Where has the Time Gone?

So, it's almost time for me to go back to work! I can't believe that Breagha will be a year soon. The time really did fly by. And that means that I go back to work - on July 9th to be exact. I've kind of got mixed feelings about it. I'm definitely looking forward to a real paycheck! And I'm going to have a home office and do 4 days a week. So, I like all that. But, I hate sending the kids off to daycare for so long. I'm sure it will all work out!

We've been quite busy the past week. Lots of car searching...yeah, we're buying a new car. Well, not new, but new to us! And Darryl started working on my home office. So, it's been busy around our house. Last weekend was St. Jean Baptiste so Monday was a holiday. And this weekend is Canada Day. And Monday is a holiday. Gotta love it!!

Last Friday we went to Darryl's Grandmother's in Dorval. We had a wonderful dinner and got to see some of Darryl's family. His uncle, half-uncle? Something like that....Anyhow, Fred has 3 girls so it was nice to see them.

This is Breagha with Gabriella. She's 8 and loves horses!

Breagha with Great Gramma Terri. (Darryl's gramma if you didn't figure it out)

Gaby, Breagha, and Erin. (Erin is almost 4)

Fred and the boys...and the girls playing with Breagha.

Dessert...ice cream! The best part of the meal for the kids!

So, Darryl was busy on Saturday with the home office so I decided to take the kids to the park. We got a kite from Aunt Cheryl and we decided to try it out. But, Shamus was more interested in the string...and teasing Indo with it! It was pretty cute! Shamus got a big kick out of watching Indo chase it.

Taunting poor Indo.

More "string" action.

We did go to the park with the kite but it wasn't quite windy enough and Shamus lost interest very quickly. He's new favorite thing at the park is the trampoline.

Breagha enjoying the warm weather in the backyard. It's been soooooo hot here lately. It was 34 yesterday and 37 with the humidex. Today is about 32. The Montreal summer is definitely here. I love when it's about 23-26 degrees...but any higher is getting really hot. BUT, I will never complain because our winter was way too long!!

It's suppose to rain a bit tonight so tomorrow should be cooler.

Breagha had her first trip to Daycare yesterday. (This was the kids before we left. And that's Shamus "posing" for the camera...eyes close and a BIG smile. Nice.) She spent an hour there with me. And today was an hour without me. She did pretty good. I thought she would cry the whole time...she's been very attached to me since our NYC trip. But, the instructor said that she cried a little on and off. That's excellent I think. So, next week will be a couple of hours each day and then full time on July 9!!! I hope she does well.

One more pic before we leave. I was kind of sad as this means that I have no more babies. sniff sniff. I have mixed feelings about it. I like that we don't have the midnight feedings and all that. But, I love new babies so I'm sad to see Breagha off to daycare. She still seems too small.

Oh well...nothing I can do about it! Like I said, Time Flies!!!

This weekend we were invited to Dave And Ksenija's for a Canada Day BBQ. And we're picking up the new car tomorrow. It's a 2004 Toyota Corolla. Sport. (that's important to Darryl)

That's been our busy lives. Next week is my last week before back to work. Not sure what I'll be doing!!!

HAPPY CANADA DAY EVERYONE!!!!!!! HAVE A KEITH'S...OR 2!

A moment in time.

Well if you want a bit of good entertainment all you need is a two year old child and a parrot. Yes, you heard me right ... two year old + parrot = FUN. Sas and I went to look at cars at the Toyota dealership next door tonight. We of course took the kids which then turned into a short walk around the neighborhood (because the evenings have been beautiful of late). This in turn became a visit to the mall which has the pet store that Shamus loves to visit.

We do our usual rounds: the minature turtles, then the lizards, and onto the snakes. A quick pass of the fish and scorpions. Next a nice visit with the puppies and finally the big turtles. Yes, it is a venerable microcosm of nature in its purest form.

Now this seemed like every other visit that we have made to this little animal kingdom until we passed the bird cages and we heard "Hello...". A little check around our immediate vacinity confirms that all patrons are in there proper animal viewing positions. Then ... "Hello" again. Wait ... where is that coming from? Is ... is it the parrot? So I tell Shamus to say hello to the bird. A two year old talking to a bird looks way more sane than a thirty-something chatting up a parrot. So Shamus says hello and the bird returns "Hello" Shamus giggles and replies "hello" which the bird once again says "hello". I wish I had the literary deftness to relay the entire "Shamus vs Bird" experience. Please take my word for it that it was pure magic. One of those rare spontaneous moments that only a child can show us. It was so infectious and entertaining to watch the back and forth banter between him and the bird. Each response from the parrot spawned another giggle which grew until it finally became belly laughs.

