Rebecca and I have been having a wonderful visit to Halifax for nearly two weeks now. We'll be heading home very early in the morning on Saturday morning. I'm a little nervous about getting through customs in Toronto, as we have exactly 1 hour and 12 minutes to pull it off between flights. Of course, we also need to count the walking to the customs area, and walking from there to our next flight, plus getting on and off the planes... so really I think we have more like 20 minutes?!?! Rather nerve wracking, really.
We went to visit some friends in P.E.I. last Thursday, have been to church a couple of times, of course, we took Rebecca to meet an old family friend and her family last Tuesday, Rebecca and I went to visit Madison (2 year old) and Jenn on Monday, and we went to visit the Schelews' (my old employers) last night. I think Rebecca is starting to get "peopled" out, seeing as she's met over a hundred new people since we got here! But, now we have less than two days left here, so she should be happy to see all the familiar faces when we get home!
Rebecca has grown incredibly since we got here. I think she's basically put on about one full pound! She's also developing intellectually very quickly, functioning for all intents and purposes at about an 8 or 9 month level instead of her "almost 6 month" age level. It's quite impressive, really, though it is sometimes becoming hard to entertain her, lol. We're coming home with a TON of stuff for her, both toys, books, and clothing. Mainly clothing though. We were given many things both new and second hand, and one family has decided to start a "baby Rebecca" box for us, since we plan to be up here at least annually, we'll even be able to pick the stuff up each time we're visiting. :-)
Anyway, there's a quick little update, and I'll have some pictures when we get home!
Thursday, April 30, 2009
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
Everything Goes in the Mouth!
Rebecca has recently started putting pretty much everything into her mouth. Paper. Toys. Fingers. Thumbs. You name it, if she can hold it (or even just get her mouth on it), it goes in her mouth. SO, I have some pictures of an entertaning evening we had with her.
Last Monday Justin decided to have a Freezie/Icy Pop/Otto Pop/whateveryoucallit, and he was holding Rebecca. Rebecca was just fascinated by the bright yellow thing hanging out of Daddy's mouth, and thought she should get to share, but try as she might, she couldn't manage to get Daddy to share. So, she gave up on getting some of the good end. Instead, she started playing with the sealed end, and decided to copy Daddy, by putting it into her mouth (no assistance from Mummy or Daddy on any of these pictures)! So, here they are sharing a freezie.
I love her expression in this one!
Rebecca has also started really sucking her thumb recently, and it is rather cute. If she's watching something, it is normally one of her two index fingers that she is chewing on, but if she really wants to suck, she's got her thumb in her mouth.
This is just a random picture I thought I'd throw in. :-)
I believe we are on the last day of cloth diapers before the trip to Halifax. I didn't want to have to panic over getting diapers washed on Friday before we leave here at 7am Saturday morning, so I thought we would wash the diapers and get them all clean and done tomorrow. That will mean an extra three days in disposables (oh horrors...) but it will make my life easier with regard to getting the dirty diapers washed.
I'm also trying to recreate our bedtime routine, because we are failing miserably at having one again. *sigh* Now I'm thinking we're going to try taking a nice walk in the evening, then coming home and reading a story, then having a bath, then eating and going to sleep with some quiet music playing. It seemed to work pretty well last night, except that Rebecca expected Daddy to be here before she went to sleep (this is the one glitch in the plan). I'm kind of dreading that part of her ideal time to go to sleep when we're in Halifax, as she thinks that she has to see Daddy before she sleeps for the night. This could make for some very wakeful nights up there!
And, I need to go so I can get some things done, and check on Rebecca (she was asleep on our bed last I checked, and I don't want her "crawling"/rolling off!!).
Last Monday Justin decided to have a Freezie/Icy Pop/Otto Pop/whateveryoucallit, and he was holding Rebecca. Rebecca was just fascinated by the bright yellow thing hanging out of Daddy's mouth, and thought she should get to share, but try as she might, she couldn't manage to get Daddy to share. So, she gave up on getting some of the good end. Instead, she started playing with the sealed end, and decided to copy Daddy, by putting it into her mouth (no assistance from Mummy or Daddy on any of these pictures)! So, here they are sharing a freezie.
I love her expression in this one!
Rebecca has also started really sucking her thumb recently, and it is rather cute. If she's watching something, it is normally one of her two index fingers that she is chewing on, but if she really wants to suck, she's got her thumb in her mouth.
This is just a random picture I thought I'd throw in. :-)And, a bath time. She is becoming more and more fun at bath times, and on this particular evening (Thursday last week, I believe) Daddy grabbed the camera and Rebecca was having a chat with him about her wonderful bath.
