Wednesday, August 29, 2007

Long Overdue Pictures

Some pictures taken over the last couple of months... life has kept us from getting them up before today. Enjoy!

Sophia giving loves to her birthday bear. We had Jennifer Eastwood create this special bear for Sophia's first birthday! Can you see the joy? Thanks Jennifer!



We thought we would start Sophia thinking about career options early. Here she is practicing for her future as Chairperson of Iron Chef Canada!

Sophia's first split lip. She has since gone on to split the place between the upper lip and gum, but this was the first mouth injury. All teeth still intact, just a lot of blood. Basically, more traumatic for the parents than the child.

Tricia's cousins Cheryl and Stan, who actually live in Hawaii, sent Sophia her very own Hawaiian dresses. Here she is modelling her blue one. They are absolute beautiful on her and big enough that she might be able to wear them next summer. Here's hoping.


Hawaiian girl at play.


Random pics taken as Sophia was motoring around the house.

Training for Muscle Man Canada. Starting small of course. Gotta work up to pulling Semis.

A new game at dinner is bite and bounce the spoon. Here is the during picture.

And this is the after...yes, there is yoghurt up her nose! Nice, eh?




Sophia knows that shirts come off. She also knows that they come off over her head. What she can't figure out is how to do it herself. Why she tries it out at dinner is beyond me.

Sophia is learning to eat with a fork. She started this at the cottage. Generally speaking, she'll eat more of what's infront of her if it is offered on a fork, either speared by an adult or herself. She's getting quite good, actually!

Last Bits of the Cottage

It's been hard returning to "real" life, but we are doing the best we can. Grandma Gladys is here with us right now, as David is in Copenhagen, of all places. So we have another week with more grandparent adoration. I could get used to having other adults around helping with childcare. I guess I shouldn't get too comfortable.

Anyway, we returned safe and sound from the cottage. We very much enjoyed our time away. The cottage is a place of wonder, especially for a one year old. She learned so very much while there. Seagulls were her favorite thing to laugh at as the flew over head or bobbed in the water. Sophia waved at every boat that went by. And she was the only person to brave the water temperature almost everyday. It was a joy and we look forward to many more cottage summer vacations!

Here are some last pictorial bits:

Hanging out on the beach with Grandpa! It's a hard life, eh?

Grandpa Arthur decided that Sophia's boating education needed to start this summer...David and I were in Kenora when this lesson took place.


Mommy and Sophie having some beach time of their own.

One of the best napping nooks at the cottage.

Yummy. tasty bark. Fiber, right?

"I wonder...."


"I...am...gonna...get...this...hat...off"


Grandpa Arthur taught Sophia how to unload the dishwasher. They did this together every morning. Now she really helps out instead of just messing around.


A couple of garden portraits I took. She loves being outside, picking stones and enjoying nature. If you want to see more, I have an album on my facebook page.

Thursday, August 16, 2007

Cottage -Week 2

I am beginning to realize that the clock is ticking, marking the days until our return to real life. Getting Sophia readjusted to life without the lake is going to be a pain! Oh well, might as well put that thought out of my mind until I actually have to deal with it! Denial, denial, denial.

The last week has been great. The weather has ranged from absolutely fabulous to miserable. At least we commented that it felt like autumn was making it's presence felt. Yikes. Seasons swing quickly in this neck of the woods.

Sophia has been happily exploring every inch of the cottage and as much of the
grounds as we will let her. She has moved from timidly walking on the grass and rocky terrain while grasping the nearest adult digit, to confidently striding along the shore line all by herself. She practically runs while she is in the house! And her favorite way to do this is without any clothes on. Seems to be we have a streaker in the making.

One morning, Sophia was exploring the bedroom while I was catching up on Facebook and Reginamoms . As I was typing I heard a wee whine and a little grunting coming from behind me. As I turned to find out what the trouble was I spotted a little pjyama-ed bum sticking out from under the bed. Turns out Sophia wanted the floating thing that was under there.

I just gotta... damn I'm stuck.

just checking out the world from under the bed.

