I received an email late last night. I read it, watched the video, smiled and then welcomed in the new year in a great frame of mind.
Here is an excerpt from Davids email:
My actress in “Paper Birds” is wearing a vintage jacket from Paris, the skirt used to be a long vintage skirt from a flea market in Los Angeles but was cut to make it mini, the yellow tights were from a department store in Los Angeles, the shoes are from Paris.
The wardrobe was meant to reflect her whimsical and maybe even mythical personality and create a stark contrast with her environment.
The theme of the video is about the inspiration that can be found even in ordinary circumstances and that in giving back / sharing to the world – magic is created. A theme that is appropriate for the holiday season!
Thanks for sharing David.
So here we go. I suggest watching the video first, then reading the text above it to fully understand.
http://bit.ly/7DxnHm
My husband and I have been working overtime setting up my new blog over on wordpress. We’re doing this because of the ongoing issue between IE and blogger. I can tell you that we’re almost there! If all goes well we’ll be launching on New Years Day. If things don’t go quite so well it’ll be within the week. So do stay tuned. I’ve also been busy with the family these past few days. There have been water fights, teething dramas, illnesses, hayfever and movie days. Everywhere else in NZ seems to be getting sun, we’re still battling rain and wind with 2 hours of glorious sunshine here and there.
This is the last week before the Random Act of Kindness Challenge finishes for the year and the winners are announced. Have you done yours? Be sure to let me know where you’ve put your entries so I can read them and put you on the list the appropriate number of times. I love reading what you’ve been up to. I can’t wait to see where the paintings will be headed. Don’t forget that every entrant will also receive two wallpapers of my artwork for their pc. These will be emailed to you at the conclusion of the challenge so make sure you include an email address for me to contact you. If you’ve forgotten to include one don’t worry, just email at chavahkinloch@xtra.co.nz and we’ll sort it out.
Can you believe there’s only one more day left in 2009? Wow. I’m excited, are you?
Here are some snapshots from the past few days of the kids and some of their Christmas gifts.
Davis set up camp.
Riding his new bike.
Testing out her new cupcake maker. Mucky business.
The cupcakes she made for her brothers.
Filling up a water pistol.
Vahnija went and set up her own picnic, complete with strawberries. I love my kiddos.
A bunch of paint we picked up on boxing day for Bostons nursery. You can see pics of what’s going on
here and
here. We’ll be doing more on the nursery this week. Yay!
Lots and lots of fun. Water fights. Need I say more.
The boys prepping.
My little terror. So lovable.
The money shot! lol
How cute are these chubby little feet? The jandals are from my cousins in Utah. I think they’re from Old Navy. They barely fit my gigantor of a baby. This may be the only time he gets to wear them
By now you’ll all be aware of the Random Act of Kindness Challenge and Giveaway that is currently on. I’ve been hearing so many great stories that I thought I may as well share them. Todays story is from Jen.
A total stranger “saved” my husband and two small girls on Sunday when my husband lost the ONLY key to the car while they were up the mountain – it was dark and had started snowing heavily and my husband was scared they were going to freeze to death. This stranger drove them home – more than two hours out of his way. As soon as they arrived home I felt SOOO relieved and wanted to pay him somehow…he wouldn’t accept anything and told my husband to just “pay it forward”. I’m grateful for his generosity and I’m inspired by the other RAOK stories on here!
*Photo sourced from flickr
With your
random act of kindness? Don’t forget, the
challenge and giveaway are still on. There are so many opportunities all around us, so take part. I just wanted to share with you these amazing examples – all by one person! Thank you Lisa for being such an inspiration.
Random Act of Kindness #1: GIVE away all my kids clothes that no longer fit. (1st Dec)
About 6 months ago, I came up with an idea which I shared on a parenting forum that I belong to. The idea was that we (mums of young kiddies) could GIVE AWAY our kids clothing when we no longer need them. With the price of new clothes, and the rate that our kids grow out of them, the idea of good, second hand clothing made sense in our house. Sahara goes through her clothes quickly with her being a busy and very messy girl at kindy, and Preston, well he just seems to grow out of stuff so quickly. ( I used to be a Trademe addict and sell anything and everything on there, but with the hike of their fee’s and the hassle of dealing with stupid questions and delayed payments, and sometimes not making any profit what-so-ever, I just couldn’t be
bothered.)
So….. the idea was to share what we had to get rid of, and if another mum asked if she could have them, there was no money that passed hands (except for postage costs), and no expectation for anything in return, except that when or if that mum was in a similar position to give clothes away, that she would list them on the forum and “pay it forward”. The idea went down really well with a lot of mum’s and hundreds of items of clothing have passed hands since then.
I hadn’t been through my kids clothes for a long time, so this week I sorted through their drawers and sorted about 5 large storage boxes of clothes, and over the past few days have been posting off box after box of clothes all around the country to mum’s for their kids.
It feels really good to know that these parents are saving money, and genuinely appreciate the gesture, some of whom I know aren’t in the position to financially afford to buy new clothes for their kids. One mum told me she is having twins in 2 months time, and with a toddler already she just hadn’t found the time or energy or money to start shopping for clothes for the twins. I don’t envy her waddling around the malls at this time of the year or in this humidity either!
