Photos: This week... Stratford, High Chair Times at Easy & General Cuteness

Last week, we introduced avocados to Rowen's menu...  it might have replaced carrots as her new favourite!   We also travelled to Stratford for a daytrip and had a mini Momma & Baby weekend.  

Stratford, Ontario is my most favourite town. Nothing has really changed there since I started going with my Mom in the summertime as a little kid.  We used to go and stay at a little Bed & Breakfast called The Deacon House, see a show at the Festival... usually the musical depending on which Shakespeare play was running and wander about town.  Wandering about town usually took, oh, an hour or so.  Stratford, Ontario is named after Stratford Upon Avon, the town where William Shakespeare was born.  So naturally, there is an Avon River in Stratford Ontario...

Which is one of the places The Heavyweights played as part of the Stratford Summer Music Festival.   They played on the river!  

Rowen and I tagged along on the first day.  Rowen met some ducks, we watched the Heavyweights' Noon show and then headed to Fellini's for lunch.

I LOVE FELLINI'S!  It is possibly one of my favourite restaurants and they haven't changed in the over 15 years that I've been going there.  The Chicken Parmigiana is my most favourite menu item.  And they have delicious "real" iced teas!  I almost couldn't get my chicken parm on this visit because it was technically still lunch menu time...but they made it for me anyway!  Thanks Fellini's!

Last Summer when Annie and I roadtripped to Stratford, I managed to finish this bad boy on my own. Annie patiently sat there while I chomped my way through this massive breaded chunk of chicken and mountain of yummy pasta.   Must have been one of those crazy hungry periods in between my constant pregnancy nausea... this year, I was only able to finish half!

Remember those pianos all over the city?  They have them all over Stratford too!

Lowell stayed over in Stratford the rest of the weekend. So it was just us girls for the weekend.

We had lunch with Ange at Easy...  another one of my most favourite places.  I think I've been going to the Parkdale location for maybe 7 or 8 years... the food never disappoints.  Oh, and the Banana Latte smoothie is ridiculously yummy and probably one of my favourite things ever. 

West Coast Toast, mmmm.  Essentially salmon eggs benny topped with caviar and dill.  And no wimpy sides here or having to choose between potatoes or a salad.... sooooo goood!

Rowen tried out a restaurant high chair for the first time!  She was amused by it but I did wind up holding her to avoid a restaurant meltdown as she was having one of her rare fussy, clingy days and it was close to naptime.  And hey, we survived public transit and a civilized restaurant lunch!  Score!  Thanks Baby!

Playing with Eileen.

"He said WHAT?!"

We went to the CNE on Monday!

Read more about Rowen's first CNE HERE!

And I know I've shared this photo already... but it's just such a crowd pleaser.  Lowell and I both changed our phone screens to this photo.  Our Baby is just too daaarrrrn cute!  

I felt a bit like I was cheating on Baxter the first time I bumped him as phone screen saver.  The Bax has been screensaver forever!  I felt bad choosing a Baby Pic over his, but I think he understands.  Or rather, he doesn't really understand well, anything.  So it's all good!

Beaches International Jazz Festival

Last week was the Beaches International Jazz Festival.  It was Rowen's first time going to one of her Daddy's big gigs.  We hung out backstage but she didn't get to actually see much of the music because we don't have her Baby Banz baby ear protection yet.  

I would say that the day started off great, with a super happy well-rested Rowen Baby who was posing for photos, giggling at the security guards and smiling at Uncle Paul of The Heavyweights ....and then as the afternoon went on, things went downhill quite quickly.  At around the second last song, we had a complete meltdown and I wound up having to feed her in the car and since she was too worked up to nap well, she kinda wailed and fussed during the entire ride home. Ah well, we will learn to master these longer Baby Adventures!  

I also recorded a video but it uploaded to YouTube with a weird WAKAWAKAWAKAWAKA over top of the music for a good 30 seconds, so I will have to re-upload it before I share it with you guys.

Here are some photos from our day at the jazz fest:

I turned the camera around in this shot and this was her reaction to seeing herself on the screen of the phone.  Oh Baby Girl, you so funnnny.

