I forgot to mention that...

... the house is absolutely beautiful!!!!

It's a very old house, English style, very classic and refine!! Really elegant!!
It's got polished wooded floor boards and fire place in every room (the fireplaces have been block and can't be used though), very high and beautiful ceilings...
The back yard is so cozy and nice!!
Ooohhh, I just love it!! Love love love it!!!
And can't wait to take hundreds of pictures of it for you all to see!! lol...

I'm so excited!!!

Boxes and mess... and we got the keys of our new house today!!

So, the boxes are pilling up in the corridor and not one single room is tidy and clean. There is ‘stuff’ everywhere, stuff to pack, stuff to give away to charity, stuff to throw out… stuff, stuff, stuff, stuff!! Who owns all this stuff? Who are these sick, demented hoarders? Well apparently we do, and we are!!

The boxes are never ending, as soon as you pack and seal one, you need to quickly grab another one to finish packing the cupboard that you just opened!! We are inefficient because we are overwhelmed by the amount of stuff we have accumulated in 3 and half years of marriage and a baby!! We just don’t know how to tackle our things. Our material possessions are literally choking us. It’s all very ZEN over here!!

The only one not faced by the boxes and the mess seems to be Mona. Our house seemed to have turned into a playground for her. She jumps in and out of the boxes and is so happy to go through them and remove what we have just put in there to discover what that thing is for and what does it do and how she can have fun with it….
But a gold star should be given to her, as she certainly merits one for her patience and helpfulness!! On Friday evening, she spent 3 hours playing quietly in the living room with her toys, while I was busy packing boxes on the kitchen bench, of course we did interact with each other quite a few times, but it was all happily and she understood that I was busy working. And one evening, she even took an empty cardboard box and put her doll, half a banana, her cup, her dummy and some other little toys in it and gave the box to daddy to seal it… it’s was so funny, the look on her cutie face was priceless, she was so proud and happy to help out daddy!!

Mona is very excited about the moving. Today when we went to the new house, she was running and jumping around like a circus kid!! She was so bright and very outgoing with the agent and the owners (they were there too, finishing up the cleaning and removing their things). And when we showed her her new bedroom, she was so excited and went to play in the wardrobes.

So yeah, we got the keys to the new house this afternoon, and tomorrow afternoon with the help of some male family members, we be will filling up the rental truck with our boxes full of stuff and furniture, fridge, TV, computers (3 and a laptop), 2 printers and the fax, washing machine, dryer, etc… and on Tuesday morning, we will all go to the new house to upload the truck.
Then we will have all afternoon to set the beds and bedroom, and unpack some boxes in the kitchen and bathroom. Then on Wednesday, we will drop Mona at one of the aunt’s house and hubby and I will come back to this house to clean it up (hopefully one day will be enough!!) and to come back again on Friday to give back the keys to the rental agent.

But before all that, we still need to finish up packing here. We still have the laundry, the pantry to really finish up, and some little stuff that we are still using every day in each rooms, and also we have to dismantle the beds and office desks and I have to unpack the fridge and clean it, we need to pack the clothes also (will spread a bed sheet on the bed and put all the clothes with the hangers still on the bed sheet and tie it around in a not, that way it’s easier to put it in place). We have to get all of this done by tomorrow afternoon.
Oh dear, how I wished I have an extra pair of hands and legs to get things done quicker!!!
Oh and also tomorrow morning we have to make calls to get all the utilities disconnected and reconnected to the new house.
It’s going to be a long week, and I don’t even thing I will be able to blog and whine about it, because I don’t know when we will have adsl connected.
Ok, I better go back to my boxes and stuff!!

Baha'i Prayer Books for infants & toddlers

This post is in response to Sarah and Mehrtash, from Virginia, USA.

Hi Sarah & Mehrtash,

The 3 Baha'i prayers books we bought for Mona, are small board books which are perfect for little children (as they can't rip it apart). You can see pictures of the books on this post here.
Each book, contains one prayer and on each page, there are illustrations for small children to better understand and memorize the words of the prayers.

The book titles are:
- Blessed is the spot
- O God Guide me
- O God! Educate these children

We got them from our local Baha'i library, here in South Australia.
They are published by the "Baha'i Publications Australia" and are available at the Australian Baha'i Distributions Services.

Hope this helps.
Feel free to leave me a message if you need more info.

Much love,

Blessed is the spot ... and the sea and the fish!!!

Tonight, Mona made me laugh and really surprised me too!!

It was bedtime and we were reading her 3 Baha'i prayer books for children before going to bed. After reading "O God, guide me", we started to read "Blessed is the spot". I mentioned before that Mona usually repeats each little sentence after me...

