happy birthday grandma!

happy birthday to grandma m! coco heard it was your birthday and he wanted to a) sing you his second favourite song (after the abc's) and b) bang the fireplace repeatedly. we miss you and love you!

three oh!

exactly one month ago cole celebrated his third birthday in style, surrounded by some very special friends. we had a little party at home with homemade pizza, oddly shaped halloons and a cake with sparklers (which set of the fire alarm, much to the amusement/shock/delight/etc of the wee folks. we had a partly sunny day, some fun outside, more fun inside and lots of laughter. thank you to everyone who came to share coco's birthday! 

  

 

thank you to the talented kim culbert for the beautiful photos above from the birthday party! here are a few more of my own...

 

 

 

 

and then, a few days later on his actual birthday, we took a day off to have some extra special fun. we did our annual measurements and got cole all fancied up. he had his first trip to bons off broadway for breakfast and a bit of doodling on the walls (and himself), followed by a visit to maplewood farms. we brought salad for the bunnies, stopped to pet all the animals, spotted some poop (always a highlight) and had a grand old time. later on we brought out a special present for cole (hamburger playdough, which gets a lot of action around here!) and a bit of leftover cake.

 

 

 

 

 

i'm continually surprised and inspired and filled with love for this little guy. he's very much three and some days that is challenging but he never fails to bring out his beautiful smile, his kooky sense of humour and his special creativity.

coco, i love you forever! xoxox, yer mom.

twosday

this little boy of ours turned two today! turning two seems so much like turning thirteen - a time of change, of growth, of rebellion and of yearning for independence. it's teenagerhood without the height or access to allowance money...

speaking of height, we hung the growth chart and took his measurements today. it's been irregularly updated until now - we bought it in the summertime after many, many months of me thinking i would make one and wanting to do something exciting but not knowing what. and then suddenly came the realization that what with the walking around and all, this little guy, this boy, was growing right in front of our eyes and we probably should start taking actual records! i settled on a chart that was not too babyish, that stretched as tall as you would ever wish to be and that i could fold away for safe keeping... we measured when we got it, again around 18 months, on the momentous day of cole's first haircut and also added a few retroactive measurements that were jotted down. we bungled some measurements on the inches side so now we're using the metric - how international! cole loves being measured, probably because i use a quilting ruler to fix his height against the wall and it's the only time he has access to it's sharp corners...

today he's as tall as he was on february first when standing on tippy toe. that makes him 88cm - almost 34 inches tall! he weighs about 27 pounds, give or take, and he's got 16 teeth, for anyone keeping track at home. today he had three small boo boos on his hands, including one sliver that he let me remove. he nurses these boo boos, hides them under his shirt sleeve if i want to look but milks them the moment i stop looking. he speaks in full sentences, gets jokes and makes us laugh, has a memory like nobody's business, dances but not if you ask him to, loves music and extreme flavours and books until the cows come home. he's two, and that means at times he's stubborn and opinionated, even if the opinion he's expressing is quite obviously illogical or the opposite of even what he wants. it's exasperating at times but thankfully, so far, not long-lasting. he's always been generally even-tempered and kind, patient and happy. not always, but mostly. i love his creative streak - "you go ahead and add eyebrows instead of stripes to that zebra," i think, smiling and loving how he sees his world.

to celebrate in our own quiet way, today we kicked off with his birthday gift first thing. it's not like he needs more toys, but it's something we knew he'd love - a mini basketball hoop for the patio. we went swimming, ate pancakes with blueberries for breakfast and lunch and sang him 'happy birthday' with his candle in ice cream with strawberries after dinner.

just when i think he's so tall and boyish, i watch him stretching to put the ball through this little hoop. he's so much still a baby at times - the one who wants to snuggle in my arms and curl with his blankets and who still fits 24-month onesies if they're long. when i go clothes shopping i keep seeing cute onesies and feeling that bittersweet twang at my heart as i realize he's nearing the end of that whole stage. babyhood. i kiss his soft, sweet-smelling head and turn toward the big boy clothes, with their durable knees and proper collars and pockets for storing found treasures. and i see a shimmery glimpse of what lies ahead - boyhood. in his smiles and his eyes, in his reaching. and adventures, independence and reaching back when he needs support.

