BYU vs SUVA

Last night we went to watch the visiting BYU soccer team play against our Suva provincial side. It was a fun night out for us. The team had previously played against the champions Vodafone Ba team in the west and lost, then they played against the Vodafone Labasa team (league champions) and won 2-0.
Last night they were again faced with defeat 3-2, but it was a fantastic game, and hats off the the visiting team that managed to keep their cool despite the rough playing from the Suva side and the on-off rain.
Sorry no pictures of the players, just us at the games!. Mind you the stadium is right next to the ocean and it does get quite chilly, so we have to dress up......that means jackets and beanies.....but good ol flip flops on our feet.

fun in the yard

Noesheen just loves running around in the yard. She will find any excuse to go outside and talk to the bushes! Here are a few pictures of her running around in the yard looking like a real 'bush bunny'.

Sunny Sunday

After almost a whole week of weird weather we had a beautiful sunny sunday, which was nice and warm but not too hot. After church my Noesheen could not resist running in the yard. Then insisted of having her lamb and garlic bread lunch outside on the porch. Which of course meant that i could not resist pulling out the handy dandy little camera for some pictures. It was a busy Sunday as we went to visit my grandmother who lives several streets down from us and my mom's cousin who lives several streets up from us. Sheen really did enjoy being the center of attention at my grandmothers where the house is full of great-grand ma and pa, grand aunties and uncles and other relatives. It usually takes me a lot of time to get her to calm down again when we get home after one of those visits, but my grand parents love having her around so thats fun. Infact she is one of 12 great-grandchildren my grandparents have, but by far she is the most animated one.
Then at my uncles place she got to mingle with aunties who were just a few years older than she was...and that is always fun for her. All in all it was a great sunday for catching up will relatives I don't get to see a whole lot of because of work.

Pippi long legs

Noesheen recieved a care package from Nadim not too long ago....and you could tell he shopped all by himself, (no skirts or dresses) the package had two pairs of pajammies, three pairs of jeans (thank goodness at least two were girlie colors of pink, violet ) two cute teeshirts, two pairs of track pants (in lavender and sky blue) and this funny yet very cute pair of leggings...tights...whatever you want to call them, i call it the Pippi-long- stockings pants

(if you recall the popular movie of that red haired girl with funky stockings and a talking horse how does the theme song go...."pippi long stockings is coming into your world that freckled faced red head girl you ought to know"....i forget the rest)

Point to note here is that i did not dress Noesheen to be a pippi-long-legs this day..... NOPE! cant take credit for that, after getting up one Sat morning, i sent her to change out of her jammies, she dissappeared into her bedroom to dress herself and emerged like this......i could not help laughing to myself for her choice of colors and her outfit.

She ignored me and started doing her chores (or so she says) of putting up the curtains and picking up her toys.

Custard Days and Laundry Dreams

Noesheen absolutely loves custard, warm or cold....she loves it. Needless to say we have custard a few times a week as dessert. So after making it one night, giving hers in a bowl and finishing off the dishes, i come into the living room to find my daughter, very nicely...sitting in my laundry basket, eating her custard, watching Nick!! As if it was the most normal thing in the world to do. I couldn't resist.

Mind you this is not the first time my little angel has found other uses for the laundry basket, it becomes a car, a spaceship, a stage for a concert...you name it. I encourage her, its a door into her imagination and i feel like she really needs to develop that....that is the artsy-ness coming out of me!

These days.....

Well since Nadim has been gone (to those of you that weren't tuned in to SIMI's BRAIN WAVES he is in New Zealand) i have been trying alittle (emphasis on a little) harder to take more pictures of Noesheen than usual. Suddenly i feel like one of the recording angels in heaven, and believe you me, its not an easy job, especially if you are a recording angel for a 3 and half year old little "big" girl. They get up to soooo much, every waking moment is an adventure...oh and some sleeping ones too!

First, there is her fetish for the puppies downstairs (aka my landlady's doggies dogs), every time Noesh is missing, i know she has made the great escape to play with the pups downstairs. And since i dont have have a camera permanently attached to my forearm, i dont have as many pictures of this as I would have liked to.

Then the there was the sunday after church, I came into her room to call her for lunch to discover Madam teaching her primary class, which existed of a handful of stuffed animals seated in row on her bed. I had to pull the camera out and observe all her facial expressions... these pictures make me truly wonder what career she will pursue when she gets older (that is not coming for another few eons, because with that i have to shudder to think of noesh all grown up...that makes me OLD and wrinkly!!! yup we will just defer that as much as we can)

Then there was the time I asked her (ever so nicely like i always do) to do a chore, i was met with silence and when i went to search for Noesh, she was absorbed in her cartoon...i am pretty sure it was "spongebox" (as she likes to call it). but the expression betrays..she looks like she is watching court dealings in progress.

So whether it is playing dress up, or thinking strategically or learning to say prayers all on her own (that has been quite the experience of broken english and hindi but i am sure Heavenly Father loved, appreciate and smiled even giggled on more than one occassion during her prayers), i feel so blessed to be able to watch this child grow...and grow along side her. What a joy motherhood is!

This Long Weekend.....

There is a little known fact about Fiji and the people who live here..besides been warm and friendly and extremely well tanned! heehee there is something else about us...WE LOVE PUBLIC HOLIDAYS! yes so much so that we have 13 or 14 public holidays every year! Take for instance this month, after a long drought of public hols since Jan we have the month off! Well almost! This month we have a total of four hols. This Monday we got off for Prophet Mohammed's birthday (Muslim leader) and this Friday we get off for Good Friday!

Public Hols are not days to laze away under a shady mango tree....no way, these days bring us together, take us to the beach and unites us with our greatest passion.....FEASTING! Thats right, garanteed this weekend there will be smoke rising from many a backyard as ground ovens are prepared for the lovo feast. Hours later the mouth watering aroma of cooked taro, fish, chicken, lamb shanks and palusami (taro leaves cooked in coconut milk with the option of a corned beef/mutton center) intoxicates the air.

Alot of work goes into the preparing of the LOVO (also called imu, umu in other parts of the Pacific). We are actually lucky at home coz our lovo pit is usable all year round.

In the old days (like when I was like knee high) all the food was delicately wrapped in coconut or banana leaves, but these days we use alumi foil....thats another thing, I don't think there are any other group of people who use alumi foil as much as the pacific islanders do. We are ever so gratefully (fully) to the inventor of that handy piece of item.

After the food is marinated, and wrapped, it is placed in the hot ground oven and covered. Three hours later.....Voila! A handsome feast!

Well that's what we will be doing this weekend! And when we are not feasting? well we will be at Church observing Easter, thats another thing we are passionate about....Jesus Christ.

P.S We get Monday off too.