visits and vball

The last few days have been full of amazing visits and volleyball action, and now, things have simmered just about as low as they can go. Well, no no no, not really. On Thursday Steve left for a hotel in Kanata (boo) - they had games to play on Friday and Saturday night against Slovakia (World League qualifying matches) - and some new friends Jen and Cooper came over for dinner. On Friday my very very verrrry good friend Anne-Marie (remember her from last summer? we had a solid preggers visit last August) came down from Montreal with her little bean Marianne, for visiting and volleyball too, and it was SO good to see her and meet her babe. What did we even do? Um... hm. We talked non-stop, walked and ate, and observed the kiddies playing with and ignoring each other. It was funny to see them together - sometimes so keenly interested in each other (grab smack pull, and the two moms - "gentle! gentle! doucement!!") and othertimes crawling over or past each other as if completely alone in the room. So yeah, it was great seeing her and great too to see Steve back in action on Friday night at Scotiabank Place. They lost on Friday night but, to get ahead of myself, won on Saturday, which means more games in a few weeks in the next round of the qualification process for next summer's World League. We had the Fab Four back here on Friday night, and our place - though just two bedrooms - really held the whole lot of us quite comfortably I must say. Hendrik was happy in our room, and it was nice for me (minus the middle of the night wake up) to have him in there... hearing his breathing and waking up to smiles right there at the foot of the bed was not such a bad way to start the day. On Saturday Amer and I walked and talked (and ate) some more, and when she left for home I left for the game and a big win - woooop woop! It was great seeing everyone on top of their game and playing with a bit more confidence. I'm hoping that the team can keep building building building, and ultimately qualify for London 2012 next summer - that's my long term hope BUT (and I'll admit that this is outright downright selfish) I hope they qualify for the World Cup in September so that Hendrik and I can tag along and watch them in action IN JAPAN in November. Ha, there you go.

dinner!

Okay and onwards. Now, the simmering; Steve had to leave this morning for TWO whole weeks.. boo! They'll be training and playing in the Czech Republic (stop number one), Slovenia (stop 2) and Estonia (stop 3) - busy! It will be interesting being alone with Hendrik, though thankfully, I've got babysitters not four hours away who are willing to come up for chunk #2 of my volleyball camp. Planning for that is going well, but there's still much to do. Ok, time for bed - but first... our little guy is eight months old now! AND - as we just noticed today - he has another tooth on the way... that makes seven - ak!!

on his 8-month birthday... it's going by way too fast!

checking out the ipad with grandpa brinkman

hanging out with another new friend ")

happy guys!

summer produce, summer projects

summer produce - mmmmmm

I stayed up waaaay too late last night reading Emma Donahue's Room; it wasn't until 12:30 that I gave in, put the book down and turned off the light. At first I wasn't completely into reading the kidspeak, and I ended up doing some skimming here and there - reading the grammatically incorrect and chopped up language was a bit too much to read word for word. The story behind the story is creepy (reminds me of the Austrian man who kept his daughter etc etc - so so so so horrible) but since you don't get much of that and it's all coming from a very naive perspective it's good; I don't stay up until 12:30 that often any more (sad sad sad), so that's saying something. Mr Muffin was up at 5:00 this morning, and I cut to the chase and fed him right away in a half-awake zombie trance, and then it was back to bed for the both of us thank goodness... and we all slept until 7:45 - bliss! On the topic of books, my current favourite kiddie tome is Love is You and Me - so poignant and cute, and the pictures are simple and perfect.

art projects! better pictures to come once they're up on a wall where they belong

for now they'll just hang out with all of the stuff that should be in our furnace room, but is stashed in a corner; the ceiling in there (drip drip drip) still needs to be put back together

We've had a few projects this week - some impromptu and some planned for weeks, or er, actually, months. I bought canvases from Michael's hmmm, when would that have been? Well anyways, it was months ago, and we finally got around to taking them out of their plastic wrappers and dousing them - or one of them - with colour. I didn't take any pictures of the artists at work, but armed with brushes, wine and lots of little bottles of paint, vee vent to vork! (said in a french artiste voice) and were totally prepared to be disappointed by the end product. BUT! It worked out and we love it. Now the challenge is getting this ouevre up on the wall before another two months jet by. Art project number two (inspired by this post at Young House Love) is in progress, but may have to be put up on the shelf until Steve gets back from his trip. Is that news? Yes - Steve and his team of vballers are leaving for a European tour/trip on Sunday for two(ish) weeks :( It will be strange not having him around, and even more strange for him to not see his son - for that long. Mrrrr... but there's skype and email and yadda yadda, so it won't be so bad, right?