On the way out we returned to say another quick "hello" to Mr. Parrot. As a treat just as we were leaving Shamus said "bye Parrot" (as he always says buy to all the animals and also pretty much any object ... like buses and boxes, cars, etc...) and of course the parrot replied "BYE".

Happy Father's Day Dad!!!

Happy Father's Day to Darrylie and to our own wonderful Dads. We love you very much.

Have a great day!!!

Right now Shamus worrrrrrrships Darryl. Totally worships Darryl. I can't do anything for him. It HAS to be Dad. So, Shamus is Darryl's shadow. It's pretty cute but I think Darryl needs a rest!

A gift from Breagha...

A card that Shamus made for Dad...very cute...

And a gift from Shamus...

So, we didn't do anything too crazy for Father's Day. Our trip away was our treat. But, we love Darryl very, very much and he's the Best Dad in The World!!

We've had very hot weather the last while so we pulled out the duck pool. A great way for the kids to cool off. It's suppose to be +33 on Tuesday!

Breagha is learning how to grab at everything. Here she is trying to take off Shamus' hat. He's pretty good about it but gets annoyed sometimes. Wait until she learns how to walk! And she's getting pretty good at standing so look out!

Breagha just chillin' out...

So, that's our weekend. The weather has been amazing. Hot, but we're loving it.

I hope everyone is well!! Happy Father's Day!!

Cap St. Jacques Beach...

We went to Cap St. Jacques beach on Friday. It was excellent! Shamus absolutely loved it!! It was suppose to be Breagha's nap while we were there so she wasn't "full out" like Shamus! He definitely has a love for the water.

Shamus and Matteo are soooooo alike. They love to hang out together but then they fight after 2 minutes together! I guess it's part of being 2!

Aidan and Breagha. Aidan wasn't a big fan of the water so he hung out with Breagha.

Shamus did not stop the whole time we were there. He had a blast.

Strolling the beach...

After the beach we had lunch on one of the picnic tables. Then the kids did lots of running around on the trails.

Preetha is a great entertainer for the kids. She had them doing the whole song..."Put your left foot, take your left foot out"....I guess that is why she works with kids for a living!!!

And it's officially out...Preetha is expecting her second child! She's 10weeks and verrrry tired...but excited too!! Congrats to Preetha and Joe!!

All Our Visitors!!

So, we got back from NYC on Tuesday night and had Wednesday and Thursday to spend with Darryl's parents. Shamus loved having them around and it was sad to see them go! They left on Thursday night and went to Ottawa to visit their other kids...Tracy and Shawn. My sister, Cheryl, arrived on Thursday morning. It's been quite busy! We love having visitors though so no complaining here!

Shirley, my Mom-In-Law, took me shopping...yeah, she knew more shopping spots on DesSources than I did! We did pretty good and it was nice to get out and enjoy some time with Shirley before she left. I'm sure she needed the break from babysitting! Breagha stuck pretty close to Shirley while I was away so I think Breagha will miss her lots!

We got this book from Jennifer...when Shamus was born. The best book ever! The kids love it! Baby Einstein is an excellent gift.

Breagha with Grammie Shirley

She was suppose to be drinking her bottle...but her toes always distracts her!

Aunt Cheryl arrived!

Gunka (Grandpa Duncan) and Grammie saying GoodBye to Shamus.

Ah, more lobsters! God Bless my siblings! They know how to take care of me! I love lobster so Cheryl brought up some from home. My nephew, Mitch actually fished them so a Big Thanks to Mitch!

Shamus just thought they were cool.

We took Cheryl to the Botannical Gardens. She did some serious shopping while she was here but I think the Gardens was her favorite part of the trip. Anyone who knows Cheryl, knows that she is a big gardener.

Admiring some flower...shrub...tree...thing. Yeah, I'm not so good with the gardening thing! But, I am working on it!

Shamus had a great time. He's getting very independent and did his own thing.

Or he was busy having Darryl drag him around on his shoulders. Darryl's the best Dad!

Just a cute picture.

He enjoyed all the stairs.

Hanging out in the Chinese Gardens. Darryl's favorite part.

Yes, Breagha did come with us...but she slept in the stroller the whole time we were there! So, no pictures of Breagha at the Gardens!

So, we did lots of shopping while Cheryl was here. Well, she did lots of shopping and I helped carry the bags!! We went out to dinner...a girls night out. We went to a new restaurant on St. Jean called "Karma". It's an Indian restaurant...which is a big step for me!!! Preetha ordered everyones food! hehee...Cheryl and I aren't too good with spicy...and everything was yummy! I really liked it and the restaurant is beautiful. The only 5Star Indian restaurant in Montreal. So, we had a wonderful time.

