Another day, another disaster.

If you come to my house, you'll know that there is no shortage of baby toys here. Simon cringes when he sees what our living room has become. In fact, you can't get to one room to another without stepping over or usually, tripping over something that is large, plastic, squeaks, uses an incessant amount of batteries or is just loud and annoying (but also "educational"!) So you would think that with my large array of toys I would be able to leave Natallie alone long enough to put my contacts in, or put a load of laundry in or if I'm feeling especially optimistic, dare I say unload the dishwasher. Yet it baffles me that when I leave Natallie alone for a second, I know I'm just asking for disaster. When it's quiet, I know something is really wrong.

This morning, in the time it takes me to put Natallie's clothes back in her room, she discovers that Q-tips are not only fun to throw across the bathroom floor but also is fantastic to chew on....

Look Mom! I don't know what these things are but they are fuzzy at the end and fun to chew!

When I leave her in the living room so I can get changed, I come downstairs to find her in the kitchen conducting scientific experiments of how the amplitude of chocolate chips bounce varies depending on how forcefully one throws them across the kitchen floor

Or sometimes Natallie just decides that the entire pantry needs some reorganization and helps me get ahead start, she was probably just trying to organize the cereal alphabetically but soon realized that she doesn't know her alphabets yet. Darn.

 

And today I took Natallie's hint and tried to organize the pantry and I ended up knocking over a box of macaroni which led to extreme excitment for Natallie. My budding scientifist seized the opporunity to see how macaroni bounces on the floor differently than chocolate chips as I frantically tried to pick up all the macaroni on my hands and knees. 

 



And when I'm in a especially positive mood, I attempt to see how many dishes I can put away before Natallie notices that I am having great fun without her and she climbs in the dishwasher and tries to offer her generous assistance.

 Thank you Natallie. Without you, my life would be so uneventful. Thank you so much for keeping things interesting around here.

Hi Goat!

 

Well it's official, Natallie has been babbling for months and months but I think I can reliably say that her first word is "hi!" I was hoping it would be mama. Oh well, I guess that is understandable since she is so, so, so happy when she says "hi" and people respond. Or it doesn't even have to be a person responding to her waving and saying "hi", it could just be a big, fat goat responding to her calls.





Hi Goat!!! I am reeeeeeeeaaaallly excited to see you! Can you tell?

Hi Sheep! I know you're trying to sleep but I can't resist the urge to pull your ears!

Did you see that Mom? The sheep said Hi to me! It did! It did!

 

I tried to get a video clip of Natallie saying hi to me or Simon but she wouldn't do it ....but for Mr. Goat, she was all smiles, waving and said, "hi!" I can't believe Natallie won't say hi to me on camera but she will for the stinking goat....oh well, at least you can see for yourself...

 

Now that she is saying Hi, the race is on to see if she will say Mama or Dada now. I better win.

Gone down south

So here are some things I have concluded from our Seattle trip:

1. The roads in Seattle are strange and confusing

2. Don't rely on the GPS and use some common sense (i.e., even if your TomTom says to go straight and it's a dead end, don't try to plow through the road)

3. A map at 7-11 should not cost $8.00

4. Renting a house is a million times better than staying in a hotel

5. Shopping malls and the Seattle outlet is not stroller friendly (how can I shop if I can't even fit my stroller down the aisles?!)

6. Babies don't really like shopping even if you tell them you are going to buy them cute clothes

7. The Seattle zoo is awesome (the big animals like babies and come right up to the glass, probably because they think Natallie is a good size lunch)

8. Going to the zoo with a 2-for-1 coupon makes it even better (and you can use the $18 you save on an over-priced lunch!)

9. Its unnecessary to buy a baby a toy from the gift store because 5 minutes later, the toy is not new and exciting anymore

10. Going through the border crossing with a cute baby makes the guards ask less questions like "well hi there sweetie, how old are you?!"

11. Stroller-blading is the best way to see a city, get some exercise and fit in baby's nap

12. Travelling in the truck is awesome and the tail gate is the perfect level for changing diapers

13. Always pack waaaaaaaaay more diapers than you think you will need

14. Swim diapers are not meant to be worn for mutiple hours in the car

15. Taking apart a pee-soaked carseat and washing it sucks

16. When ordering at a fast-food place, a small size American drink is actually a large size on a Canadian menu

17. Always pack along extra clothes for yourself on a day trip even if your baby is beyond the newborn spitty phase (unless you enjoy smelling like baby puke the whole day)

18. Roaming charges on your cell phone suck. Walkie talkies are the best invention ever

19. God is so creative and has quite the sense of humour when creating animals (example the black and white colobus looks like a cross between a skunk and a monkey)

20. Going on vacation with friends that have kids the same age is awesome (thanks Sarah & Jordan!)

And now photos from our little road trip...

pretending to ride the mechanical toys at Bellis Fair

example of my point #15 : this is a medium size?!

playing in the fountain is so more fun than shopping at the outlet mall

we went to the zoo with our friends Sarah and Jordan.
They have 2 kids: Corin & Ellie.
Natallie and Ellie are birthday buddies,
born 30 mins apart.

