Fangs

I never thought trying to capture evidence of Kate's fangs would be so difficult.

After trying - there were lots more pictures than this I felt it was hopeless.  I mean she looks funny enough with the fangs - forget what a mutant she looks like trying to capture her from underneath?!  I was going to give up until the other day when I felt around in her mouth - as I do from time to time and felt a little something in the middle.  I was spurred into action!  Our sweet little dracula!  She has two middle bottom teeth and fangs - four teeth in total.  Who knows when this smile will change again.

The Royal

Ken and I both have fond memories of going to the Royal Agricutural Winter Fair as children.  And not that Kate is able to make memories she'll keep yet, but we thought it would be fun to take her to the fair, and fun it was!

Our first stop was the horse ring.  We watched a horse and rider being presented, and then we walked around a few of the horse stalls.  Kate was so excited.  Our next stop was the petting farm, goats, and cows and sheep oh my!

They had cups of food for sale that you could feed to the animals.  I fed the animals while Kate watched.  Every so often she would sort of touch an animal.  There were sheep, goats, llamas, and calves.  This picture is not even remotely flattering of me, but it is funny.  I was just slightly icked out by the calf putting his very wet nose all over my hand.  Ken remarked, at least I've never been sneezed on by a cow!  And just in case you were wondering, I used lots of hand sanitizer and washed my hands several times.

After seeing the little animals we walked past the BIG cows.

Our next stop was the Superdog show.  It was super.  The dogs were great.  First on the program was the high jump.  Then came the races.  The show was about 35 minutes long.  Kate got into it shouting at the dogs.

After a morning of almost more excitement then she could handle Kate fell asleep.  Ken and I enjoyed yummy Indian food and walked around a little bit more.  Hopefully we'll go again in a few years, when Kate will actually be able to remember, for now, she'll have pictures.

Ten Months Old

To mark the occasion of Kate's turning ten months old, Ken took a picture of her.

We went to church and I took a picture of her.

It was a beautiful day so we went to the park.  Her Daddy needed to see how much she loves the swings.

After the park we walked past the Tottenham Cenotaph.

We paused for a quiet moment of respect.

And to end a lovely day, Kate had a bath.

We love our cute girl so much!

The Tragic Tale of Kate's First Halloween!

After the sad Berry-Fairy ordeal I was still optimistic that Kate would enjoy Halloween...

Kate and I flew home from New Hampshire on Friday the 30th.  I wanted us to spend Kate's first Halloween together as a family.  I was moving in slow motion on Saturday morning and well the morning turned into afternoon.  We decided to go grocery shopping in Alliston.  We were going to purchase a pumpkin, go home and carve the pumpkin and decorate for Halloween.  About five minutes before we got to the grocery store, Kate fell asleep.

I had dressed her in her costume because all of the store owners in Alliston hand out candy on Halloween and even though we wouldn't be asking for candy I wanted Kate to be in costume too.  I had orginally tried to dress her in the Berry-Fairy costume - silly me.  The minute I put it on her she started to cry.  I had wanted to do a midday costume change.  I wanted to start with the Berry-Fairy and then switch after we'd carved the pumpkin.  I was worried about goo.  However, Kate has expensive taste it would seem and she refused to wear the cheap Berry-Fairy costume.  So I put the Tinkerbell costume on, so Kate could look cute in the car?! 

This is me waiting...(I was bored, not angry) Ken was in the grocery store for an hour.  Then we drove to Canadian Tire... and still she slept.

Kate woke up when we were pulling out of the Canadian Tire parking lot.  We drove home through Beeton so that we could buy a pumpkin from a stand, as the supermarket was sold out.  We bought a five dollar pumpkin from the first stand that we saw.  They had a locked metal money container attached to a post in the ground with prices beside all of the different sized pumpkins and gourds.  The only money we had was an American $5.00 bill.  So I picked out a $5.00 pumpkin, put the money in the box and hoped they wouldn't mind...  When we got home Kate and I set about cleaning out the pumpkin.

Next Ken took over and carved the pumpkin.  I wanted a simple Jack-o-lantern.  Ken gave it four teeth - because Kate has four teeth and he gave it a cute curl of "hair".  Kate couldn't decide whether or not she liked it.