I believe we are on the last day of cloth diapers before the trip to Halifax. I didn't want to have to panic over getting diapers washed on Friday before we leave here at 7am Saturday morning, so I thought we would wash the diapers and get them all clean and done tomorrow. That will mean an extra three days in disposables (oh horrors...) but it will make my life easier with regard to getting the dirty diapers washed.
I'm also trying to recreate our bedtime routine, because we are failing miserably at having one again. *sigh* Now I'm thinking we're going to try taking a nice walk in the evening, then coming home and reading a story, then having a bath, then eating and going to sleep with some quiet music playing. It seemed to work pretty well last night, except that Rebecca expected Daddy to be here before she went to sleep (this is the one glitch in the plan). I'm kind of dreading that part of her ideal time to go to sleep when we're in Halifax, as she thinks that she has to see Daddy before she sleeps for the night. This could make for some very wakeful nights up there!
And, I need to go so I can get some things done, and check on Rebecca (she was asleep on our bed last I checked, and I don't want her "crawling"/rolling off!!).
Sunday, April 12, 2009
A Beautiful Sunday (Easter) Morning
We awoke to a sunny, but a little chilly morning this morning, and after getting ourselves a little more organized, I made some apple-cinnamon muffins to take along with us to the church "pot luck" breakfast. I'll have to work on them, since I didn't find they had enough apple or cinnamon flavour, but hey, they worked.
Here's Rebecca all ready to go to church.
They put a cross outside the church every Easter morning for people to put fresh cut flowers on (it has chicken wire all over it so you can put the stems into the wire).
And, here's Rebecca at the breakfast in her Easter dress.
And again.
This is the first time she has ever sat in a high chair, and she seemed to enjoy it for most of the time. That is the foamy butterfly DeAnna gave her on Wednesday evening last week.
Rebecca is sitting up really well now, as evidenced in this picture! She can't get there on her own, but if you put her down sitting up, she can stay that way. Anyway, she was playing with the dandelions. :)
DeAnna took some pictures of us, here's one that turned out pretty well.
Here's another that turned out pretty well.
It's DeAnna!
And, Pete (DeAnna's fiance) and DeAnna.
This is the first time Pete has ever held Rebecca. He kept claiming that he felt he might break her with her being so small, but we convinced him that she is SO close to 6 months old, that he probably wouldn't do anything to her that could hurt her. :-)
Rebecca just loves anything to do with music. In church today we had piano, organ, and the handbells, and then I guess Pete must have had the guitar in the earlier service, so he was playing it after our later service, and Rebecca was trying to "dance" in her car seat. :-)
Here's Rebecca all ready to go to church.
They put a cross outside the church every Easter morning for people to put fresh cut flowers on (it has chicken wire all over it so you can put the stems into the wire).
And, here's Rebecca at the breakfast in her Easter dress.
And again.
This is the first time she has ever sat in a high chair, and she seemed to enjoy it for most of the time. That is the foamy butterfly DeAnna gave her on Wednesday evening last week.
Rebecca is sitting up really well now, as evidenced in this picture! She can't get there on her own, but if you put her down sitting up, she can stay that way. Anyway, she was playing with the dandelions. :)
DeAnna took some pictures of us, here's one that turned out pretty well.
Here's another that turned out pretty well.
It's DeAnna!
And, Pete (DeAnna's fiance) and DeAnna.
This is the first time Pete has ever held Rebecca. He kept claiming that he felt he might break her with her being so small, but we convinced him that she is SO close to 6 months old, that he probably wouldn't do anything to her that could hurt her. :-)
Rebecca just loves anything to do with music. In church today we had piano, organ, and the handbells, and then I guess Pete must have had the guitar in the earlier service, so he was playing it after our later service, and Rebecca was trying to "dance" in her car seat. :-)Friday, April 10, 2009
Stuff
So, I thought I would give a verbal update on what all is going on around here lately.
I caught a skink. But, I failed to take a picture of it before I let it go again! It was a Southeastern Five-Lined Skink, if you want the "proper" name for it. In other words, it was brown with five pale white/cream stripes running lengthwise down its body.
I'm wanting to figure out where to catch a turtle, but I'm afraid that the only turtles I know how to find are rather large (and impossible to catch). I want a baby one. Just a little thing, perhaps the size of a quarter or half dollar. It is my guess that the baby turtles should be hatching sometime soon... or at least baby turtles should be coming out of hiding by now! But, the best "river" we have immediate to us is the ditch, which for some reason, hasn't even accumulated frogs eggs despite being full for about three months!
