Our Baby Size Life!

Posts Tagged ‘fun’

I want out! Take the screen off or I'll go through it!

While you can’t tell by the questionable weather we’ve been having lately, the calendar says summer is only days away.  As I type this, looking out the window, sitting on the living room floor, I see nothing but gray, dreary skies and wet pavement.  This is, assuredly, a spring-time climate.  But come on already! It`s freakin` June 18th and I want some sun dammit!

Ahem… Pardon the outburst, I guess I’m vitamin D deficient.

We do get a nice day now and then. Sometimes we even get two or three nice, dry and sunny days strung together.

"I wanna touch... you!"

But that happens tops… tops once every three weeks. That is not enough! Is this global warming? Well I can’t help but feel a little disappointed if it is! When that sun does shine it’s glorious beams of loving warmth, we get outdoors and have some fun!  Sam loves being outside.  He loves it so much in fact, that every evening when we arrive home after work, we unpack him out of the trunk and bring him into the house to eat supper.  As soon as we cross our front door threshold, he loses it! Big tears roll down his reddening cheeks as he throws out a finger pointing back outside and gives one of his best “feel sorry for me” frowns.  He doesn’t want to eat now, he wants to explore! Sam loves the trees and plans and flowers that make up our little yard and it’s as if he has to walk around to each one and say “Hi!”.

Oh! And I was kidding about the trunk comment, he prefers the roof a lot more… He gets a nice breeze up there.

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What a crazy weekend we just had! We kicked in about 1200 km in just over 12 hours of driving to head on down to see my sis in Toronto.  You see, it was an important occasion, as my nephew was being confirmed.  Now, Melissa and I were both born and raised into Catholic families and you could say we were practising Catholics until… well until we reached the age of reason Folks, folks! Settle down. I like to joke around remember? Lets not get off track here eh? Ahem! So, my sis was throwing a party after the ceremony on Saturday and had invited us to go along.

We, of course, said No.

We were too busy, Sam was sick and I left a camel in the oven… Whatever excuse I came up with, my sis bought it.  So the stage was set for a nice little surprise.  We packed up Thursday night and left mid-afternoon on Friday, finally getting to her house at around 10 pm.  We were a little cautious about having Sam stuffed in his car seat for six hours, as he had been a little under the weather the last couple days, but he was a trooper! He cried a little when he was hungry midway into our trip and again a little at the very end because he could not get into his normal sleeping position while strapped into his chair. We got there and snuck up to the house…

Looks like our lying worked! She was happy we came down, and so were we!  It was a very fun filled, if short weekend, but we had loads of laughs, some great food and an epic street hockey game, as is custom when our families meet.  As per every year, my brother and I take on my nephews and their friends to a Montreal Vs. Toronto street hockey game. The prize: Unquestionable Domination… And bragging rights. We’ve never lost a game as my bro and I really put it to them… no crosschecks or anything like that, just good hockey. We clean ‘em out… because, well, they deserved it! The trash talking these kids do is legendary.  Whenever we talk on the phone, there’s always a comment like:

“I gonna beat you down when we play man! Your goin’ down!” or the old “I’m gonna kick your butt dude!”

So my bro and I take it upon ourselves to… what’s the word? Teach. Or impart our wisdom of life upon them… and totally crush them! Our last game ended 52-23 in our favor. This time, however, we modified some rules to make it a fairer game… and it was.  We ended up playing to a 9 – 9 tie because it was past 10 pm and we lost the ball in a yard. Visibility was close to none, so we called it there.  Close, I know. They almost pulled off a victory after what, 7, 8 years?!?  Hehe, nice try boys, but you’ll have to do better next time!

My sis really oudid herself on this one. Food galore! Her famous canellonis and lasagna were great once again (and we even got some to take home!).  Everything was just perfect.  My nephew is now one rich kid… With all those confirmation cards exploding with money, he got excited before opening each one to see what color bill was inside. Pink. Pink. Brown! Hey hey hey!

We headed back early on Sunday morning and got in, after a side stop at an uncles house for lunch, around 5 pm.  We were as pooped as, well poop!  We ate, then slept. End of story. But here a re a few pics that I took of the weekend… I HOPE MY BROTHER AND BROTHER-IN-LAW WILL SEND ME SOME OF THEIRS… AHEM! HINT HINT!!!