So the art thing was our non-impromptu project, and our spur of the moment deal was buying a whole bunch of fruit and prepping and freezing it for future enjoyment. My mom has always canned - or frozen I should say - fruit, and throughout our childhood we enjoyed peaches and applesauce, plums and rhubarb, strawberries and apricots throughout the winter. Of course, we had no idea how amazing it was to have such delicious fruit in the throes of winter - it was normal for us to have fruit and cookies for dessert every night. (YUM.) Here and now, it was Steve's initiative, and the freezer is now stocked with 6 or 7 jars of raspberries, and 3 jars of strawberries... mmm mmm good. I mean, yeah, okay, we're not sure that we'll be here in the winter (Plan A is for Steve to get a vb contract overseas somewhere) but the fruit will either be there or already gobbled - we'll see how long it lasts in there.

Okay, and to finish (I'm fading fast here), one - just one! - pic of our cute little boy.... oh how I love him!!!

the latest

trying to beat the heat with a quick trip to the park

Ouuuuf it has been HOT out! I find it kind of unbelievable that a place can be so hot in the summer and so cold in the winter. It topped out yesterday at 39 degrees (45 with the humidex) and is thankfully a bit cooler (yeah, right) today with a high of 33. Besides a quick walk and two minute swing ride, we've been inside almost all week. Well, there was also a too-hot afternoon up at Dan's cot on the Gatineau river; I actually considered leaving because I felt like a flaming ball of fire - blech. Anyways, I suppose I shouldn't really complain - if it weren't for Hendrik I'd probably be spending more time outside, and really, all I have to do is remember the cold winter bite and I'll umm, yeah, I'll stop all this hot weather cogitation.

almost 8 months and on the move

SO! As per usual, there is lots to catch up on. The last bit of our vacation was superb, and we had a great time at Peter and Lisa's wedding in Oakville. We made it to the church just in time for the beautiful bride to walk down the aisle and wed her groom (yay!) and then, after a gathering at the Lewis household, headed for the dinner and re-ception. Hendrik was soooo well-behaved, and even fell asleep on Steve after the first dance, allowing all three of us to join guests and the bride and groom on the dance floor for Louis Armstrong's What a Wonderful World. And yes, it was as cute as can be. Steve managed to do a successful transfer to his car seat, and Hendrik slept in a corner while we both ripped it up on the dance floor for 20 minutes. And then the poor little dude woke up screeeeeaming; I'm sure the loud music and dark, unfamiliar surroundings didn't help him out at all - and that was my cue to scoop him up and head for the hotel.

yay! congrats to peter and lisa :)

my two guys

Some of these Bison champs were at the wedding, and came to ours too - spot anyone familiar?

We stopped a few times on our way back home on Sunday - in Bowmanville, and then up at the cottage for dinner and a jump or two in the river - and now, life is as it was before. Well, not really. Hendrik is crawling and cruising everywhere, and we're babyproofing on the go - so life is different for us all. He's adorable though - he'll crawl and sit and clap, then crawl and sit and clap (see vid above), and he laughs and is a happy little dude almost all the time. He's been up a bit at night which is not my most favourite thing, but we've lucked out on the sleep thing thus far, so I can't really complain. He's still a champ when it comes to eating, and besides quinoa, just about everything we've put in front of him gets gobbled. And that's pretty much it as far as Hendrik updates go - I know that's what everyone really wants to read about anyways (right?), so now on to his parentals. I'm staying super busy with both the mom thing and the volleyball program I'm running - sometimes I wonder how people with more on their plate do it - when do you get groceries? When do you cook? Anyways - Steve is back in the swing of things (paaaaha) in the gym and is feeling good, so woop, that's good news. The team has a few games next week here in Ottawa against Slovakia - they're competing for a chance for a spot in World League next summer... should be good! And I'm going to end this blog with two golden tidbits of information: Number UNO: over the last few days I've had some amazing chats with friends that are far far away, way out west, and it's been awesome. Number TWO: At Costco the other day a 15-pack of KRISPY KREME donuts jumped into my cart and followed me home and I had to throw them in the freezer and slam the door after eating not one not two but three donuts. Why? Why does Costco have to sell 15 packs of donuts? YUM. I shouldn't really complain about that either. :)

