Balançoires et crème solaire
Transl. “Swings and sunscreen”
Skipped a couple of great days and activities lately, notably my first Mother’s day – which was great and involved one dinner and two brunches, the gift of a new blanket by Frank and Xavier’s welcome cooperation at the restaurant – Ge and me going to see Shrek III – nice movie, Shrek babies are so cute! – and Ge’s and my trip to Québec city for the third Mommies-babies lunch on Monday – good weather, good hosting by Anne-Marie and good company for an afternoon of baby chatting. I’m making up with pictures and video.
One of the first hot days of the season today, so Xavier and I went playing out and strolled to the park where are the swings. I took care to apply sunblock on his soft skin and made him wear his sunhat. I, well… I pushed aside my sunglasses and put on my new sandals (for the second time, over the first time’s fresh welts), my capris and my neck-tied cami that exposes the most skin – which is stupid, since I have vitiligo. Alas, it seems the increased vulnerability to sunburn and skin cancer does not surpass my will to start the summer with an even tan. [Note: After writing this I did some additionnal research on vitiligo, and found there are different views on its role in cancer risks, some articles even suggesting people with the condition would be less likely to get skin cancer.]
Two summers ago, on our trip to Boston, we spent an afternoon at the beach in Ipswich under a blazing sun. I passed on Frank’s offer to apply sunscreen to my back and proceeded to do it myself instead. If I remember correctly, the dark tan marks of my finger’s outlines were still showing at Christmas.
Today – except for an incident involving carrot puree and the blender – was mostly fun, one of these days when it’s good to be on maternity leave. To prove it, here’s a 15 seconds video of Xavier in the swings (faint of heart, beware of motion sickness!):
For those who don’t feel like video, I also put up some stills in the album (and many other new pictures, including Mother’s day and Romane and Xavier in the car on our trip to Québec city on Monday). The park offers a superb background, and the pictures turned out great:
A good summer to all!
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Xavier qui joue sur la petite plage de la marina / Xavier playing on the harbour's small beach
Romane à la cueillette
Orléane is now... 
Xavier is now...
I think those people LEAST likely to get skin cancer (generally) are those who refrain from worrying about what newest study reveals what will now give you skin cancer, and instead simply enjoy what nice weather we have and take suitable precautions where warranted by experience. But that’s just me.
Swings are awesome!!
I may not have vitiligo, but am instead uniformly pale…a condition I sadly seem to have passed on to my daughter. I recall hearing on the radio once that the occurance of skin cancer increases significantly if you have had three or mor emajor sunburns in your life. Growing up I had three or more major sunburns each summer! Now I have a loving wife who reminds me to apply sunblock and that has helped immeasurably…especially since each year there’s a bit more vulnerable scalp exposed to the sun.
Great video. I need to find a nearby infant swing like that. I think Norah would love it.
Who doesn’t like video?! Awesome pictures Emilie. Glad to hear that you had a great Mother’s Day!
Hooray for playgrounds! Just wait until he is climbing up and sliding down…
Cute, cute, cute!
Hot Water Solar Panels…
I found your site on technorati and read a few of your other posts. Keep up the good work. I just added your RSS feed to my Google News Reader. Looking forward to reading more from you….