Yay! Finally at the zoo!

ready for Natallie's first time at the zoo

Natallie loved the penguins! They swam right up to her!



Ellie liked the penguins too!

Natallie's eyes were glued on the gorilla

What are you looooookin' at?!

Sarah & Jordan's son, Corin. He thought the gorilla was pretty cool too!

The jaguar must of thought Natallie could of been a tasty lunch and
pounced on the window. It scared me but not Natallie!

Right up close to the jaguar and loving it!

Giraffes were cool but a bit too far away for Natallie to get excited about

Lions (they were a bit far away too, our camera is just zoomed in)

Simon's favourite was the Komodo dragon
...a pretty manly-looking but ugly thing

Corin pretending to be Komodo dragon
(FYI, the one he is sitting on isn't real)

The indonesian tapir, we saw a tapir in wild in Costa Rica
and it was way smaller than this one.

we brought the stroller to the zoo but Simon carried Natallie all day

Grizzly!

the Canadian section of the zoo wasn't quite as exciting for us

we see these at home...although a lot farther away

Simon & Jordan with the kiddies at the end of the trip
(pretty successful outing, I must say!)

Sarah and I with the kiddos (almost everyone looking at the camera!)

Stroller blading around Green Lake in Seattle

Hi Ellie! You are cuuuuute!

Natallie says Hi to Ellie
(not yet learned that it's not necessary to wave right in someone's face)

Natallie sharing her toy elephant that we bought her from the zoo

Stroller-blading to the Sunday Market in Fremont

Don't you want to buy a pulled pork sandwich from a van that looks like this?

on the Burke Gilman trail

Rollerblading to Gas Works Park
(sort of obvious why it's named Gas Works Park)

@ Gas Works Park, not sure what this is but took pictures
Simon said this place would of been his dad's dream and could of spent
all day looking at all the different pipes! (i agree)

@ Gas Works Park
you can see the Space Needle in the distant background

I love you Natallie!

the back of the truck was perfect spot for lunches and changing diapers
(not at the same time)

Mmmmm mango-pineapple smoothie!

You know its a vacation when lunch is ice cream!

Although packing for a 2-nights away had the truck packed full,
it was super fun and so glad we did it!

Shoplifting at age 1?!

Oh no!! We just got back from the grocery store and I realized that Natallie accidentally shoplifted! I gave her 2 cans of tuna to her to play with while I was getting my list done. She was so happy banging the two tins together. I forgot to take them from her at the checkout and now we're home, she is fast asleep....holding the two cans of  stolen tuna.

Should I take them back? It just seems like a lot of work to go back and pay $1.88 each for them. What would you do if your baby shoplifted 2 cans of tuna??

Whistler & Squamish

We decided to take a mini vacation (or as Simon calls it an "appetizer vacation") and drove out to Whistler on Saturday morning. On the sea to sky highway, we spotted our good friends, Kirsty & Mike Stormer and through the wonderful technology of text messages found out they were spending the next several days up at Whistler and they graciously invited us to the place they were renting up at Whistler. I love when spontaneous plans work out so perfectly! We spent the day strolling in the village and took in the CrankWorx mountain biking festival but sadly not too many freebies (all festivals should have free stuff!)

Crankworx competition @ Whistler

trying not the eat eaten by Grizzly bears

fast forward a few years and Natallie will be doing this for real

Natallie's first chocolate chip crumble frappuchino

@ playground in Whistler village

Natallie's signature scrunchy nose of approval

even statues were new and fun things to climb on

Beavertails! (purchased with a 2 for 1 coupon...of course!)

very very excited about the Beavertails!


 BBQ with the Stormers was great. Kirsty's parents were visiting from NZ so it was fantastic to spend the evening with them and be out numbered by Kiwi accents! I wonder if Toby, Kirsty & Mike's son, will have a NZ accent when he grows up. Natallie had a great time stealing his toys, although she did learn to share. There is even video-taped proof of Natallie passing the ball multiple times back to Toby. So cute to see them play together!

By the time we left the Stormer's place it was almost 9:00pm but Natallie was still awake AND happy. Maybe it was the grande chocolate crumbe frappucino, or the Beavertail or the cinnimon buns we had for dessert but she quickly fell asleep in the car on the way back to our hotel in Squamish. I was worried that she wouldn't go back to sleep when we got to the hotel but we quickly set up the travel crib and she seemed so pleased to see her blanky and stuffed animal and went right back to sleep til the morning.

And 7:00am brought about a new day of adventures!! Starting with...

pulling excessive amounts of toilet paper out

shredding and feasting on toilet paper

a short hike around Alice Lake

getting a free ride from Dad

taking in the beauty of the lake



balancing the camera on a tree stump for a family photo

playing with Dad at the beach at Alice Lake

catching bubbles

pretending to have photography skills

soaking up our vitamin D

And then it was time to pack up and start heading back home, but the view on the way back was so nice, we stopped at every single viewpoint and took picturres...

it's so pretty here eh?
this is Porteau Cove ( I think)

got lots more pictures on the way back but Natallie isn't in any
 of the pictures on the way home because ...

she was too busy doing this!
I guess that means she's had a good weekend!