Oilers Fan

Today we decided to brave the crowds and stand in line to get some autographs for Joshua's jersey. There were different spots set up around West Edmonton Mall today with different members of the Edmonton Oilers signing autographs today. I normally don't get caught up with autographs but we thought it would really cool to get Joshua's itty bitty jersey signed. We decided to stand in line for Sam Gagner and Steve Staios' autographs. We were suprised that the line moved as quickly as it did and that Joshua was in a great mood the entire time.

"Give me that camera"

Sam Gagne

Fernando Pisani (Fernando!!!)

These shoes are made for walking

Joshua got his first pair of walking shoes for Christmas (thanks Great Grandpa). I spent a lot of time trying to figure out what he would need and I quickly realized that Alberta is missing one very important children's shop, Kiddie Kobbler, this chain is all over Ontario but no where else really. In Alberta there are no real children's shoe stores which made finding a good fair of first shoes quite a challenge. As luck would have it we were walking through West Edmonton Mall before Christmas and came a cross and store called GEOX. I had heard of this brand before when I was in a Kiddie Kobbler in Ontario so I stopped in and was delighted to find a fairly good selection of children's shoes. So we got a pair of cute brown one's that had velcro on them, only to realize that his foot were far to narrow for velcro so we went back and exchanged them for a pair that lace up. The new ones are a much better fit and stay on his feet very well.

More Christmas Celebrations!

To finish off our Christmas posts!

On Christmas afternoon we went out to my Aunt and Uncle's house and celebrated with about 20 other relatives, it was a great time. Unfortunately we missed the wagon ride with everyone, but Joshua got his very own Daddy drawn sled ride (thanks Opa and Nona). Later on Joshua enjoyed spending time with relatives and had a great time laughing with Auntie Meaghan and Marc!

43 days to go, I am so not ready for this.

I can't believe it, in 43 days my wee boy turns One. When I think to much about it I become overwhelmed with everything from happiness to sadnees that he growing up so quickly and soon I will be returning to work I won't get to see him every day.

I am trying to decide how carried away to get with his birthday I see some people going all out and I think why bother he won't remember, but the other part of me wants to do it ALL; minus the clown of course, but maybe a petting zoo ;). So what is a happy medium that both Chris and I can agree on? Tough question, but I suppose I should start thinking about it soon. One thing is for sure, there will be cake smashing!

10 Months

Well Joshua's 10 month milestone has come and gone and I completely missed posting about it. Unfortunately it was the same day that we got into a car accident, we are all fine, so I was without a car for 2 weeks and didn't get Joshua to the Well Baby Clinic to get weighed so I have no idea how much he weighs right now.

He is crawling everywhere now and getting into everything, sure makes it more difficult to get things done. He has also started climbing the stairs and will go all the way to the top if I let. In the beginning it was great because he couldn't figure out how to climb the step from the living room to the kitchen dining room so it was like he was in a giant playpen, unfortunately that didn't last long! He loves crawling over the the big windows in the living room and staring out the windows, especially when we had someone working on our garage!

I am happy to report that Joshua is sleeping through the night (in his crib) again, it took a while to get back to this point, but it has been great to sleep again. His daytime naps are a bit out of wack, but I am more than willing to live with that if it means that I can sleep through the night.

He continues to amaze us everyday and its hard to believe he is 10 months old already.

Happy New Year

OK so I am a bit late with my New Years post!

Joshua had a quiet evening at home sleeping while Grandma looked after him and Chris and I got to spend a quient evening with friends, it was a great night but I was sure exhausted the next day from being up so late and having to get up so early to take care of Joshua!

I have decided to make some resolutions this year, in the past I have not really made any so I this is essentially my first shot at it.

1. Make sure I update the blog more often than I am, my goal is at least 3 time a week!
2. Get back in to exercising!
3. Get my house into tip-top shape before I go back to work!
4. Read more!
5. Keep in better touch with my friends!

I hope that everyone has a very happy and healthy 2008!

Christmas Morning

We had a lovely Chrismas Morning, Grandma, Auntie Sarah and Auntie Emma came over to open presents at our house. It was the first time we have ever opened presents in our own how and the first time we have really had any presents under our tree. Joshua was fascinated by all the presents that appeared under the tree while he was asleep and attempted to climb the mountain.

