At the reno store:
E – I didn’t quite expect to have trouble finding a garden gazebo in June.
Clerk – Yeah. People all rushed in for those in spring – I guess they got sick of winter. The store has trouble re-stocking, so they’re pushing to get fireplaces in, now. Should be in soon.
E – You know what? I saw you had a fireplace I loved at half price in February, but I gave birth later that same day and, by the time I could get back to the store in March, BBQs were out and I missed my chance.
Clerk – Good thing those will be back soon then, eh?
E – Yeah. But I was hoping to get it on sale again, so I’ll have to wait for the end-of-season prices. When will that be: september or october, do you think?
Crazy commerce.

***
Who would have thought a shade of taupe/beige would be the most difficult colour to pick? Jane should have a hotline.

***
***
“You know all the pamphlets they give you at the hospital, that say your baby will die if you let him sleep on his tummy?”

***
E – Xavier, eat some chicken, please. Yum, yum, chicken?
X – No.
E – Mmm, yummy chicken! … Taste it, at the least.
X – NO.
F – Here, Xav, a SCAL-LOP.
X – … A-LOP! (He tastes, then:) Mmmm!! More?
F – Here, more.
X – A-lop! (He chews.) More?
F – There you go. Another scallop (which is in fact chicken cut to the size of a scallop).
X – Yum, yum! (He swallows.) More?
F – It’s chicken, Xavier. See, there’s lots of chicken already in your plate.
X – Chi-kennnn!
He starts stuffing all the little pieces of chicken one by one in his mouth. Oy, the tricks we have to pull…

***
It’s hard to determine which kid is learning the fastest these days. Xavier is absorbing language and concepts like a big noisy snowball, while Orly’s development – prehension, motor and social skills – is more subtle, but no less quick, because she’s starting from scratch, after all.

***
X – Allô mamaaan.
E – Allô Xavier. Oh, you smell nice, Xavier. You just had a good bath?
X – Yes… (He thinks, then adds:) …water.
E – With water? Wow. To hell with expenses, eh?
X – Yes.

Someone’s having fun with Photoshop…

Transl. “Camera or not… we’re rolling!”

I rolled onto my tummy!!! It was on my mattress – softness helps! – but it still counts. I’m barely 4 months old… yay me!

I had started practising suddenly on Wenesday, but yesterday I wasn’t feeling like putting in the effort. Earlier, though, I was practising again with mommy in my crib and I was getting quite good, and fast; I tried to play a trick on her and get it done while she’d gone to fetch the camera, but she came back just in time to see me and say how proud she was! No movieclip, though, just a photo of the results.

Congratulations to me!

PS. My brother Xavier was 5 months when he rolled on his belly by himself. It’s not a competition, of course, but I just felt like mentionning it, you know… *whistles*

Xavier is almost 6 times Orly’s age. Weird.
***
It’s hilarious that my mommy planner calendar comes with icon stickers labeled “personnal time”.
***
Xavier, it sucks for you that the most beautiful girl in the world had to be your sister!
***
Surely there’s a daddy Einstein out there to invent glow-in-the-dark pacifiers?
***
Black chocolate, chocolate coated cakes, chocolate chip cookies, chocolate ice cream, chocolate bars. We wish for a chocolate treat every day!
***
Okay. So it’s your usual small nursings every 2.5 hours; or a big nursing every 4-5 hours, but then you spit up milk every time you’re propped up vertical. Good to know. (Oh, the smell…)
***
I found out I have an endless liking for pink. I can dress my baby girl in pink every day, and it’s always awesomely cute.
***
X – More!
F – More egg?
X – Yes.
E – Wouldn’t you like toast, Xavier?
X – No.
E – Banana?
X – No.
E – Grapes?
X – No. Egg.
F – You want more egg?
X – More! Egg.
(And, yes, he ate a second whole egg, the little glutton.)

It took very little effort to imagine a pack of children scampering off in the yard, as I pulled up the car to a large white house just before lunch on Saturday. The house sits at the heart of the village, a few yards from a great ornate church; various extensions on sloped ground overlook the spot where the big garden used to grow. All over the walls, fish scales of wood dress the house with ancestral charm, and green trim complements it, though I remember it being painted burgundy – I have an old blurry picture somewhere, that I took with my first camera back in the nineties.

It became my private game for that day: conjuring up visions of cousins crouching behind beds playing hide-and-seek, aunts calling up children from the bottom of the twisted carpeted staircase, or uncles sleeping off hangovers on the couch after New Year’s celebrations. We’re all grown up now; some of us have children of our own. Yet, still, my grandmother’s house remained the carefour of an extended family scattered throughout the province; it remained, despite the loss of my grandfather over a decade ago and, more recently, my grandmother herself moving out to lodgings better suited to her failing health. It served through the years as gathering place, shelter and rallying point. The house was permeated with family.

It’s odd that it will not be our first stop on trips to my parents’ neighboring hometowns anymore. My other grandfather’s house – on my father’s side of the family – was sold last year as well, so I am not sure where visits will land us or how often we will make the trip in the years to come. Times are changing.

I took a picture of Xavier in front of the house, to try and hold my past and future in the same image. The little bugger will just NOT stand still!

And Orléane got to meet her great-grandmother for the second time, so we snatched a pic of the 4 generations of women.

Seeing these two pictures from this evening’s playtime, I’ve been struck by the thought “This is SO Xavier”. So much of his presence shows through these two images.

Orléane is turning 4 months on Monday. Aaaaah!