This year is an important year

This year will mark the fourth year I have had this blog. Combined I have probably blogged one third of a year's worth of material. However I have had a few other blogs that would probably make up the loss. This year I hope to do many more things like Reviews, Giveaways and invite you into my life a little more. I have several things I'd like to say and do so stay tuned!

It also marks the fourth year of my marriage! Go figure!

Review - Lighting-Fast Chinese for Kids and Families by Carolyn Woods

Learning a language can be tough, whether it be your second or third and in my case filth! With a full time job, two kids, and a husband to look after I though the possibilities of learning a language was remote. Only when my two year old was watching Ni-Hao Kai-lan on the television was it possible to engage her and my husband in another language. So when this book review opportunity came I really wanted to give it a shot.

Having the sayings from Kai-lan, the small amount of Chinese food words and random words I picked up from my husband, I was totally lost and overwhelmed to start learning one of the oldest languages in the world.

Taken from Amazon.com

The book Lighting-Fast Chinese for Kids and Families by Carolyn Woods makes it easy. She creates prompts and guides in the 60 pages (in paper back or on the Kindle) that made it easy for me to ask my two year old basic questions in real life situations like getting dressed, going to the Zoo, and going to the store. How easy is that? Immersion is one of the best ways to learn a new language and by taking this book with us as we went walking to see the shī zi (lions), lǎo hǔ (tigers) and the xióng (bears) at the Zoo made it more interesting because we were having fun learning Chinese. And that is when real learning takes place.

A small video I made to show you how fun and easy the lesson are!

More by Carolyn Woods

Lightning-fast Spanish For Kids and Families 
 Lightning-fast Spanish Vocabulary Building Crossword Puzzles 

Lightning-fast French For Kids and Families

Lightning-fast German For Kids and Families

Lightning-fast Italian For Kids and Families

Make Money From Home With A Children’s eBay Business

And just published 

Lightning-fast Japanese For Kids and Families

There are only 2 cons I could see about the book. One was the lack of clarity of what dialect I was about to learn. In China there are two main branches Mandarin and Cantonese, then there are the smaller regional subsets. I had to ask my husband, who has a few years of the language, tell me it was Mandarin. The second was the word Pinyin, not until the end of the book is it defined, in the book, {as} the Chinese phonetic language, rather than characters. I would have liked to see that in the beginning as I thought it was the actual dialect of Chinese! 

I give this book 4 out of 5 stars (Amazon Rating system), because of the ease of use that my family enjoyed learning from the book, but lost a star because of the confusion of the dialect and definition as I pointed out above.

Please Note: I was given a copy of the book to review ($14.99 value), however was not told in any way how to write or do a video for the author or received anything other than the copy mentioned above to influence my review.

Wordless Wednesday

Dear sixteen year old self,

Can you believe you are now 32? Have two daughters, a husband, a house, and the VW?

Me at 16 with my friend Winston

I know it seems far fetched because you are in the mist of a melt down. You will get help and medication for what you are finding out from your biological father about a chemical imbalance in your brain called Bi-Polar Mania. The medication will make things better, but our mom will not.

When you are 18, she will call the cops and have them place you under a 5150, though its hard for the doctors to find out what is wrong with you after the first 12 hours of being there. Some of them think our mom should be in here, not you. When you get back to your home, your mother is there with a restraining order not to go near her or your childhood home. All of this at the start of your last year in high school, how rude right?

You do graduate from Skyline High School with top honors. Both the Future Teachers and Preforming Arts magnate completions and honor roll cords. I think we were the first person to do such a thing in the schools history. I doubt that few will remember, but we will!

It took us a few more years to complete college than we had hoped. 1 year in City College and 5 years in San Francisco State University. You met a few friends, laughed and tried so hard to shed the awkwardness about you by reinventing yourself a few times. However it seemed not to work and the self doubt haunts you even to this day. 

