New Beginnings

New Life, New Start, New Beginnings. That's what Easter represents to me this year. Although we were sad to miss the Easter service because of Adrianna sickness, we still rejoiced in remembering that Christ offered himself as a sacrifice to you and me. I am glad we celebrate it every year because it reminds me to continually start fresh again, to surrender all that I have and who I am to the Maker and Author of Love. We enjoyed spending time with family this Easter. On Saturday we had a wonderful lunch at Marlen's place. They prepapred a wonderful meal and even made a special little pie just for Adrianna. This is probably the last get together before the arrival of the next baby Buitelaar. Harvie and I can't wait to become Uncle and Aunt for the first time and meet Adrianna first little cousin. Baby Joey (how we all call the little one for now) is already deeply loved by us all. On Sunday we had the Peters extended family gathering. Adrianna enjoyed running around the kids while they searched for their Easter baskets. She didn't quite find hers this year...even though it was on plain sight! But she did spot the chocolate bunny once we gave her the basket!

I also rejoice in the fact that I am finished my Masters of Education. This is the bridge model for my presentation that Harvie and I put together. Yes, I couldn't quite do this one myself, Harvie's engineer skills came quite handy. Marlen also helped us out by finding some drawings we could use as a model. I used the metaphor of "Bridge Building" to weave my paper and presentation together. I have to say that I have a new found appreciation to the design process and other engineering terms. It was really neat to finally understand a little more of Harvie's world. This past week I started dealing with the aftermath of finishing a masters. The living room and dining room have served as my study room. I can finally see the top of the dining table again...but there are still many piles of papers, articles, and books to deal with. It will take another week to get it all organized, filed, and cleaned up. And then, there is the rest of the house which was somewhat neglected the last couple of months. I am looking forward to the next couple of months where I won't have studies on my mind whereever I go.

Adrianna has recently began to play more with her toys. It's so beautiful to watch her line up her animals, stack blocks and build towers, and play with her tea set. I am trying to expand her attention by playing with her, but she is quite busy and likes to move from one thing to the next very quickly. She has finally gotten more teeth, with her pre-molars (I think that's the name) just breaking through these last couple of weeks. This next month I hope to wean her off the bottles (or at least only keep the before bed one). We'll see how that goes.

This past Sunday we met Marlen and Sue in the Tulip field in Burlington. We haven't taken too many day trips with Adrianna because she doesn't sleep well anywhere but her own crib. It was a very warm day. When we got to there, Adrianna didn't quite know what to do with herself...she LOVES flowers and I think she was so excited to run from place to place and admire the beautiful vibrant tulips. I was even amazed, who knew there were so many varieties and colours? Of course, we loved the orange ones! She didn't take a nap there even though we put her in the stroller and walked the perimeter of the field. It wasn't until we were heading home just before five that she finally slept in the car for half an hour. We had such a good time and it reminded me that sometimes I have to let go of trying to maintain her nap schedule to have a fun family day. We need to start having more of days like these and I look forward to having them more often this summer now that my weekends are not spent up at SFU.

We are heading to Seattle for the weekend with Adrianna. We are celebrating finishing my studies (hopefully for good) and Harvie's birthday. Seattle is a special place for us. Harvie lived there for three/four years while we were dating and we have many favourite spots we like to hit while we are there. This is the first time we take Adrianna along and we hope she likes it just as much as we do. On our ambitious list: Outlet Malls, Seattle Zoo, Downtown, Wild Ginger, Zeenas or Thai Tom, a park or two, getting my ring cleaned and checked, and just spending time together the three of us. Let the weekend begin!