WHOA finally something kinda cool in the crazy City Place condos that are popping up like freakin' WEEDS in our city skyline...  The two towers towards the top left/middle of the pic are linked together by some crazy condo bridge thing, what!

Okay, this condo is obscenely close to the highway.  

No exaggeration you could actually lean over and touch the building.  Why is this necessary?

Rowen was really sad in the car.  

She could not be consoled... not with singing, her scrunchy owl and definitely not a pacifier.  This bag of Doritos from the food tent backstage was a last resort.  It made her happy!  It probably makes us look like really, reeeeeally bad parents though. But don't worry, she's not strong enough to pop the bag open! 

Happy Birthday Lowell!

The Baby bought Lowell some beer.  

I thought it would be funny and kinda nice since I haven't really been letting Lowell keep beer at home lately. Which kinda makes me a total jerk...cuz man, on my 24th many, many, many moons ago there was a literally a bathtub full of booze.  We called it the boozetub!  But I digress.   We got a 2-4 of nice Muskoka beers for Daddy's 24th. (Except we only got 12.)  

Super tall classic chocolate cake and a baby strawberry-rhubarb pie from Mabel's, one of my favourite places.  

One of my favourite lemon bars, possibly my favourite lemon bar in the city is from Mabel's! And their brownies are amazing so I figured their cakes must be as well.  They use real quality, local ingredients so that's a plus too.  I was way too lazy to make a nice cake so I bought one.

BUT! The wonky icing writing was done by me at home....

Her shirt says Incredible, Amazing, Incredible Dad.

Rowen very seriously composed a song for the occasion on her Baby Einstein piano.

Happy Birthday Lowelldish!  We love you!

Piano in the Park

This morning, we walked and got a one of my MOST FAVOURITE CROISSANTS IN THE CITY (and I've had a lot of croissants in this city) and then headed across the street to the park to check out the piano.  There are currently 40 or 41 pianos placed all around the city as some sort of promo/installation thing for the 2015 Pan Am Games.  

Our park got a cool, aqua coloured "Grenada" piano.

Lowell played for Rowen and a small group who gathered.  

Rowen didn't actually comprehend what was happening, but that's okay.

_______

Earlier in the morning, we read some books.  

Rowen likes to inspect the book after we read it together.

A sign of a good book?

Photos: This week.... Daddy's home, Auntie Annie, Cats

This week.... instragrammed.

She wants to walk soooo bad!

Trying to fit the entire Bax in her mouth

Auntie Annie came to town!!  

Annie is my very Best Friend who's amazing and living her dream to live in NYC.  I miss her so and hope that one day soon she comes home and hangs out with us some more!

Sunglasses at brunch.  Ray Ban, so hip!

DADDY CAME HOME!!

More Jolly Jumping, of course.  

Bax is loving the Jolly kicks to his head.... Oh Bax.

Bean says "Do not disturb plz"

Animals are so funny.

Momma got creative with Rowen Baby's 'do...

Hey, leave us a comment if you have a sec, Friends!  

Daddy's on tour

Her Dad is the Drummer!

Last dinner together on Fresh's sunny patio..

Well friends, I am officially a single parent starting today until late night on July 3, about 18 days!!

  The Heavyweights are on their Western Canada tour...so if you're in Western Canada, or know of anyone out there, tell them to go see The Heavyweights Brass Band!!  They are opening for The Roots in Saskatoon on Canada Day, which is really really cool right?


Come visit Rowen and me (and Bax and Eileen too)!  We'd love the company! And if you're not afraid to entertain the  Rowen baby by yourself briefly, I'd probably love a few minutes to take a shower without sticking the poor baby in her bouncy chair on the bathroom floor!!

Also dinner company and strawberry donations are greatly appreciated and always welcome.  I will trade you for adorable Rowen giggle-squeals and ice cream dessert!

Check out the boys' EPK below!

A few photos from our week so far....

 Walked in on them napping like this last weekend.  Excuse me, how cute, right? 

