rain – Chasing Dreams

One year and one month

November 24, 2013May 13, 2019 Rhiza3 Comments

How do you blog about your baby’s first birthday? I totally missed doing that, and it’s weird because I was so sure that I was not going to miss out on blogging about that milestone.

I was going to write an open letter to Dawn and Rain. I’d tell them how much they’ve changed our lives and how thankful we are to God for this beautiful first year. I was going to post lots of photographs from their birthday party, which would be beautifully styled and DIY-ed like the ones you see on Pinterest.

But then their first birthday party happened, and all I could think about doing after weeks of preparations was to lie down in bed the whole day with the twins and their Daddy, and laugh at how silly these two are becoming. Which was pretty much what happened.

And then the following days turned to weeks, and the weeks turned to a month,

and here we are.

The open love letter I imagined myself writing became a short cover photo caption posted on Facebook, which simply said

Dear Dawn & Rain,

You probably didn’t care so much, blowing your first birthday cake. But for me and your Daddy, it was a beautiful moment, a milestone, we’ll remember forever. Thank you for giving us reasons to celebrate life everyday.

Love, Mommy

I meant it with all my heart, no doubt about it, but it was about a thousand words short of how I imagined their first birthday love letter should be, and what I really wanted to say.

And these photographs, haha.

When we had Isaac‘s first birthday party, there was not a single photograph of him smiling. I thought to myself, when I have babies, I would make sure they were smiling on their first birthday photos.

I guess even that is beyond my control.

Life is just too big for words

The truth is, I stare at blank spaces a lot these days. Blank WordPress screen, blank Facebook status field, blank pages of my journal. All waiting for me to pour my heart out.

Time is flying swiftly and most of my reflections these days remain in my head (and my heart), unwritten. Dawn & Rain are growing too fast, and I’m sometimes scared of missing out on that. As much as I want to capture every moment so that someday I can relieve them, God is teaching me every day to live each moment as they come, and then let them go.

Lara Casey blogged about this so eloquently, and for lack of better words, I quote (emphases mine):

As a creative, I am compelled to create because I want to mirror back to the world God’s goodness. I want to create with every fiber of my being. I try so hard. I try to share and create what I think will help. I try to share what I hope will inspire Grace one day to know and love Him. I try, but sometimes I get really tired trying to pour the ocean of life into a little cup. Most of my favorite moments don’t get photographed because I’m completely immersed in them. And sometimes life is just too big for words.

Well there you go. I bold-faced phrases for emphasis, and then underlined some words in those phrases for even more emphasis. I laugh at myself for being such a weirdo sometimes. On a serious note, that’s how much her words resonate with how I feel and what I really want to do around here.

Go ahead, read the whole thing.

Today marks Dawn & Rain’s 13th month. Oh wow, I’ve been a Mommy for 13 months!

And like a broken record I would say it over again, it still often feels like I’m living in a dream.

Happy 13 months, my loves.

Starbucks Double Date

November 11, 2013November 13, 2013 Rhiza2 Comments

It’s November and the Christmas drinks at Starbucks are here. So on Saturday morning, I convinced my husband to go to the nearest Starbucks with me so that I could get my Toffee Nut fix.

But his idea was even more ~~crazy~~ brilliant: Take the twins with us and have a little family date. And so we did, and what I got was more than just a satisfied craving.

Going to Starbucks has always meant for me either one of these two things: (1) to meet friends for some catching up, or (2) to have some alone time with my laptop, my earphones, and my thoughts. Bringing along two giddy little girls is surely a deviation from my usual Starbucks “dates”.

Instead of having a meaningful conversation, my husband and I had our hands full—holding the babies close, feeding them, entertaining them, singing songs to them, and making sure they didn’t fall off the couch.

But in the midst of the riot, I found myself pausing for one moment and holding back tears of joy.

It was my Dad’s birthday that day.

He would have been 64, and I still often find myself wishing that he’s around to spoil his grandchildren rotten, watch them grow, and steal them from us every now and then so that the parents can go away for a date haha.

But even if there’s a little bit of sadness in that thought, mostly there was joy knowing that a part of my Dad lives on.

So we placed a little candle on our Banoffee Pie to remember the life of the Great Lolo Bob who still never fails to inspire us even until now, 6 years after he’s gone to be with the Lord.

Happy birthday, Dad. Happy birthday, Lolo. We love you.

I praise God for moments like this.