So in the middle of the prayer, where it reads "and the sea", instead of repeating the same words, Mona said: "and the fish"!!!
I just couldn't stop laughing and giggling, untill the end of the prayer. It was so funny, because she said it so naturally as if it was part of the prayer!! lol

Then we said the last prayer (and her favourite one) "O God, Educate these children."
We then kissed each other goodnight and said goodnight to 'Abdu'l-Bahá and Baha'u'lláh, and told them we loved them, and then I turned off the lights and sat next to Mona's bed until she falls asleep. Usually we sing in the dark together, little lullabies or prayers until she falls asleep, but this time, Mona started saying the Baha'i prayer "Blessed is the spot" all by herself...

Here is what little Mona was saying:

"Bessed spot, and house, and pace, and city, and heart, and mountain, and zefuge, and cave, and valleeeeeee, and sea, and eeeland and meedow"!!


She stopped there and repeated the whole prayer again and again and until i told her that it was time to sleep now...
I was so suprised!! I didnt say anything while she was saying the prayer in the dark, so that i could listen carefully to her and see if she could really say the prayer by heart. And she did!!
From the top of her little 23 months old brain, she did got most of it right!! And I was pretty impressed.
She did forget the part where it says "and the land" and I think she is a bit too young to remember the last sentence in its full lenght "where mention of God hath been made and His praise glorified". But it's pretty good for an almost two year old girl !!


Here is the Baha'i Prayer by Bahá'u'lláh, in its entirety:

"Blessed is the spot, and the house, and the place,

and the city, and the heart, and the mountain,

and the refuge, and the cave, and the valley,

and the land, and the sea, and the island,

and the meadow where mention of God

hath been made and His praise glorified."

Water and Air Con is back!!! Yay!!

This morning, around 10am, the plumber came to fix the pipes.
He said that the nut that was placed to hold the pipes together, was a very low and cheap quality. So he replaced the nut and now we have water back on and we can also use the air con too!!
So now the 3 of us, are very happy, clean and cool !!
:)

Great!! No WATER and No AIR CON on a very very HOT day!!

This morning, we woke up only to realize that there was no water!! No water was coming out of any of the taps from the house!!
We had to go to the airport this morning to farewell my in laws for their trip to India.
So hubby went outside to check out if there was anything wrong with our pipes or something, and good thing he did, because he saw that someone had closed the main water tap that brings water from the big pipes into the home. The main water tap is on the front right corner of our front lawn, very close to the footpath and the street. So he opened it up and we spent 5 mins wondering who and why someone would have done this to us… Then while we were taking our showers and all, hubby realizes that the pipes outside were gushing waters everywhere, on our lawn and the footpath, and the water was going down the whole street. So he quickly turned the tap off (while I was in the middle of my shower!!) and he started making calls. After spending an hour on the phone, trying to find out who would be responsible to come and repair the pipes, which the rental agents said was the responsibility of the South Australian Water Department, he left the phone when he was told that someone from the water department would come real soon to fix the problem. So he turned back the water tap on, so that we could all get ready very quickly, then turned the tap off and we headed to the airport.
After coming back from the airport (after lunch time), we noticed that no one came yet, and that we couldn’t use the air-conditioned, because it uses water too. Oh did I mention that it was 39degrees today!! A very very dry and hot day!! So we call the SA water department again and this time they sent someone in less than an hour. The guy said that as the pipes were on the property’s lawn, it was not the work for the department to do, so we call back the agents, who gave us a plumber’s phone number to call. We call the guy and the guy told us that he could only come to check it out tomorrow morning. So as it was too hot to stay inside the house without air conditioning, we went to the shopping center and spent all afternoon there, looking around at shops and we sent 2 hours on the kids playground before we headed home to cook dinner.
So now, each time we need water, we have to go outside the house in the front and open the tap so that we can fill up bottles and jugs of water, to then quickly turn the tap off. The house is really hot and we are still suffering from the heat. Right not, it’s 1am and it’s 30degrees!! Still pretty hot. Mona has been naked all evening and is sleeping with only her nappies on. We have been eating lots of ice blogs too!!
So hopefully tomorrow morning, the guy will come early to fix the pipes and we will enjoying having water and air conditioning back on!! It’s going to be as hot at today was!!
I hate this kind of weather!!! You can feel how hot it is just by breathing!! The air is hot and it makes it really hard to breathe!!Ok I better go and try to sleep in this hot weather!!

We are moving!! .... On demenage!!!