Ken had purchased the cute pumpkin lights earlier in the week.  I thought they looked great.

We ordered pizza from the local place - for the first time.  It was really good.  Everything was looking great.  The day had come together nicely...

...that is until the trick-o-treaters showed up!  I thought for sure Kate would be tickled to see so many different kids come to the house.  Boy was I wrong.  The first set of kids brought on tears and sobs.  The second set, more tears and sobs.  I took her outside before the third set thinking that perhaps she would like to greet the kids outside, this seemed to work.  For the fourth set we went back inside and there were more tears and sobs.  I decided to put Kate out of her misery and after removing her from her costume, I put her to bed!  And so ends our somewhat tragic tale of Kate's first Halloween.

New Hampshire - Kate + Overview

COLOUR!  The INS officer at the airport didn't ask me a single question.  He did however talk to me about how lovely the colours were in New Hampshire this time of year.  And yes, the colours were gorgeous.  Okay, I'm lying, he did ask me one question, he asked me in Spanish if I spoke Spanish.  He had just practiced his Spanish and was looking for more practice.

These pictures were taken outside of the library.  The leaves were in abundance and the red and yellow and the blue sky, deep breath in and happy sigh - so beautiful!

This was the first of a few attempts at taking a picture of the girls in the brown chair.  The little monkeys would never smile in the same shot.  Either Kate was losing her mind, or Anna was!  I was a little bummed about not getting a single cute shot on the brown chair.  This is perhaps the best one, Anna is practically smiling and if you don't know Kate very well you might think that she's sort of smiling - even though she isn't.

Amidst all of the craziness that is Suzanne's life right now we did manage to have a few outings.  We took Thomas, Anna and Kate to the Boston Children's museum which was fun.  Kate will enjoy it more in a few years of course - or even next year.  There was a small area in one of the rooms for crawlers only.  I thought she'd explore more but she decided to have a shy moment.

We also went into Boston on another day and we went to Harvard - with all the kids!  Matthew is taking a class at Harvard and we went to show the kids where Matthew is going to school.  The boys played a little bit of soccer which I found amusing.  A few passersby kicked the ball back to them.

After we walked around campus and enjoyed our yummy sandwiches we walked to a cupcake store in Harvard Square called Sweet.  Oh my goodness the cupcakes were so good.

As previously mentioned we made a trip to the library.  This is the one and only picture I have of Kate with her Auntie Suzanne.  I must do better next time!

There was also trunk or treat - the Halloween activity at church.  I was pleasently surprised by how into it everyone was - the kids, the youth, the adults - so many awesome costumes.  Kate didn't like her Berry Fairy costume one little bit.  I took a few photos and then called off the torture!  She wore a bear suit, which didn't really look like a costume, oh well.

Mostly we just hung out.  I tried to protect Kate from her cousins - and her cousins from her (she tried to bite Anna, several times!).

Sometimes I protected her better than other times...

She definitely developed a love for her Uncle Matthew this trip.

We played outside in Suzanne's awesome backyard.

We went for a few walks.

And before you knew it, it was time to come home again.  Every time we visit both Suzanne and I lament "we wish we lived closer".  I do wish we lived closer.  But I do feel blessed that we see each other as often as we do - especially this year!

A word about my little flyer...

We had fun playing with the airport toys.  And yes Suzanne - in her Harvard outfit everyone thought she was a boy.  I was able to bring the car seat on the plane with me on both the trip to NH and the trip home - YAY!  Kate is such a good little flyer.  She nursed to sleep and slept pretty much the whole flight there and the return flight as well.  It helps that the flight is only about 90 minutes!

So Bates family, we love you and we miss you.  We're keeping our fingers crossed that we'll be spending Christmas with you!!

New Hampshire - Isaac

I would like to know what happened?!  Isaac, when did you stop being this?

And when exactly did you start being this?

I know it isn't cool to say 'look at how much you've grown'.  I vaguely remember people saying it to me.  What am I supposed to do, not grow up?  Isaac, I'm not asking you to stop growing up, but could you slow down a little?  Isaac, I'm so glad that you love music!

I'm so glad that you love to read.

I'm so glad that you love school.

I'm so glad that you love to be silly!

But mostly I am just so glad (more than glad!) that you are my nephew!