Last weekend, Melissa and I wanted to take advantage of the mild weather and get Sammy-boy some fresh air.  We’ve been going out for walks on week nights, but it’s usually dark and a bit colder than during the day, so we can’t stay out long.  On Sunday, the weather was perfect for a little sleigh ride with Sam.  A quick hop and skip away was Melissa’s parents house and their huge backyard.  Grandpa Papitou had snow-blown a bunch of paths through the snow in their yard last week, and he invited us over to pull Sam through them on a sleigh.  It sounded like a great idea, and it was!

Here’s a little gallery of the fun we had. Sam loved being pulled and pushed around the yard.  The whole time his eyes wide looking at the trees and birds and, of course, his family that were with him.  As you’ll see in the pics, Melissa hopped in with Sam to start off the fun, and yes, I had to pull both of them around the yard! Whew! I think Sam put on some weight! A little while later, the sun was setting and made for a gorgeous atmosphere of calm in the yard.  Only the birds singing and the crisp crackling of the snow beneath our feet could be heard throughout the yard. Good, peaceful times!

Here are the pics, enjoy, and if you get a chance, get outside and enjoy some nice winter weather… if the weather’s crap, then stay in and watch a movie or three!

One day, I almost broke my back hauling big Sammy out of our bathtub.  It’s one of those extra deep, extra long suckers that requires a step to get into… for shorter people anyways. Me, being the giraffe of the family, I have no problems stepping in and out of the thing,  but when we give Sam a bath (as written about here and here), it’s a tough gut-wrench to get him out!  I am usually sitting on the bath step washing him, and then while sitting, I get him under the arms and pull straight up to get him out of his bath chair, then over and around into a waiting towel.  He likes the ride, but Mom can’t do it anymore, and Dad is finding it ‘s getting tougher to pull off… Well Sam’s over 20 lbs now! He’s a good sack of potatoes! Plus he’s wet! So that’s gotta count for something! I know, I’m getting old!

So, one night, I was feeling a little lazy and decided to give him his own shower.  Now while I was feeling lazy, I didn’t just open the shower door, turn on the water, throw him in and shut the door! Come on folks… I turned the light on first! Kidding aside, I was actually pretty pumped to see his reaction to the shower head and whether or not he’d like it.  Back in July, in Wildwood, I had brought him into the shower with me, and the shower head scared him something good!  So, this time, I was a little weary.  I didn’t want to stress the little guy out… or clean a bunch of poop out of the shower drain.

Sliding Sam into his seat, his interest in the spewing shower head was immediate… and he loved it! He just wanted to swing the dangling shower head back and forth.  He even tried to get a couple sprays on Dad, but I was too quick to him… this time.  Next, he kept trying to drink from it.  The water temperature was a nice warm/hot and was approved by his temperature telling rubber ducky!  Which Sam promptly stuck in his mouth when I wouldn’t let him drink any of the water.  The shower was a success!  Sam loved being gently sprayed with the water while chewing on his toys.  I foamed up his loofah and got to work scrubbing the little guy down, which he also found interesting.  Of course, as soon as he saw bubbles on his skin, he just had to taste them!

Having Sam on the bottom of the shower just makes sense.  He’s easy to ship in or out and we don’t have to worry about accidental drowning or other creepy stuff like that.  He’s certainly not crying about it, so we won’t either! One thing we;ve noticed , however, is when Sam’s in his towel for the drying off phase, he just has to have something in his hands.  If you don’t give him something, he will make your life a living hell!  He’ll kick, squirm, punch, slap, twist, jiggle, bend, sit up, roll over, yanks, pick, reach and eventually crawl away… naked over the cold tile!  He simply doesn’t care!  We’ve got a little libertine baby on our hands here folks!  As long as he doesn’t “pull it out on the playground” I think we’ll be OK.

Winter stinks… and thanks for reading!

