Randoms

My first leather wallet. It took me so long to decide on it. After all i haven't really spent so much on a wallet before. Actually i was also deciding on this long one or the other normal wallet-y squarish kinda wallet. In the end, the vote goes to this one even though it's more expensive, i love the strap at the end, so i can sling it when i go out for lunch.
I'm hoping this lasts a long long time.
Guy Laroche for $95, after discount.

Honestly the colour of the photo doesn't reflect the real thing. But for once, i love my wallet. Hmm...not that i hated the rest of the wallets i had, it's just mediocre, maybe.

Then i ran out of things to do online...
So i finally got down to read the Real Simple Family (special issue) that i bought weeks ago at Borders. Checked out some cool websites...and this! I didn't know there was a kids room website too!
Check out Ohdeedoh
If i have loads of time...i can surf this and these websites (see below) for hours on end...and dream dream dream. It's mad, but i love these spaces and wish i can have all of them. or live in all of them.
The other really cool spaces are:
Apartment Thearpy
Unplggd
re-nest
the Kitchen
decor8

Somehow i wonder if it's the way the present the page & photograph it that makes me fall in love with the spaces shown in these websites. It always feels so homely.

Someday i wish to have a house with tall windows and loads of light, high but not too high ceilings and large but not too large space. Even though i tell Ww that it's not too fun to have a house because there's more structural issues to deal with(ie. roof problems, foundation problems, piping problems etc) compared to a flat/condo, in my imaginations and dreams i would love to own a summer house.

I like this...

even though it looks like a showroom...so many of these rooms and beautiful wall decals. I wish i have the ability to illustrate these beautiful artworks...and so create my own line of wall decals. but alas, my illustration skills have flown to pluto.

New directions

It's really wonderful to see our good friends happily married. Weddings always reminds us of ours, which we enjoyed thoroughly. It's almost 3 years. This year we finally didn't have something mega up at the end of the year. Previously, it was our new house. Then Eliza. Oh..ok this year will be Eliza's 1st year birthday bash.

We have been so blessed. And as always i wonder what does God have in store for us. What legacy will we leave behind? What will the future be in store? Will we eventually go beyond the shores and edge out a different life? It has been something we have been talking about lately. I'll be happy to stay here though. But as we have discussed, we want our kids to grow up in an environment where learning and not testing is the norm; where they'll grow to love the aquisition of knowledge, the ability to think, the sensitivity to be considerate...
I wonder, if in the end will our nurturing will be affected by our society? Will there be a difference in where we bring out kids up? Maybe. We may try.

In the end, in the light of education, we would want our kids to grow to love learning, not love being better than others, being top in class, (or being tested thousands of times by the time they reach 12yrs old. I'm trying, in my miserable attempts to teach Eliza to read. In the book, it write that you can teach often, but test rarely. Of course, we'll want to know whether they have learnt the word, and how to, it's by testing. However, babies/toddlers will end up not choosing the right answer if they are tested too often. Can I resist the need to gauge my kids intelligence and knowledge by tests & exams? That's where the love of learning dies...isn't it?

My thoughts are many, my time is short. So i need to sleep already...more words another time..

Midwives in Egypt

I started reading Exodus, simply because i didn't know where to start off in my bible reading. I read it in the bathroom though doing my big business, after the house has all settled down, floors cleaned, food cleared & packed, Eliza snuggled to sleep....and God spoke in Exodus 1.

The midwives who feared the Lord. Do you know about them? I guess this shed light that there was a proper profession called a mid-wife in those times. I wondered what they were like...were they large & imposing, fierce women? or gentle & encouraging, sensitive & knowledgable women? I would think that it is either. The thing was that they feared the Lord more than the pharaoh. Their faith was that deep. I mean they could be killed for defying the pharaoh, but by God's grace they were spared. Though i wonder what God thinks of them spinning the stories about Hebrew women being more vigorous than Egyptian women. Maybe it's true. But i guess it doesn't happen 100% of the time.

Their obedience led to God blessing them with families of their own. It reminds me of the verse "Delight in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart" Psalm 37:4. Maybe there should be a phrase .."Fear the Lord....desires of your heart" Probably God meant that that delight is closely knitted to fear. Those who have young kids will probably understand.

I learnt about fearing the Lord today.