Weather and other awesomeness.

The weather has been absurdly beautiful the past week or so. Just clear and sunny and perfect. Spent some time out on the deck, walked down to the grocery store with Wesley, went to Trevor’s soccer game last night (though we walked around a lot during that too to keep Wesley quiet). A picture!

This time of year has such gorgeous weather and it just makes you pine for everlasting summer. Fall is gorgeous too though, thankfully, so I hope I won’t be too sad when I’m staring down the barrel of the middle of September. That’s when my birthday and wedding anniversary are as well, so that helps. 🙂

Swimfit today, which may or may not be the last class- my schedule says there’s one more after today, but the instructor said last week that this was the last class, so we’ll have to sort that out. I’ve definitely enjoyed it, thinking about signing up for a mommy and me water yoga class this fall.

Gymnastics

Don’t worry, NBC-watchers, I promise not to spoil anything.

I just wanted to talk a little bit about the things I really enjoy about watching gymnastics. So I will!

Awesome beam mounts:

I love when ladies get on the beam in an interesting way. I feel like a lot of the beam mounts in this games are fairly ho hum compared to some that I’ve seen, but I didn’t get to see everyone, and hopefully the beam event final will have some more interesting tricks. Here’s a video of what I mean by interesting mounts:

Crazy hard bars routines:

I love watching a difficult release skill. Check this out:

Fascinating Gymnastics History

Yesterday, when I was learning some more about the history of gymnastics, I learned about a former Soviet gymnast named Elena Mukhina. I hadn’t read much about her before! She was world all-around champion, and preparing for the 1980 Olympics in Moscow. She did a lot of daring and dangerous skills in her routines, including a Thomas salto in her floor exercise. It’s a 1 and 3/4 flip with 1½ twists ending in a forward roll, meaning the gymnast is basically landing on their shoulders after the flip. Here’s a video of a Elena Shushunova doing the skill in 1987:

The salto is about 9 seconds in. You can see how if things didn’t go right for whatever reason, the gymnast could land on a pretty sensitive bit of head or neck, and that’s what happened to Elena Mukhina. She wound up a quadripalegic, which is bad enough, but the really crazy thing is that the details and severity of her injury were concealed for some time by the Soviet Gymnastics Federation, who kept deflecting questions and it took a while for the truth to come out. Eventually, the Thomas salto became a banned skill for women in gymnastics, though it’s still performed by men.

Anyway, I thought that was pretty fascinating.

Olympics

I’m pretty much a big huge fan of the Olympics. Summer, winter, I like them all. So I’m pretty excited about the London 2012 games that just started. One of the interesting things about living in Canada is that we have some more choices for Olympics coverage- we can watch the CTV coverage broadcast in Canada, or the NBC feed from nearby NBC affiliates in the US.

So we watched the Opening Ceremonies twice last night- first when it was broadcast live on CTV, and then when NBC broadcast it on delay. There are some things about the NBC coverage that I like- first of all, they have John Williams’ Olympic Fanfare and Theme. Which I love. Also, they do make a pretty montage.

I could pretty much do without Meredith Vieira, however. When I saw that she was hosting the Opening, I was surprised, and then thought “hey, maybe she’ll do well!” I was wrong. It was kind of a foot-in-mouth parade for her. I do kinda like Bob Costas, mostly because he’s been doing the Olympics forever so he’s like, the Olympics voice from my childhood. But man, Ms. Vieira really brought it down for me. Thankfully I’d already seen the ceremony once (including the bits NBC cut out in order to run more commercials), so I was just watching again to see the initial bits that I missed and to compare the coverage.

So a few point-form comments on bits I enjoyed of the Opening Ceremonies!

  • Kenneth Branagh in a stovepipe hat
  • Um, the Queen as a Bond girl.  I <3 being in the commonwealth.
  • And her CORGIS.  I swear, corgis are turning me into a dog person.
  • Glowing beds and dancing nurses and kids and a tribute to the NHS
  • Childrens’ choirs singing pretty songs I know
  • Abide with me, so pretty.
  • All the pretty sod that they used for the opening
  • The hill with all the flags of the represented countries on it
  • OMG, each country a part of the cauldron. How awesome is that?

