Spring comes early!

Thanks to the beautiful, warm weather the last week or so, we have been able to get Kira out of the house and playing in the park and school yard across the street. This is great for her as she is able to play with much more of the playground equipment than she was last summer. She is also slowly starting to recognize letters and numbers, and loves to run around and find them on the concrete (in the school yard). Yesterday, Jon and I took Kira on a bike ride around our neighbourhood. We didn't go too far as neither of us were too keen on hoofing it up hill, but Kira throughly enjoyed herself. We stopped off at a park, and when we tried to take Kira out of her bike seat, she pushed the lock back down - indicating that she did NOT want to get out and play, thank you very much. So, we kept riding. She has a knack of always getting her way...

Here is a picture I grabbed of her in her bike seat on Jon's bike. We take her glasses off when we ride as she has taken them off for no reason before, and we don't really want that to happen while we are out riding. You can see how her eye turns in without her glasses.

Last week Kira had her eye check-up, we were told that despite her eye turning in without her glasses on, her vision is doing well. It hasn't gotten worse, but it hasn't gotten better. She will be seeing the specialist at Children's Hospital at the end of next month as they are now monitoring her lazy eye to see if an eye patch or (gulp) surgery are going to be required in the next couple of years. My brother and nephew both had/have to use the patch, and my brother and I both had multiple eye surgeries when we were kids; so I guess this shouldn't be surprising news for me...but it is a lot harder on this side of the fence. When I was a kid it was cool to have surgery cause you got ice cream!! But, being the Mom, well, let's just say it will take more than ice cream to console me if she needs to go for surgery.

On a lighter note, her 4th incisor tooth came in last week, hurray! So, all we have left is the 2 year molars, which, at her rate, I figure will come in when she is close to 3. Ha.

Here are a couple of recent pictures of Kira from the playground and our house. She says "cheese" now when the camera is on her, very cute. The words are slowly sneaking up on us, not much longer before we have a talkative little lady.

Just for you, Grandpa Charlie

Go Canada Go!

So, the Olympics are upon us, and I am very excited; it seems that the city has finally come alive as well. I went shopping for a "Canada" hoodie the other day, only to find a mob of people sifting through the Olympic gear like it was a boxing day sale. CHAOS! Needless to say, I got the heck out of there as soon as I could. I did manage to grab a cute little Canada shirt, hat, and bib for Kira.

Yesterday, the Olympic torch run came past our office, so we headed out - along with hundreds of other office workers - to the street to cheer on the runners. Naturally, a down pour started right when we got out there, but it didn't dampen the spirit of the crowd. We were pretty far back, but here are a couple of pictures that I was able to snag...

My office sits very close to a few Olympic sites - the Village, Live City Yaletown, BC PLace and GM Place/Canada Hockey House. I took a couple of photos from the offices the other day, unfortunately my camera is not so great so it's hard to see these places...

The Olympic Village -- you can see a big Canada Flag on one of the cranes there. In the background is Science World, which has become "Russia House", dedicated to the 2014 Winter Games.

BC Place + Canada Hockey House. BC Place is where the opening ceremonies will be held, indoors. Smart thinking since it's raining today.

Live City Yaletown, there will be lots of concerts there as well as laser light shows and who knows what else.

This week we also got Kira's new bed, she hasn't seen it yet, but I'm sure that she will love all the extra space that she has. Here are a couple of pictures of the big bed...

Kira had a play date tonight with a new friend named Sophia. Sophia and her parents just moved here from Edmonton to work at Jon's company. We had met them before, but it was in a darkened restaurant, so we didn't really get a chance to have the 2 kids play with each other. When they arrived here tonight, one thing became obvious fast...these 2 girls look and act very similar! They had fun playing individually with Kira's toys, but they didn't get angry or possessive when one was playing with a toy that the other wanted, so that's a good sign. We hope to have Sophia over again soon. Here are a couple of pictures of the girls watching Yo Gabba Gabba...

