aug, 17th - provence: swan rides....

day 549:

carousel rides seem to be a way of life in France.....i'm so in love with this idea....instead of swings, French children grow up riding on unicorns and tigers (okay, i realise that they also have swings...but you know what i mean)

i love the faded colours, the theatrically strung lights, the worn handle bars.......and the gleeful faces of kids as they come in and out of focus.

this was Limi's first ride (found in Arles)....a swan....next time, the high-stepping lion or horse.... 

one day i'd like a garden big enough for a carousel.

feb, 15th - limi's cloak....

day 374:

my mum, Limi's lola, made this sweet limi-and-the-wolf cloak for her first birthday. i love it (of course i do....it's grey.) Limi can stick her hands through slits in the sides so it also gives me a great excuse to invest in arm warmers.

i love it not only because we selected our own grey wool and fine french-floral lining.....but because it brings back a flood of memories of my sister and i designing outfits and my mum whipping them up on her sewing machine.....always including a last-minute-stitching-dash to finish it and we'd normally be throwing it on second before dashing out the door (sometimes it even included being stitched into the outfit or a metal-detector-buzz of safety pins holding it all together (sorry liz hurley but we did it first...yes, the pins were on the inside....but sometimes they also ended up on the outside))

i can remember from about the age of six, my sister and i picking out our own fabrics and 'designing' outfits....and it hasn't stopped. since my imagination far exceeds my skills, I have to rely on my mum, my sister and my sister's incredible dressmaker in Hong Kong, Mrs Kwok. just see what happens when i try and do it myself - day 258

anyway, i hope that with my mum, my sister and mrs kwok's help.......i can bring the same sense of creativity and individualism to Limi's life......

oct, 10th - swinging time....

day 240:

FIRSTS! who doesn't love the first time that they try something good....or, being with someone else when they try something for the first time....watching their fizz of joy and excitement is even better

when i think of Lissom and all the Firsts that she has in front of her.....first jump on a trampoline, first feel of running, first taste of chocolate, first feel of snow, first read of alice and wonderland.....and if her wonderment over her first balloon is some indication (day 234)....she's going to be bursting out her skin when we take her to her first fair.

so with my mum and stepdad in town, we took her off for her very First Swing....

she didn't quite fit...

and seemed more intent on her toes than swinging.....

but once she'd taken some tips from the 2/3 year old veterans swinging next to her....

there was some sedate serious swinging to be had!

.....you may need to wait awhile for those flying-through-the-air action shots though.