Emballage valeur is right - yummm!

a crowe and b-ville shorty

Coffee commercial? Coffee and morning sunshine... perfection!

Here are the last of my pictures from our time up at the Crowe; I'm sure there are some other gems out there but before time gets away from me (again - this is a recurring theme here), I'll post 'em. We're headed into Toronto this weekend for a wedding, and it is going to be epic! Well hmm, maybe not so much... I'll have Hendrik by my side and I'm thinking we'll head home on the early side (for me) on Saturday night and let Poppa Steve ham it up with his friends. A lot of the people that made our wedding such a blast will be there, so I'm sure it will be lots and lots of fun. Um um um so I should go and pack up - there are some B-ville pics thrown in here too... we've had such a great vacation!

Hendrik still LOVEs being on his feet - and he liked the guitar too. Baby Beluga was the favourite - the New Raffi up at the Crowe

Fishing!

Mmmm pizza on the grill... it's the BEST!

Erin and Fred, pizza chefs extraordinaire!

He LOVES this play table; thank you Jordynn! I keep meaning to thank you and your family again for this gift :)

happy and happy :)

pool party

There is a serious backlog of blogs going on in my brain, and not a whole lot of time to get them up here, so I'm just going to cut to the chase and start with what's fresh; namely, an afternoon pool party at Pam and Bob's. They have an AMAZING back yard - pool, trees, sunny spots, shady spots, and the whole lot of us went over to visit and enjoy a sunny afternoon on Tuesday. We pooled and then after some Bob BBQ action, had a delicious dinner on the deck. And then there was dessert (cheesecake - yummmm) and coffee (with the Keurig making it's way outside even - ooh la la) followed by ab-workout induced laughter at a few of the nicknames being thrown around (smelly, stinky, P.U.bus to name a few). Here are pics... and it's time to get off the computer and on with my day :).



i

the new raffi and his one-man dance troupe

happy belated canada day to all ")

Okay, so this Canada Day post is a little late but hey, better late than never, right? Rewind two weeks.... We were planning on being up at the Brinkman-Tukker cottage on the first of July, but a change of plans too us to Dan's humble summer abode on the Gatineau river. It was a near perfect day spent with friends on, off and in the water, though Hendrik wasn't as big of a fan of the boat ride (in a not as humble fancy-ish fabulous speed boat) as we were. We boated and tubed and fell (/flew) off and into the water and it was super fun and such a perfect way to spend a day meant for celebrating our country. July 1st was also the first day we fed him solid food for breakfast and whether it was the result of three solid mushy meals or not, he started babbling in near full force in the afternoon. All eyes and ears were riveted on the little dude and he had everyone's attention for a solid 30 minutes. There's not too much else to report about the day - it was a great way to kick off our two weeks of vacay; here's to friends and food and our spectacular country!

more crowe cottaging!

There is WAY too much to blog about - way too much. So, since we're just back from cottage country and I don't want to overdo it on the time vortex that is the internet, I'm going to - once again - stick to pictures. Well, mostly. I have to update all of you readers... Hendrik is now babbling (as of July 1), crawling AND knows how to drink out of a sippy cup - kapow! How's that for a few milestones?! He also has two more teeth (see pic) and loves to show them off; we have one happy little babe. Okay, so pictures, and more words to come.

All ready for Hendrik's first bonfire, wearing a very Canadian moose shirt (hand-me down from Jayme and Hendrix and family - thanks!) - and Dad... nice hat!

Bonfire! And s'mores... mmmm mmm yums.

Campfire + family + s'mores = near perfection!

A big huge congrats to Paul and Steph and their families on the arrival of baby James on July 5, 2011!