In fact, I look forward to moments like this. Afternoons when we can just slow down and breathe in this new life that we have as a family. Times when we can bring them along wherever we go (while they still have no choice!), take them to places we love, and make some happy core memories.

And okay, maybe I’m a little too excited about making memories. They just turned one year old and surely they won’t have a recollection of this day just yet.

But someday.. someday, they’ll start to remember.

In the meantime, I’ll keep taking photographs and writing memories down.

5/52: Just another happy Saturday

March 25, 2013July 21, 2020 Rhiza2 Comments

I feel the need to remind you (whoever you are reading this) that my twins are girls. Haha. Sometimes they look like boys. They just grow so fast, you know? Except their hair, but that’s okay. It only makes them fashionably bald babies.

OAN, you know what I really wish I could have right now? A camera attached to my eyes. D&R are smiling and chuckling a lot these days, but they get distracted whenever we start pointing the camera to their faces. So most of their photographs are like, them curiously staring at the light coming from the camera flash and wondering what’s going on. (Still cute, though!) Sometimes I wish I could record on video every babytalk and every single smile they make!

This would have been a great time for Google glass to go mainstream, what’s taking it soo long? (Not that I can afford the Glass.)

In the meantime, I’m taking ridiculous amounts of photographs, and flooding my blog and Facebook pages with them. I want to be able to remember this time of their life always.

See outtakes here.

5/52, A Year of Dawn & Rain | March 24-30
Portraits of my children, once a week, every week in 2013

4/52: Sunday best

March 24, 2013July 21, 2020 RhizaLeave a comment

Sundays are for going to church and getting your Sunday best on—as little kids, that’s what my sibs and I have grown accustomed to. Of course as we grew older, Sundays became more than just physically dressing up. More importantly, it’s about getting the heart, mind, body and soul ready for what the Lord has to say in this special day of the week.

But as for the dressing up, it’s never too early to start training the twins, eh? :)

It’s like playing with two life-size dolls. Dressing up a baby girl is fun as it is, imagine how much more when you’re dressing up twins—mix-and-matching their dresses so that they would complement each other’s outfits, if not wear exactly the same dress.

These photographs were from last Sunday. Can you tell that their Mommy enjoys dressing them up more than they do? ;)

4/52, A Year of Dawn & Rain | March 17-23
Portraits of my children, once a week, every week in 2013

3/52: Fairies are real

March 22, 2013July 21, 2020 RhizaLeave a comment

..they come into your life, make some magic, and you’re never the same. Such is what happened to me when these two little fairies graced my life with their existence.

As usual, I couldn’t pick just one portrait each. So here’s another set:

These were taken a few days after their Dedication Day. Since I didn’t get to take portraits of them on the day itself, I made them wear these fluffy little dresses again at home, just for photo op. (Thank you Lola Amy for these pretty dresses!) However, it looks like it’s the last time they’re ever going to wear these dresses again. They grow soooo fast!

In fact, Dawn’s dress was a little too small for her already at the time I took these photos—notice in the last picture how I couldn’t zip up the back of her dress anymore? To think it fit her just a few days before! Which explains why she was a little uncomfortable and not in the mood to flash her sunshiney smile here. But yeah, still cute! :P

Rain, who’s a little smaller than Dawn, still fit in the dress perfectly that afternoon and was in the mood to play princess! Dawn started off as the twin who’s more playful and cheerful, but Rain has been showing us a lot of smiles and chuckles lately as well. She’s catching up! :)

I love these two girls to bits! (And I know you’re loving them too!)

3/52, A Year of Dawn & Rain | March 10-16
Portraits of my children, once a week, every week in 2013

2/52: My little darlings

March 4, 2013July 21, 2020 Rhiza1 Comment

Dawn & Rain may have shared almost everything (one womb, one crib, same clothes), but they’re different in so many ways! We’re seeing more smiles now and different personalities. Dawn is the more sociable twin, she smiles so much she drives me crazy. Rain is a little more reserved, but when you finally get her to smile (after she had her milk, or her bath), ohh does she smile so beautifully. We love them to bits, for everything they both are.

Everyone keeps saying that Dawn is a little version of her Dad, and Rain, me. It’s like seeing ourselves when we were babies, I sometimes wonder if our parents were so smitten with us the way we are with these two. :)

See outtakes here.

2/52, A Year of Dawn & Rain | March 3-9
Portraits of my children, once a week, every week in 2013