And now for a few pictures...

Luke cleaning the bathtub with his dad...














Reading stories with cousin Claire and amazing Tante Folle, I mean, Auntie Robyn.














Eating rollkuchen for the first time














Playing catch with Nannie














Gardening














And a couple of other recent favorites...

Not what I thought

A friend of mine told me years ago that parenting wasn't what she thought it would be. She said that no one can really prepare you for what it will be like, and that it is harder than you can imagine. I have to agree these days. I think it's the all-the-timeness of it that makes it hard at times. Luke has had a cold for several weeks and has been waking more frequently at night, wanting to nurse more, etc, and it has been a bit draining. But the wonder of parenting is that in all of these moments, I wouldn't trade it for a childless life ever. Love is a funny thing. I love Luke so much that I think about him most of the time and can become obsessed with his "success" at each stage of his life. And I worry if he's not "succeeding" and I'm elated when he does. I'll explain. For example, I decided about a week ago that it was time that he mastered the sippy cup. We're starting to give him a bit of milk and I've had people tell me not to give him a bottle, but to go straight to a sippy cup (to avoid "double-weaning"). So I spent several days giving him the sippy cup, without the valve, with the valve, without the valve, with the valve, so he would understand that stuff comes out of the spout. Well, for several days he didn't suck on it when the valve was in, and it was stressing me out! I thought, oh no, he'll never learn this! And then one day, he just started sucking on it and it worked and now he can use it just fine. So much stress for nothing. But I tell you, sippy cups had never been so much on my mind then for those few days! And now it's eating...he's decided that all he likes is quesadillas. I'm thinking that it's because we had a guy from Mexico stay with us for a couple of weeks and it had a profound effect on him. I'm not sure. Sounds funny, maybe, but it's been a bit stressful! He doesn't want to be spoonfed, he doesn't want to eat any vegetables and he's just figured out in the last couple of weeks that if he doesn't like food, he can actually spit it out. So, my life has become one quesadilla-filled culinary adventure. Luke has now had, not only cheese quesadillas, but also rice, peas, chicken, yogurt and cheese quesadillas and the latest, squash and cheese quesadillas. Julio and I both thought the squash quesadillas weren't that bad actually...
So I guess one of the reasons why parenting is hard is because you don't want to mess up and you don't want to mess your kid up. And you don't know what to make a big deal of and what to relax about. But here are a couple of things I'm learning about Luke: forcing him to do things is not highly effective. If he doesn't want to eat, he won't. When he's hungry, he will indeed eat, even if it is only quesadillas. Another thing: "no," to him, is probably the funniest word out there. He giggles immediately almost whenever I say it. And it makes whatever he's doing all that much more enjoyable. I haven't quite figured out the answer to this conundrum but today, when he was reaching for the lamp and I said no, his giggle and smile were so cute that I had to laugh for a while too.
All the stress and parenting disillusionment aside, Luke is a great kid. Tonight Julio and I watched him for about 20 minutes just play with a pen as he was "writing" on paper and babbling away. It was amazing. I can't get over how smart he is, how curious and independent he is, how he finds humour in things that I can only wonder at, and how somehow by the grace of God, I get to be this amazing kid's mother.

The latest on Luke

Luke has had a busy past couple of weeks! He has really gotten going in terms of crawling, climbing, standing, getting stuck in tight places, maneuvering over and under things, etc, etc. It’s so fun to watch, I’m just so continually impressed with his curiosity and drive to try new things. Today we were at a play group with a couple of other moms and their kids, and I was all of a sudden struck by the realization that he's a KID now! He's chasing the other kids, pulling hair, eating paper...he's one of them! I can truly say that I am enjoying this phase of his life. The trick now is to savour it and not wish it away...I'm not sure why we do it, but so often we think and dream and plan of the next stage of our lives instead of savouring the one we're in. So here's a few snapshots of Luke's latest endeavors...swimming lessons with dad, going to the zoo with Belen, and then swimming at the lake this past weekend. He was really into the beach and water this past weekend, it was great! I'm looking forward to being there a lot this summer and seeing him become more and more of a beach bum...

One night at the lake

We went to my parents' cottage for the weekend and had a blast. It was so cool to see Luke go from looking at the sand, to feeling it between his toes, to moving his feet around in it, to grabbing it, to playing with it, and the inevitable, to eating it! We had a lot of fun and my parents even let us have a sleep in morning and took care of Luke for us. We'll be back, for sure! Here's a few pictures of our weekend...

City farmers?

