victoria

this past weekend, tim and i took off for a whole 2 nights! friday morning until sunday afternoon. we left our wee ones with my parents (who were willing to stay in abby all weekend at our house - so convenient! thank you, mom and dad!) and we went to victoria. we bought a groupon back in october for a two night stay at Parkside and it was SO lovely. just like the photos on the website.

after walking on the ferry and then taking a city bus to downtown, we filled our friday, saturday, and sunday with lots of dallas and rachel (our friends who moved there last year from edmonto) and lots of reading (the hunger games are an all consuming series). we had a couples' massage at the hotel spa on the first night there and rachel cooked us up some dinner in our hotel suite which was a great way to kick off the weekend.

saturday morning, we walked to breakfast here and i went against my usual predictability and ordered the Maple Bacon Sticky Bun...those are chunks of bacon on it. i wondered, "how could bacon taste good on this?" but it was awesome. we enjoyed the luxury of reading our books over breakfast both saturday and sunday.
we ate at lots of fun places - here, we faced the wind to enjoy the sunshine and ate on a dock at Red Fish, Blue Fish. and though tim had planned not to eat here because he does not like seafood (what a pain to find places to eat with this guy!), he found himself enjoying a BLT with tuna instead of bacon. rachel was so thrilled that tim ate something here that she continued to talk about it for the next two days. haha. rachel is the greatest hostess and made it her mission to feed us well and she and dallas showed us the best sights of victoria while we were there.

we got our history fix at Craigdarroch Castle which is on a regular looking cul-de-sac but at one time was the highest building in victoria. it has 39 rooms and was pretty cool to walk through.

the view from the top of the tower (above) and the view inside the tower (below)

we took a scenic drive and ended up at the top of mt. doug, catching the best light as the sun went down. we were pretty happy to have no rain all day despite the cold temperature that made me super happy to have my scarf and toque.

(walking down the mountain)

it was so amazing to have a few days away from the everyday though i wondered a LOT about what the kids were doing and if they were napping/eating/sleeping/crying etc. my mom managed to text me very, very few details though i continued to ask. haha. it was nice to have the chance to MISS the kids and of course, they had a great time while we were away.

avery at 5 months

oh, this little girl is just the sweetest. we've had a great week discovering that avery is beginning to chill out just a little on the schedule. i think i maybe heard her cry only two or three times ALL WEEK - this wee one is sooo mellow. she's getting good at falling asleep in her playpen when we go other places as long as she is swaddled. she's happy to sit and watch whatever is going on in the room around her and she is quick to give a big smile to anyone who makes eye contact with her. she was a dolly on valentines day when we went down to bellingham for a little valentine's day party at our friends' house and just went with the flow of the day - eating wherever and sleeping in the carseat. she's the quietest baby i have ever met. while she'll squeal and talk here and there throughout the day, it's still a very, very rare occurance to hear a giggle. the best person to make her smile is still ben. i've been giving avery her first bottle of the morning (between 7 - 7:30am) while she lays in my bed with me and it has been such a sweet way to start my mornings. she seems to have woken up with a stuffy nose this morning so she may be on her way to experiencing her first cold (sigh) but it didn't stop her from smiling and playing all morning. i have enjoyed avery so much this month as we get to know her better and better.

the big boy bed

tuesday, ben finally climbed out of his crib. saturday, we put the big boy bed into his room. we kept the crib in the room thinking that he'd do naps in the crib, bedtimes in the bed. ben was so unbelievably excited that he spent most of the morning pretending to sleep in the bed. he moved all his soothers and his Curious George and his baby over to the new bed. he climbed in and out so many times. at lunch, we had a big discussion about staying in bed at bedtime and not getting out...a discussion in that i told him over and over that he needed to stay in bed and ben nodding.

naptime rolls around and i asked him if he wanted to sleep in the bed or in his crib. "big boy bed!", he shouted. okay! so he climbed in, we had our nap time routine, and then i set his clock (and by clock, i mean an app on the ipod that looks like a moon and then when it becomes the time that you set it for, it turns into a sun). i reminded him that he couldn't get out of bed until he saw the sun and then he could get out and come find mommy.

i spent many minutes peeking through the crack in the door watching what he was doing in that big boy bed. he was mostly moving around his pillow, his stuffies, and his soothers. finally, i went in and took the pillow away, saying that he probably doesn't need it because it's too big. (do kids need pillows at all? the day before he was sleeping with none in the crib, right?) after about 10 more minutes, asleep. he didn't get out of bed once! when he woke up, he checked the ipod, saw the sun, and came running at top speed out of his room. "awake, mommy!" i have never seen a prouder little boy than this. he stood there with his arms crossed, smiling the biggest smile. oh, it was sweet.

bed time rolled around and we did the bedtime routine, got ben into the big boy bed, and i left him in there in the dark. i just could not believe he wasn't scared to be alone in that big bed in the dark but no. he never called for me once. never got out of bed once. in fact, i went in after 10 minutes or so just to double check that he didn't want to sleep in the crib. "are you SURE you don't want to sleep in the crib, ben?" "no! big boy bed!" he slept until the sun came out on the ipod and for the first time in 2 years, 7 months, and 18 days, ben came into out room and woke us up in the morning! he was so happy to have slept all night in his bed. it was pretty fun.

so today's naptime was uneventful as was bedtime. my mom said to me, "i wonder how long before he figures out that he can get out of bed and come out here?" the thought had honestly never occurred to me. i thought we had won the jackpot on easiest transition to big bed ever...but i guess we won't know for sure for awhile. but for now? i'm pretty excited for that little boy.

avery talks

oh ben...always trying to get in on the action...

(blogger is cutting off part of the screen so if you want to see it in it's entirety, click over to youtube. :)

you're on camera

i ventured out to my step class at the gym last night. it's at 6pm which is a super awkward time to get out of the house but it's only available once a week and i love step so i do my best.

i don't mind taking a spot near the front of the class - this way i'm not distracted by all the people in front of me AND there are no mirrors front and center because that's where the stage is for the instructor. i'd rather not look at myself in my gym clothes these days. so i got my step set up and the class began. there were probably 20 people there. the room has some awkward posts so there is a camera facing the instructor and two screens on either side of the room for people to watch if they can't see the instructor around the posts.

we get going into the exercises and to make the most of your workout, you have to get your arms into it too so while you're stepping up and jumping up, you punch your arms up high or whatever. the first 15 minutes, i'm going about my workout and then i happened to look over at one of the screens. the back of my head keeps popping up, in and out of the screen. what? i'm so close to the stage, i'm apparently in the camera's line of view! i stop and try to move my step back a little ways. no such luck. every step up, my ponytail is front and center on the screen. there's really nothing i can do about it so i just keep stepping but now i'm feeling pretty self-conscious about my arm actions. for the next 10 minutes, i barely do any arms. but eventually, i'm thinking that i need to get into the workout...there's nothing i can do about this.

now we're at peak cardio and jumping up and punching the air etc etc (i bet you'd love to see this, hey? haha) so i tell myself to stop watching the screen and just work out. i picked up the pace and started getting my arms going but i couldn't help but keep peeking over at the screen. there was the back of my head bobbing in and out of the picture and everytime i would punch up, it looked like i was punching the instructor. haha.

of course, it was all good - no one pointed and laughed at me after the class but note to self, next time, be a little less keen and stand a little farther back.