So there it is, my first of many random acts of kindness.
Random Act of Kindness #2: Gave $5 to a little girl fundraising for a walk-a-thon(3rd Dec)
This afternoon I was rushing around trying to get to my parents on time for dinner. I was supposed to take drinks with me, so swung by a dairy on the way to buy something. When I came out of the store there was a little Maori girl, she must have been 8 or 9 years old, standing outside all on her own, asking customers as they came out if they’d sponsor her for her school walk-a-thon, and she had a little clip board for people to fill out. I was in such a rush that I apologized, said no and carried on walking to my car which was parked only a few metres away from her. This is pretty typical for me as 1) I rarely carry loose change, 2) I usually hav
e 2 kids with me and just want to get home and 3) am a bit weary of giving my money to people aka I’m bit of a tight arse hehehe. BUT when I got into my car I saw that I had $5 in gold coins in the centre console, which is very unusual for me. I only had this money because earlier today I had intended to repay a friend who’d bought something for me, but I’d forgotten to give it to her and after I’d texted her telling her I’d forgotten to give it to her, she’d told me to keep it (you know who you are!!). So, I grabbed it, raced back to this little girl, told her I didn’t have time to fill in her form as I was in a rush, but put the money in her hand and gave her a smile and raced back to my car. She looked a bit dumbfounded, as I drove off and gave her a wave. I’m not sure if that $5 will actually make it towards her walk-a-thon fundraising, or if she decided that a t
offee pop and a mars bar from the dairy would be better, but either way, I’m sure she thought $5 was great, and I felt better for giving it to her. Good on her for taking an initiative and fundraising while alot of other kids would be sitting watching tv after school or playing xbox or playstation or something equally as productive.
Random Act of Kindness #3: Donating to Charity (12th Dec)
As most of you know, Donovan and I have our own IT business, Expedite, and we decided a few years ago to make a conscious effort to make a business donation to one worthy cause every year. We were approached by the Radio Network to be sponsors of their annual “Special Children’s Christmas Party” and after hearing what they do, we were more than happy to donate.
The Special Children’s Christmas Party enlists the sponsorship of hundreds of local businesses to provide an incredible christmas party for disabled and disadvantaged children in the community. There are between 1500 and 2300 children who are invited to the party, suffering from one or more
of the following; – life threatening illness, physical and intellectual impairment, domestic violence, or living in underprivileged circumstances. Between 350 – 550 Government organisations, local charities, societies, and special schools / kindergartens in each region are also selected, effectively covering all children facing challenges in life.
This year was our third year in supporting this great idea. The party is held in Auckland at the ASB Showgrounds in Greenlane, so you get an idea of the size of this thing!
Every year the sponsors are invited with their kids to attend the party so they can see first hand where their money has gone. So this morning we toddled along to the event with the kids and got a guided tour around the event. There were hundreds and hundred of kids, some more obviously affected than others, but equally as deserving of the treats that were in store for them. There were bouncy cas
tles, celebs, face painting, free food, free icecreams, animals for the kids to pat, carnival type rides, a live stage with dancers and singers and Santa of course! And the “secret santa cave” where families line up and get taken through a dimly lit “cave” with a big empty bag, and come out the other end with it filled to the brim with gifts. The gifts are all brand new and donated by sponsors or paid for by sponsors, and it was really a sight to see the piles and piles and piles of gifts in there, from soft-toys to games and everything inbetween…it really did look like Santa’s secret cave of presents!
As sponsors we got to go up to the corporate box to get a better view of the event, and our own kids got a soft toy each which was lovely.
Sahara threw a little tantrum while we were there, cause she didn’t want to share her ice cream with her brother, and Donovan and I were verging on the edge of wanting to give her a swift kick up the butt so we decided to leave. She sulked in the car on the drive home before falling asleep. Although she acted like a spoilt little diva, which compared to alot of the kids at the party, she probably is, Donovan and I both agreed that diva or not, that after today we perhaps needed the reminder that we are very fortunate to be blessed with two happy (most of the time) and HEALTHY children.
If you are interested in donating to next years parties (they have parties in various regions all over NZ), please check out their website www.sccpnz.co.nz
(Unlike this little guy!)
About my upcoming ‘new’ blog. I hope you are too! Right now I’m going through the design process, trying to figure out exactly what I want and how to Chavahify it. Yes, I know that’s not a real word.
If you didn’t know, I’m verrrry particular about some things. My towels have to be folded a certain way, my cushions have to be puffed, the books must line up properly, heaven forbid the corners of my rug get kicked up. Well, my new blog is getting this treatment too. I can’t help it. So please forgive me if it takes a while for me to launch it. It’s only taking so long because I’m pouring my soul into it so you can enjoy it as much as I do. I feel the need to perfect it as much as possible before we all move on over. So to my IE using readers, I’m sorry. We’re working overtime to get it done.
Buttttttt like I said. I’m so excited!!!!
