Some tidbits

Everyone else is napping right now so I can jot some things down.

I wanted to put in writing (before I forget) my three favourite things that Leo has been saying over the past couple of months.

My absolute #1 is when Leo is looking for something and can't find it - he says "anywhere". As in: "Leo, where is the guitar?" "Guitaaaarrr. Anywhere!" (in a mega-whiny but super cute voice). This has already been upgraded to "Can't find it anywhere", but when he only said "anywhere", that was the best.

Also, when Leo eventually finds what he was looking for, you get the awesome "[squeal of delight] Right theeeere/heeeeere" (still whiny). It's a wonder we don't set Leo out looking for things all day long. Although it must be said that he is extremely good at finding things in "finding books".

Another popular Leo-ism is when he wants to let you know that he's hungry or wants a bite of what you're eating. He says "I humvee". Or maybe sometimes "I'm humvee". But in either case, he's definitely all about the Hummers.

Leo and Max have both settled into their daily routines now. The three of us (Holly is usually comatose with Henry in the mornings) are getting pretty good at waking, eating, dressing and mobilizing in the mornings in order to drop Leo off at daycare around 8:10 and Max at school for the 8:30 bell. I think we've only been late once in six weeks, which is pretty good for me. The routine will have to tighten up a bit this next week to accommodate my return to work, but I am optimistic things will work out.

Leo is having a great time interacting with the other boys his age and worshipping Max's old daycare mate (a 5 year-old! how cool!) while playing, eating well, making crafts and occasionally visiting the Children's Village playgroup. He has even (finally!) stopped crying upon drop-off, although it was more of a separation thing rather than a hating daycare thing - he would always turn off the waterworks within 5 minutes of my departure.

Max is doing all sorts of things at school. We still get the daily blurbs from his teacher so that helps us engage him on some of the things he's learning. He just went through a week of covering the five senses and now the kids have started a "letter of the week" initiative, where they learn about words starting with the letter of the week and make attempts to write the letter. Max has developed an interest in drawing and writing lately, due to some of the school initiatives and this has been helped along by his LeapFrog learn-to-write-and-draw toy he got at Christmas. It's become a great tool for him.

The wild card for Max is that we never really know what he gets up to at daycare. Every now and then, he'll rattle off a poem or song that we'd never heard before and then nonchalantly mention that he picked that up at daycare. In fact, over the past couple of days, he has come home singing The Lion Sleeps Tonight and has started to teach Leo how to sing it. It's pretty cute.

Anyway, here are some pictures from September:

This is your brain on McDonald's.

Our favourite game: which child is this?

I bet Holly misses this.

Mom and Max, cooking up a storm at the Children's Museum.

Max and a hot dog trying to escape a stalker . . .

Leo at an Ottawa Fat Cats game (Thanks Auntie Melody!)

Some face painting at the Fat Cats game.

Photo evidence of our helicopter ride (A birthday present for Max that Leo and I got to share - Thanks Uncle James!). The take-off spot was the Aviation Museum, one of the boys' favourite spots. A pretty cool way to see the city.

I can't believe I neglected to post these pictures from Max's birthday on the 9th. Here is the birthday boy with some star pancakes.

And here with some lunchtime birthday dessert at Scores.

Max and I went go-karting with Nana after lunch, while Auntie Laramie and Holly spectated. Surprisingly, go-karting is not recommended for pregnant women!

Max and I also played some video games. Nana played her first ever game of air hockey too.

Then we went mini-golfing...

And Max won two free rounds in a game of chance!

I think Max had a good time.

It's official: before Henry popped out, we had actually started working with Leo and the potty. This was his first time in underwear.

Giving thanks

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend here at Casa Stardom so a quick post is in order. The weather was absolutely spectacular all weekend so we took advantage with plenty of adventures.

On Friday night, Max had his first successful sleepover at Nana's. They had smelts (one of Max's new favourite foods) and other treats for dinner and watched a movie. Max slept in until after 8:00 am! We took Leo to Cosmic Adventures for some awesome playtime which he loved. He kept asking where Max was for a while then settled in and enjoyed some time with both of us. Henry obliged as well with lots of quiet and alert time in the ball pit. We had a funny exchange with Leo on the way home from Cosmic. I told Leo that he was one of the loves of my life and then John asked Leo who the love of his life was. His response: "James". Priceless.

On Saturday morning, we had a lovely brunch then set out for Mackenzie King Estate with Auntie Laramie and Uncle James. Going to Mackenzie King on Thanksgiving weekend was a family tradition for my family growing up and Laramie and I had a blast reminiscing about our exploits. We hiked the Waterfall Trail and then had a nice picnic lunch on the grounds. Henry definitely elicited some oohs and aahs! Back in the day, we brought John's mum, brother and sister-in-law here for Thanksgiving when Max was a wee thing. The big boys were so exhausted that they both passed out before we got out of Gatineau Park.








