A Little July 4th Awesomeness...

Summer - Day 4

Summer - Day 4
Originally uploaded by JenJeff

Being at home has really taught me to see the relationship between our kids in a more close manner. Usually when I get home from work they are tired and grouchy.

I can't believe the circus we had today in the Mall. A simple walk in the mall which would normally take about 5 minutes turns into a 2 hour jamboree. We stop at every little ride on toy (which we don't $$ for) and climb over them as if they are a really expensive jungle gym. I thought we were through this stage already!

Sam decided that he wanted to join his sister on this 2 person train contraption (it doesn't look like a train). It is about 2-3 feet off the ground and he decided that he would test my heart's reflexes by fake falling off the edge while laughing as if he didn't notice that his life was in my hands (how naive). Amanda then decided to proceed across the train by scaling the side like she's Marty from "Back To The Future" to join her brother. All of this mayhem and we still manage to make it out of the mall alive!

On to our next adventure!

First Day of Summer

First Day of Summer
Originally uploaded by JenJeff

Mmmm $1.00 breakfast! Well actually more like $21 after all of the upgrades. Not the healthiest breakfast but sure is convenient! Not only do we get fed but we get to spend hundreds of dollars at Ikea!

So the first "official" day of summer for us begins. This is "Dad" reporting. We have an extremely long list of things that need to get done in the house and the summer is already filled with activities (which include 1 week of school where I'm doing some administrative work... at least it will help fund the home reno projects!)

Amanda and Sam seem to be quite a handful these days. Sam's new tooth has caused him to walk around with a portable version of the Niagara falls. It just sits below his chin. I think we'll go shopping for some super absorbent clothes for him later today. Kinda like the ones that that guy in the paper towel commercial. Amanda asks about 1 million questions per minute. I think that we should have a new game show called, "Can You Survive 5 Minutes with a Curious 5 Year Old?" It will be a hit amongst parents. Or not...

Day 1 seems to be going well. Not much is getting accomplished but that is what summer is all about! Enjoy.

10 Month Sam Update

Wow, once again it's been awhile since we've posted! Here's a quick update on Sam as he has just turned 10 months old (ack...where has the time gone?!?).

We posted at 8 months that the big news was mobility...well multiply that by 10! By 9 months Sam was crawling very well and pulling himself up on almost anything (even a flat wall). Now at 10 months he seems very close to walking. He walks very well holding on to only a single finger (even if we're beside him and not behind him), and we can see that he really doesn't need it; it's just a security blanket at this point. He can stand for several seconds not holding on to anything, as long as he doesn't notice he's doing it! As soon as her realizes he's not holding on, he sits down on his bum or grabs onto whatever is in front of him. He can climb stairs - he doesn't do it at our house as the staircase is big, but he loves the small 4-step stairs at Grandma and Grandpa's house.

Some more exciting news...Sam is signing! He has a definite sign for "more" (although it isn't the normal one that we taught him...he's kind of made up his own sign) and he's using it whenever he wants to tell us anything. So we're working on "milk", "diaper change", "food", and "water" (and a few others thrown in as well). Hopefully he will pick up some more signs soon so he can communicate with us even better! But we are thrilled that he's even doing any signs at this point - Amanda didn't start until after her first birthday. Hooray Sam!

Other Sam stuff:

• He loves to wave! And he knows the word, because if we ask him to wave at someone he'll do it even if we don't demonstrate!
  
• He still loves books, and is very good at turning the pages on his own.
  
• He continues to eat well, although all new foods are greeted with an extremely dubious face. But we haven't found anything he absolutely won't eat (knock on wood). He has also finally gotten the hang of finger foods...we started introducing some cheerios and small pieces of cheese, etc. just after 8 months and it's only in the past few weeks that he's really gotten the hang of it. Of course, now he wants to put everything in his mouth, including bits of yuckiness that he finds on the floor. Oh well...comes with the territory!
  
• He is a really happy baby and treats us to random laughter at regular intervals. He has a funny laugh, kind of a barking "ha, ha, ha" noise, and he loves to laugh when others are laughing. Sometimes he makes us feel extra-funny when we tell a joke and laughs at it!
  