This week we learned that my dear friend Maya will be moving back to Ontario with her family. I first met Maya about 8 years ago when we were playing soccer together and eventually became gym buddies, which was immediately followed by dairy queen blizzards and survivor. She was the matron of honour at my wedding and my very first friend to have a baby. This move is a great thing for them as they will both be back with their families, who all live in Ontario, but my dreams of Kira marrying one of her boys have been crushed. Maya, I'll miss you loads - but now we have another reason to come and visit Ontario. I can't wait to see pictures of your gigantic house and yard that you'll get in Ontario where housing prices are actually affordable :)

There hasn't been too much going on with us lately, more of the same. This past week Kira enjoyed visits from her friend, Kieren, and her cousins Marcus and Isabel. We took her off to gymnastics and the park, but that's about it. This coming weekend will be her last gymnastics class until after the olympics; the new road closures and parking restrictions will be in place by Saturday, so it should be fun for us to try to get downtown. Saturday night is our friends wedding reception, so Kira will be staying at Grandma Tracy's and Grandpa Charlie's house, I'm sure she will have a great time. Perhaps Grandpa will take her to McDonalds for a delicious, nutritious breakfast - and then let her run her energy out in the play area.

Here is a picture of Kira enjoying pudding. As she is still not drinking milk (sigh) we are doing what we can to ensure she gets calcium from other sources, she recently took to the pudding...in her own special way.

Teeth!

Kira has got more teeth! In the last 2 weeks she got 3 of her 4 eye teeth (or fang teeth as I like to call them). This has made her cranky at times, but overall, she is still a happy kid. Her vocabulary continues to expand, and she is starting to string two or more words together. She has also learned to identify parts on her face, if you ask her "Kira, where is your nose/mouth/eyes/ears/teeth" she will point and laugh. She still is very aware of where her belly is and continues to flash it to anyone that asks.

Her gymnastics class will wrap up on Feb 6 as the streets around the building will be closed off for the Olympics, we aren't sure yet what we will do for the month without gymnastics, but we may have found a couple of fun indoor play areas for her to burn off her energy. I'll try to get some video or pictures of her at gymnastics before the olympic break.

Yesterday, we took Kira on her first shopping excursion in the US. I was very worried about her sitting calmly while we were in the border line ups, but fortunately, she was so tired both times, she slept right through. Hurray! We went down there to find Jon a new pair of shoes, I guess they are cheaper there? I also managed to find a new pair of jeans and some new cookie monster shoes for Kira. Hee. To get her sleepy for the ride home, we let her run around in the mall play area for 45 minutes and then we headed home. All and all, much more successful than I originally thought it would be.

Here are some new photos of Kira

She got these boots as a Christmas gift from my friend Wendy; as they didn't fit, we put them in her cupboard until her feet grew a bit. Kira decided that it didn't matter if they were too large, she pulled them out of the cupboard and ensures that they are always on her feet when she is at home. Too funny. I guess they are her first pair of slippers...? (she had just finished her bath, so her hair is wet and she's in her jammies)

Kira getting into the Olympic spirit - Go Canada!!

Happy New Year

Happy 2010 everyone! Hope that your holidays were nice and relaxing. 2010 promises to be a busy one for us with 13 friends and coworkers having babies in the first 6 months of this year (7 in June alone!) and 3 weddings. One has already happened, our good friends Brian and Sandra got married in the Caribbean on January 7; congratulations you two! Wish we could have been there.

Kira has been enjoying all of her new toys from Christmas as well as working on her vocabulary. She is trying very hard to say new words and has recently started to tell us "peepee"; although she has yet to actually pee on the potty, this is definitely a good start. Hopefully we will have her potty trained soon. With her vocabulary skills comes the tantrums which happen when she can't get what she really wants (usually because we have no idea what she is really saying), so far they haven't too bad, but they are occurring more than I would like. All you other Mom's reading this are probably laughing at me, but we have known that this day would come and we know that it will last for a while - Kira is a very stubborn child, should be good times for the next couple of years.

Here are a couple of photos and a video of Kira.

A friend of ours lent us "Beatles Rock Band" so Kira has been hard at work practicing her drum skills in an effort to be the next Ringo Starr. This is a nice way to play the drums as it's not nearly as loud or expensive as the real thing.

Grandma Tracy and Grandpa Charlie came over for a dinner a few weeks ago; while they were here Kira decided that she wanted to sing the Itsy Bitsy Spider - a lot. By the time we got the camera out, Kira had decided that she would just get Daddy to sing while Grandma and Grandpa did the motions for the song and she'd sit and clap. As you can see, this brought her much enjoyment. Not sure if it was the singing or that she was able to get everyone to do what she wanted.