Sam and Mom, cheek to cheek

On with the rest of the Christmas pictures!  Melissa, Sam and I are lucky to have two great families to spend every Christmas with.  On the evening of the 24th, we had great fun with Melissa’s family for a traditional “réveillon” as you saw in my last post.   Sam had a great time and ended up fast asleep in his “mamienounes” bedroom, no doubt dreaming of what Santa would bring him in the morning… or maybe he was dreaming of whatever babies dream of… a bottle? Milk? Nipples? Toys? The birth canal? Who knows!

After we got home from Melissa’s parents at around 1 in the morning, Melissa and I put Sam to bed and we had our own little gift exchange… hehehe But seriously, we actually traded gifts so get yer mind out of the gutter (but just for a little while)!  We then hit the sack ourselves around 2:30 am  only to be up again at 7 am to pack the car and head over to my parents house, which is about an hour’s drive away.  I think we were the only car on the road.  It was dead.  We got there in just under 40 minutes. Sweet.

We had a great day full of good family fun, including our annual Toronto Vs. Montreal street hockey game, which Montreal won again, for the tenth year in a row… go HABS! Mom and Dad had all kinds of food out all day long, so we naturally stuffed our faces silly.  I took it upon myself to cook everyone our traditional “Big Christmas Breakfast”, which I did not mess up too badly, dishing out bacon, sausage, eggs, ham, etc. In the early afternoon, we had our secret Santa gift exchange that brought us some good laughs and plenty of picture opportunities.  Then came supper with a gorgeous and scrumptious turkey with all the fixings. Mom and Dad have really mastered the Christmas dinner, it was beyond excellent and they are to be commended in the efforts! Sam, however, did not taste the turkey as he was busy puking up his own meal… Poor little guy, we’re guessing there was a little too much excitment for him, so he projectile vomited all over his high chair!  He was fine after, even managing to score some nice fruit puray for dessert.

Following dinner, we had our “5 dollar just for laughs” mini gift exchange, which is always full of suspense and “gotcha” type moments.  The only rule that applies is that the gift you buy has to be of a 5$ value.  So it can be anything… and that may not be a good thing if your left standing with a crappy gift!  This year, I actually stole my Godson’s gift: a giant universal remote control.  I’m a geek. It was cool. It was mine. Then we had some dessert (Mom baked four types of pies!!!! Pumpkin, coconut, chocolate and lemon! They were filthy good folks… F-I-L-T-H-Y G-O-O-D!

Mom giving it a shot

My bro hitting the tough part

We then polished the evening off with a fun little tradition we started last year, which consists of wrapping a gift 50 times with all sorts of boxes and paper.  The letting people have a chance at trying to unwrap it with oven mitts!  This game rocks people! The rules are that you must put the gift in the middle of the floor and all the players must sit around it.  One person takes a pair of dice and throws them. If they roll a pair, they can put the mitts on and start to unwrap the gift. If no pair is rolled, the dice are given to the next player and the gift remains unharmed. The next player then rolls for a pair as well… and so on and so forth.  Whom ever successfully and completely unwraps the gift gets to keep it.  It’s nothing but fun and hectic times ahead if you try this game, as the pace quickens as the gift is unwrapped.

As you can see, it was a busy Christmas on my end, and I am thankful for every moment.  Sam had a blast playing with his aunt and uncles, grand-parents… and, of course, his cousins!  Here are some pics from the day, as I am out of words… and tired of writing!

Our family on our first Christmas together

The family tree with the gifts being guarded by my nephews	My bro and his daughter, a proud irish girl
My nephew with Sam	My godson after he won the oven mitt gift game!
My sis and niece take a quick picture break from the frantic oven mitt game	My bro-in-law sweating with the effort... he really gave it his all!
Next it was my brothers turn, he hit the duct tape!	My sis taking care of Sam as she always does when she's in town!
The frantic family dinner table	Sam and his uncle sharing a ribbon
Me in my new Irish colors...	... and my niece in hers!!!
Grand-parents with the grand-kids!	Three generations... I've waited a long time to take this picture!
Sammy rockin' it with his cousins... he later beat them up!	The grand-parents fightin' over Sam... like usual!
Sam makin' a move for a tree ornament!	Nanny with Colby, my sis's dog.
Me acting stupid... what else is new

As always, thanks for reading!