today a lost bee flew in the window while we were measuring and became trapped. we stopped and watched him buzz and fuss and try to find his way back out the window. when he rested, we caught him in a cup, took him safely outside and set him free. as the bee flew away, cole reached out and asked me where he was going. "back to his family," i told him. they would miss him and surely he wouldn't want to spend the day inside with us. he thought about it and nodded, and told me that the bee was looking for fun, he saw the toys and wanted to play. "but bee flew home," he said, and he tucked his little hand into mine and we went back inside to finish our measurements.

coco, we love you!

party on, coco

we celebrated coco's second birthday in the park with family and friends this past sunday. it was the perfect day for a park party - springtimey and sunny and warmish. being vancouverites, accustomed to planning for rain, we rented a picnic shelter, just to be sure we'd have someplace to cower in case the weather was uncooperative. cole and the kids had a blast running around, enjoying the playgrounds and park and all the grownups chasing them. mostly they all ran in separate directions - oh, these two year olds. loose in a park they're like a bunch of magnets repelling each other!

as is usually the case, i didn't get photos of everyone and i wish i had. but then again, i go back and forth about putting photos of other folks and their kids on the good old interwebs, so i've saved what photos i do have of everyone for facebook... i really wanted to round up all the munchkins for a group photo, but i figured it would likely be as successful as trying to corral wild monkeys! nobody was crying or injured so it seemed best to leave them all be. ;-)

when asked what he wanted for his birthday, cole was emphatic. cake. just cake. chocolate cake. where is the cake? is cake now? etcetera... so we got him a chocolate cake and he was very happy.

we are so thankful to all the friends and family who came to help us cheer cole into his second year. thank you trevor for capturing the cake moments! thank you all for the lovely presents for coco - such thoughtful gifts and you really shouldn't have. he's thrilled to realize that his exciting new toys followed him home! :-)

and tomorrow, for his actual birthday, we're just planning to hang out during the day as usual and hopefully do "something fun" and have "something yummy" for dinner. and possibly some more cake, because really, cake is pretty awesome.

happy birthday to the happiest little dude

cole is one! that is a strange thing to think, i'm realizing - that he's growing up is, of course, undeniable but somehow to be one full year old is such a different thought.

can you believe the difference one year makes?

we celebrated on sunday in stanley park, at ceperley playground at second beach. i hadn't ever really been to that park (other than biking past it) and it was a terrific place. lots to do, lots to see - very vancouvery too. we had our immediate local family, good friends, balloons and cupcakes, running and playing and only a few raindrops. grandma bonnie helped cole take his first solo slide (very exciting!) and cole tried to eat his very first clam on the beach (denied!).

he seemed a little concerned about the flaming candle - maybe because we play a lot of 'fire chief' here at home with his red fireman's hat? he much prefered eating the cupcake...

thank you so much to all who came to celebrate with us - which was no small feat considering it was all the way downtown, we moved parks at the last minute, and the sun run made traffic & transit generally confounding.

yesterday was his actual birthday. we went to the aquarium and had a grand time, running everywhere. i'm amazed that in the course of a few weeks he's gone from gripping the couch to venturing out on his own to running away in public places. :-) he squealed and ran and chortled from one thing to another. made friends with everyone, loved the otters, thoroughly enjoyed playing up to his elbows in the tidal pool and got his first touch of a sea cucumber (me too!). we played on the grass in the park too, and he chased birds and found sticks and tried to eat pinecones...

after supper we went to the park across the street to release his balloons. i know that's not a really great thing to do, what with the birds and all, but i couldn't bear to let them become all sad and deflated in the house, or to go and pop them myself... somehow seeing them float up and away as cole and jamie let go of them really seemed right. the first year is under our belts, all of us. we've leared so much, come so far and are ready to see what's next.

happy birthday little guy. we love you!