Getting Around (To a Dance Festival)

Here are some pictures of how we get around these days: Yannick loves being in the sling and Kai enjoys riding in (or pushing) the stroller.

 

And in the car, they now share the back seat. Yannick usually falls asleep during car rides, but if he doesn't and cries, Kai will tell him that he shouldn't cry because we are almost at our destination. And, if he can manage, he throws his own lovey in Yannick's car seat, so his little brother can be comforted by it.

 

On of the places we went to last weekend was a very nice festival, the Carnival of Cultures. The festival was held on Nepean Point where we had this beautiful view of the Parliament Buildings and the Ottawa River.

 

 

And another nice view: Yannick on my lap, enjoying the sounds and movements.

Brotherly Love

Kai adores his little brother and likes to tell everyone: "Look, that's my baby!" Whenever he gets the chance he want to kiss and cuddle Yannick, or cover him with his stuffed animals and give his lovey to Yannick. (And trust me, he doesn't usually share his lovey with anyone). When Yannick cries Kai will sometimes tell him: "Don't cry baby, Kai is here." or he tells me that Yannick wants to nurse.

This is how much they love each other:

Yannick covered with Kai's stuffed animals:



Yannick and Kai in the travel bed we have in our living room. Kai loves to play in it (and pretend that he is "baby Kai") and when he does, he usually insists that Yannick is put next to him.

Some Random Stuff

* Yannick turned one month old yesterday!!! Time really does fly.

* Kai started singing "Oh Canada" (Canadian national anthem), completely out of the blue yesterday! We had no idea that he knew that song, but he told us that he learned it at daycare.

* Yannick's love for milk is paying off: at 4 weeks old he weighed in at 4800 g (about 10 lbs 9 oz). We love his double chin!

* Today we (well, Kai..) went on our first diaper-free outing to Costco, Starbucks and the library. He had no accidents at all and was always able to tell us when he had to use the washroom: It seems that the big brother is officially potty trained!! On Monday we will try a full diaper-free day at daycare.

And some random pictures:

Comparison

Here's a comparison of Kai and Yannick at the same age. Both are about 3 weeks old in the pictures.

Growing, growing...

Finally some time for a little update! Yannick is now 2 weeks and 4 days old and he is growing and growing! It is wonderful to see how he literally unfolds and becomes more aware of the world every day. He loves to nurse and makes it very clear when he is ready for more milk. It seems that he doesn't wait until his tummy is empty, but that he decides he wants more whenever it's not completely full. At his 10 day check up he already weighed 9 lbs (almost 4100 g).

Today Yannick went on his first "real" outing. He has already been on some walks around the neighbourhood, to the grocery store and the daycare to drop off his big brother, but today we took him to the Turkish Festival. Yannick was perfectly content in the sling and even though we were a bit worried about his ears, the loud music didn't seem to bother him. Kai had a blast: he went on a bouncy castle for the first time in his life. It took him a little while to get used to it, but when he did he just loved it and would not come off. Kai also loved the Turkish music. He couldn't wait to join the dancing people, but when we took him to the dance floor he was too shy to really dance and also declined the singer's invitation to come up on stage. We are now wondering if Yannick will become a little dancer just like his big brother.

Unfortunately we didn't bring our camera to the festival, but here are some pictures of the last week or so:

Daddy and his boys:


"Don't disturb me when I'm eating!"


Showing off the cute shorties our friend Michi made for him:



The big brother wears a sling too!

NEW PICTURES!!!

We are still pretty busy and don't have much computer time, but click HERE to see some more pics of Yannick's first week.

He's here!

Our sweet Yannick was born at home on July 8th, 2008 at 10:48 pm with the support of our wonderful midwives Diane and Fabienne. He weighed in at 8lbs 10 oz (3900 g) and is 54 cm long. Everyone is doing well and Kai loves his little brother. We are taking it easy right now and are trying to settle into our new routine as a family of four. More pictures and updates will follow soon!

In labour


And there he was!


Being weighed.


Some cuddle time with daddy.


Kai loves his little brother.

Biceps...

Now that Kai has learned what biceps are he likes to point them out. When asked if Mommy has biceps too his answer was: "No, Daddy has biceps".

Toddler Bed Adventures

Since the past week Kai has been sleeping in a toddler bed. Technically it's still his crib, but we have taken one side off and installed a guard rail and Kai loves to talk about his "new bed". To our suprise he stayed in his bed the whole first week. When he woke up he would call for us, saying that he was awake, but he would be sitting quietly in his bed.

However, this has changed! After finding him playing in his room once when we were sure that he was still asleep, quite a funny thing happened today.

I had put Kai down for his nap and since he was very tired and I did not hear a sound from his room, I assumed he was asleep. When putting him to bed I had turned the monitor on in his room, because I would be on the phone and wanted to be able to see if he was awake. Temporarily the monitor was on the floor (usually it is in a place where Kai can't reach it that easily). Downstairs I turned the monitor on too, but it didn't seem to work. This suprised me, but I assumed that I must have been forgetful and didn't turn it on after all.

When I went to his room to wake him because we had to go somewhere, this is what I found:

An empty bed, a sleeping Kai on the floor:






The monitor disconnected from the socket.



The child safety plug, put back in the socket. (Mind you, this was lying on a shelf when I left his room.)



The naughty little boy awake again.

Oma's visit, Halloween, Fall etc.

It has been a while since we have had the chance to post on Kai's blog. The past few months have been very busy and a lot has happened. First and foremost: Kai has grown so much!!! We know we write it all the time, but it never ceases to amaze us how quickly he changes. He is talking more and more each day. Still mostly in Dutch, but English is clearly his second language and we do still hear some French at times. We can actually have small conversations with Kai now. Sometimes they are fairly intelligent but other times it goes something like this:

- "Kai, are you done eating?"
- "NO!!!!"
- "Okay, would you like some more bread?"
- "NO!!!!"
- "What would you like then?"
- "NO!!!"

Yep, Kai has entered this famous fase of toddlerhood.....

His gross motor skills are developing very fast as well. He loves to dance, jump, climb and run and most days it seems like he doesn't do anything else. He is always on the move and prefers to move around together with us. If there is music, he likes to dance with us. If he climbs onto something he wants to jump and be caught by us. If he climbs around on our bed in the morning we have to make him a tent with the duvet. Oh, and as it turns out, we double quite well as a "horsey!!!!!" too.

Another thing that has happened this fall was Kai's oma Monika visit to us. Kai loves his oma very much and still misses her a lot. Every times he sees an airplane, he tells us oma is in it and when the phone rings he wants it to be oma. During oma's visit it happened to be Halloween and Kai went trick or treating, dressed up as a little gnome. We only planned to go to a few houses in our street, but Kai didn't want to stop. He loved collecting the candy and to say "eng, eng!!" (scary, scary) whenever he saw someone dressed up. The days after he played with his candy a lot, until it had all magically disappeared.....

There is a lot to write about the past few months, but we will leave it at this and just add some (well, a lot) of pictures.









A little gnome looking for candy.


The little gnome at daycare.


On our way to Mont-Tremblant.


A stop in Montebello.


Mont-Tremblant




At a waterfall in Mont-Tremblant.




The Biodome in Montreal, Kai loved the fish.


Very tired on our way home.


Some more fun with grandma before she left.