Showered with Pressies and Love

Right before the big move, Grandma, Grandpa, Auntie Tina, Uncle Ryan and cousin Emily packed tons of gifts and love for the girls. Here's Mia sitting on her stash of birthday pressies.

Thank you Grandma and Grandpa for the purse and Minnie Mouse! Thank you Auntie Tina, Uncle Ryan and Emily for the lovely dresses!!! They were so cute Mia wore it the very next day for her birthday party! :)



Understandably, Kayla got rather upset when she realized Mia was the ONLY person getting presents on her birthday. She calmed down only after she got to keep Mia's Minnie Mouse plush doll. The day before, however, the sweet jie-jie in her drew a beautiful birthday card for Mia.

I think that's her impression of Mia learning her ABCs. The inside of the card features Mikayla, Mia and a drawing of a candle. Not sure what MAF means.

The back of the card is a picture of two happy bunnies. That's what the two sisters are like on a good day--two happy bouncing bunnies.

Mia's One!

We had a small party at the condo's function room, mostly for family and close friends. Since Darrius' (my nephew) birthday is just three weeks apart from Mia's, we chose to combine the celebrations!


Mia with Gong Gong and Po Po.

An impromptu magic show by Uncle Julius. The kids were trying to figure out where the tissue went!

More silly games: The kids pretending to be sleeping lions. In the other, the kids pretending to be elephants!

Little Lucas saying "Hi" to her favorite jie jie Kayla. Kayla pigging out on M&Ms.

The candle's the wrong way round; otherwise, the cake's picture perfect and rather yummy too.

Kayla saying "Hi" to Aunty Jasmine! And finally, the birthday babies!! Happy birthday, Mia and Darrius!

The Hundred Languages Of Children

The Hundred Languages Of Children
by Loris Malaguzzi

The child
is made of one hundred.
The child has
a hundred languages
a hundred hands
a hundred thoughts
a hundred ways of thinking
of playing, of speaking.
A hundred always a hundred
ways of listening
of marvelling, of loving
a hundred joys
for singing and understanding
a hundred worlds
to discover
a hundred worlds
to invent
a hundred worlds
to dream.

The child has
a hundred languages
(and a hundred hundred hundred more)
but they steal ninety-nine.
The school and the culture
separate the head from the body.
They tell the child:
to think without hands
to do without head
to listen and not to speak
to understand without joy
to love and to marvel
only at Easter and at Christmas.
They tell the child:
to discover the world already there
and of the hundred
they steal ninety-nine.

They tell the child:
that work and play
reality and fantasy
science and imagination
sky and earth
reason and dream
are things
that do not belong together.
And thus they tell the child
that the hundred is not there.
The child says:
No way. The hundred is there.