Our birds are incubating five eggs, and we anticipate the hatching of those eggs sometime in the next few days... I think. I don't exactly remember when the babies are supposed to hatch. I know they started incubating their five eggs the same day as the robins started incubating their five as well, so seeing as they have the same incubation period, there is potential that they will have hatchlings on the same day! Oh the noise we could encounter!
Rebecca is becoming more and more determined that she should get places, and can now go from a sitting position to a crawling position... but she doesn't get any further than that. She has been trying to maneuver herself into all sorts of places for the last little while, mainly meaning she gets herself off her blanket, or tries to take falls off the bed, or whatever else we may have put her down on at the time. She is in need of constant supervision, essentially.
I picked up some books about caterpillars and butterflies to read to Rebecca, as I figured that even if she isn't really interested in a "theme" per se, I could at least be reading spring/summer themed books to her. There are some really cool ones in our little selection! One of them "The Butterfly Alphabet" is a book of magnified photographs of butterfly's wings, in which there are letters of the alphabet! Of course we have "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" since it is definitely a children's classic... Rebecca thought she ought to eat each page along with the caterpillar (LOL). I also picked up a cute little book called "Arabella Miller and the Tiny Caterpillar" which is basically a rhyme all about the development of a caterpillar into a butterfly. Rebecca liked the pictures, but I find the illustrations to be more abstract than I'm really interested in. I suppose she probably particularly liked the bright colours in bold patterns. And then, we have a couple of other books to read as well. Rebecca really likes to sit and let you read to her, but she will NOT allow it for bed time. Even if she seems to be in a particularly good mood after a bath and having got her sleeper on, she does not have the patience to allow you to read her a bed time story. It's a must that we put her in her sleeper, and immediately feed her and put her to bed. Maybe some day we will accomplish a routine that includes one or two stories before bed time, but right now her routine is just "eat, then sleep". I guess it makes it really easy to get her to go down, and maybe as she gets bigger she'll be more interested in that last little cuddle with Mummy and Daddy before she goes to bed...
I believe Rebecca threw her first real tantrum last night. Deanna gave her a little foamy butterfly decoration to play with on Wednesday night, and for whatever reason Rebecca just loves the thing. I don't know if it is the texture, the flavour, or something else entirely, but she cries when you take it away from her. Anyway, after church last night I put her in her seat, got everything into the car, and then about a minute or two after we were driving away from the church Rebecca started to cry. Not her normal "I'm fussy" cry, but an outright "something is wrong" type of cry. Well, I figured that since she was recently fed, recently changd, and definitely not too hot or too cold, whatever her problem was could wait. I discovered what her problem was when we got home. She had somehow lost the butterfly way down at her feet, and because she was strapped into her seat, she couldn't get it back! She calmed instantly the second I handed that butterfly back to her! So then, after I got her out of her seat at home, she dropped it again, and I failed to give it back to her (she had other things around her to play with), and it took nearly 15 minutes for her to decide that maybe she could play with one of the other toys. Never did I think a five month old would throw a fit like that.
Last night was the church's Maundy Thursday service, and they had the tenebrae service last night as well, so there is no church today (Good Friday). The church is having a pot-luck breakfast/brunch on Sunday morning before the Easter service. I'm not really sure what we're going to take. I'm tempted to take muffins, as the only thing I can think of to take other than that is like a quiche or something, but there were lots of those last year.
I mixed up some sugar cookie dough, and I'm a little concerned as it seems a little crumbly compared to what I had last time, so I'm hoping it will work still. I picked up a pack of six spring time shaped cutters at the dollar store (yes, six for a dollar! I was excited!), so I thought I would make some spring time cookies. Perhaps I'll even put some icing on them, as I'm not really interested in putting decorations on spring cookies. Icing really seems more appropriate. :-)
And, finally, Rebecca and I are going to visit my parents for a couple of weeks from the 18th to the 2nd! I believe that as a lapsit baby, she is permitted to have one carry on piece of luggage, and one checked piece, so that leaves me with the ability to still pack my big case and bring along my purse and camera and not have to worry about not having the diaper bag and a back pack allowed as well. I still need to check on that though.
I caught a skink. But, I failed to take a picture of it before I let it go again! It was a Southeastern Five-Lined Skink, if you want the "proper" name for it. In other words, it was brown with five pale white/cream stripes running lengthwise down its body.
I'm wanting to figure out where to catch a turtle, but I'm afraid that the only turtles I know how to find are rather large (and impossible to catch). I want a baby one. Just a little thing, perhaps the size of a quarter or half dollar. It is my guess that the baby turtles should be hatching sometime soon... or at least baby turtles should be coming out of hiding by now! But, the best "river" we have immediate to us is the ditch, which for some reason, hasn't even accumulated frogs eggs despite being full for about three months!
