Happy Summer Solstice

2016 is a leap year.

That means the June Solstice comes a day early this year.

Now -in case you forget- I was born on the June Solstice, which occurred on June 21 on the year I was born.

However, since today is the June Solstice, and since I was born both on the June Solstice and on June 21, I declare I shall have a two-day birthday celebration this year!

Because fun!.

Sooooooooooooooo,

from the Summer Solstice Girl, for those of you in the Northern hemisphere

And for those of you in the Southern hemisphere, Happy Winter Solstice. Please know I am very jealous of you and I’d trade places with you in a heartbeat if I could.

And Happy Birthday to me! :)

 

 

Post Summer Solstice Report

fun was had!

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What’s that?

Oh, you want me to elaborate? Why, I’ll be happy to oblige!

From the Summer Solstice Girl

March the 25th

 Today is the birthday of the super-amazing-kickass-ridiculouslygorgeous-insanelytalented-businesswoman daughter of mine.

And for the third time in life, we’re in a different city.

The first time, she was 11 and I was in Bogota, for my Molecular Biology internship after finishing med school.

The second time, she was between ages 13 – 16 and I was here in Canada while she remained in Colombia with her brother, waiting for her Canadian papers.

This time around, we are both in Canada but I am in Windsor and she is in Montreal/Ottawa. I just got off the phone with her. She told me she’s sad we’re not together on her birthday.

I am sad too

I went to bed last night thinking I was not going to be able to jump on her bed while singing the happy birthday song loudly to wake her up like I always did. Or put her birthday card and present by her coffee cup (full with delicious Colombia coffee I had just made for her, of course) on the table for her to find when she came to have her birthday breakfast.

I know that this is how life is supposed to be. Children grow up and then they leave the nest.

I know I was very lucky to be able to do it for so long.

I know she needs to spread her wings and I am very happy she’s doing it now.

In a way, I am happy I am here because if I were still in Ottawa, she’d still be with me and I know I was holding her back. You see, even though she had had her own place for a while, which is normal and healthy, she had moved back in with me when I got very sick back in 2012 so she could help with my recovery. Sure, we had great times together. We traveled, we laughed, we cooked – okay, fine, SHE cooked and I ate. We watched movies. We worked together. We entertained friends. And I did get better.

But she’s a grown up woman now and she needs to live her life.

So, happy birthday daughter. I know you’ll have a wonderful time in Montreal today. Laugh. Drink. Eat cake. Dance. Savour every moment because life is but an instant and in the end, all we have is our memories and the love we gave and received in return!

Footnote:

The phone conversation didn’t end up in a sad tone. We did laugh and I did sing her the birthday song and wish her a happy birthday. Now she’s off to enjoy the day, as it should be.

There were some good times too

With all the bad news, I totally forgot to say that there were great moments during the holidays too. And that’s never a good thingmcause I rarely lose sight of the little [big] things. Besides, it is rather uncharacteristic of me not to make a big fuss about presents and food, and presents, and snow, and presents and parties, and presents and stuff, you know?

So, fret not cause here it is, [cue fanfare] my much belated Christmas/New Years Eve post!!!*

Let’s start with Sid’s surprise birthday party:

The cake

The Birthday Boy

Some goofy people I don’t know

Chocolate Galore

There is this amazing chocolate place I try to go to every time I’m in Montreal.

So, when N asked me what I wanted to do while in Montreal, first thing I said was, I want to go to Juliette et Chocolat. They have chocolate in all sort of delicious forms: Savoury chocolate, liquid chocolate, sweet chocolate, alcoholic chocolate… O! Heavenly Chocolat!

I never get tired of the place.

As I mentioned in my last post, I got the chocolate fondue duo, with one bowl of semi-sweet chocolate and one bowl of milk chocolate. It even came with a candle stuck in a banana slice. Cute.

This time around, I also took some time browse around the shop and take some pictures. And something caught my eye and made me think of Carine of Books, cupcakes and cats chasing chipmunks 

Celebrating the Summer Solstice

I went to Montreal to celebrate my birthday. It was Zack’s birthday on Thursday  –  You know, he of The Jazz Monkey fame, N’s Balboa partner at CSC and organizer of the dances at the Rialto.  Thus, we thought celebrating our birthdays together was a good idea.

The adventure started on Thursday early afternoon with a haircut. Then we headed to Montreal for the Rialto Swings LIVE!

Zack, Natalia and I doing birthday shots

My son’s reply

Yesterday, I wrote about my son’s birthday.

I posted the link on his FB wall.

This is his reply:

So long ago in the middle of the forest and yet so little has changed…

This forest is disappearing, the mines are now in its stead.

And yet the boy, I, keeps dreaming,

we’ll see how far he will get.

I’m sure he’ll get very far

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• There Was A Boy (summersolsticemusings.wordpress.com)

Happy birthday, my son

Yesterday was my son’s birthday.

My amazing, talented, beautiful son is now 24.

But to me, he’ll always be the little dreamer, carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders

But work (because we’re in the middle of a big weekend event) and life (because we’re one continent away) got in the way of celebrating.

How can I even begin to enumerate all the things I wish and hope for him? I don’t think there is enough space in WP for that.

Happy birthday my son! Be all the things you want to be and dream all the dreams you dare to dream.

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• There Was A Boy (summersolsticemusings.wordpress.com)

A quarter Century

My daughter turned 25 today. TWENTY-FIVE!

How did that happen? It feels like yesterday when we celebrated her first birthday.

I decided we should make a big deal out of her first quarter of a century – and because, really, anything is a good excuse for a good party, I declared this past weekend a Nataliapalooza and celebrate we did.

Nataliapalooza Day 1 started on Friday when I woke her up with this card

She said that I had “found the best mother to daughter B-Day card! It’s like you had it made especially for us”.