We all received wonderful gifts, Joshua got lots of toys and clothes.

Christmas Eve I

I am little behind so here I go.

The holiday's were wonderful for us! Christmas Eve we went to Mass, we went much earlier than in previous years to accomodate Joshua's bedtime. Joshua was very good through the entire mass, mainly because he fell asleep on Auntie Sarah.

After Mass we came home and got Joshua ready for bed and he opened up his Christmas pjs from us, this is a tradition that I wanted start and then he got ready for bed and Chris, Angela, Sarah, Emma and I had nice evening in with lots of food.

Some Early Christmas Presents

On the Saturday before Christmas Opa and Nona came to drop off some presents for Joshua, since i figured he would have more than enough to open on Christmas morning we opened a few together.



It was a lot of fun, Joshua got his very first ride on Digger and a new pair of Edmonton Oilers pajamas, since he outgrew his first pair a long time ago.

Finally Crawling

What an exciting morning we have had today, Joshua has finally started crawling, it is still a bit slow and a bit shakey, but he has finally progressed from his thrusting movements. For a month and a half now he has been fairly mobile, but this movement involved him thrusting around the house, getting up on his hands and knees rocking back and forth and shooting himself forward, he was not understanding that he needed to use his arms, until this morning. He also started being able to sit himself up on his own and he has started to climb me. I know not all babies learn to crawl and "apparently" the norm for sitting up on their own was 11 months but I was getting a bit anxious for him to meet these milestones. He has also started climbing the step from the living room to the kitchen/dining room so he can get all over our main floor. Good thing we moved our playpen on to the mainfloor, otherwise I don't know how I would get anything done.

Waldo

Meet the newest addition to our family, Waldo. We picked him up for the Edmonton Humane Society a week ago. He is 3 months old and is a wonderful kitten so far. Joshua loves watching and Scott, the bunny, has been enjoying putting him in his place!

Family Pictures

Teaser

Here is a one of the photos from our family photo shoot that we had on the weekend, more to come soon.

9 Months Old

So I am a bit behind on this since he turned Nine Months last Thursday. I still can't believe how quickly the time goes when you have a little one.

Except for the last couple of weeks things have continued to be great, unfortunately our family has been hit with a couple of colds, but we all seem to be on the mend. Luckily the worst that Joshua got was a runny nose.

Sleeping has become and ever increasing problem, that I am working hard on rectifying. He has gone from sleeping through the night to now wanting to sleep next to us all night, yes I broke down and started bringing him in to bed with us, so now I am trying to get him to stay in his crib for the entire night and hopefully get him back to sleeping through the night. I have dubbed this "Baby Boot Camp" and we are currently on Day 4. He has spent the last two nights in his crib but is waking quite frequently. When he was sleeping in our bed he took to nursing frequently, at least every two hours, so I am also trying to get him back to only nursing two times per night instead. I think it is going to be a long process but it is definitely necessary.

Despite Chris and I being sure he was going to take off crawling as soon as he learned to rock, he still has yet to do it. He now rocks and pushes up high on his toes in a reverse v shape, but still no crawling. I am sure once we get the Christmas Tree up this weekend he will have the motivation he needed to start.

Mmmm Blueberries

Since Joshua continues to show a lack of interest in anything that I feed him on a spoon I am continuing to find new things for him to it in non-pureed form. This morning I gave him some whole blueberries, they were nice and soft so he munched them down quite easily.

Among his favourite things to eat on his own now are:

• bananas


• egg yolks


• cheese


• shredded chicken


• cottage cheese (so messy though)


• carrot (cooked of course)


• Cheerios


• Puffs


• Baby Mum mum rice rusks

I am still battling to get him to eat his cereals so if anyone has any suggestions please share!

Adventures in Self Feeding

Over the last month I have been introducing Joshua to the idea of feeding himself, like most babies it took him a bit of time to figure things out but now it seems to be his preferred way of eating.

I took this video of Joshua the first time I gave him a piece of banana.

I have been a bad blogger!

Sorry things have been a bit busy lately but I promise to post some new pics and some updates in the next few days!

Cluck, Cluck

Happy Halloween!