Well folks, as I write this, my holiday vacation has little less than twenty four hours of life to it, but don’t get me wrong because I’m not complaining.  It’s been a very busy, wacky and wild two weeks, and maybe a little relaxed, slacker time at work is just what I need! My bosses read my blog on occasion, so I really hope they picked up the sarcasm there! If not, I may be staring an unemployment related blog soon, stay tuned

Our Christmas festivities started off in the evening of the 24th, over at Melissa’s parents house.  The whole gang was there dressed to the nines and Sam was at his attention grabbing best.  Being passed around from adult to adult without the slightest frown or sob, Sam soldiered on until Mom plopped him down in his retro 80′s feeding chair that his “MamieNoune”, Melissa’s mother, had bought for him. The buffet was laid out and Sam was eating like the rest of us. He seems to enjoy that, I think it makes him feel like one of the big people. That when Sammy boy decided to shake things up a bit, and when Mom wasn’t looking, that’s when he struck! Mom’s head was turned and out flew his hand.  The slap completely knocking over his bowl of chicken pot pie and pea puray… all over his bib, the retro 80′s chair, the floor… and Melissa’s black dress pants! Merry Christmas Mom!

The rest of the evening went really well, except for the abrupt end that hit around 10:30, when my God-Son Jeremy, after an understandably exciting and long Christmas-Eve, was strung out and tired. So much so in fact, that after getting his “big gift”, the train set pic, he did what any five year old pooped out but over zealous kid does on Christmas when told by his parents he can’t open the “big gift” now:  complete meltdown! Quite the tantrum, so the family packed up an left with the little guy steaming… oh well we had some good fun anyways. Besides, if I’m still blogging in five years time, I might be writing the same thing about Sam!

Here are just some of the pics from the evening, enjoy:

Happy Halloween!  That’s right folks, Halloween is finally here!  Time to let out those inner ghouls and demons so they can frolic and play!  Get dressed up! Scare people! Have fun!  I’ve got a very busy day and haunting night ahead of me as I’ll be disguised at work and will hopefully scare a couple people, then I head home and prepare the house for my victims tonight! So here’s a quick post of some of our costumes from the past… I’ve got some family in there as well.  Some are from the 80′s and some are more recent.  Also, we reveal Sam’s first Halloween Costume! So here’s to having fun on Halloween!  Enjoy!

It’s been a few days since my last post, but life’s been kicking up the busy recently.  I don’t know why, but Melissa and I just get stuck in these weird periods when we suddenly have a crazy influx of appointments and meetings and family events that just keep us constantly on the go for a few days.  Then, nothing.  Which is nice, cause now I can catch up on some posts!  Hence, the events in this post happened over 2 weeks ago, back when Fall was still nice and the bitter cold of winters’ creeping hands couldn’t be felt. It’s ironic too, that as I’m writing this, we are getting hit with our first dump of snow.  So, I guess this will be my farewell to Fall, even though Halloween has yet to pass!

About three weeks ago, I wrote about a walk in the woods near my place, and I said at the time that I might have been a little premature in expecting a vibrant display of Mother Natures Fall colors.  Well, after a busy Thanksgiving weekend, which I’ll be telling you about soon, we decided to head out for another walk, and this time we hoped Sam would stay awake and see some colors!  Well, he stayed awake and as you can see from the pic on the left, we got some serious color action!  We then found a quiet part of the forested area to sit down in some leaves and just let Sam explore.  We, of course took some pics, way to many to post here and way to many to be healthy.  The weather was nice and the sun kept poking through some shoddy clouds that didn’t offer much resistance.  It was quiet too.  No car noise or other people around being annoying.  Just us and a pile of leaves, and a few curious squirrels.

Sammy and Dad enjoying the leaves

Sam and Mom taking a seat

A good Samaritan squirrel took a family pic for us. He was nice, if a little nuts.