Our birds are incubating five eggs, and we anticipate the hatching of those eggs sometime in the next few days... I think. I don't exactly remember when the babies are supposed to hatch. I know they started incubating their five eggs the same day as the robins started incubating their five as well, so seeing as they have the same incubation period, there is potential that they will have hatchlings on the same day! Oh the noise we could encounter!
Rebecca is becoming more and more determined that she should get places, and can now go from a sitting position to a crawling position... but she doesn't get any further than that. She has been trying to maneuver herself into all sorts of places for the last little while, mainly meaning she gets herself off her blanket, or tries to take falls off the bed, or whatever else we may have put her down on at the time. She is in need of constant supervision, essentially.
I picked up some books about caterpillars and butterflies to read to Rebecca, as I figured that even if she isn't really interested in a "theme" per se, I could at least be reading spring/summer themed books to her. There are some really cool ones in our little selection! One of them "The Butterfly Alphabet" is a book of magnified photographs of butterfly's wings, in which there are letters of the alphabet! Of course we have "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" since it is definitely a children's classic... Rebecca thought she ought to eat each page along with the caterpillar (LOL). I also picked up a cute little book called "Arabella Miller and the Tiny Caterpillar" which is basically a rhyme all about the development of a caterpillar into a butterfly. Rebecca liked the pictures, but I find the illustrations to be more abstract than I'm really interested in. I suppose she probably particularly liked the bright colours in bold patterns. And then, we have a couple of other books to read as well. Rebecca really likes to sit and let you read to her, but she will NOT allow it for bed time. Even if she seems to be in a particularly good mood after a bath and having got her sleeper on, she does not have the patience to allow you to read her a bed time story. It's a must that we put her in her sleeper, and immediately feed her and put her to bed. Maybe some day we will accomplish a routine that includes one or two stories before bed time, but right now her routine is just "eat, then sleep". I guess it makes it really easy to get her to go down, and maybe as she gets bigger she'll be more interested in that last little cuddle with Mummy and Daddy before she goes to bed...
I believe Rebecca threw her first real tantrum last night. Deanna gave her a little foamy butterfly decoration to play with on Wednesday night, and for whatever reason Rebecca just loves the thing. I don't know if it is the texture, the flavour, or something else entirely, but she cries when you take it away from her. Anyway, after church last night I put her in her seat, got everything into the car, and then about a minute or two after we were driving away from the church Rebecca started to cry. Not her normal "I'm fussy" cry, but an outright "something is wrong" type of cry. Well, I figured that since she was recently fed, recently changd, and definitely not too hot or too cold, whatever her problem was could wait. I discovered what her problem was when we got home. She had somehow lost the butterfly way down at her feet, and because she was strapped into her seat, she couldn't get it back! She calmed instantly the second I handed that butterfly back to her! So then, after I got her out of her seat at home, she dropped it again, and I failed to give it back to her (she had other things around her to play with), and it took nearly 15 minutes for her to decide that maybe she could play with one of the other toys. Never did I think a five month old would throw a fit like that.
Last night was the church's Maundy Thursday service, and they had the tenebrae service last night as well, so there is no church today (Good Friday). The church is having a pot-luck breakfast/brunch on Sunday morning before the Easter service. I'm not really sure what we're going to take. I'm tempted to take muffins, as the only thing I can think of to take other than that is like a quiche or something, but there were lots of those last year.
I mixed up some sugar cookie dough, and I'm a little concerned as it seems a little crumbly compared to what I had last time, so I'm hoping it will work still. I picked up a pack of six spring time shaped cutters at the dollar store (yes, six for a dollar! I was excited!), so I thought I would make some spring time cookies. Perhaps I'll even put some icing on them, as I'm not really interested in putting decorations on spring cookies. Icing really seems more appropriate. :-)
And, finally, Rebecca and I are going to visit my parents for a couple of weeks from the 18th to the 2nd! I believe that as a lapsit baby, she is permitted to have one carry on piece of luggage, and one checked piece, so that leaves me with the ability to still pack my big case and bring along my purse and camera and not have to worry about not having the diaper bag and a back pack allowed as well. I still need to check on that though.
Monday, April 6, 2009
Pictures, and lots of them!
Okay, so I have a ton of pictures on this post... it might take a while to load if you have a slow connection!
