- This is already old news, I guess, since Easter was a week ago but I can’t resist an opportunity to share some cute pictures and it was technically a highlight of this week:
- Hand-me-downs! This is a form of recycling that makes me happy. We have some generous friends who have passed clothes from their daughters down to Pearl and then from Pearl to Rose. Things that our girls have outgrown and that are still in good shape get passed along to friends with smaller daughters. I couldn’t say how much money we’ve saved through this as well as saving clothes from the landfill. Plus, I love seeing my girls’ little things on our friends’ cute little girl! Along with that, six-year-old fashion:
- More vaccines! Canada’s vaccine roll-out has been less than perfect and our COVID numbers are going up every day. BUT…more and more people around us are getting their vaccines, including many of our family members. Both my parents and Peter’s are now booked in or have already had their first shots which is wonderful. I’ve heard of people having “vaccination envy” and I can understand that, seeing as my own appointment is likely still months away. But every person around me who gets their own shot is a person who keeps me safe until I can get mine. So thank you!
- First laundry line of the year!
- April is C-Section Awareness Month. I’m not entirely sure we need a whole month to be aware (?) of caesareans but as someone who has given birth both via c-section (Pearl) and VBAC (Rose) I feel like I have some perspective on both experiences. (VBAC = vaginal birth after caesarean) When asked, I usually tell people that the VBAC was more painful but the c-section was harder. In the end, there is no easy way for a baby to exit the human body.
- Sometimes Rose requests books to look at but she doesn’t know their titles. Here are some recent clues she gave us: “The monster with the castle. They live up the hill where the people are.” Or “There’s a boat. And it goes between two walls and there’s grass on the walls.” And because she’s three she gets very upset when we don’t know which book she’s talking about.
- Somewhat on a whim, I have taken on a new project:
We got this chest for free and have kept it outside, storing outdoor toys and tools in it. We’ve been talking about bring it inside so I started sanding it one afternoon while the girls played outside and now we’re going to fix it up a little and bring it indoors.
- Pearl and I had a Saturday date together. We walked to the village together, strolled through the farmers’ market, picked out some treats, and had a drink on an outdoor patio at a local coffee shop. She picked out these flowers at the farmers’ market:
Karissa Reads Books 
Easter is always in the heart – because it is resurrection celebration. These are beautiful pics!
Absolutely and a good reminder! We celebrate the resurrection each time we worship!
I love your comment about used kids clothes. I know as an adult it can be hard to many people to wear hand-me-down clothing because once your body hits puberty, things may fit funny. But with kids, they grow so fast that it makes no sense to buy new stuff and contribute to landfills. Greta Thunberg would be proud 🙂 Plus, I love how cute kids are in the slightly-but-not-really mismatched funky clothes. It’s adorable!
Yes! Little kids grow out of clothes before they come close to wearing them out. And some specialty things like snow boots that don’t get worn as much (but you really want to have them when you need them!) can go through 3 or 4 kids before they’re truly worn out. Plus, as someone who can get sentimental about clothes my girls have outgrown, it helps me let things go when I can pass it along to a friend.
In that picture of Pearl, she was delighted to realize that everything she was wearing was a hand-me-down! Seeing the outfits she puts together is a really fun way to see her personality emerging.
Lovely Easter photos! And that red coat for Pearl is so cute, styles sure have changed since I was six! (Though in all honesty Pearl’s fashion sense is probably better than mine was, haha! I’m afraid to even look back at the photos.) The talk of hand-me-downs for kids really sends me back, too. All of my cousins lived nearby during my childhood and the hand-me-downs made the rounds through all of them. For most of my childhood I was the only girl, so I didn’t benefit much aside from some of the plainer t-shirts and sweatshirts, but my youngest brother was at the very tail end of the group so it was hilarious getting some of the clothes back for him that had originally come from as far back as my oldest cousin born in the late 80s- styles have DEFINITELY changed!
I’m the only girl in my family too and I HATED wearing my brother’s hand-me-downs. Most of my childhood was ill-fitting jeans and over-sized t-shirts! But we had family friends with a daughter a little older than me and sometimes I’d get things from her and it always seemed so cool. It’s always interesting to see what Pearl is drawn to because sometimes we are given clothes that I wouldn’t have bought but that she loves.
Your experience with boy-fitted clothes does not sound fun! Luckily there was a cluster of boys around my size in the family, so I mostly got my own clothes (being the only granddaughter for a good twelve years had its perks) and skipped the most boy-ish of the hand-me-downs. My too-small clothes were sent to another girl at our church who was a little younger than me and didn’t have anyone else to get clothes handed down from. But that’s a good point, about some hand-me-downs giving a little more room for fashion experimentation, in that it introduces one to things they might not try if money had to be spent. I must admit to feeling a bit lost as a kid when let loose in a clothing store and told to find things I liked! And then, of course, the grown-ups would have veto power anyway, since they were the ones paying the bills. For all the choice I was supposedly given, I think my wardrobe probably looked like a mini version of my mom’s taste until about middle school.
I am definitely guilty of choosing my kids’ clothes based on my own taste! Which hasn’t been a problem so far since they’re still so young but Pearl does get pretty excited to get clothes with sparkles and cartoon characters!
Sparkles and cartoon characters sound great! That was not my mom’s taste at all, lol. At least, not one she indulged in. She worked at a law office for most of my childhood and I would walk there after school and wait in the breakroom until she could drive us home, and I always had to be matching and presentable in case any lawyers or clients saw me and, you know, might notice that I was a child and not a small professional, haha. There was probably more than personal taste at play there, surely, but living rurally also meant that there was a definitely difference between casual clothes for at home that could get dirty on the farm and no one would see, and “proper” clothes to wear in public; unfortunately her sense of proper was kind of frilly but bland in a way that didn’t really suit me. That doesn’t sound at all like it’s the case with Pearl or Rose!
I’m laughing at the thought of a small child trying to dress like an adult lawyer! We had church clothes that were only worn on Sundays but other than that we could be pretty relaxed.