Summer Update

It's 4am and I can't sleep, so I might as well check "finally write another blog entry" off my to do list and post a bunch of pictures I've been holding onto for the last couple of months.

We went to Jasper for Canada day...the weather wasn't fantastic but the boys proved to be excellent little travellers and we made the best of it. We had a picnic beside Lake Annette and Emmett was way too busy throwing rocks in the lake to actually eat!

There's a paved trail around the lake so we were able to take Em and Seth for a little hike after lunch...Emmett walked most of the 2.4 km, which I thought was pretty impressive for someone who's legs are only 10 inches long or so. ;)

A rare shot of James - he's almost always behind the camera!

Then the kids figured, hey we drove 4 hours to get here...let's hang out in the car some more!

Em and daddy by the Jasper bear - it's amazing how much these two look alike, their builds are identical!

One of the stores in town had a bubble machine...he was SO MAD when we had to leave it behind!

Not sure why James took this one, probably because he's pinching himself while sleeping...kids are weird.

I turned 28 on the August long weekend...getting older isn't really as fun when you're closer to 30 than 20! I decided to make my own birthday dinner - I saw these french bread mushroom pizzas on Rachael Ray's show years ago, and they looked SO good, but the ingredients were way too expensive to justify making it for a regular dinner. This year I decided I was finally going to make them...they were really good! I turned it into kind of an italian theme with caprese salad and grilled asparagus.

James cleaned the kitchen after, which was also my present. ;)

Emmett started preschool last week...he was very excited to wear his little backpack and seems to be really enjoying it! Here he is on the first day:

He's having a little trouble adjusting to the structured environment of preschool, but hopefully we'll be able to work with him on that in the coming weeks.

We just got back from Lethbridge this weekend - we visited James' Oma and Opa, and hit the Calgary Zoo on the way down as well. (I don't have pics of this yet, as they're on James' phone) It's funny what is important to little folks...we worked hard to get Emmett to notice all of the exotic animals, but he was more excited by things like the flowers and a bunch of sparrows hanging out in the porcupine enclosure. He did really enjoy the giraffes and the monkeys though.
The boys did very well camping and visiting Oma and Opa...it was a lot of time in small spaces not really designed for children and they handled it quite well. (We were hoping to spend some time outdoors but it was wasp central...I got bit myself under my arm, not fun.) The boys were the hit of the assisted living centre where Oma and Opa live - Seth was in full charm mode and Emmett had a great time running around and saying hi to all the residents. Opa even arranged for Emmett to have yogurt for dessert at dinner time...yogurt is his favorite food and he was SO excited! Now that he's talking more it's so fun to get his "take" on things...we got a lot of "Wow!" and "It's so BEAUTIFUL!" this weekend. (The camper was especially "beautiful" ;))

Sethers sure changed a lot this summer...he's sitting up really well now, and is on the verge of crawling. He's adapted a really cute system to get around - a combination of rolling and hand over hand wriggling that looks like he's swimming! He's babbling constantly and we think he's starting to mimic words - this weekend he was saying "oooooooooopa, oooooooooooooopa" a lot. (Probably because big brother was saying Hey Opa, Hi Opa, Opa up, etc constantly the whole trip)

A few random pics:

This is what happens when you go on a formula bender:

The tiger and the hawaiian tourist:

So that was our summer...it was fun but I'm glad it's over - bring on the colder temperatures please! (Note: I reserve the right to take this back in February!)