You did get a job at the PlayStation Store San Francisco in the Metreon. Yup you get into video games. You actually meet your husband there, however don't know it yet, and meet another guy that will break your heart into a million pieces and runs back to Michigan. So when you see a tall handsome, blond hair, blue eyed guy that is just as shy, RUN AWAY! 

A few years later when you're about to turn 27, our mother dies and you lose your childhood home to fore-closer. You have days from when you find out that she has died to when they take it away, to prioritize the things that you want to take with you and the things you will never see again. And those decisions still haunt you till this day.

A year latter you get married and another year after that your first daughter is born. Bella is a great little girl and brings mountains of joy. So in 2011 you try once again and you have another daughter Grace and you decide to give her our mother's middle name as hers. 

Please do not be scared as this is even over whelming to your 32 year old self. Just know that you do not become what your mother has told you, however the bit about the girls were right. 

You are not crazy, you do become loved by yourself, and you are loved by others.

Working or Not Working - this is the reality

In my previous post Stunning absolute I talked about the real possibility of me quitting my job to stay home with my two year old and my newborn. I felt that I can totally quit my job as long as I can get some extra income by a part time job on the weekends.

I talked to my husband about this and he feels in order for me to complete the quitting my job part, I would have to stay at my job till at least my husband feels like he's in the black or if Grandma once faced with the day to day routine of baby G, doesn't feel like she can handle it anymore give my two weeks notice.

I still feel like I am going to get fired before that happens however we need to get one foot out of the debt that maternity leave leaves me in and I think I could do fine. How come I feel a sense of dread coming on then??

Start of a homemade guru? The Tutu Story

To stick to a New Years Goal of getting off my duff and start making something of and for myself and family, led to the motivation of making things from scratch. Whether it be food or home goods including clothes. 

When I was a kid I didn't have a good impression of homemade clothes. My mother used to make a few of my summer dresses and a few shirts which was fine. However the hang up was when she took my store bought dresses that still fit on the top, however because I would have a growth spurt (as all kids do) they turned in to mini skirts, she would find the "matching" (that kind of looked like the dress material but was off) material and sew an extra panel to the bottom of the dress. To an eight year old all ready getting teased and bullied because I was different having this fashion faux pas was just another nail in my coffin. 

By associating this with the sewing machine and the horrid dresses that my mom tacked with extra material, I disliked dresses and the thought of home made anything made me think of clothes looking cheep and dirty.

Flash forward twenty years I met my husband and he had a love of sewing. Soon I was introduced back into the thing I vowed not to touch back when I was an eight year old child. A Sewing Machine. The fabric store was easy to get back into. The feel of the yards of different fabrics made my brain explode with different ideas of things to make. Maybe a bag, maybe make an actual piece of clothing or something like a bed sheet. A few years later I got pregnant and I got all the Winnie the Pooh material, patterns and accessories to make everything a nursery would need. However a good majority of material is still uncut, the patterns are still folded and the accessories have been used a little. Though I did manage to make a quilt for my first daughter, but that's a different story.

Two and a half years later, I had my second daughter and my eldest was getting into girly things like princesses, also their fluffy dresses and Tutu's. However to spend the money on one pre-made tutu with out braking the bank is hard. So I decided to make two. One for my eldest and one for my baby girl. 

On my quest to the fabric store I found an organza I thought would be nice as a topper to the tutu rather than just plane white tutu.

The organza I used

The problem was with the tulle. How to make the multiple layers with out cutting each piece individually. I solved the problem by folding the tulle fabric to the correct size that I wanted, I sewed  it to the top and bottom layer of organza (I feel tulle is a bit itchy so I used the sheer part of the organza to make a backing), I cut the folds and sewed a pink ribbon on it.

My baby girl trying it on. She wasn't too happy about being the model however I did get to snag these pictures. It should be with a white onesie or a nice shirt and leggings.

Now on to my eldest's tutu!

Wordless Wednesday picture