First Steps!

Adam took his first consecutive steps today! He's been standing on his own for a while and takes the occasional step. But today he took two steps together! And he did it a few times! But he's still not too sure about the whole walking thing. He takes two steps, stands there for a minute and then slowly lowers himself to the ground and crawls away! He just won't try for that third step yet. But we were all very excited this evening. James and I were cheering Adam on. And Daniel does in his own way, too. He usually yells, "See! See! Amam walkin' all myself!"

We managed to get one picture before Adam decided enough was enough.

Thank you, Grandma Rowe!

The boys love their Spiderman capes. Well, Daniel LOVES them and Adam doesn't mind wearing his. They got them on Sunday during our monthly family dinner and have worn them many times since. What a great idea!

It's hard to get a picture of Daniel in his cape, because he's usually running around, trying to save a day, as he says.


Only the toughest superheroes use soothers.

And a good view of the cool capes:

Avalon Dairy

On September 7, we met up with Gramma and Grampa Terry and went to the fair at the Avalon Dairy by their house. It's a fully-functioning dairy that has been around since 1906. A few years ago, they started this fair and it has been extremely popular. Luckily, Gramma and Grampa live only three blocks away so we were able to walk up there, since parking was ridiculous.

The boys had a great time. Daniel played a few games, they sat on a firetruck and Daniel even got to try on the fire helmet and boots. There was an area with farm animals where the boys got to pet chickens, goats and a cow. Daniel got a balloon shaped as a ladybug that he could wear on his wrist (kind of like a corsage). We listened to Nearly Neil (Neil Diamond impersonator) while we ate our free ice cream.

The boys were photographed by dairy staff and their picture may be put on the Avalon Dairy website. They're not there yet but, if you want to check it out, it's http://www.avalondairy.com/.

What a busy month!

My apologies for the lack of posts lately. I had written a nice, long entry a few days ago, filled with lots of pictures. Then, when I went to post it, it disappeared! I was not impressed and gave up for a few days! So, here I am, trying again to get you all up-to-date with what's going on in the Rowe home...

We've been keeping ourselves pretty busy these days. The boys are enjoying going to daycare and I'm liking my new class (especially after hearing what the other Kindergarten classes are like). Our weekends have been filled with outings and festivals and I'll write about those in their own posts.

Daniel is growing up so fast. He's talking so much more these days and is starting to speak in longer sentences. He's going to speech therapy once a week right now. The therapist is still figuring him out so, during each session, she plays lots of games with him and gets him to talk as much as she can. However, as we all know, Daniel doesn't like to "perform" and doesn't talk quite as much there as he does at home. But she (and others) have noticed the difference in his speech lately.

Daniel is obsessed with Spiderman and super heroes these days. He loves capes and masks and runs around saying, "Superman save the day!"

We went to Central Park in Burnaby one day with our friends Angie and Greg to play bocce ball and on the playground. There's a small spray park there that we weren't prepared for, so Daniel didn't have a bathing suit to wear. As you can see, heavy jean shorts don't stay up very well but make for a cute picture to save for bribery at a later date!

Daniel is such a daredevil! He's started jumping off the stairs and tries to jump 3 or 4 steps - I think he tried 5 today before I noticed! I have visions of him breaking something - hopefully it's not one of his bones! We went to Sapperton Park in New Westminster the other day and Daniel climbed up the old playground ladder all by himself. Of course, I stood by nervously but he was steady as anything.

Little Adam isn't so little anymore! He had a doctor's appointment last week and is now 21 pounds 3 ounces. That puts him in about the 25th percentile! Grow Adam grow! He also got his chicken pox vaccine, which he wasn't too pleased about. The doctor wants him to continue with the toddler formula for a while longer before switching to whole milk, since he's gaining so well.

Adam thinks he's a big boy these days and is starting to feed himself. He's a bit messy but is doing alright.

Adam had fun when we went to Central Park as well. He didn't like the cold spray park but he really liked the playground. He often stands up on his own for a while, until he realizes that he's not holding on to anything. Then he slowly lowers himself to the ground. He's not quite brave enough to take any steps, though. Occasionally he'll take one step, but that's it.

And here's a cute one of Adam. He's starting to interact more with people and act more like a "big kid," which is fun to watch.

Daniel's shiner

Daniel decided not to take a nap today so, by the time he went upstairs to go to bed at 7pm, he was pretty exhausted. So exhausted that he walked into a door! We didn't see what happened but we heard him cry and you know, if Daniel cries, it must be bad. Here's his eye a few minutes later.

I wonder what it'll look like tomorrow? I did manage to get him to hold a bag of frozen green beans on it for a few minutes, so hopefully that helped a bit. It also helped him feel a bit better since it thought it was pretty funny having beans on his eye!

We survived!

We survived our first week with Mommy back at work! We've tried really hard to have a good routine now that I've returned to work and it seems to be working alright so far. The boys have done so well. On Tuesday, they went to Linda's and had a great day. Daniel, of course, has been going to Linda's house for a long time now but it was only Adam's third day. He did well - cried a little bit and had a few run-ins with 15 month old Andrew, but otherwise he had fun. Linda did say Adam had a hard time falling asleep. He'd cry, then stop...cry, then stop... When she finally returned to the room, she saw that he was standing in his playpen, falling asleep while he was standing up! Every time his head fell, he'd wake himself up again and start to cry. When she finally laid him down, he was out in a second.

Daniel had an interesting adventure on Tuesday as well. At some point, Linda went into the bathroom to change Adam's diaper and she stepped in a big puddle of pee. Then she saw a pair of pants and underwear. She went into the playroom to see Daniel hiding behind a toy box. He came out wearing a pair of bright red pants. He hadn't made it to the toilet in time so he took off his wet pants, found Linda's stash of extra pants, changed his own pants and thought no one would be the wiser! If only he had known to clean up the puddle, too...

I had to go into work for a couple of hours on Wednesday morning, so James stayed home with the boys. They had quite the adventure. The worst part of the morning was when James was showering and put Daniel in his room. Daniel emptied out every drawer in his dresser and climbed up the drawers like a ladder. The dresser actually fell over! Luckily, Daniel managed to get out of the way and was unhurt. But now he's all impressed that he's so fast and was able to jump out of the way.

The boys went to daycare again on Thursday and had a fun day. Adam seems to like it there but, the moment I arrive, he won't leave my arms. It's a nice welcome, though!

Thursday night was James' first rehearsal with his new band. He's joined the Royal City Concert Band in New Westminster. Their website is http://www.royalcityconcertband.org/ if you're interested in taking a look. He's pretty excited about it and realizes how much he's missed playing. He even got Daniel into it!

On Friday, the boys went to their second daycare, Ashley's, for the first time. I think they had a good time. There are a couple of other kids from the neighbourhood there. Ashley does not run a very structured daycare, and kids can sleep when and if they want. Daniel's certainly not going to choose to nap, so we had a pretty tired boy on our hands in the evening. Both Daniel and Adam were fast asleep by about 7:30.

My first week back at school went quite well. This week was spent organizing classes and having interviews with the children and parents. My class seems pretty good - so far, many of the kids are quiet and shy. I'm sure they'll get more outgoing and chatty as the year goes on, though - they always do!