I’m linking up with The Write Balance, Pink Chai Living and Love, Laugh, Mirch who are also sharing 3 things with you today from their world. If you want to join in on a Thursday, check out one of their sites and add your link! I also recommend poking around all 3 of their sites for great stories, recipes and more.

Today’s post is brought to you by the letter G 🙂

1. Grandmas 

Grandmas are awesome for so many reasons. I have very early memories of both of my grandmas and grew up closely with these two strong women. Today, I want to tell you about an amazing milestone we celebrated a couple of weeks ago: my maternal grandmother turned 90! It was a great time – every single member of my mom’s family was present, except for my cousin, her husband and their son who live overseas. Family flew in from Alberta, Ontario and California. I realize how lucky we are to celebrate such an occasion, and to do it all in one place was a real blessing. My favourite part, other than seeing everyone together, was knowing my kids were having a blast with their cousins – ten kids, ages 7 and under – who they don’t get to see very often. But kids are amazing like that. Put them in a room together with some toys and their imaginations and they become best buds. I only wish we could get them together more often.

We did something very special to mark the occasion: Liesel Sanday Photography was there to capture photos of my grandma with her children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. I have to say, we didn’t scare Liesel away with our crying babies and escaping toddlers! Liesel was professional, always smiling and able to snap this – and many more! What thrilled me about Liesel was that she was able to come to US – as you can imagine, we would not be able to get to her! More than that, she was genuinely honoured to be there and it shone through in our correspondences prior to the event and in the way she presented the photographs to us after. When you combine talent with passion, you get someone like Liesel, and it makes all the difference. The photos that she snapped are family treasures.

www.lieselsandayphotography.com

Liesel has offered a special package for my readers – you should take advantage of it! I have learned the importance of taking the time to grab those family pics. The kids grow up so fast, life happens, and we want to hold on to precious moments. Let her know Taslim sent you!

2. Girlfriends

I have a really great collection of girlfriends who are spread out all over the place. I miss the ones who live thousands of miles away. Heck, I miss the ones who live 30 minutes away. Scheduling in time to hang out became quite the ordeal with all of us having babies at different times. I had a Big Vent session to my cousin in Calgary last week about how I really missed ‘in person’ connections with other women. Like, quality, child-less, fun times. The kind where you can look at each other with both eyes, instead of just one because the other one is keeping an eye on your wandering kid. The day after my Big Vent, I reached out to a couple friends who were totally game and feeling the same way. And then over the next couple of days, I received 3 texts from 3 different friends asking when we could schedule in some one-on-one time. (See, what happens when you identify what you want and then go after it?! Thank you, Universe!) So, after probably over a year of not being really social (thanks to a gross pregnancy and then being permanently attached to a breastfeeding-every-two-hours baby) I was now faced with…how do I do this? With some ninja-like agility, my husband and I navigated our schedules, the kids’ schedules, and consulted with the phases of the moon (ha, kidding!) and I am looking forward to  super giddy about girly chat minus the interruptions!

3. Growing up with cousins

I was lucky enough to have cousins around all the time growing up. We shared homes, nicknames, clothes, disagreements, crazy relatives and more. Sometimes things got really complicated. But most of the time, my cousins were friends I knew would never really go away. 🙂 I am still growing with them and they are still the first ones I turn to to share things with (oh, like the Big Vent mentioned above), including my fears and my successes. They are the ones who really ‘get’ where I am coming from because, even though they may not have the same viewpoint as me, they just know me, my background, my ideals, what I stand for, what I don’t…so I don’t have to explain much. The awesome thing is I now have cousins-in-law who have  added to my circle of ‘fRamily’ (friends who are also family and vice versa). At my grandma’s party I mentioned above, we were (almost) all together. All different in our own ways, but held together by a commonality. And now we are glued together by the 11 children we share who – despite the fact that they are spread out in age and geography – have an incredible amount of fun together.

And that’s a wrap for today! Hope you get a chance to check out the other 3 Things posts by some fabulous bloggers!