Barbecue Season!

If you are Douglas you know that there is no such thing as Barbecue Season! One can barbecue in any weather. At any rate, it is definitely barbecue season at our house, as we have had friends over three times in the last 7 days for barbecue! Doug went to Costco and filled the fridge and a portion of the deep freeze with steak, ribs, chicken....Mmmmm!

I am also excited about our fire pit! I have always wanted one! There is no better place to pass the evenings than a fire pit! Much as I LOVE Doug's barbecue, I can't wait to polish off a bag of marshmallows around it!

Well, it's supper time and we're having ribs! 

Gabriella's World

I love my names, but neither Doug nor I wanted our baby to have an unusual name that gets butchered on a daily bases. Gabriella was the perfect name for our little bumpkin, but a large majority of our community has never heard of Gabriella. They have heard of Gabriel, as that is more common around here, but Gabriella is often pronounced as Gabriel-a. It is very irritating. When we were at swimming last week a couple of "big girls" were chatting with us in the change room and asked me what her name was. When I told them Gabriella the youngest, who may have been 5, said "that's a weird name!". The older one elbowed her and said "Rude!" I could only laugh!

Gabriella and I went to see a friend who was visiting from BC and her little boy who was perhaps 8 months old at my baby shower. It was Gabriella's first time meeting him "on the outside". I was very excited to see her interact with him as much as she did. She usually doesn't care much for children her own age, although he is a little older. He has long blond hair and is a very gentle little man. He would walk over to her and flop his head forward or back in her face so that she could play with his hair! It was so sweet! Well the following week when we went to songs and story time at the library she was trying to pet the little boy next to us. He had blond hair too and was just a little bit older than her. She was also trying to sing along for the first time!It will be interesting to see how she does in swimming tomorrow. She is still very quiet there. She just watches all of the other babies reactions.

If Doug and I had waited till we were ready to have children to have her, we would never have had any! I never thought I would be able to give a child all of the things I felt were necessary to give them a well rounded childhood, but here we are. Gabriella is such a happy girl! She has everything she needs and then some.

I am so thankful to our friends and family who have drench her in love and beautiful things.

Gabriella is Mitsy Moo Moo's biggest fan! Mitsy has been scared of little people for years after being tortured by the many kids we entertained at our house. She had kept her distance from Gabby when she was born, but these days she will sit next

to her on the couch and let Gabriella pet her with slimy little finger,
pull her whiskers and claw her eyes. Of course I do my best to keep Gabriella gentle, but I can only do so much.

Gabriella has been standing since she was two months old. She doesn't have enough balance to keep herself upright, of course, so I have been holding her whenever she feels like standing. I am so glad that I finally got her an exersaucer! She LOVES her exersaucer and has been spending the last few days in it screeching and jumping and laughing.... and now she's sleeping!

Looking Forward to Spring

Thanks to Gabriella there are so many firsts to celebrate! We are looking forward to our first Spring and Summer as parents! There are so many wonderful things to do as a family here.

We moved to a house down the street that backs onto a forested area. Gabriella and I explored it one day in her super awesome off road stroller! It's still pretty muddy with all of the snow melting, so we will have to go back again in a few weeks. Our backyard has a couple of apple trees that the Magpies and Cardinals seem to be enjoying. I just hope they don't attract too many stinging insects in the summer.

Our new house is up the street from the library. Our library is beautiful! It has a few rooms in the children's section just for song and story times. In the children's play area there is even a little puppet theater! Just behind the library is a park that has a track around a lake that connects the park to the theater and swim center that we go to.

We are so fortunate that Gabriella's swimming lessons are in a salt water pool. She will most likely swallow a lot of that water before she can actually swim! We take a class with some friends we met some months ago. I hope that Gabriella will make them long term friends by seeing them for playdates and other activities.

We haven't had a playdate at our house yet because I'm afraid it may be boring for the other babies. our house doesn't have as many toys and gadgets as the others. But we like it! Gabriella has a lot of books!

Doug finally had to put together her crib since she was getting a bit long for her bassinet. She looks so small in her crib though! She used to be such a good sleeper, but now all she does is play in her crib! Hahaha! There is so much room around her that she rolls around and kicks and plays with the cat through the bars... Sigh!



We are still working on our room. I have an idea in my mind, but we will see if it ends up as nice as Gabby's! Thankfully, we have a walk in closet in this house. That help so much, as one of us has way too many cloths!


We are so thankful to be here! It's so nice to be surrounded by beautiful places and people. Sherwood Park is a great place to grow our family. Much as we love and miss our friends and family back in Ontario, we wish everyone gets a chance to come out here and visit us some day.