Crash!

So, there was a big crash today. Don't sell into this market. Hold everything and just hope for a miracle.

Vacation photos and Willa's new words

Finally, I've had time to load the vacation photos, add some captions, and link them to the blog. I think Markus posted off and on during the trip, but in sum, it was a nice trip. Weather was a little warmer than we had planned so we had to buy some short sleeve shirts and shorts for Willa and improvise on the outfits to make sure she wasn't overheated. By the end of our trip, we realized she just wasn't going to take any naps so we did lots of walking and sightseeing. We'd have some down time each day so Willa could play, but she was pretty much full-force the entire trip. On the train ride back to Montreal on the last day, she slept much of the time. Then she slept for much of the plane ride home. Overall, she was a very good girl most of the time. As long as the bread basket was filled during dinner, she was well-behaved there, too.

Here's a link to the photo album:

20080829 - Montreal and Quebec

In other news, she's at that point where she's saying new words almost everyday. This week we heard out, bye-bye, up, weeeee (as she was going down the slide head first), hello, and finally, finally, she said yes tonight. We've been hearing no for months now! Her other words are mama, dada, no, more, book, numa-numa (which means cup/drink), and nye (which means nice). Willa says "nice" when she pets the cats because I'm always saying "niiiiice" so that she learns to pet them instead of smacking them...so far she only says nice, she doesn't pet the cats nicely. They're very tolerant, thankfully. She says bah-boo a lot, but we haven't figured that one out yet. I think it might be dog because she says it most when she sees our neighbor dog. The other sound she makes a lot is gah-doy, on repeat (gah-doy gah-doy gah-doy). No idea what that means. My mom heard some other baby saying it in a store last week, so maybe it's part of the secret baby language. At any rate, Willa chatters nonstop and we're glad that we're starting to understand more of what she's saying.

New this week, too, is that Willa helps when we're dressing her. She puts her arms through shirts now and pulls them out. Finally, and we'll have to get video of this, Willa has become a dancing machine. It started with just a little shake of the hiny but now she moves her arms around, too. It's quite funny to watch.

She had an allergist appointment last week and at that visit she was 24.7 pounds, up two pounds from her checkup a month ago. She's finally getting some baby fat and a cute baby belly! That's probably enough news for one post (or Markus will harass me for typing too much). We'll post again soon!

Lots of pictures

The office is kind of reassembled, or at least the computer is, so we've started getting the pictures off of the camera. Lots of pictures! I'll post a few small albums tonight and get to the vacation photos later this week.

It's a big birthday week in our families - today is my dad's birthday, tomorrow is Dennis' birthday, Wednesday is my birthday, and Thursday is our niece, Emma's, birthday. Happy Birthday to everyone!!

Now to the photos.

August 18 - Willa's walking toy arrived and we let her test it out. She loves this thing and it apparently helped her :-)


August 23 - Wearing sunglasses and playing with Abby at a picnic


September 6 - I realized her hair was long enough to wear pigtails so after her bath, I slicked it back and took pictures.

Walking Milestone

Willa took steps from standing!

Willa has a boyfriend!

On Willa's report card today, in the Things I Liked section:

Was happy and liked laughing with my friend Sriram

I guess little Sriram is a charmer! He is a cute little boy - has Willa found herself a daycare boyfriend? We'll keep you posted. :-)

Boarded

Boarded

Goodbye Montreal!

Sleeping

We're back on Canada's VIA Rail to Montreal. Baby didn't sleep well last night so she's having a little nap.

And Christie is reading the newspaper.

Tuesday Update

This morning we started out with coffee and a coissant on Rue St Jean. We then walked near the St. Roch neighborhood and then cut through Montcalm to see the Parc des Champs de Bataille which is kind of like Valley Forge in terms of signifiance. We did a nature walk and then descended about (200-300 meters I think) a million stairs down to the St. Lawrence where we walked north to the Old Quebec port area.

After returning to the hotel for lunch we then walked the Rue Grand Allee Est which is a beautiful commercial corridor with restaurants and shops. We checked out Rue Cartier and then headed back down to the Chateau Frontenac via the Boulevard Rene Levesque Est... Anyway, it was a lot of walking and we're back at the hotel to wash up before dinner and then bed. We have an early train back to Montreal tomorrow and then a few hours before our flight home.

Last full day of vacation

In le parc Francaphonie

Vieux Quebec