• He definitely has a mischievous side. When we put him down he will automatically go for the one thing in the room that he's not supposed to touch. He also loves to crawl up onto the fireplace (strictly forbidden) as soon as I have my back turned, and has come dangerously close to turning off the computer a number of times by pushing that lovely power button on the front!
  
• Despite starting out a lot fairer than Amanda did, he has taken after his Dad and sister in automatically turning 50 shades darker as soon as he gets into sunshine, even with super-powered sunscreen on. Oh well, at least he will hopefully be like Amanda and not burn!

Some photos to share:

Hanging out in his booster seat at 8.5 months:


Total blackmail photo - nice outfit dude!Around 9 months:


9 month photo - 18 lbs, 4 oz and around 27":


A nice family shot on Mother's Day (9.5 months):


Playing with some friends at Babyeats, 9.5 months:


First time at the pool (9.5 months):


Sam signing! 9.5 months:


Getting into mischief, 9.5 months:


Eating cheese and demonstrating his funny laugh, also 9.5 months:


Big boy at 10 months! About 19 lbs, 6 oz and just over 27" long:

Easter Fun

I always have so many great ideas for things to do around Easter time, and somehow it sneaks up on me every year and I'm left scrambling at the last minute (hah...scrambling...Easter eggs...OK I'm pathetic). This year was no different. We did manage to fit in a few fun crafts in the days before Easter, but a lot of things - like dyeing Easter eggs - just didn't happen this year.

Amanda and I did make these super-cute tissue paper chicks:

I got the idea from a website and we modified it a bit...stupid dollar store was completely out of all pipe cleaners except red and black and we could only get small egg-shaped styrofoam balls. It still worked great, though. I was a bit dubious as I wasn't sure the tissue would stick well to the styrofoam, but it did, even as we rotated the balls to cover the whole area. Amanda did hers pretty much on her own, and added a few embellishments as well (hers is on the left) - lovely pom pom belly button, ears, and tail, as well as a crinkled up pipe cleaner "hat".

We also put together these great cards for family to give out at Easter dinner:

The idea for these ones came from here. (As you might have noticed, I mostly steal craft ideas from other people since I'm not great at coming up with them on my own!).

We had a lovely dinner at my mom & dad's place with both sets of parents and my brother, sister-in-law, and nephew (as well as little peanut niece/nephew-to-be!), plus my aunt and cousins. We were also celebrating Mike's birthday at the same time...he was an Easter Sunday baby which means that his birthday often falls right around the holidays, this year on Good Friday. The kids looked adorable in their Easter outfits (courtesy of Grandma):



This meant that we were on our own for Easter dinner, which doesn't happen very often! We picked up some rack of lamb and put together a pretty nice dinner: roasted rack of lamb, oven-roasted tomatoes with a bread crumb, pine nut, and feta topping (I made these up), steamed broccoli with lemon (even though I always forget that lemon juice turns the broccoli kinda brown!), and buttery rice. Yum! It was delicious if I do say!


And for dessert, I was actually organized enough to make something in advance. I always love lemon for Easter, and lemon roll is one of my favourites, so I decided to try the recipe from Best of Bridge. It was fantastic! If you're looking for a super-lemony dessert, this one definitely fits the bill. It was actually better a day or two later once it had sat in the fridge for a bit. I will admit that I didn't use real whipping cream...I'm one of the few people on the planet who doesn't love whipping cream, and after a heavy dinner I figured we could use something a bit lighter (as in sitting in the tummy lighter, not calorie-wise...that was already a lost cause). So I used Dream Whip instead and I thought it was delicious! I also doubled the amount of Dream Whip and used half to mix with the lemon filling and half to ice the outside. Mmmm...I wish there was still some left!



I am far too lazy to type in this long recipe, but I found it online (this site does not credit the recipe, but it's from Best of Bridge, The Best of the Best and More, Volume 1.

And so ends this long Easter post! Belated Happy Easter everyone!