Month in Review - October

Mommy’s birthday
For Mommy’s birthday, Daddy & I took Mommy to a town called Niagara-on-the-Lake. Daddy drove us while I napped in the car. Once there we took Mommy for a nice lunch, toured around the town and then let Mommy shop for her dream Irish knit sweater that she always wanted. It was fun to see her so excited and getting spoiled on her day. I like it when Mommy is happy like that. After our day on the town, we went for another drive, but this time it was a longer drive. We drove all the way to London to see our friends Cam, Tim, Rydan & Haley. They treated us to dinner and had a surprise birthday cake for Mommy. I love going to see them. Rydan and Hailey are so much fun and they have the best collection of toys and tons of space to play.

Camp
Do you remember this place? I love it and I didn’t forget it, but I did forget how long it takes to get there. We drove and drove and drove, but finally arrived at the Camp. We came to celebrate thanksgiving, to see all the beautiful fall colours and to close the camp for the season. Our camp neighbours were also up and so was their dog Trax. He is a big dog, but very gentle. His tail would keep wacking me when he was excited. We hosted thanksgiving dinner for our neighbours and our good friends Armand & Elicia, who came out to visit for an afternoon. Apparently the fall season was my grandfather’s favourite time up there and I can totally see why. The colours on the trees were amazing. It was so peaceful at that time of the year as well. I wish we could have stayed longer. When can we go back?

I don’t like colds
Well I guess I got a cold because the Kleenex monster came back. It appears I picked up a cold either during our travels or at the various Kidnasiums or play groups I’m in. I don’t like colds. My nose was sore and my Mommy kept following me with Kleenex. I’m happy to report that after a few days I was feeling much better.

Visit from Henri

Daddy & Mommy's olden day friends (Jimmy & Catherine) came to visit us from Montreal. They brought their boy Henri. Henri and I go way back to 2009, he is my buddy. We hung out for the afternoon and played in the fall leaves and on the slides. Its too bad he lives so far away, its fun having Henri around.

Pumpkins & Playing Dress up
As you might recall from last year’s blog entry, Pumpkins are actually a fruit, not a vegetable (A pumpkin is a fruit, including tomatoes and cucumbers. They are fruits because they contain seeds and are the ripened ovary of a flower), but I don’t seem to remember people carving up oranges, apples, bananas and putting candles in them like we did with our pumpkin. But something I do remember from last year is venturing from home to home to collect the candy tax. Its still a little confusing to me, given the recent mayor’s election and talk of lowering property taxes. I sure hope the new Mayor wasn’t referring to lowering the house owner candy tax that’s paid to us kids on Halloween….I like that tax (for now). One condition of collecting this tax is to disguise oneself in a costume. So I chose to dress as Tiger from the Winnie the Poo books and it worked….I collected the candy tax and the home owners even seemed to enjoy giving the tax. Maybe the new mayor should dress up in a costume when he goes home to home to collect the grown up tax.

Happy B-day Mommy



Niagara-on-the-Lake





Nature walk at the camp

Hanging out with Henri

Halloween fun

Month in Review - September

Sorry for the Delay

We it appears I'm a little late in getting my blog updated for the month of September. For my regular readers I do apologize. You see although I manage this blog and put my thoughts and pictures on it, I do have to rely on external service providers to get it published. The current bottle neck is my Daddy's new job and recent travels, which has slowed me down. But here we are ready to go with September in review.

Second cousin Gilbert

My mommy's cousin Gilbert stayed in Toronto for a few days after Uncle Jamie's wedding. I showed him around downtown Toronto and some of the cool stuff in Dundas square. I even let him buy me ice cream and in return I tricked him into the water fountains in the square. Gilbert is from Scotland and speaks like Granddad and is also loads of fun.

My first trip to Montreal

I ventured down to Montreal for the first time in order to help my auntie Steph celebrate her marriage to Mr. Paul. This was my second wedding in two weekends, so I was a pro at this whole picture thing and giving the bride a kiss. She sure was pretty. I also got to spend a few wonderful days in Montreal. Its so neat with all its farmer's markets and small shops. We did a ton of walking and exploring. We even went up Mount Royal Mountain.

All my cousins were in Montreal for this event, even my cousins from Vancouver. My older Cousin Tor showed me how to make pictures fun by sticking your tongue out and he showed me how to get a reaction out of grown ups by jumping on the sofa and bed. He was a ton of fun. I loved hanging out with my cousins, they sure taught me a lot.

Mommy's 1/2 Marathon

I'm so proud of my Mommy. She participated in a 1/2 marathon with her cousin Becky in honour of my Great Aunt Ruth. Mommy trained hard for this marathon and was a little nervous, but I was happy for her when it was done and gave her a big hug. Mommy & Becky did great!

Showing cousin Gilbert around Toronto

fun playgrounds in Montreal

My Aunt Steph's wedding in Montreal

With Family on top of Mount Royal

Fun with my cousins

Me & auntie Susan in the car

Daddy, Mommy & I on Mount Royal

Farmer's market in Montreal

Mommy & her cousin Becky did the 1/2 marathon in Memory of Great Aunt Ruth

Mommy post race & Cousin Jessica

Month in Review - August

Mr. Ring Bearer

Jump, Jump, Jump

Early in the month we went to visit my buddy Cameron at his parents' place. We had a good sleep over and spent loads of time on a jumpy trampoline.