So the actual events start today! Artistic gymnastics is a favourite of mine, so I’ll be watching that. We’re watching a good bit of cycling (fresh from watching weeks of the Tour de France, we love our cycling). I like gymnastics and diving the best, but I also like to watch sports I don’t get to see much of otherwise- canoe/kayak, badminton, equestrian, rowing, etc etc. I like the opportunity to learn more about the various nations that have sent athletes, and about the host country. Super excited.

So yeah, for the next couple weeks, it will be Olympics fever up in here! Yaaaaaay. 😀

Weekend awesomeness

This past weekend was pretty nice! We didn’t have any specific plans for Friday or Saturday. We wound up having takeout wings for dinner on Friday, and on Saturday, we had a couple of nice outings and a long walk around the neighbourhood.

On Sunday, we went to the zoo! I’ve been to the Toronto Zoo a couple of times, but this was Wesley’s first trip. I love zoos, and have been to a ton of different ones in North America and Europe, and the Toronto Zoo is pretty good. Jackie, a friend of ours, was organizing an outing, so we decided to go!

It was a super hot day, so we made sure to stick to the shade where we could to keep cool. We saw mostly the African Savannah section of the zoo, since we were only there for a few hours.

Wesley is just getting to the age where he is able to enjoy a zoo trip. He was able to watch the animals (the ones that moved around, anyway- he wasn’t really interested in the crocodile that just sat still) and he liked being outside (though he got pretty hot before it started to rain).

And did it ever rain! We decided to stop for lunch because we were getting really hot, and the storm blew in while we were eating.

We waited until the rain died down a bit and then headed to do some of the indoor stuff, where we saw a pygmy hippo (so cute!) and some other cool animals. We hit up the kids’ zoo area before leaving (Wesley is gonna love that when he gets a little older!) and then came home.

All in all, a pretty awesome weekend.

Entering the tablet world

For a long time, I didn’t really have a use for a tablet- I have a laptop, and am not a huge fan of touchscreens (aaaaahhhh fingerprints). But just this past weekend, I got one of my own, because I found a use for them finally! I like to read in bed before I fall asleep, and I have an e-reader, which helps me avoid the otherwise inevitable stack of books on my nightstand. But sometimes I want to read blog articles or Facebook or whatever other internet, since those things work a little more nicely when my attention span is shorter. I don’t like using my laptop in bed though- so enter the tablet- it’s my ereader for the internet.

I got a BlackBerry Playbook. It was a fairly easy choice for me, since I like to support RIM, but I particularly like the size of it- it’s similar in size to my Sony ereader and since I have small hands, I find it a lot easier to handle than a 10″ tablet. I took it with me when we went to Trevor’s parents’ this past weekend as well, and it’s really nice as an alternative to lugging the laptop along or using my phone to check my email and such. It’s nice out on the deck as well, if I am not wanting to avoid technology out there. 🙂 I’m pretty pleased with it, and the price is pretty awesome too. Hooray!

Visiting the US Consulate!

Since Wesley is the child of a US citizen (me!) he is a US citizen himself. In order to claim that though, we had to file some paperwork, since he doesn’t have a US birth certificate. The paperwork is fairly simple, especially in comparison to some of the government paperwork I’ve filed in the past (Canadian Permanent Residence, I’m looking at you). One question, however, requires that both parents of the child list every period of physical presence in the US. Living close to the border, that was a fairly long list for us (and I never even crossed said border until 2004!). Still, we got it all sorted out the night before- the application for the Consular Report of Birth Abroad, the application for the Social Security Number (which I’ll need to file my taxes) and the application for his US passport (which will be his proof of US citizenship).

In order to file this stuff, we had to make an appointment at the US Consulate in Toronto. We made an appointment for the latest time they had available (10:30 AM) since we’d have to drive there and the morning drive into TO is a bit rough.