 She LOVES her baths!  Immediately after this, Ms. Rowen proceeded to spalsh me so hard that I had to change my shorts

Beeeeyoooty-fulll!  I enjoyed a Bailey's Coffee, my most favourite drink.

Lowell's gig this past Tuesday night got cancelled at the last minute, so we decided to send me on a solo dessert date while he put the baby to bed with a bottle.  I had not been alone (not counting the bathroom or Doctor's office) in.... AN ENTIRE YEAR!  

Ms. Baby is teething and can't stop drooling or keep her hand out of her mouth.

  

Her nails are also growing at such a rate that even though I try to trim them all the time (a few times a week!) , she keeps on scratching herself. :(

However, she is still her usual happy happy self!

Just us girls hanging out.  Eileen is pretty much Rowen's guardian cat these days...  Yeah, it's pretty darn cute.

Random oldie and a hat pic

Just had to pop in and share this photo. Holy cripes when I think that the Rowen Baby cannot possibly get any cuter, she allows me to put my hat on her little head and makes adorable faces while we take photos!

Randomly found this on the computer. I baked peanut butter chocolate heart cookies for Valentine's Day last year. Fast forward a year later and we had a Valentine's BABY. Man oh man. p.s. This photo also makes me miss our old loft.

37 weeks: last weekend shift at work

37 weeks! My last Sunday at work (I still work short shifts this coming week though)! The belly is fairly gigantic and attracts a lot of comments. It's funny because when I'm lying down at the Doctor's, the belly technically is "measuring small" but when I stand up, it looks huuuge because the Kittenheart has lodged herself in a "head down, butt sticking straight out, feet against my guts" position. There is a tiny baby butt sticking straight out at all times.

On Sundays, I work from 8am till about 5:30 or 6pm at the Yoga studio. It's a long day at the best of times. Even longer as I get more and more pregnant and now SUPER LONG today when I'm full-term pregnant (yay!) but sick with a terrible cold (not yay!) ...

Things that are amusing and help the day go by:

Shocking people with my giant belly when I come around the counter. I don't think I generally seem that pregnant from the boobs up, so people often can't tell that I'm pregnant at first glance. I don't have much of a waddle until the end of the day when my lower back/sciatic flares up and I go from being normal limber to barely able to move.

Snacks. So many snacks.

Discovering what kind of random lunch/snacks that Lowell packs for me. Example, today I went into bag that he packed for me and discovered a yogurt, a spoon, a whole apple zipped into its own ziplock (? lol) and a ziplock full of Fudgee-Os. I'll probably have to venture downstairs for actual lunch.

.

Bax Love, Lowell Love, Kitten Love (19 weeks and 5 days photos)

Bax is so stinkin' cute we forgot the belly in the first photo.




I've been living in this stripey shirt from H&M Mama lately. It's super comfy but drapes on my body like a giant tent. It makes the ol' belly look far larger than it is! My increasingly awfully curved posture doesn't help the situation because in reality, the belly isn't that big anymore! It's somehow shrinking due to less jiggly bloat and more firm baby.



It blows my mind that one day, sooner than I think, there is a little person who I will love as much as I love Baxter. I explain to Lowell that my Bax-Love is measured on a different scale than Love-love, so it's not a competition.

Example... I love chocolate chip cookies and I also love the colour purple. You can't ask me if I love cookies or purple more because they're measured on a totally different scale. Hence Bax-Love and other-Love. Lowell and Bugdish can be at the top of both their divisions. It just blows my mind that there will be another division soon and another being that will be top ranking. Another little creature that I can tuck under my arm and knows how to conform to my body like a little koala bear! (Bax may be a fatty but we OWN the One-armed Cat Hold! Who needs two hands to hold a cat? Psssshhhhwwwwahh!)

It truly is a life changing experience, having a little human being growing inside you. It's a totally bizarre process that feels long, uncomfortable, painful, disgusting and thoroughly unnatural at times. I'd really like to meet one of those "I loved being pregnant!" type women... because they're f*cked. Please pardon my language. Do no get me wrong though, despite my complaining and despite the fact that I may have never wanted to or planned to experience it - now that it's happening? It's pretty freakin' cool.