Sophia has figured her grandma out. Every time Diane puts her shoes on, Sophia runs straight to her and puts her arms out to be picked up. This is what goes through Sophia's mind: "This is the lady who will take me to the water. It doesn't matter what else she was planning to do, now she is going outside." Usually this works. Which is great because Sophia LOVES the water and the beach. She wanders into the water fully clothed when she gets the chance. Often she is in the water, even when the adults don't want to be because it's "cold". :)

Anyway, Sophia has spent a lot of time soaking up the sun and splashing in the water...
Look at me!

Splashing with Grandma Gerhard



Oh look, a Seagull! Sophia loves the seagulls around the cottage. She laughs and laughs as they fly by or as they float in the water.

Haley only swims when she thinks we are going to leave her behind! Otherwise, she stays as far from the water as possible, but not out of eye site of her family.

We had a beautiful, calm day so we packed up a picnic lunch and loaded up the boat (AKA Ed) and headed out to Timber Beach --a lovely, long, sandy beach. It's about a half an hour away from the cottage, and Sophia loved the ride. She played in sand, and splashed in the water. It was a fun afternoon for everyone.

Everyone's at the beach! Even Haley, who kept to the shade of the boat, until she decided to take a swim because she saw David, Sophie and I on the boat. She looked a bit like a drowned rat.


Sophia being flung around by Daddy. He's more of a risk taker with her than I am. Seems that she has inherited this risky behaviour.

Post beach shenanigans...yesh, that is a bathing suit on her head. She thought it quite funny.

More boating happened this week. The weather cooperated to the point that we could make the trip to Northern Harbour and take a sail on Shadowfax. It takes me a little bit of time to get used to sailing...it is not unusual for the boat to move along at a serious list, which is completely normal. For this landlubber, having part of the deck of the boat dip into the water (and stay that way) will elicit loud and somewhat panicked prayers (along the lines of "oh God, oh God, we're all going to die"). If you add to this unease the souls of a beloved child and four footed creature, (David doesn't register here because he is used to the boat and knows what to expect) you pretty much have a very anxious, somewhat unhappy Tricia. To ease my tension, Grandma Gerhard took Sophia below deck, where she was very happy to discard the unwieldy life jacket and play to her hearts content. Haley, well...she was a different story ---shaking below deck and braced for the worse above. Sophia had a great time, watching the water go along and checking out the birds and such. By the end of the sail, I was very happily dangling my feet in the water and enjoying the movement. After the sail, we headed into Kenora for dinner and then drove back to the cottage.





I think that Sophia would have happily hung over the edge of boat to drag her fingers through the water. We, the responsible adults, decided to squash this plan.

Just popping up through the hatch!

A Canadian Plum orchard has been discovered on one of the pathways. So this morning, Diane, David and Arthur headed out and picked a hoard of plums for making preserves and jams.



The haul...

Sophia and I went to check out the orchard later in the day.

Finally, we let Sophia's inner artist out again. This time, Mommy got smart and let the art happen in more easily cleaned tub!


Body and tub art...

The final piece de resistance

Thursday, August 09, 2007

Cottage Week 1

Whew, what a week. Actually, it's hard to believe we've spent a week here already. It is usually about this time that we start hunting through the house, looking for all the things we have spread about in order to pack up and head back to Saskatchewan. It's really, really nice to know that I can put that off for another two whole weeks! That means that I can spread even more stuff around this place and spend more time looking for it the night before we leave.

Anyway, we are here and enjoying ourselves thoroughly! Much has happened since we packed up the Vue and headed east. The drive itself was a little trying. It's a long way from Regina to Sioux Narrows --about eight hours in total. Well, add a couple of hours to that for diaper stops, caching (that's a GPS thing, totally David's domain), eating breaks and dog walking adventures. We stopped in Broadview (two hours from Regina), in Brandon (two hours from Broadview), in Winnipeg (two hours from Brandon) and finally ended up in Sioux Narrows, where Grandpa and Grandma met us on the road. Unfortunately, Sophia had just woken up from a very brief nap and was not too happy about still being in the car and that there were new faces to deal with. She promptly broke down into red faced tears. What a welcome, eh? David took her out of the car seat and walked down the road with Diane and Arthur, which calmed the babe right down. Needless to say, we were all VERY HAPPY to be at the cottage. It was an incredibly long day for us all.