We recently embarked on a new endeavor...gardening! We rented out a garden plot, 25x50 ft large to do some gardening this summer. We're looking forward to the challenges and joys of what this summer can bring, and already one day when Julio came home I said excitedly, It rained today, hopefully our seeds will germinate! And he said, I know, I was thinking about that too! I must admit though, our first day of planting was slightly overwhelming (at least for me). We had been out there for probably half an hour, chatting with our garden neighbour and friend from church about how to do things, and I looked at all that needed to be done, looked at Luke who was wandering off his blanket into the mud, and thought, what have we done! Are we in over our heads? Just as I was thinking that, no joke, Julio said to me, isn't this great?! He had such great gardening spirit and energy that day and once he said that I felt so much better. We worked for 3 or so hours that day, and then Luke and I went home, and Julio continued on for another couple of hours. I must say too, that Luke had great gardening spirit and even took time out for a nap on his dad's back.
A couple of days ago we went back to plant some tomatoes and I was struck by how easy it would be to get garden jealousy/intimidation/pride/etc, depending on how good your garden looked. Some people had obviously tilled and raked and added compost and manure and all sorts of lovely things to their garden plot, and we kept having soil envy. But Julio was able to strike up a conversation with a fellow gardener who let us know that our plot wasn't very well cared for last year and that it will take a little TLC to get it looking better. My only conversation with a fellow gardener was with an Asian man who smiled at me, from his lovely rows of lettuce, and said tomatoes? I said yes, yes, we're planting tomatoes, noticed that he didn't have any tomatoes planted yet and wondered if we were over zealous. I just said, yes, we're hoping the frost will stay away, and then Julio and I noticed that no one else had planted tomatoes yet. We're hoping we're not secretly getting mocked for our little tomato plants!
And today we will plant potatoes, zucchini and squash, and try to fill up the rest of the garden. So now when the rain falls, I won't grumble and complain wishing for a lovely, hot summer day, I'll smile and think of our garden.

Mischief!

Luke is now officially getting into mischief. In fact, as I write, he keeps going for the reset button on the computer and loves the flashing modem lights. I now know how to turn my modem on and off, thanks to him! I also know how dusty it is under our computer desk as I went hunting for his little ball...we have officially entered into a new phase of parenting!
This past week has definitely been the beginning of a whole new era. He loves our carbon monoxide detector and loves our reaction when he starts taking off for it. It's a plug-in thing with a shiny little reset button, which he has found already several times, and which makes an incredibly loud series of beeping noises. He'll start going for it, look back at me, smile, I'll say "no Luke" and then he scurries off. If he manages to get to it before I stop him, he'll press the button and the beeps will go off, and then sometimes he'll try to imitate the beeps with his own high pitched screeches! It's way too cute, to be honest.
Yesterday he did two fairly adventurous things...firstly, he had his friend Liam over and was chasing him around the house as Liam is a bit older and quicker than him! All of a sudden he is underneath a dining room chair, and then managed to get up onto the little wooden beam and over, and kept crawling away! Later on that evening, Julio was hanging out with him and he managed to climb onto the bottom shelf of our entrance way shelf unit, just lying there. This kid is always on the go! And now we are at the standing and rocking in the crib phase. It's amazing how all of a sudden he has just taken off, literally, with all the things he can do! Is it a coincidence that he's sleeping better lately too?!?

Starting Out: Some thoughts on parenting...

A friend of mine was talking about how she would like to journal about all the things she thinks about as she parents her little guy, and I thought that was such a great idea that I thought I might do the same...so, here it goes! Some thoughts on parenting...
Sometimes I think that people without kids must look at my life and think it is so dull. With certain people, when they ask me about my day, my life, what I'm up to, I have no idea what to say beyond playing with Luke, going for walks, changing diapers, etc. And I feel like some people feel sorry for me and feel like my life has become rather dull. But they have no idea. I don't think I had any idea before we had Luke. Every day with Luke is amazing. I find him utterly fascinating. I think I could watch him like a tv all day long and never grow tired of it. His every facial expression, every action, is motivated out of pure desire and emotion, it's so raw and real and beautiful. Like when Julio plays peekaboo with him, crawling around the house on all fours and popping up behind any random piece of furniture, and Luke immediately starts smiling...and soon that smile turns into a giggle and the giggles turn into a laughing fit and soon we're all completely losing it and I can't remember ever having so much fun. Or watching him try to put a piece of bread in his mouth, grabbing it and shoving his whole hand inside his mouth in a hope that somehow the bread will find it's way in and actually stay in. I remember the week he was learning to eat Cheerios and how my heart kept breaking for him as he would drop a Cheerio just as it was getting close to his mouth...but how he never flinched and just tried again. Now that is truly something to marvel at...kids have this amazing ability to try again even when they have failed 20 times before. Something motivates them to keep going. So why can't I be more like that?!? I want to paint a few canvases for my living room wall, but after a couple of attempts at creating something on canvas that my mind envisions, I get discouraged and give up. What if I had tried 20, maybe even just 10 times? What would the result be? I'm sure I would be proudly displaying my silly little art project on my living room wall right now. How crazy it is that I'm learning these lessons from someone so small.
So how do I communicate all this to someone who thinks my life is dull, in a sentence or two? How do I explain that, even though I like to be home by 8:30 every night, my life is more exciting than it's ever been? No, parenting is challenging at times, often tiring, but definitely never dull. I would never go back in a million years, Luke has made my life so infinitely more amazing and I praise God for all He is teaching me through him.