We got out of the house at 7:30, and after the drive and then the subway ride downtown, we barely made it in time. It was Wesley’s first subway ride! We took him in the Boba carrier because we didn’t want to deal with taking the whole big stroller and everything on the subway, and we didn’t know if we’d have space for the stroller at the consulate either. It worked really well for the trip.

Once we got downtown, we quickly hit up a Canada Post outlet to get a prepaid Express Post envelope (which you have to submit with your paperwork so they can mail you the passport and report of birth abroad). After that, we headed up to the consulate, which is on a shady sidestreet that is closed to car traffic.

MAN, was that place crazy. The line for visas was way out the door and down the street, and then there was another line inside, then another line after that. The people getting visas there had a long wait in front of them. We had an appointment so we were able to head in and up to a different area, but we had to throw away the ice packs we were using to keep the baby’s milk fresh, at security. Oh well. At least we didn’t have to waste any of his food (it was still good when it came time to feed him, shortly after).

After getting through security, we headed upstairs to the designated office. There were a bunch of windows, and we had to sign in at one, and they checked our paperwork. We had to fix a few things, and then wait to be called. After that, a second person checked our paperwork again, and we were told to wait again, and then we were called again, for our final paperwork check and interview. All told it was about an hour, which was a bit faster than we were expecting. We were the last ones out. The waiting area had a lot of children (naturally), and the washroom had a nice changing table and we were able to feed the baby there, which was nice.

All in all it was an interesting outing! We hope to get Wesley’s paperwork and passport in a few weeks, and his SSN sometime after that (it takes much longer). I’m glad we got it done now and not later when he would be harder to handle in a government office sort of situation. 🙂

Wesley

Wesley is 6 months old (as of last Thursday)! He’s pretty much enormous. At his doctor appointment, he weighed 18 lbs 13 oz, and was over 27 inches long! The joke is that he’ll be taller than me any minute now (since I’m only 5’1″, he doesn’t get his height from me!)

He’s started on solid foods. So far, we’ve tried sweet potatoes and green beans, and rice cereal, and the biggest winner so far has been sweet potatoes mixed with rice cereal. Introducing new foods is a bunch more fun than I thought it would be- I thought feeding him would be really time-consuming and messy enough to bother me. But really, Wesley has been a relatively tidy eater (in that he hasn’t sneezed it all on me yet) and he gets through his little bowl of food pretty quickly, in about 15 or 20 minutes.

He rolls all over the floor, and is working on crawling, but hasn’t quite figured out how to push with his feet yet. He loves standing up though, if you hold him up he is super pleased to be on his feet (no standing on his own yet, of course!)

We had a half-birthday party for him last weekend, and it was nice! Just a barbecue for our friends, and their kids, too. Our friends have some really charming kids, as well. There were 6 children here aside from Wesley, and they were all girls, so that might have something to do with it, but talk about well-behaved and quiet! I hope they had fun. It was fun to have so many littles around, but I don’t know if I could handle it every day!

He’s still a pretty good sleeper, but he almost always has to sleep in his crib in his room now- where he used to be able to just nap wherever he was, now he’s too distracted if anything cool is going on around him. So he naps in his crib most of the time.

Trip to Texas!

About a month ago, Trevor and Wesley and I took our first plane trip together as a family, to Texas to visit my parents and brother and sister-in-law.

Flying

The flights were pretty awesome! It was Wesley’s first time on a plane, and we did some planning ahead and things worked out incredibly well. We flew mostly on MD88s, which are a middle-sized plane, two seats on one side and three on the other. We were on the three seat side a few times, and that worked out surprisingly okay!

Can I just say, pre-boarding for families with kids under 2? Awesome. Gave me enough time to get situated without having to trip over a bunch of people and bags, and without worrying about people bashing my kid with their bags. That was sweet.

We bought enough ready-made formula for the flights down and back (as Wesley is formula fed at this point) and brought our bottles. The timing worked out such that it was time to feed Wesley at each takeoff (we had 2 flights down and 2 flights back) and that kept him calm during the initial parts of the flight and probably helped keep his ear pressure normalized. Because we were next to a third person on a few of the flights, I was a bit apprehansive, but each time they complemented us on how calm the baby was, which was nice. After takeoff, he’d be pretty much done eating, hang out for a bit, then have a nap on our lap/shoulders/whatever. It worked out well.