This is the knitting group Rebecca and I go to on Tuesday afternoons. We get together in one of the church's fellowship rooms or whatever it is called, sit in a circle, and they talk (I mostly just listen) and Rebecca visits each person around the circle and everyone knits. It's a great way to find out everything happening in the church!
Knitting again.
Our Garden
This is what you see when you look out our front door right now (though those daffodils are starting to die off now).
And this... is a robin's nest! It's in our front porch hangover thingy.
From our front door, looking to the right.
A little closer up.
The robin sitting on the nest!
I thought it quite brave, but on further reflection, perhaps it is a little foolish seeing as it just sat staring at a big black piece of machinery while I took pictures!
Eggs! There are actually five now, but this is from last Monday.
A hyacinth getting ready to bloom.
And in full bloom!
Daffodil
I have no idea what that bug is, but I thought it looked kind of neat.
Pansy! We have purple, bright orange, and the previously posted wine coloured ones in the garden, all in full bloom.
Crocuses.
Daffodils. I think these are particularly pretty with the frilly edges of the centres.
A bit of a view of our garden from the front.
Our house! The driveway happened to be empty since Justin was at work and my car was in getting a bunch of belts and things changed that day, so I took advantage of it and took a picture.
Rebecca Pictures
Hanging out on the front lawn.
Getting ready to go for a walk! She has just recently started riding in the stroller itself without sitting in her car seat, and she just loves watching where we are going.
Looking at all the flowers from our front porch.
Sitting up! Though she does have my legs and feet for support, but she was mostly doing it herself.
Rebecca really loves that frog. Shannon gave it to me a couple of years ago, and for some reason Rebecca thinks it is one of the best stuffed toys to play with. I think it is because it is easy to maneuver, as she also likes that little duck toy in the background there.
Another of Rebecca's new favourites! This is one of the neatest toys I have ever seen. It rattles, spins, flips around, and there are little mirrors all over the interrior!
Sitting up! This and the next two are from yesterday. Our church had an Easter egg hunt for the children, and they insisted that Rebecca was old enough to participate, LOL. She got seven eggs, and enjoys playing with them. I think we're supposed to return them though... so I'll have to do that sometime!
Yes, she's actually on her hands and knees. She's not crawling yet, but she *can* get up on her hands and knees when she wants to. She prefers to push herself forward with her toes and backward with her hands though!!
Tuesday Afternoons
This is the knitting group Rebecca and I go to on Tuesday afternoons. We get together in one of the church's fellowship rooms or whatever it is called, sit in a circle, and they talk (I mostly just listen) and Rebecca visits each person around the circle and everyone knits. It's a great way to find out everything happening in the church!
Knitting again.Our Garden
This is what you see when you look out our front door right now (though those daffodils are starting to die off now).
And this... is a robin's nest! It's in our front porch hangover thingy.
From our front door, looking to the right.
A little closer up.
The robin sitting on the nest!
I thought it quite brave, but on further reflection, perhaps it is a little foolish seeing as it just sat staring at a big black piece of machinery while I took pictures!
Eggs! There are actually five now, but this is from last Monday.
A hyacinth getting ready to bloom.
And in full bloom!
Daffodil
I have no idea what that bug is, but I thought it looked kind of neat.
Pansy! We have purple, bright orange, and the previously posted wine coloured ones in the garden, all in full bloom.
Crocuses.
Daffodils. I think these are particularly pretty with the frilly edges of the centres.
A bit of a view of our garden from the front.
Our house! The driveway happened to be empty since Justin was at work and my car was in getting a bunch of belts and things changed that day, so I took advantage of it and took a picture.Rebecca Pictures
Hanging out on the front lawn.
Getting ready to go for a walk! She has just recently started riding in the stroller itself without sitting in her car seat, and she just loves watching where we are going.
Looking at all the flowers from our front porch.
Sitting up! Though she does have my legs and feet for support, but she was mostly doing it herself.
Rebecca really loves that frog. Shannon gave it to me a couple of years ago, and for some reason Rebecca thinks it is one of the best stuffed toys to play with. I think it is because it is easy to maneuver, as she also likes that little duck toy in the background there.
Another of Rebecca's new favourites! This is one of the neatest toys I have ever seen. It rattles, spins, flips around, and there are little mirrors all over the interrior!
Sitting up! This and the next two are from yesterday. Our church had an Easter egg hunt for the children, and they insisted that Rebecca was old enough to participate, LOL. She got seven eggs, and enjoys playing with them. I think we're supposed to return them though... so I'll have to do that sometime!
Yes, she's actually on her hands and knees. She's not crawling yet, but she *can* get up on her hands and knees when she wants to. She prefers to push herself forward with her toes and backward with her hands though!!
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