People are Funny

Everywhere we go as a family we get bombarded with people telling us how much Wesley looks like Nick. Even if people don't stop us to talk to us (and it's still surprising to me how many people do that!) we've often heard people talking to each other as we've gone past about the resemblance. It's bizarre.

So when a woman stopped us yesterday in Costco to fuss over the kids we were expecting more of the same. Imagine our surprise when she said to Wesley, "You look just like your Mommy!" I almost laughed in her face. If Nick hadn't been standing right there then maybe I would understand but Nick was pushing the stroller. Then she looked at Darcy and told her that she looks just like Daddy!

I think she might need new glasses.

Growing Up

Two posts in one day. Crazy.

Last Friday we were out doing some errands and I saw a sign up in front of a local church advertising their summer vacation Bible school. It's a big church, pretty close to our house and I thought to myself, "That will be something to keep in mind when Darcy's old enough." Then I looked at the sign again and it was for kids aged 4-11. She's old enough now. The program was set to start today so I needed to make a decision.

It's running from 1-4 every day this week, which will be similar to the schedule Darcy will have once school starts in September. I thought it would be a good practice week for her to see what her days will be like once school starts. It was supposed to be practice for her.

I talked to her about it and she thought it sounded like fun so I signed her up. I talked to her about it all weekend and she got pretty excited. Today came and she couldn't wait to go. So after lunch I loaded her up in the car and off we went. She was already registered so when we got there there was nothing to do. They weren't quite ready to start yet so they had some movies and activities in the lobby for the kids. Darcy gave me a kiss and went and sat in front of one of the movies.

I couldn't leave. I started to wonder, "Will she get to the right places?", "Will she miss me?", "Will she make friends?" She didn't seem big enough to leave there all by herself. She didn't know anyone else there. I decided to stay until they got things started.

After a couple of minutes of watching the movie she looked around and was surprised to see me still standing there. She looked over and said in an incredulous voice, "Mommy, I already gave you a kiss!" I guess I should have no reason to stay after that.

They got things started a few minutes later and I had no choice but to leave. Wesley was at home with Nick and needed to be nursed and there wasn't much Nick could do about that. Then as I was driving away, I started to cry! I couldn't believe it. It surprised even me. I just can't believe my baby girl is big enough for stuff like that and especially for school in the fall.

She had an absolute blast this afternoon and can't wait to go back tomorrow. I think I might need to get Nick to drive her!

Darcy's Latest Escapade

Yesterday at naptime I could hear all kinds of crazy sounds coming from Darcy's room. Finally I went in and asked what was going on. I asked her if she had been jumping on the bed and her response was, "Yes, but it was just by accident." It was all I could do not to burst out laughing in front of her. We had a little chat about how that's not safe and then she said, "I didn't know I couldn't stand on my bed." Yeah, right. I'm supposed to believe that she can remember what shirt she wore the one day she went to day care a year and a half ago but she can't remember the main "big girl bed" rule that is constantly reinforced around here.

I put a little note about it as my status on facebook yesterday which apparently made my father-in-law laugh. I've mentioned before that Papa is Darcy's favourite person in the world. He called us later in the evening to have a laugh about the whole thing and he talked to Darcy about it himself. He asked her about jumping on the bed and why she did it and she said, "It was fun." While she was saying that she looked at me with an incredibly guilty expression on her face.

So apparently she has no trouble lying to Mommy's face but she can't lie t Papa 1000 km away over the phone! If this keeps up Papa may need to move in with us when she's a teenager.

And We're Back

We're back from our mini-vacation to London and we had a wonderful time. I just didn't expect that a vacation of any length would go smoothly with a 4-year old and a 10-month old but it did. Everything was perfect.

We went to Storybook Gardens yesterday. There were animals to see, a ferris wheel, playgrounds, shows and a big splash pad. Darcy loved the ferris wheel the most but enjoyed the whole thing. She had a bit of a scare in the splash pad though. Nick and Wesley had gone for a walk while I took Darcy to the splash pad. It was pretty big and she was running all over the place. There were parents everywhere and I tried to stay close enough so that she could easily see me at any time and so that I could see her more easily (although her blue hat helped with that). At one point she got a little turned around and I was on the opposite side of the pad and she couldn't see me. I could tell that she was starting to cry and get scared that she didn't know where I was. I started running around the edge to get to her but with all the other parents and strollers and all that I couldn't get there as quickly as I wanted or she needed. By the time I got there she was totally freaked out. She wanted to leave the splash pad then so we got her dried off and back into her clothes. She was still pretty scared but another trip to the ferris wheel got that taken care of in a hurry. My only concern with Storybook Gardens is that there was nothing for Wesley to do so he got a little frustrated being stuck in his stroller that long. Nick let him crawl around in the grass while Darcy and I were waiting for the ferris wheel.

We really liked our hotel too. We got a suite for a really reasonable rate which allowed us to get the kids to bed at their normal time and still be able to stay up a while ourselves. Perfect. Darcy loved the hotel pool, Wesley hated it. He screamed the whole time we were down there last night. He may look exactly like his Daddy but he seems to have some of Mommy in him after all!

Wesley has never slept well when he's been anywhere other than at home so that was our big concern last night, but he did great! He slept through the night and only woke up about 15 minutes earlier than usual this morning. We were so pleased.