In praise of the family restroom


On the way down, during our layover, we both needed to hit up the restroom and Wesley needed a diaper change. Enter the family restroom! If you’ve not seen these, it’s basically a big, accessible restroom with a change table. We got everything taken care of way faster than if we’d gone to the separate restrooms. Super awesome.

In Texas

While we were down there, we stayed in a hotel near my parents’ house, so that we’d have our own space and also because I kind of love hotels and this one had a whirlpool, so yay. We bought the baby supplies we’d need while we were down there. Diapers (we used disposable diapers, though we use a cloth diaper service at home), some wipes, swim diapers (so Wesley could try out the pool!), formula and water, and a couple other things. My mom got Wesley some clothes as a nice gift, and we also got some clothes from Kimberly and Tony (my brother and sister-in-law) which was nice.

We mostly hung out at my parents’ house and my brother’s place, which was good and relaxing. I was worried that with an infant it wouldn’t feel like we were on vacation, but the hotel stay helped with that (I love having other people make my bed! Also, whirlpool). We watched TV and played with the baby and had a good time. We watched crazy stuff too, Superman II! And Hazel. Random, but entertaining!

Speaking of the whirlpool, we made use of it a few times! It was nice. We also took Wesley in the indoor pool they had. It was a little chilly for him, but he had fun!

To give my mom some babysitting/grandma time, Trevor and I went with Tony and Kimberly to see The Avengers. We saw it at the Movie Theatre Tavern, which is a fantastic thing they have in Texas (and some other locations in the US) where you basically have your movie and food and beer all at once. It is particularly fantastic for comic book movies, I think.

They also have a system there which I think pretty much all diners/casual dining restaurants need- you push a button, it lights up, and then a server comes. Seriously, awesome. It’s rude to call a server over (especially from across the room), but sometimes they don’t catch the pointed glances when I want a refill or a dessert menu or the check. All in all, it was a nice baby-free outing, and my parents had fun babysitting. Here’s my dad and Wesley!

Back home

The flights back were also pretty good, Wesley had a tiny bit more fussyness but was overall pretty calm. He got a little bit upset on the car ride back home from Buffalo, but we made it home late in the evening and Trevor and I both had the following day off from our various obligations so we were able to get back into our regular home routine. Overall, I definitely recommend traveling with infants, especially when they’re still not mobile on their own (as Wesley was at the time, he’s rolling all over the place now).

Was reminded of this just now

Trevor just gave me a bit of his biscuit (there are not enough biscuits in Canada so I eat them every chance I get which is not all that often) and he reminded me of the best best best sports team logo ever.


The Montgomery Biscuits. Biscuits. And the Biscuit has a butter-pat tongue, and it’s pretty much the most ridiculous and awesome thing ever contrived by a graphic artist ever.

If we ever have reason to hang in Alabama, we’re going to a Biscuits game and I’m getting a t-shirt.

Basement Finishing

So when we moved into our house, it was with the assumption that at some point we would finish the basement- it was studded in around the edges and insulated and basically unspoiled, so it looked like it would be easy enough. Now, over 5 years later, we’ve started that project, and are even getting close to finishing it. It’s taking about 5 weeks to get it all done, but I’m excited for the extra living space that we’ll gain- we’ll have a rec room and a full bathroom down there.

We’ve been using a contracting company called Catalyst General Contracting. They’ve been pretty great- always in touch, keeping us up to date (and via email, thank god. I love companies that deal with me via email, it’s 100 times easier for me than dealing with phone calls and voicemails). We’ve had a couple of little problems, but everything has been resolved as soon as it is brought up. It’s the biggest contracting project I’ve ever been on the client side of, so it’s a new experience for me.

The project is wrapping up in the next couple of days. It’ll be awesome to have it all done, it has been a big part of my life for several weeks now! We’ve been taking photos along the way:

You can view more progress photos in the photo gallery.