We welcomed little Adie’s 2nd birthday with back-to-back celebrations. The first one was held the Saturday before his special day, with friends and the second was exactly on his birthday, spent with the family.

Birthday Part 1

He thinks he’s got super powers! I bet he wants to fly!

Blow the candles, Adie!

He received lots of toy cars!

And some more trains and tracks to add to his collection.

Getting ready to pull the piñata.

Little Jakub trying to reach the train piñata.

And it’s opened!

Happy Adie!

He was wide-awake for more than 12 hours.  He refused to nap in the morning, stayed up late way past his bedtime, and was all active the entire day.  He must have known it was HIS PARTY!

Our simple celebration wouldn’t be complete without the presence of friends!

Birthday Part 2

Trivia: Adrian is one of Adie’s two first names.

Adie was happy with the alphabet train that spells out his name A-D-R-I-A-N from his grandmother. The bookstore where I bought the alphabet trains for give-aways have limited letters; they don’t even have the letter A, but Mam bought her gift from a store in the city center that sells wooden toys. Gotta check it out one of these days.

A wooden toy puzzle from Děda. Easy-peasy for little Adie.

Prepping for the candle-blowing!

Big sister Caity cheering for Adie.

Yeyyyy!  Mission accomplished!

Happy birthday Adie! We love you!

Related Post:
Birthday preps and props

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I had this interesting conversation with my 2 year-old yesterday. [It's STILL surreal to think that he's already 2 (2 days ago). I have to get used counting his age by years and not by months. hmmmm or I can choose both.]. It’s nice that my little cave man has learned to communicate like a real human (or at least trying to be) showing the right manners .

So while I was puttering with the PC, he took my hand and pulled me.

Adie: Come mama, come. (saying it in his very soft voice).

He stands on the kiddie table placed beside the cabinet where some of the toys are hidden. Motions me to “Open it, please“. ( rubs palms together, which is typical for Czech kids when they want something while saying please. That’s the first time I saw him doing that!)

Adie: “This one”. (points to the cabinet)

I tried to bribe him first before following his request.

Me: Hug mama, Adie. hug mama!”

Adie: Ne! (He pushes me away defiantly).

Me: huhuhu (I gave a fake cry).

Adie: Sorry. (regret plastered all over his face).

I gave him another sad look, he reaches for my head and caressed it. Whoa! I didn’t see it coming! I sure was surprised!

Adie: Sorry (he repeats and points to the cabinet).

Adie: Open it. (opens the cabinet).

Adie: This one. (he points to the book with alphabet blocks).

He settled on the table with his choice of “toy” while I was left in awe over his maturity. LOL! It only shows that kids are easily influenced by what they always see and hear. There will come a time, when he’s all grown-up, when our conversations will be serious and probably lean towards technical subject like pentair pool pumps as this boy is curious how toys or things in general work. I’d surely miss this simple talks with my innocent child.

Here’s the little tyke… pa simple lang! hehe

Breathe, breathe, and breathe some more! Yipeee! Adie’s 2nd birthday has been celebrated and the last hurrah was yesterday (which was his real birth date), we spent with family. Last Saturday we also threw him a simple party and invited our friends. So you can tell I’ve been buried deep in the heap of preparations.

I had a train theme in mind for my little tyke who adores trains (and everything else that runs on wheels) and it had my hands busy for a week, creating crafts.

Birthday invitation was of course a train with Adie’s pictures as smokes, and the wagon carrying jungle animals and a balloon with his new age! (:  Big thanks to my sister, Carey for turning my concept into one awesome invitation!

Used were scrapbooking elements from A Scraps of Our Lives/shellshok© DESIGNS.

After the invitations have been sent out, the next on my list was to make give-away bags for the kids.  I filled it with a wooden train letter representing the kiddie guests’ initials, a train picture for coloring, wax crayons and some coated rice bears.

Made the bag from scratch.

Next craft to follow was the flower pompoms for decors.  I wanted it in dark blue but that color wasn’t available.  I went ahead with pastel blue.

Couldn’t get enough of these beauties, so I made small ones for the vase.

Then came the piñata! We actually already bought one for the party, but it was Caity who chose it and it was a donkey in pink, purple, orange and other girly colors. It just doesn’t fit into the train theme I wanted. I got inspired to make a train piñata when I saw from one blog how easy that it was possible to make it. I recycled the beer box sitting out in the cold balcony.

The train banner was bought from Pro Party.  It was amusing when people started asking me if I made it too.

We skipped the party hats coz I know Adie won’t wear it anyway and let him sport this cool birthday boy badge. He looked dapper in his get-up; coin cufflinks would add an interesting appeal. Whatchathink?

