1 coarse loaf of stale bread and 1 cup of water a day and watched hundreds of people give up and die – every single day. But my grandmother endured until the war was over.

Then she came back to Germany and got reunited with her brother. Only 2 brothers had survived the Holocaust (and 1 sister who had left for Israel before the war started and survived as well).

In Germany she met my grandfather who had lost his family as well. They fell in love and got married and had my mother while they were still living in Berlin.

Thereafter my grandparents left Berlin and came to Israel where they started their own restaurant in downtown Haifa and they had both lived in Haifa until their last day.

My grandma was a hard working woman and a survivor. She had strong determination to work as long as she could.

My grandma also had the type of charisma that drew people towards her wherever she went and whatever she did.

She was a generous person who always loved to host as many guests as possible and prepare noteworthy dinners for everyone.

She had led a long, laborious but fulfilling life – a real inspiration to everyone.

In Her Memory

Wednesday, April 27th, 2011

Yesterday I came back from a homeland visit and welcoming me back were the news of my grandmother’s passing.

In these sad moments I had some comfort in the fact that just the day before I managed to visit her at the hospital and say my mental goodbye.

Visiting her was a hard decision for me.

I remember my grandmother as a beautiful, beautiful woman, always taking pride in her impeccable appearance.

She had beautiful blond hair and big blue-gray eyes. I wish I had some photos with me so I could show you how gorgeous she was. Every picture looks like it was taken on the red carpet in a Hollywood-ian premiere.

When I was young she used to take me home from kindergarten and later from school and spend the day with me until my father picked me up in the evening or in the late afternoon.

She would go over the yellowing pictures and tell me the stories behind the 2-D photos and then she would start telling me stories she made up or read in Polish and translated for me.

Her patience was endless and she kept going and going and never grew tired of telling me all these marvelous stories that I enjoyed so much.

I am sure she had contributed to my love of story telling just as much as my parents have.

When I was a teenager she got Alzheimer and little by little she grew smaller and smaller until she became just a shadow of her glorious self.

In my mind’s eye she was beautiful and glamorous and it was difficult for me to watch her being anything else.

At the hospital she was hardly breathing, half comatose.

I looked at her and tears started pushing at my eyelids and a big knot started forming in my throat. I could hardly say a word.

Watching her shriveled in an impersonal hospital bed broke my heart.

Her eyes were partly closed and the light taken out of them. Her big beautiful eyes weren’t glowing anymore.

I said “Hello, grandmother” and for a split second I thought she might have heard me. Her eyebrows raised and then dropped again.

I tried to touch her, gently, but she pulled back, as if my gentle stroke was hurting her.

I wanted to sing to her. I wanted to sing the Polish song she taught me as a child “Zashale Gurale”, but I couldn’t say a word. I just looked at her, silently, and sang it in my heart. Hoping she had somehow heard me.

I am glad I had the chance to see my grandmother, just a couple days before her passing but I don’t want to ever remember seeing her like that.

For me my grandmother, Gutta, would always be that beautiful lady.

Wearing pink lipstick and a fabulous dress or a figure hugging suit, putting to shame the fashionistas on “Mad Men”.

For me she would always have light in her eyes and lots of spirit.

Telling me stories in half (or quarter…) Hebrew and half Yiddish and Polish (languages that I have never understood).

For me she would always be the grandmother who asks me if I want a piece of cake and then making the cake from scratch, just for me.

She would always be the grandmother who brings huge jars of scrumptious handmade cookies that disappear in a matter of hours.

She would always be that grandmother. For me.

I love you, savta. May you rest in peace.

Friday Freebie – Family Journaling Tags

Friday, March 18th, 2011

Free Journaling Labels
This week I am sharing a set of FREE family journaling tags with you guys (for personal use only).

Now you have a cute place to write down your family’s secrets and memories on…

To download it simply click on the image (or the link) and if it doesn’t work try to right-click on it and opt for the “save target as…” option (it may be phrased a bit differently on different operating systems – but do NOT opt for the “save image as” option, as you will get the low resolution tiny preview image).

I hope you like it and have lots and lots and lots of fun with it.

Make sure you didn’t miss the rest of the free printables on Creativity Prompt.

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Welcome Little One Workshop
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