On Friday, we spent some time getting settled, playing in the sand and water, and David and Arthur started planning the deck addition (there are two decks,and a connecting piece was needed). Every cottage trip must have a project of some sort. Sophia and I searched out the hammock...



By this time, Haley wanted to make sure that I was not going anywhere and that if I was going somewhere, she was going with me.

Uncle Adam and Auntie Kristine joined the fun on Friday night. Sophia was a little shy to begin with but took to the two of them pretty well. I think Uncle Adam caused her a little confusion, for once there was a man hanging around without facial fur. Hmmm....a very strange occurrence that is for sure.

One of the things we do very well at the cottage is eat. Eating is very important as it supports our efforts of all things cottage...be it building, swimming or just generally lazing. Dinner tends to be the most important meal of the day. On our way out of Winnipeg, we stopped at a little farmers market and picked up some fresh Manitoba corn. Now, Sophia has decided that she really truly wants to eat whatever we are eating...this is good. It makes picking her meals so much easier. She points, and grunts and food appears on the plate! Anyway, I was just going to cut the corn off the cob for her. But no, that wasn't good enough. She was not satisfied until she had the entire thing for herself...


Another new adventure took place on Sunday...Sophia got her very first fingerpainting session. I decided that such a potentially messy craft should take place in a easily cleanable location. So I put a happily diapered baby in the bathtub and offered her the paints. We had paint everywhere. On the walls, all over the tub, on hands, knees, feet, legs, diapers and in hair. She loved it! Unfortunately for me, I picked the only bathtub lacking a handheld shower! So I had to carry a paint laden baby across the cottage to the bathtub with the shower and hose off the child. Then I had to clean the tub. Sigh. But boy was it fun for Sophie and I.

A fingerpainting masterpiece!
After the fun.

Our friends, Lia and Vijay, live half the time in Winnipeg (their's is a complicated, split province marriage, which I won't get into here). Usually, we are guaranteed at least one yearly visit, as Lia and Vijay either drive from Winnipeg to Edmonton, or vice versa. This year we put a kink in the plans by being in the cottage. So we said, "why not come to the cottage?" So they did. They spent Sunday night with us and we had a great time catching up. Vijay joined in the deck construction fun, while Lia and I had a good talk. Later there was swimming, sailing (without any wind, which makes it difficult-- Vijay ended up pushing the boat back to the boat house!), eating, tubing and a good game of Settlers of Cattan. All in all a good visit was had.

Watching Uncle Adam, Auntie Kristine, Daddy and Vijay swimming.

Lia demonstrating the polite way to hold your cob of corn.

Sophia's version.


Checking out the touchable bubbles that Grandma bought for Sophia. Way too cool.

Everybody checking out the deck construction progress.

Viajy Daniels, Lia Daniels, Tricia, Sophia and David. A successful cottage visit! We miss them already.

Yesterday we decided to take Sophia out on her first boat ride of the season. Really, this was to see how well Sophia took to not only being on the boat but also how well she would wear her life jacket. There were to be no boat rides without the life jacket. Well, mostly the life jacket wearing went okay. The only problem is that it is front heavy. So every time Sophie tried to walk, she would get a couple of steps and then topple over forwards. Now, this is funny only to the adults watching the child trying to walk. Sophia on the other had found it frustrating and the fact that all her monkeys were laughing added insult to injury. She ended up crying her little eyes out. Only being carried by mom seemed to help the humiliation. Anyway, we took the obligatory pictures. In the end, the boat ride was a huge success and she loved every minute of it...from waving to other boats, to chatting to the loons.

Holding on for balance. Can you see why she was a little forward heavy?

Askew but happy

Checking out the scenery with Grandma G. The wind happily blowing through her hair.

Contemplating life with Grandpa G.

In the end, Haley truly reflects the correct cottage way of being...

Till next week!