I wanted to experiment with marshmallow fondant for Adie’s train cake but never got around to make it. ): He had to settle for mom’s amateur cake.

For last night’s party with the grandparents, I hurriedly whipped a name banner and set-up a throne for his Royal Highness. (:

I  had a lot of party ideas that weren’t implemented. Time constraints and availability of materials were the culprit. Maybe next time, it will be perfect.
Over and out… more birthday posts to follow.  I’m also thinking of making individual posts on how-to for the props.

Got a sweet tooth? I guess I can offer some suggestion to satisfy your sweet cravings. Let me introduce you to my precious discoveries from Candy land!

Candies from Jelly Belly Jelly Beans, Candy King and our recent find this weekend, from Veselá Veverka (VV).

Pink and green stones? Cool!

How about some red colored stones?  Awesomely yummy!

When I saw these rock candies, they reminded me of my Mom who loves collecting stones/rocks from her trips.  These would be great gifts for her, edible stones!

These chocolate-coated sunflower seeds are my fave.  Nutritious and sweet at the same time.  Vietnamese stores sell this 10 czk lesser than VV though.

Eggs!  I love Candy King’s egg candies, but these ones from Veselá Veverka would do.

Don’t mind my dry palm!

And this is Candy King which we bought the other weekend.

We filled the tumbler with all sorts of candies which were long gone.  Only these colored round chocolates are left which are my fave.  I wish the tumbler would refill itself!

I was more than glad when we found out that Tesco Supermarkets sell Candy King.  This candy brand is popular in Scandinavian countries and also in Finland, where we first got to taste it.  There’s less variety sold here though, but at least, there’s Candy King in Prague!

Colorful sweets do make an amazing Colorful Weekend! Don’t you think? Grab a handful as there’s more for everybody.  As Caity said yesterday while we were popping these goodies in our mouths, “That’s enough Mama”. “Tomorrow again, okay?  We’ll give to Nikki, Vladi, Leah, Martin and Titas!”  “It’s for *everybodys!”  “Okay, Mama?”

*Everybodys – Caity is fond of putting s at the end of her nouns.  Even Czech words that are already plural in form, get to have an English facelift with her s.  Here’s an example: 1 toy in Czech is called hračka.  Plural form is hračky. Caity makes it double plural, hračkys. Kalowka!

[Another title with "HAPPY]. Love that word!
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Anyway, lookie!

A mini hurricane hit our living room leaving us with this mess! Or was it a thief looking for some valuables under the cushions? Nahhhh! This is what happens when you have two rowdy kids having fun in the house while the mama is making crepes for lunch in the kitchen.  Hahaha.  I am used to this. Welcome to my life!

Playing house.  Every kid should experience this!

But you know what? I’d rather have that than bouts of cries from either one of them fighting over a toy or something. I’d also gladly have this chaos over a spic and span, quiet house without kids any day. (But yeah, it’s nice to have a house free from clutter too and some peace once in awhile).  The sight of the two enjoying each others’ company makes my heart swell.  There were times in the past that I couldn’t even leave them for a minute without hearing Adie cry or Caity which was annoyingly frustrating especially when I had cook or do other house chores.  But that’s it, a thing of the past… I am glad Caity is getting matured and learning how to treat her little brother nicely.  Kids do grow up!

Their Legos and wooden toy trains from Ikea are their current faves.  They play with these everyday; making houses, towers, creating tracks for the trains…  Adie’s rc car is taking a break after it ran out of batteries. I’m sure he’d be thrilled to play with it again along with rc trucks once we put new batteries in it.

Caity had to stay at home 3 days out of 5 this week because their school lacked teachers.  I didn’t mind, coz I know Adie would be pleased having his ate (big sis) around to play with.  And even Caity sometimes would tell me she wants to stay home instead of go to school, coz she likes to play with Adie.

Pretending to sleep…

Caity is big enough to help me clean the mess they made, even little Adie knows what to do when I tell them it’s time to clean up so it’s not much of a work for me.  Anyway, this too shall pass. Kids do grow, right?

This long darkness during winter has limited the work I can do because when daylight is out, it seems my body is also telling me to slow down. There are lots of craft projects I’m putting on hold, to give way for more important things, such as family!

Anyway, I’ve already got an idea how to maximize my time. I think the solution to lengthen my “day” is to add more lighting at home. There’s only the chandelier in our living room to light up the whole space. It’s got like 6 bulbs but the orangey-yellowish lighting doesn’t really help much. Here in this side of the world, most homes if not all use the bulbs which I don’t like. I prefer fluorescent which has the daylight effect. It’s brighter and even cost-efficient. I can just imagine how it would brighten up the room if we add fluorescent wall lights.