We've found a very beautiful house in Norwood (up north the city of Adelaide), and we are so excited to move in there and create a happy home! We are moving from our current house on Wednesday 27th Feb to Friday 29 Feb 2008. (We have to give back the keys of our current house on Friday 29).

Moving is, in a word, chaotic. We’ve already had to deal with the stress of trying to buy a new home, but then finally decided that with the increase of interest rate on home loans and considering that we would be living remotely far from the city centre and our family, we thought that renting a new home closer to the city for a couple of years, is the best move for us right now. Not to mention that the house we will be renting is located in the most famous area of the whole of Adelaide. We are just two streets away from the famous “The Parade” street and literally 2 minutes away from city centre. Norwood is one of the most expensive area of Adelaide, where the smallest and cheapest houses for sale are not below 800 000$!! The house that we are renting is a very classic and old style house, with lots of fire place in most of the rooms and with high and beautifully carved ceilings, and the house has been beautifully updated and modernised. The back and front yard is just exquisite, with lots of fruit trees, a lawn area and paved and pergola area with a separate home office at the back of the house. The house belongs to a friend of hubby’s dad and we are so lucky to rent this house at a very very competitive price!!

So right now we’re knee-deep in boxes and packing tape as we prepare to make the switch from one house to another, hoping that my china teapot survives the move in one piece and praying that little Mona adapts herself very easily to her new environment!
So much is going on right now; I just hope that I won't forget the vital needs, like having electricity and gas connected in time, not to mention the internet and phone connection (without which we couldn't survive for long!!)

So yeah, we started packing this Friday, we've finished the home office room and now there's the whole house to pack and the big stuff like furniture and electrical devices and food that can only be packed and moved on the D day!! I won't be able to take any pictures of the moving out and moving in, because we just gave our cameras to my mother in law, who is going on holidays to India for two weeks. So when she and her hubby gets back, around the 5th of March, that's when I will be able to show you all our new house!! But here are some pictures that I took today of Mona in the middle of all the boxes and stuff.... Also, we might be quiet for some time, at least until we get settled into our new home... but will try to keep you all updated on how things goes...
Till then... enjoy the pics taken this week.

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On a enfin trouvé une jolie maison a Norwood (au nord de la ville d’Adelaïde), et on est très impatient d’y emménager et de créer a nouveau une maison remplis de bonheurs!! On démange a partir du mercredi 27 fév. au vendredi 29 fév. 2008 (parce qu’on doit rendre les clés de notre maison le vendredi 29).

Le déménagement, résumé en un mot est, chaotique ! On a déjà eu a faire au stress en essayant d’acheter une maison, mais avec la hausse du taux intérêt pour les prêts immobilier, et être loin du centre ville et de la famille, nous avons, après mure réflexion, enfin décidé que le mieux pour nous en ce moment est de louer une maison plus prés du centre ville d’Adelaïde. De plus, la maison que nous allons louer est située dans la partie la plus populaire d’Adelaïde. Nous sommes à deux rues prés de la fameuse avenue «La Parade » (équivalente des Champs Elysées) et pratiquement à 2 minutes du centre ville. Norwood est la banlieue la plus chère d’Adelaïde, ou la plus petite et moins chère des maisons ne coutent pas moins de 800 000 $ !!! La maison que nous allons louer est une maison de style ancienne et classique, avec pleins de cheminées dans presque toutes les pièces de la maison, avec des plafonds très élevés et joliment sculptés et la maison a été si bien modernisée et mis a jour. Le jardin est simplement exquis, remplis d’arbres de fruits et superbement bien aménager entre gazon et pavés et un bureau aménager a l’arrière de la maison. La maison appartient a l’un des amis du père de mon époux et on est très chanceux de pouvoir louer cette jolie maison a un prix très très compétitif !!

Donc maintenant on est on plein milieu des boites en cartons (et plastiques) et du bande adhésif alors qu’on se prépare à faire le transfert d’une maison à l’autre, tout en esperant que ma théière en porcelaine reste en un seul morceau et en priant que la petite Mona s'adaptera trés vite a son nouvel environnement. Et parmi tout ce chaos, j’espère et prie de ne rien oublier, surtout le principale comme faire connecter l’électricité et le gaz, et surtout l’internet et le téléphone (sans lesquels nous ne pourrions pas survive très longtemps!!).