We hosted our third annual family Thanksgiving dinner at our place on Sunday. A few people have remarked that we were crazy to do this with a 13-day old baby but it was great. Everyone pitched in, from stuffing the turkey and prepping side dishes to cooking and doing dishes and bringing pies and wine. In the afternoon, there were games of Settlers and Carcassonne while Auntie Karen and Max had a two-hour walkabout in the neighbourhood after they got slightly lost on the way to the park, and Leo had a three-hour nap. Henry also conked out on Uncle James' chest for a nap.

I probably don't say it enough so I'll say it here again - my family is amazing and super supportive and it was a real pleasure to sit around the table with them to share a delicious meal and celebrate all that we have to be thankful for - new babies, new homes, a medical miracle for a family friend, our health, being together and so much more.

Leo provided us with another priceless moment as everyone was leaving our place after dinner. Laramie and James were heading to Mexico on vacation the next day and we told the boys to say goodbye. James offhandedly mentioned that Leo could come in their suitcase. A minute later, Leo had his Crocs on and was at the door saying "I ready. I ready." It was funny and heart-breaking at the same time. Leo definitely adores his Uncle James. We've been joking that Leo will be more jealous of Laramie and James' baby when he arrives in January than he is of Henry but I don't think we are far off the mark!









On Monday, we headed out to the Agricultural Museum for the morning. The Ag Museum always has wonderful activities on holiday weekends. Max and Leo participated in an apple cider making demonstration and learned about the importance of pollination. Then we met our dear friend Chris and his awesome mum for a dim sum lunch at our favourite place. The boys actually associate Chris with this restaurant because they have gone with him so many times. The boys have been going there with family and friends since they were tiny babies and the staff all know us so it was great to introduce Henry to this tradition. I grew up around the corner from this restaurant and have been going there for almost 30 years so it is pretty amazing that the boys are now "regulars" as well.

More about Henry

Hi there,

So we're two weeks in and still alive. Actually, we definitely measure things in weekends, when we have to switch to a zone defense*. In any case, everyone is still doing well and we've only had to discipline the older boys once each for hitting Henry (their contacts with Henry have been about 1/34 violent so far...not too bad).

Henry is coming along nicely. After a couple of days at the start of DEMANDING BETTER FOOD NOW, like a new hospital patient, Holly's milk came in and he became a lot happier. He is a good eater and, after a snack, routinely spends long blocks of time quiet (or at least hiccupping) with his eyes open. This is something I don't remember the last one doing much early on (what do you call that, black-coloured glasses?). Henry also likes being held by pretty much anybody, as long as he's not hungry.

Sleep-wise, Henry does really well. We've broken the rules a bit by letting him have a couple of extra-long sleeps, but his weight and bodily functions are right on track so we're not too concerned about sacrificing a feeding for more parental functionality. The trouble is coercing Henry to sleep. He doesn't seem that soothable at this point...at least not the rocking/shushing variety. Holly's had some success with this sort of soothing, but after punishing him with a typhoon of breast milk. For me, it's all about walking and wearing (thankfully, the October weather has been more than accommodating!!!). I should have a pedometer.

Given that this is our last go-around with babies, we are breaking our own mould by trying to dress Henry in things other than sleepers as much as possible. You know what, babies look pretty cute in all these baby clothes! I look back at how many pictures we have of Max and Leo in sleeper after sleeper and it's kind of funny.

Here are some more pictures of our cutie-pie:

*Actually, this line (which I've heard from a few people now) got me thinking that with a much larger family, we could use some other defensive alignment analogies from the sporting world. I'd love to say that we'd have to employ the neutral zone trap, the Tampa 2, taxi, 40 minutes of hell, a shallow outfield, or a nickel package. Given a bit more time or energy, I could figure out how those would translate to parenting but for right now, I just think they'd be fun to say.

Max's 4th birthday

Believe it or not, this is our 300th post. Crazy.

At the start of last month, we all threw Max a party for his 4th birthday. This is probably that last awkward year where the list of invitees depends more on who Holly and I know, rather than who Max knows. It will be interesting to see who shows up next time around!

It seems to be the thing to do to theme it up with preschoolers so we decided to go for it this year and give Max a special parrrrrrty. (That's pirate speak for pirate party). We looked online for some ideas and it's MIND-BLOWING the lengths to which some parents go for a four-year-old's party. So we took it down a few notches and planned only two activities (seriously, some parties seemed to have four or five).

We started off at 10:30 in the morning with a craft for the kids - Holly unearthed a pile of her decorating supplies and everybody decorated their own treasure chests. At the end of the party, once all the paint dried, everyone got to stash their loot in the chests.

After the chests were all decorated, all of the kids and parents went outside where Max was presented with a giant treasure map (it was delivered to the mailbox - wink, wink). The map led Max and his fellow marauders to a few different locations around the block where we had stashed some pirate accessories (hats, eye patches andswords), chocolate coins, and a treasure chest filled with jewels at the end.

Once they were all kitted out, the pirates returned to the house for some grub (pizza, and lots of it). A really cool moment kind of happened organically: all of the kids were quietly eating at the table with minimal supervision while the parents got a chance to chat in the next room. It was neat to allow our friends to meet one another while their children took themselves off their parents' hands. Considering the age of the crowd and the energy levels at a birthday party, I was really surprised that this happened.