We spent a good lazy hour tossing leaves around, playing peek-a-boo and spinning Sam around and through the air a bit, then headed for home as somebody was getting a little cranky because he was a little hungry!  Yeah well, I only had a quick sandwich for lunch alright! I was starved!  Frolicking and merry making family style takes it’s burden on a man!  Should have brought some crackers and cheese… Mmmmmm… Cheese.   When we got home, we decided that five gigs of photos wasn’t enough.  So we propped Sam up on our decorative hay stack and pumpkin outdoor deco and took a few terabytes more pictures… You know, just in case the other thousand come out bad.  Ah to be trigger happy, gone gaga parents in the digital age.  Sam’s only 8 months old and he’s got more documented about his life than Jesus!   And yes folks, Sammy-boy does look pretty kick-ass in his bomber jacket huh?  Before you say it, or think it, or comment it below, we didn’t buy it for him, his Aunt did.  So we are not that gaga.  Close.  But not yet!  OK, gotta run as I’ve got a few Halloween things to prepare and with only 2 days left… time is tight!  Take care!

Hey folks! Let me tell you, it’s been a busy weekend! We had quite the Thanksgiving! I’ll be posting on that later in the week, because I just can’t let another good hospital story go unheard! That’s right, my long weekend was interrupted by another long wait at a hospital. Fear not, we are doing well, but that isn’t the case for everybody… But as I said, check back later in the week for that story.

So, to switch to a brighter note, here’s something I’ve wanted to talk about for a while now: the bath. One of Sam’s favorite activities has got to be taking a bath. Thinking back, asking Sam if he “wants to take a bath and go splish splash” has to be one of the earliest triggers for getting an excited reaction from Sam. Around 3 months old, just as he was getting out of that “lump on a log, I eat and poop” baby phase, I would say that magic catch phrase and Sam would start wiggling his arms and kicking both his legs. Now when I say it, he kicks and twists and squeals and giggles and smiles and… well you get the picture. This kid loves water! Well, except for the ocean, he thought that was freaking cold.

Bath time is now my little routine, and alone time, with Sammy. Melissa takes good care of the squirt all day, so Mom takes a well deserved break and Dad shifts into Mr. Mom mode. I won’t lie, I love it. It’s our father-son time where we can kick back, talk about chicks and have a coupe beers… yeah yeah…. you know I’m kidding. I don’t let Sam drink beer… from the can. I pour a little in his bottle, strap on a nipple and presto! Instant baby-sleep-o potion! Actually, after a big day of fun with Mom, a good bath and bottle are all he needs to send him off to La-La-Land, which I have the pleasure of doing.

Of course, bath time isn’t just all business. Sam has some friends to chew on. We have, of course, the staple of bath time toys in the rubber ducky. As an added bonus, not only does this rubber ducky provide immeasurable quacking fun for Sam, but he also tells the temperature of the water! Amazing I know… If the rubber ducky should be fortunate enough to escape the clutches of Sam’s ever searching fingers, there are a bevy of sea creature that will surely fall pray to his gaping, gum lined maw. He’s like the Sarlacc in the Great Pit of Carkoon! As you can see in the pic, Mr. Crab has fallen on hard times. Now I’ll have to find a little wheelchair for that legless crab! Sam rains down his “bath time martial law” upon the little sea creatures from his sturdy throne. It’s suction-cupped to the bath so it can withstand all of King Sam’s jerks, wiggles and leans. That chair is great, it makes handling a wet, slick baby a breeze. I just pull the suction release tab and lift the whole thing out onto dry ground. It’s a neat little thing that we’ve started using since Sam outgrew his infant bath. Plus, Sam’s a sitter now, he only lies down when he wants to sleep! The infant bath had a sloping bed that’s great for newborns, but not so much for curious, mobile babies.

Before Sam starts to prune up, I whisk him out of the warm water into his doggy towel. This thing has got ears, paws and a tail… which are totally there for the enjoyment of the parents. Ain’t he cute? Yeah well, I’m allowed to go ga-ga a bit alright!?! By this time, he’s getting a little tired and hungry. He lets me know by grabbing his belly and rubbing his eyes as I dry him off. To be honest, those are the least of my concerns. I’m busy watching down below. You see, Daddy has managed to stay dry this entire time, getting hosed now would not be a good thing. But I have to say, Sam’s been kind to me lately. I can’t remember the last time I got zinged during bath time. I must be doing something right!