Mr. Gerry's Visit
Early in the month we had a visitor from Calgary. It was Mommy & Daddy's olden day friend who they worked with in Bermuda. His name was Gerry. He was so much fun. He had all these fun moves and sounds. He told me it was Kung Fu and he taught me a few moves.

Cottage Country

We were blessed and had the opportunity to go to our friend's family cottage. I went with Mommy & Daddy for an extra long weekend up there and had a great time. I learned how to drive a boat, I swam in a lake for the first time (it was colder than my bathtub) and I caught a fish on the very first try. It was so nice up there, why don't we live up there all the time? Thanks to the Levan family for sharing their weekend at the cottage with us.

Ring Bearer

At Uncle Jamie & Aunt Kristie's wedding, I had a very important job to do. I was the official ring bearer and my responsibilities were very important. I'm very pleased to say I delivered on time (with the help of Mommy) and everything went very well. It was my first wedding celebration and I had an amazing time! I even had a girlfriend for the day - a very pretty flower girl took an interest in me and was always willing to hold my hand and show me around. I even danced with her after dinner. Are all weddings this fun? Oh, I almost forgot to mention that Auntie Kristie looked very pretty that day, so did Uncle Jamie. Thank you Uncle and Auntie for letting me be part of your celebration!

Mr. Gerry

Cottage country

Levan family

1st lake swim

cottage fun

Aunt Kristie & Uncle Jamie

wedding fun

me & Granddad

Kung fu
Cottage

Month in Review - July (Part II)

Special Visitors
During the second half of July, Mommy and Daddy had some very special friends visit from Sweden. They met them while working in Bermuda in the olden days before I was born. Their names are Bjorn & Sari and they brought their son Noah with them on the trip. He is my friend. We hung out for 8 days and had some pretty cool adventures. He’s a few months older than me and he speaks Swedish, but I understood most of what he had to say.

Full Fart
Did you know that Full Fart doesn’t mean how it reads in English? It means “top speed” or “full speed”. Example – the sportsbil (Sports car) drove Full Fart (top speed). Mommy laughed and laughed when she read Noah’s book and the title was “Full Fart”. I learned lots of little Swedish sayings over their visit.

Adventures, road trips & exciting times
During their visit, Daddy took some time off work. The first day of the visit we drove up to a place called Blue Mountain Village, where Mommy & Noah’s Mommy went to a spa and Noah and I hung out with our Daddies. We went to a restaurant for lunch and then played in the water fountain. After all the excitement we picked up our Mommy’s and went to Gord’s for the weekend. At Gord’s place, we watched as our parents laughed and joked around, and drove something called an ATV. It was fun to have all that space to play around and see our parents having fun.

Niagara Falls
One of the highlights of their visit was our trip to "Niagara on the Lake" and "Niagara Falls". We did tons of touristy stuff, but it was fun to see Niagara Falls again. Mommy & Daddy upgraded Bjorn & Sari’s room so they had a “Fall’s View Room”, which was awesome. Noah and I liked the falls, but after 10 seconds we discovered a muddy puddle on the sidewalk. I stomped and jumped in it while Noah lay down on his belly in the water. Our Mommies ran to stop us, but it was too late, we got all wet. The tourists in the area didn’t seem to mind as much as our Mommies as they laughed and pointed and took pictures of us.

It was hard to say goodbye to my new friend Noah. It took me a few days to realize he’d left for home. I kept expecting him to come and play with me, but he’d left. I was sad. But I’m happy to have met him and look forward to the next time we hang out again.

Blue's Village

ATVing

Staying at Gord's

Fun in the City

Room with a view

Noah in the puddle

Noah's visitNiagaraFalls

Month in Review - July (Part I)

Me working on my blog

Centre Island

I love Canada Day long weekend. Daddy was home for an extra few days to help celebrate Canada's birthday and we went on tons of adventures. One of my favourite trips was to Centre Island just off the shores of downtown Toronto. Captain Tim and his second mate Rydan picked me, Mommy & Daddy up and boated us over to the island where I met up with my buddies Rydan and Haley. We had so much fun running around and even spent a few hours over at the kiddy rides. When we got back we had a BBQ and a bonfire, all with the city as our backdrop. I sure was tired by the time we got home that night, but it was worth it.

Down the 401

Later that weekend we picked up uncle Toddie and went down to visit Grandma Ruth for the day. We also dropped in to see my great uncle Pat. He's so cool and I love visiting his place. He has a fun doggie named "Daisy" and he has a bunch of old cars and a tractor and donkeys and goats. Plus there is tons of space to run around. I also ate corn right off the cob for the first time, which was what everyone else was doing....so why not give it a try?!

Views of Toronto

Captain Tim

fun rides

Rydan & Haley

Boys & their toys

Me working by the barn

Me & Grandma Ruth

Video