FINALLY!!

A new post - YAY! - :D



We've had a fairly mellow week this week readjusting to life apart from grandparents and family members close by.



Myra continues to love pulling things off shelves and surfaces. Here she is having fun with some new frigde magnets I found for her at the Farmer's Market...



Anyway... I was actually feeling overwhelmed with the amount of stuff I wanted to post so I decided to post 5 separate shorter posts instead of having an uber long one. So make sure you scroll down and check out the cute pictures and videos!

Easter Sunday Plethora of Pictures

Looking so adorable with her rosy cheeks :D







Hunting for Easter eggs :D



Tim placed these plastic eggs strategically around the lawn outside our apartment for Myra to find. Turns out she was more interested in walking and touching the trees than actually picking up the eggs - ha ha :D





Photo Shoot....







Supper time inside...



Using Grandpa's leg as a stepping stool :-)



Giggles!

Walking

Myra worked very hard all week last week to perfect her walking skills. Every evening (often between 8:30 pm and 11:30 pm), no matter how tired she was, Myra would walk and walk and walk and walk. The first few nights she would alternate walking with face planting onto our floor. Needless to say, after many falls and a bloody mouth incident, she quickly learned to put her arms out in front of her to break her fall. :-)

Here is a video I took about 2 weeks ago of Myra walking with her push-toy.


She is able to walk unassisted now for the most part but still chooses to hold onto furniture or our hands if she can. I've been having fun the past few days going for walks with her outside and being able to walk beside her, holding her hand, instead of behind her. :D

Early Birthday Fun

My parents arrived on the Wednesday before Easter - YAY! Sandy and Rob invited us for dinner on Friday and we spontaneously decided to have a little early birthday party for Myra.

My dad and I have both been waiting eagerly for the opportunity for him to take Myra out for ice cream. Since Myra is still a little young for that, Rosanna and I found a way to make some ice cream with breast milk and offered that to Myra as her birthday treat. :D



She actually did like it, though you wouldn't be able to tell from her facial expressions...



Opening presents...







Modelling a new outfit and looking silly :D





Myra had her first exposure to stairs at Rob and Sandy's house and after Tim showed/helped her crawl up them once - she mastered them and crawled up the stairs over and over again until we were ready to go home.

Auntie Rosanna came for a visit the week before Easter. YAY! Auntie Rosanna!!



We headed off to Grand Rapids, Michigan on Sunday to attend a service at Mars Hill - the church where Rob Bell teaches at. (Rob Bell is the guy who does the "NOOMA" videos if you're familiar with them.) Anyways... we took advantage of a sunny day and stopped at Lake Michigan before continuing on to the church.



The sunshine was deceiving - it was actually super cold and windy. We barely lasted about 5 minutes before running back to the warmth of the car. The white you see in this next picture is ice.







Well...that sums up our adventures of the past 2 weeks :D Wishing you a wonderful sleep tonight since it's already 1:30 am here and a peace-filled Sunday. Until next time....

SOOO BIG! :D

First things first! THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU! to all you Emmanuel-ites who contributed so many goodies into a care package for us. :D It was an unexpected, welcome and yummy surprise ...mmm....chocolate :D






Now onto the most adorable member of the family.... :D

Myra has been busy playing and growing. I was able to have her weighed last week and she currently weighs 19 lbs 13 oz and is 29 inches long.

Her new favourite activity is to pull her books off the shelf and then drop them onto the floor beside her. As soon as I put the books back and sometimes even before I finish - she makes a bee-line to the shelf to drop them all over again.



The three top teeth that she's been working on these past weeks have yet to break through - yay! for medicine and spoons and nice cold carrot sticks to soothe aching gums.







A few times in the past weeks I have intended to change Myra's diaper after a nap or stretch of sleep during the night and have found her diaper completely dry. So...I decided to introduce her to the 'potty'. Here she is sitting on it for the first time. I made a big deal of it and kept saying "YAY!!". Now, I put her on it after each nap and in the morning when she first wakes up and Myra promptly starts clapping and saying "yay". :D She actually does pee in it about 80% of the time that I put her on so that's kind of fun. :)



"Peek-a-boo!"



Anyways...thought you would enjoy some cute videos that I shot today. :D


Taking some first steps! :D (sorry about the camera being turned - I keep forgetting that when I do that I'll have to watch it sideways)



So big!! :D

Five Boys in the City...

On Sunday, March 2, 2008 - Five boys set out on a trek to the 3rd largest city in North America - that's right, Chicago! The purpose of the journey was to attend the Canucks/Blackhawks game at United Center. We had the pleasure of making good use of the public transit system. Taking the train in, and then busing around the city. As you can see by the first pictures here, we are very excitedly riding the bus, and proudly, yet carefully, holding our tickets as we bused our way out to United Center. We're also smiling cause we just ate pizza in Chicago - and yes - it does taste better in Chicago :-)


"he who chose not to be named" happily holding his ticket. Incidentally, he was also the only Chicago fan of our group.



Brandon "Butter", Craig, and Matt. Brandon and Matt were the purest Canuck fans, Craig and I were the purest Canadians


One of the rare times another nations flag is on prominent display here in the US, so I had to document the moment. Craig and I proudly sang the anthem, even though neither of us have a strong history of patriotism. Something about being away from your home land...


5 boys in the city - at the hockey game - yay! we had really good seats!


At this point in the game the Canucks looked strong - of course, this is the opening face off, and if you saw the game, you know it was all down hill from here :-( We got to cheer for one goal though. It feels awesome to be one of a handful of people cheering for the visiting team. On the other hand, it feels pretty pathetic when you have to sit there while the rest of the arena roars with cheers when the home team scores. We had more opportunities to feel pathetic than we did to feel awesome :-P Except for "he who chose not to be named" - he was flying high.


We hung out in Millennium Park after the game. Is this Craig's favourite building, or did I tell him to stand like that? I'll let you decide...


There's a fancy skating rink here. Notice the big bean up there...


If you look closely, you will notice this picture is the reflection of us standing in front of the bean. It's a cool bean! Yup - 5 boys in the city, hanging out in front of a big reflective bean. I think broadway may make a musical of our adventure...


Anyway, here's a nice reflection of the cityscape at sunset reflecting in the giant bean. kinda cool.
After this we ate at Subway in the Subway, yeah that's right, you read correctly - how appropriate is that?! :-) and then we rode the train back home. It was quite the day; adventure, joy, sadness, and a big reflective bean. Five boys in the city really couldn't have asked for any more.
lol :-)