After Sam’s been dried, creamed, diapered and dressed, we head downstairs for a nice warm bottle. Half the time, he’s falling asleep at the nipple. I don’t know where he gets it, I’ve never done that! It’s kind of funny watching him fall asleep in my arms, he likes to rest his hands on something, like my cheek or chin. Then, every thirty seconds, he keeps peeking out the corner of his eye to make sure I’m still there.

That’s when I whisper to him “Don’t worry Sammy, Daddy’s here. Daddy’s here…” and he nods off to sleep. I then bring him upstairs and gently lay him in his crib and tuck him in. By this time, it’s close to 10 P.M. and having a baby fall asleep on you is contagious. Melissa and I would love to get some Zs as well, but now that Sam is finally down for the night… It’s time to clean the house!

As always, thanks for reading!

It’s Fall over here in Canada, and I couldn’t be happier!  If you don’t live around here, you wouldn’t know that we just had one of the worst, crappiest, rainy, blah summers ever.  We could hardly get a weeks worth of sunshine and we were constantly peed on by some mean looking cumuli. So, bring on Fall!  If we’re going to sit through crappy weather like that, we might as well have some perks to go along with it right?  Yummy apples made for some great, crunchy apple crisp and the chilly weather made from some nice Fall colors.  We decided to take a walk and check things out, as we both love walking in the forest paths that are right at the end of our street.  This may sound familiar as I’ve posted about this before, this past March, while I was looking for signs of Spring.  you can check out that post here.  That post and this one, kind of make nice bookends to a sub par summer.  I would ask for a refund if I could folks, but all sales are final with Mother Nature.

Sunday was your typical Fall day: overcast with a stiff, cold breeze.  Melissa and I packed Sam up with a few layers of clothing, poor kid couldn’t move his arms. He was wearing his new Fall coat and he seemed to be totally… unaware that it was his new Fall coat.  Which, in retrospect, is perfectly normal.  It’s the parents expecting their 7 month old to notice that it’s his new Fall coat that’s the problem. We then “crow-barred” him into his super wheeled, off-road, full suspension, 4 wheel drive stroller that Sam’s Uncle Mike gave him, and set off on our merry little way.  He seemed to enjoy the chilly air on his cheeks, cause that’s all of him that was exposed, and soon fell asleep!  He always does this.  Whenever we bring him somewhere… he’s gone.  This summer, we went to the ocean, which is as you know one of the grandest of natures beauties, limitless in its expanse and inspiring wonder.  But Sam fell asleep right when we hit the beach. You can read that adventure series here, some here, a little here and lastly here.

As with every time I take a walk through this little forest trail, I spot little things that make me take pictures.  Curious things like the white berries on the left, or the known but no-less-beautiful things like a bee getting some nectar in his belly before the big chill of winter.  I even caught that “huge” dragonfly on the wall of my house, just sitting there starting at me.  He scared the crap out of me as I stepped out of the house.  Think that’s funny? Well it was H-U-G-E I tells ya! Just look at that pic! I was a little disappointed, however, that the leaves hadn’t changed colors as much as I had hoped.  Here are a few shots of what we saw.  I’ll try and get back out there this upcoming weekend and get a few more nice shots of the rainbow foliage… maybe even a few with Sam sitting in some leaves.  If he’s awake. :/

Melissa waiting for me to hurry up and take the shot	Some wild Fall flowers	A couple big trees turned red
Zoom on a leaf	A trail to...?	A bee getting some of the Fall flower

Overall, it was a nice afternoon to be together as a family.  Sam woke up after we had gotten home, which was about an hour after we had left.  The way the fresh air had affected Sam now hit us full force. Melissa and I were yawing and thinking about laying down for a quick nap when Sam woke up, full of vim and ready for an intense crawling and playing session.  So on the floor we went, playing with the little guy until supper.  We had great fun together, as always.  He’s just a giggle-puss that kid.  Melissa and I got creative and stuck him in his toy bin to give us a little break (and get a funny picture). Joke was on us as he loved it in there!  He had all his toys and buddies in there with him and he never complained.  And as you can see, he’s got no way out which let us get supper ready.

Whew, what a day! We were all pooped when bedtime rolled around.  We had nothing planned as of that morning, but it’s funny how things just seem to Fall into your lap during those lazy Sundays.

That’s it for now, thanks for reading!