We actually bought a regular fluorescent tube and placed it on one side of the room which doesn’t look nice, but serves the purpose. Wall sconces are the perfect solution if only we’re allowed to drill or destroy walls in this flat. Hmmmm… Next solution, floor lamps! Yep, that’s just what I’m gonna do, get us a new floor lamp when the tide of busyness subsides. Right now, the priority for this week is the preparation for Adie’s 2nd birthday.

Happy New Year!!!
There’s so much to be grateful for, for the past year. Thanks a lot Lord for all the blessings, for the good health and relationships, for families and friends, and for life itself. It’s our prayer that this year will be another fruitful one.

Moving on, our life in photos the past weeks & days, coz I’ve got no more words to write… (:

M and I celebrated our 8th year wedding anniversary last January 3! Cheers to 8 years!

My Christmas wish in a frame; love, joy and peace.

Hullo! Me here! I’m still stuck in the maze of the Christmas celebrations with family and friends. I like to stay in this place for a little while until the year ends, got no choice actually. hehe I wish I have the mojo for blogging, like one wave of my hand, and all the thoughts in my head would magically turn into words and sentences. That would be cool!

Sharing here our afternoon of the Christmas eve – after all the shopping madness and cooking galore, it was time to put our feet up and enjoy ze day! We were just filling our tummies with food, Christmas cookies and wine, relishing the company of loved ones and the delighted look on the children’s faces when they opened their gifts. I couldn’t help feeling like a small child as I was unwrapping my gifts too.

Caity with her Bába and Ori, the poodle.

What did you get Adie?

Caity busy with her Barbie make-up.

Photo using self-timer! Adie is even smiling!

This one was taken by Caity after all the gifts have been opened. I Like! (:

Christmas day was even more relaxed, the family together with the grandparents went to Hotel Hoffmeister for a Christmas brunch. And as usual when its buffet, you get to eat more and feel a kilo heavier when you go out of the place. The kids had a great time in their play area, while the adults were busy chatting and errmmm, eating of course.  It might not have the fun amenities Disney World hotels have, but it was perfect for all of us.



She likes her new make-up kit!

Sleepy Adie…

Later in the afternoon, my friend Tess from Brno, and his son visited us.
The next day, we took out the kids to ride their scooters. But it seemed like they terribly missed playing outdoor that we got stuck in this old sand pit.  The kids had fun scooping the sand, even when it was freezing cold!




Little Adie is obviously obsessed with big sis’ scooter.

Whew! It will be New Year in a few days…  might be caught in another loop of parties and celebrations, again.

My kids prefer the PC over TV, that’s why we’ve given up our cable subscription coz they’d rather watch their favorite kiddie movies and music videos from Youtube. There are a lot of cool music videos (even educational ones) which they love to sing or dance along. Adie especially likes music and gets bored with kid shows that are all blah, blah, blah.  Thanks to youtube downloader, I can have copies of their favorites saved in our hard drive. Current video faves of the kids are from Tutitu, Super Simple Songs and Mother Goose Club channels. User nay1115 also have nice videos which Caity and Adie recently discovered. Now my head is filled with silly kids’ songs… “Daddy Finger, Daddy Finger, where are you? Here I am, here I am. How do you do?”    “One little calf is sitting on a hot pot, bursting into tears. Help, mom! Help, mom! Oh my butt is burning up.” The latter is actually my personal favorite coz I sing it with funny actions and expressions which sends the kids to fit of giggles!  We’re crazy like that.

We checked out the newly opened indoor playground in Galerie Butovice one weekday. M had three days off from work, it’s like having a loooonnnggg weekend! Me and the kids, so happy. (:

From one ride to another…

Trying the trampoline…

Notice how Adie’s cheeks are flushed red, probably from all the excitement.

You can camp here with the kids as long as you want.  The entrance fee per kid is 99 czk (about 5 USD), for unlimited time. Adults are free.  There’s a restaurant where you can order food if you get hungry, prices are affordable.  The kids will surely have a grand time playing with the slides, swing, trampolines, tunnels, ball pools, ride-on toys, play house or they can get creative and sit down to color/draw.  If that isn’t enough, there are also lessons in dancing, drama, exercise and lots more.  They also accept babysitting. And they have friendly staff.

I left M and the kids here for sometime for some gift-shopping.  How convenient! We definitely like this place.  We’ll come back here, that’s for sure.

Taking a break.

While waiting for our order…

Back to playing…

Caity driving the battery-operated bike.

A kiss of gratitude?

Tired, yet happy parents coz we’ve got happy kids!

As expected, the kids complained when we told them it was time to go home.  Good thing they were given coins upon signing in which they can exchange for candies/sweets.  That made our exit easy. hehe

Linking up for:
Colorful Weekend
Kids in Doodles