Finally, before everyone started tucking into their pirate cupcakes, I treated the crowd to the telling of a pirate story, read from a book that Max's Winnipeg Grandma bought for him this past summer. It was a big hit! Max's Auntie Laramie did an awesome job fusing some cupcakes and decorations together to create a pirate ship for Max (including a Twix plank - awesome!).

All in all, it was a great party. Everyone had a lot of fun and it wasn't even that stressful for me (for those of you who don't know me, this really isn't my kind of thing). The only bummer was that the party couldn't line up on International Talk Like a Pirate Day (the 19th of September). A big thank you to Kerry, Laramie, James and Jessa who helped out a lot with the set-up, execution, and clean-up of the party. Laramie and James even came in costume. It definitely wouldn't have gone as smoothly without you guys! Big thanks to Auntie Jan who sent the amazing pirate chest all the way from Victoria, BC. Also, thanks to Henry for deciding to stay inside a little longer to let Max have his special celebration.

Max does kindergarten

I thought I would write a quick post about Max's first few weeks at school. That's right - our first baby is in junior kindergarten.

Max's awesome teacher, Mrs. N, sends us a little email every day to let us know what the kids have been doing in class. Considering that Max lets us know things in dribs and drabs and sometimes weeks after something has happened, this is a GREAT way to get a sense of what he is doing every day. He seems to really like school and is definitely enjoying daycare more as well as he settles into his morning at school-bus-lunch-daycare routine. It is a big relief for us not to have a crying Max on our hands every morning anymore.

Max is in the French immersion program. This entails 20 minutes of French per day. Max does his gym time in French every day and we can already see the results with many French words, phrases and songs being repeated at home. In Senior Kindergarten, the ratio will flip and he will have all day French with 20 minutes of English.

Here is a quick sampling of what Max has been up to in school (thanks, Mrs. N!):

- We started out by playing Alphabet Bingo. This week the focus was Books by Kevin Henkes; We read Chrysanthemum, Birds, Wemberley Worried, and Chester's Way. They especially enjoyed his book Chrysanthemum. Hence, we watched the movie Chrysanthemum.

- We had a fire drill today. We discussed what to do in case of a fire. We went to our school library. Later the children made a self portrait.

- Today the children made a tactile activity using glue and sparkles. Some were also spelling their name using either magnets or sand paper letters.

- Today we made a graph of number of letters in each child's name.

- This week the focus will be the children's names. Today the children were either spelling their names using magnetic letters (using one to one correspondence), Alphabet sand paper rubbing, or printing letters, painting, or working on puzzles.

- We started our morning counting the straws for number of days we've been in school. We played number games. After French we read some nursery rhymes.

- Today the focus was on numbers. We played a game with numbers 1-5 and later we played Bingo numbers 1-20. After going to our school library we read a story about numbers.

- Today we played a Numbers Bingo (1-20). Later we made a class graph to find out how many children take the bus, car, walk or bicycle to school. We learned that most of the children take the bus.

- Today we discussed what is a calendar and what it is used for. We are learning the days of the week. We counted the number of days we've been in school. We're tracking the days using straws.

- Today we made a graph of the number of boys and girls in the class. In the morning class there are 10 girls and 7 boys. In the afternoon class we have 11 girls and 9 boys. We read Chicka Chicka Boom Boom Alphabet book and listened to the song. We had a great day!

- The theme for this week is the five senses. The Big Idea for this theme is to understand that through our five senses we learn about our world.
Today we focused on 'sight'. We played seeing games such as I Spy and guess what's missing! We walked around the classroom with our eyes open and tried to walk with our eyes closed. We compared the two walks, stressing the important role the eyes play in our everyday lives. We talked about things we see outside and discussed what we see with our eyes: colours, shapes, buildings, trees, birds and sky. At the art centre, the children experimented with colours to observe what happens when mixing yellow and red, blue and red, and blue and yellow. At another centre, the children were using magnifying glasses to look at small objects and at the math centre, some of the children were sorting objects by colour or shape. We read Panda Bear, Panda Bear, What Do You See? I Can See by Peter Curry. We had a very busy day!

- Today we talked about our sense of smell and how it helps us decide whether we want something or not. We also discussed how some smells give us important warnings i.e. smoke warning us if something is on fire. We also discussed how our appetite changes when we have a stuffy nose. We made a graph of things we would miss or not miss if we had a cold. We also played a game the children had to guess what they were smelling (lemon, orange, cinnamon). The children painted today and sprinkled cinnamon on their art work. We read Smell it! by Sally Hewitt.

- We talked about our sense of Touch. We felt things that were smooth, bumpy, rough and soft. We made a craft and read a book Touch and Feel by Katie Dicker.

- For the Sense of Taste, during snack time the children described what they were eating and how it tasted. They were using words like sweet, sour, and bland. We read The Big Brag by Dr. Seuss. Everyone finished making their Turkey Craft. We also went to the school library.

Here are a few photos:


Max leaves the nest.

Max and his classmates (the ones in the yellow crowns) line up in the yard to go into his classroom for the first time.