Cheryl left on Monday and now it's back to busy! She helped me buy a bunch of new flowers/shrubs for our flowers beds so I finished planting them yesterday. I'm really enjoying the time outside and I'm really happy with the excellent weather we've been getting. I've actually got a pretty good tan already! The kids and I are hoping to get to the Cap St. Jacques beach on Friday so maybe we'll have some new pictures! Crossing my fingers for sunny weather.

New York City Baby!!!

So, the trip to NYC was wooooonderful!! I loved it! The city was amazing, very friendly, very busy....of course, and just had a wonderful vibe!

We arrived very early on Saturday morning - 8:00am! So, we dropped off our luggage at the hotel...which wasn't as bad as I thought it would be...and we started our shopping day! Oh yeah baby!! We were only a couple of blocks from Broadway and started towards Time Square. It was amazing. There are billboards everywhere! It was really cool to get to experience. I loved it there. It's definitely friendlier than Montreal! I thought anyway. We got to do alot and see alot but we still relaxed, didn't rush anywhere, and slept in! What a treat!

Thanks again to Darryl's wonderful parents for taking care of Shamus and Breagha. They did very well, by the way. Breagha was a bit lonely on Saturday and would do a little cry every now and then...and that was it. Shamus asked for us on Saturday morning, and that was it! His cousins came in from Ottawa and he had a blast! I don't think he was too worried that we were gone!!!

Here are a few shots of the trip:

I was pretty impressed with all the billboards. They really are everywhere...well, in the Time Square area. Of course they aren't all over Manhatten! They're huge too. I saw one ad for Aveeno cream and it was the whole block!

And more billboards...

Heading to Time Square...I was pretty pumped!

And that's Time Square.

We went to see Tarzan on Saturday night. It was superb. The staging was amazing, the cast was excellent, and it was just cool.

On Sunday we headed to Rockefeller Center and then to Central Park. This is in front of Rockefeller Central...you know where they skate in the winter, NBC's headquarters, and do all the events...all that good stuff! ...of course we did some shopping on the way!!!...it took forever to actually get to Central Park because we stopped every 10feet!

Darryl checking out Rockefeller....

This was really cool. Remember the famous NewYork pictures of the Steel workers from the 1930's...working on Rockefeller Center. Well, this was inside the building, on the way up. You could sit on one of the beams with the "famous" background....

View from the top of Rockefeller. That's the Empire State Building in the back. (thanks for the tip Kristjan!)
View of Central Park for the top of Rockefeller. I didn't realize that C Park was so big.

We stopped in at FAO Schwartz. Pretty cool. This is the piano that Tom Hanks played on in the movie "Big".

Finally made it to Central Park! Only took us about 5 hours!!!

Central Park.

Yeah, so this is inside Macy's. This is a shot of the cosmetics department...this is only a small part of the department. Macy's is the biggest department store in the world. 10 Floors! You needed a map to get around! Huge!

Bubba Gump's restaurant!

Oh yeah, did we forget to mention that we got tickets to the Late Show with Dave Letterman?!!!

Oh yeaaaaaah! Pretty awesommmme! We were pumped! I emailed the show about a month before we left but I really didn't think that we would get tickets. The show called on Thursday and asked Darryl a question about the show...he got it right, and we won the tickets! Oh man was I excited! We got there on Monday afternoon, the workers ask you a couple of questions..."scan" the audience...and they put us in the Front Row! Right in front of Dave! I couldn't sit still! And the guests were Matt Damon...Wheee hooo!!...and Dario Franchitti...he just won the Indy 500...and he's married to Ashley Judd.

So, needless to say...this was definitely the highlight for me. I was so pumped for the show. It was cool to see how everything worked. They have a comedian come out before the show to "warm up" the crowd. Then the band comes out. Then Dave came out for a couple of minutes. He was standing right in front of us! I'm not a "star struck" person, but it was really cool!

Going to pick up the tickets.

Yeah, Dario Franchitti drove his race car down the street after the show. Pretty cool.

And that was the trip. We did lots of sightseeing, saw Madison Square Garden, Radio City, Tiffany's, NYC Library..which Darryl thought was cool because of the movie "Day After Tomorrow", lots of shopping, went out to some great restaurants, slept in, drank booze, checked out some pubs/clubs, more shopping, took the subways...which of course I almost got stuck on one!...I don't have good luck with subways!!....and did some more sightseeing and shopping, and reeeeelaxed together!