We had a great breakfast at the hotel and then we were off to the Children's Museum which was fantastic. It was a completely hands-on museum geared to children (as the name suggests) and they both had a blast there. There were lots of places for Wesley to crawl around and climb and he loved every minute of it. Just as we were getting ready to leave there was an announcement that a Canadian Paralympic athlete, David Willsie was going to be speaking to the kids so we went to have a listen. There weren't a lot of kids there so we really got to interact with him and ask a lot of questions. It was very cool. Darcy got to try his rugby wheelchair (it was pretty new and it looked 100 years old because it takes such a beating) and wear his silver medal from the Athens Paralympics. Very cool. He was really interesting to listen to so we're going to have to watch some rugby to see if we can see him.

We brought two very tired kids home today (not to mention their parents!). Wesley perked right up when we got home though and barely stopped giggling until we put him in bed. He clearly recognizes his surroundings and was glad to be home. Darcy cried when we were leaving the museum because she didn't want her "adventure" to be over. I guess life with us isn't exciting enough for her anymore.

I'll have the pictures up on flickr soon!

Thanks for the Memories

When I first found out I was pregnant with Wesley, one of my first thoughts was to despair over the fact that I would be at my most pregnant in the hottest part of the summer. That turned out not to be an issue because one year ago today I was admitted to the hospital and spent the six hottest weeks of the summer in captivity.

Earlier this week my friend had a baby girl and Darcy and I went to the hospital to visit them. While we were there she wanted to visit the atrium, a visiting area we went to nearly every day. It was weird for me to be there again. It seemed like no time had passed. The same books were there and Darcy and I read one together again. At least this time I could walk in the room myself instead of being pushed in wheelchair.

It all seems like a big blur to me now, except for the memory of the best grilled cheese sandwiches I've ever eaten in my life. I still haven't figured out what the secret was but I haven't been able to make one at home that is nearly as good. I'm not interested in going back for a sandwich though.

Stair Master

We're quickly learning that Wesley is going to keep us on our toes. He's a much more active baby than Darcy ever was and much more daring. Darcy is still timid about climbing some things but Wesley seems to have no fear. He wants to climb everything he can get near. I tell you, you can't turn your back on this boy for a second!

The way our basement is set up it is impossible to put a gate on the stairs to prevent him from climbing up. I'm trying whatever I can to keep him from constantly escaping to the stairs. Darcy has an easel set up beside the stairs so I used that for a time to block access to the stairs. It worked for a little while but then he found a way to go over the side and up the stairs. I swear he's part monkey. Instead of blocking it I just spend most of my time following him up the stairs, carrying him back down and starting again. We've got a Little Tikes slide in the back yard and he can now climb it, sit down at the top and get himself down the slide with very little help from anyone else. Darcy wouldn't have tried anything like that at her age.

On a different note, our big vacation for this year is a cruise that Nick and I have booked (sans kids) for the fall to celebrate our 10th anniversary (August 29th). We still wanted to do something interesting this summer so we've agreed to help out at a music camp being run in Quebec the first week of August. That will be fun, but still a lot of work for us so we've decided to take a mini-vacation next week. We don't want to go far so we've settled on London, Ontario. There are two places there I've wanted to check out for a while, The Children's Museum and Storybook Gardens. There's also a water park we've heard about but I don't know if that's what we're looking for. We waiting until we get a bit closer to the date to check out the weather forecast. London doesn't seem like a typical tourist destination but these two places sound pretty cool and I think the kids will really enjoy their time there. There might even be stuff for Wesley to climb on!

Amazing Find

Sometimes you find the greatest things when you're not even looking.

I've always had pretty big problems with getting blisters with new shoes. It seems that no matter what shoes I buy or how much I spend on them, I get blisters. Stef wrote about a similar problem here and the comments there show we're not alone.

It's been a constant frustration for me, but I might have found a solution.

While walking through Shopper's Drug Mart the other night this product just happened to catch my eye. It's a balm that you apply directly to your feet in problem areas before putting on your shoes. It works as a barrier between your foot and the shoe, preventing blisters. I figured it was worth a shot. I tried it with some flip flops that had been giving me trouble and it worked like a miracle. The next day I tried it with some cute little running shoes I had just picked up and was amazed at how well it worked. I'm sold!

You will want to carry it in your purse if you're going to be out for a couple of hours because you might need to reapply. Fortunately the tube is really small so that's easy to do. If you've got sensitive feet, you might want to look this stuff up!

The Favourite

Darcy has always had an amazing bond with her Papa, Nick's dad. It started when they first met when she was 3 weeks old. Grandmaman and Papa had travelled down from Montreal to meet their first grandchild and couldn't wait to see her. Darcy was crying and crying and crying but as soon as Papa picked her up she stopped. He was always able to get her to stop crying. As she got older their bond stretched beyond soothing tears to playing together, reading, shoulder rides and many other fun things. Grandmaman has often felt like she gets snubbed because of Darcy's preference for Papa. She's not alone.

Nick's parents were here last weekend to visit us and my parents are here with us now. On Saturday when we were getting ready for my parents to arrive Darcy announced that she loved my Dad (she calls him Pa) but that Papa is her favourite. I told her she should love them both the same. She said again that Papa is her favourite. She didn't seem to be able to be swayed from this opinion so I told her never to say that around Pa or else she'd hurt his feelings.

On Sunday afternoon my Mom and I were on the couch talking and Darcy was playing with my Dad. Then she turned to me and said, "I didn't hurt his feelings." Dad was laughing like crazy. I asked her what she meant and she said, "I told him that Papa is my favourite and it didn't hurt his feelings." Dad said he's going to cry all the way home.

Of course when we walked down by the river last night she wouldn't leave Pa's side!