Donc voila, nous avons commencé à emballer nos affaires vendredi dernier, et on a fini d’emballer le bureau/chambre d’ordi et maintenant il ne reste plus à faire toutes les chambres et le reste de la maison ainsi que les gros trucs comme les meubles et électroménagers etc. qui ne peuvent être emballés que le jour J.
Aussi, je ne pourrai partager les photos de la nouvelle maison a partir du 4 mars, puisque nos appareils photos et camera sont avec ma belle mère qui les a emprunter pour son séjour en Inde. Mais j’ai pris quelques photos de Mona qui joue avec les boites et d’autres photos prisent cette semaine.
Je serai un peu silencieuse ces quelques jours a venir, puisque qu’on sera très occuper a emballer et démanger etc., du moins jusqu'à ce qu’on s’installe enfin dans notre chez nous, mais je ferai de mon mieux pour vous tenir informer de nos aventures!! En attendant, voici les photos....

Rock-A-Bye Bear and Twinkle Twinkle Little Star by Mona

Rock-A-Bye Bear by Mona

Twinkle Twinkle Little Star by Mona
(Part 1)

Twinkle Twinkle Little Star by Mona
(Part 2)

More Night Time Prayers Stories

Last night, while putting Mona to bed, I was reading to and with her, her prayer books.
When reading the book and prayer " O God Guide Me", I started to say each little sentence and Mona repeats after me as usual: "O God! Guide me, protect me, make of me a shining lamp and" then I paused to see if Mona would continue the prayer or not, and she did!!
When i paused, she continued and said: "a brilliant star". She was so happy to have helped me read the prayer and so was I !!!

Tonight, again, while getting ready to say our night prayers, i took the three prayers books and was about to start with "O God! Guide Me" as usual, but Mona said: "Close prayer book, mummy O God Children!!!" Several times!!
She wanted me to start with the prayer book "O God Educate these children"!!!
And so we did, and ended up reading 3 times "O God Educate these children" and 2 times each of "O God Guide me" and "Blessed is the spot".

Also today, Mona started singing the prayer "Blessed is the spot" by herself, while playing in her room and while taking her bath!!! Of course she doesnt know all the words yet, but we are getting closer each day!!
She is constantly asking for her prayer books now. Even for her nap time, she wants me to read her prayer books to her!!

I'm so happy I bought those prayer books for her, she absolutely loves them and the images are really helpful for her to learn the prayers, and needless to say that the books being a board books, are quite handy for her to use and without me having to worry of her tearing them apart.... I only wished they had the French versions of the prayers though....

------------------------------------

"O God, guide me, protect me, make of me a shining lamp and a brilliant star. Thou art the Mighty and the Powerful."

~ 'Abdu'l-Bahá ~

---------------------------

"O God! Educate these children. These children are the plants of Thine orchard, the flowers of Thy meadow, the roses of Thy garden. Let Thy rain fall upon them; let the Sun of Reality shine upon them with Thy love. Let Thy breeze refresh them in order that they may be trained, grow and develop, and appear in the utmost beauty. Thou art the Giver. Thou art the Compasionate."

~ 'Abdu'l-Bahá ~

And the heart....

This evening, as usual, while putting Mona to bed, we were reading one of her prayer books entitled "Blessed is the spot". It is actually the prayer "Blessed is the spot" revealed by Bahá'u'lláh, illustrated with cute pictures in a board book for little toddlers.
So I usually read the prayer aloud and Mona repeats the words after me, she usually repeats only the last word of each sentence.


So tonight, it went like this:
Me: Blessed
Mona: Bessed
Me: is the spot
Mona: the spot
Me: And the house
Mona: the hoose
Me: And the place
Mona: the pace
Me: and the city
Mona: the heart!!

I was in shocked!! She knew what came after city!! I was so happy!! And with a big smile on my face, i acknowledged her and we continued with the prayer and two other more prayers " O God Educate these children" and "O God Guide Me".
But it's pretty amazing for a 22months old baby, don't you think!!

Here is the prayer in it's entirety:

"Blessed is the spot, and the house, and the place, and the city, and the heart, and the mountains, and the refuge, and the cave, and the valley, and the land, and the sea, and the island, and the meadow where mention of God hath been made, and His praise glorified."

~ Bahá'u'lláh ~

Mona on scooter and Ajay on bike

Ajay's 2nd Birthday Party

Picture updates

Here are some pictures of Mona playing with her cousins and at the playground.
Lots has been happenning lately and we have been pretty busy, so hopefully soon will be able to update you all on what's is happening over here... but for now, enjoy the pictures.

Voici quelques photos de Mona qui joue avec ses cousins et au park.
Je n'ai pas eu le temps de vous tenir au courrant de toutes les derniers evenements passés, mais j'espere pouvoir le faire tres tres bientot.... mais en attendant, profitez-en des photos.