Ava Marie Matter

Born Feb 23, 2010 3:41am, 9.3lbs

Bath time with big helper Luca

Peek a boo Ava



Cuddles with Mommy




Pretty in pink




She's a big one

Lucas is a Big Fan

With the Olympics in full swing Lucas has caught on to the spirit and has picked up our National anthem. Wants to sing it all the time

That is him playing for Team Canada. Lately the balloon is the ball/puck of choice. Don't know what that says about our chances for Gold but he sure is a big fan.

The other day he also decided he was going to be a ski jumper. Now spends a lot of the day crouched down and counting "1,2,3 GOLD!!! Yeah Lucas" Hands over his head in a victory stance. Sure has the confidence to make it to the olympics if not the skill at this stage.

Not Two? Yeah Right!

Peek A Boo

Lucas has entered a new phase in his life, the "almost two", I really don't want to call it the terrible twos or the terrific twos, there has to be some sort of middle ground that can describe the way he is. A bit of a challenge lately to say the least.

For example,

Mommy: Want to go outside Lucas

Lucas: No

Mommy: Want to play downstairs Lucas

Lucas: No Go outside

Mommy: Ok lets get our coats on

Lucas: No put coat on

Mommy: Can't go outside without our winter clothes

Lucas: No put coat on

Mommy: Ok we will stay inside than

Lucas: No stay inside, go outside (now yelling at me)

Mommy: You choose, put on your coat or have time out

Lucas: No time out

So we finally get his coat on, he finally calms down acts as if he never battled at all and we go outside Lucas has a great time

Just a little taste of his every day, no that should read moment of testing and pushing his boundries.

Today he threw a train at me, I think he was just excited and wanted to play but come on I can't just let him throw things at me so off to time out we go. Lucas screams his head off and I feel like a horrible mother because I have locked my child in a room, he wont stay on a 'naughty spot' no matter what the experts say! It is like torture for me as lucas screams "No close door Mommy, No throw trains, No close door" over and over and over again. Rips your heart out. So after a whole minute (which beleive me feels like a very very long time) I go to let him out of his cage, he melts in my arms hugging and sobbing on my shoulder. He has to say sorry and give me a kiss and then he tells me again "No close door Mommy" Just to make sure that Mommy knows that he really did not like that at all.

Bottom line, it seems to work and for a few minutes, we have a sensible child again who loves to do everything, than the fun starts again.

Practising Jumping!

Man Down!

Oh the joys of growing up, wonder what will happen when the new one comes. Maybe since he has started this early he will just go back to being the sweet, sensible, loving, helpful little angel that I know him to be! Um, somehow I think there will be a few more timeouts in our future before that happens

I say all this and then he does something that makes you feel so good. He woke up the other day and when Peter went in to pick him up he says "I missed you Daddy".

He still loves us

Mini Me

Mr Lucas enjoys his penquins even in french. So cute with his hand on his cheek.

Mini Pat (Tyson) and mini Peter (Lucas) spending some quality time together. They are about the right height at the moment although it looks like it will only be a couple of months before Tyson is giving Lucas hand me downs. It's ok Lucas he is only a year younger than you nothing to be ashamed of.

Time is flying by

Due date is Feb 21st, can't believe how fast these 9 months have gone. That being said we have been a little bit busy over the last few months, I am sure that has made a difference.

I am now so uncomfortable most of the time but since it is pregnancy number 2 I am not as anxious for the new little one to pop out since I know sleep will be no better after the baby is here.

I think I am mostly ready, we are still working on organizing a few things but mostly we are ready for a baby, we have

• Diapers
• Wipes
• A place for baby to sleep
• Back up formula in case I need it
• Car seat all ready to go
• A camera on standby (thanks for the lend Mom, mine did not survive the washing machine)
• A little boy excited to be a big brother


• I have reread my 'How to be a Mom book' that I read with Lucas

I think that should do it, we should be set - famous last words I am sure.

In a just over a month I am sure we will not know what hit us as we are once again up in the middle of the night and teaching a new little one the pleasure of sleep, lets hope this one catches on to the craze a little quicker than Lucas did.

Lots of practising on how to handle a new baby

Finally Sorted - Or so we think

So moving home has proven to be a little more of a challenge than we expected, mainly because it is so unusual for people from Burlington to move away that no one seems to know what to do with us. Thought I might vent a few of our issues

Mortgage

• Peter spent 3 days on the phone trying to get a mortgage. Apparently we have not been earning any recognizable income for the last 5 years even though Peter has been working for multi -national companies. Huge waste of time. In the end we were able to get one, thankfully!

Keys to the house

• Get the keys, start to move in – oh the old owners are still here, they think they have till 6pm to move out
• No big deal but want it on record that we are not in the house, we call the lawyer and real estate agent who calls their lawyer and real estate agen and the woman gets pissed off and is all offended that we would dare move in before they are ready, etc, etc, etc. Too bad we are moving in anyway!
  

Phone and internet

• Randomly the phone line would cut out, call the technician and it would magically be working again
• Had a technician come out to the house to find that our line is buried in water and therefore doesn’t work sometimes
• Technician ran a new line and all appears to be working fine, except the line runs through a tree at the front of our house and will not be buried until spring – ghetto looking
• Answering machine would not work so I took the phone back and replaced it
• Still does not work, called the technician figure it is a problem with the line, no it is just a bad choice apparently it means that out of all the phones we could pick this one is not compatible with a digital phone – fantastic
• Had to buy a new phone, works fine, thankfully
• Got a phone number so we could call long distance for a cheaper rate, couldn’t call within Canada for some reason – that is now fixed

Cable T.V

• Same issue with the cable line as the phone
• We bought a cable box off a friend and it did not work with our cable for some reason.
• Called the technician and they had no idea how to fix it so they sent out a technician
• He was baffled as well
• Finally called in our expert Patto who seemed to get it up and running
• Yippee we can watch T.V
• Wanted the cable box so we can record programs, that does not work
• Pat figures we needed a new remote so we get it and try it
• Of course the by the time we get the remote the cable is no longer working again
• Finally figure out we need a new hard drive in the recorder - everything is now working great, I love to watch T.V with no commercials

Appliances

• Ordered appliances to be delivered just after we moved into the house
• Finally got everything in on Christmas Eve
• Ordered Gas and have yet to be able to get the 'guy' in to hook up the gas so stove is sitting in a box in the kitchen, Dryer is ready to go but does not work, looks nice though, Microwave is in the garage waiting to install stove so we can install microwave above the stove.
• Freezer is on back order – still

Shipment

• Followed up on our shipment from New Zealand once we got to Canada. It had not even left the warehouse yet.
• Finally got them shipped on a boat with a confirmation of when they are meant to arrive, got the email saying what we need to get it through customs and find out we were never given the forms that we need in order to clear customs
• Had to drive to the airport (hamilton thankfully) to clear customs, showed up with all the items they said I needed, apparently that was not enough so had to go back and do it all again.
• On second trip to the airport put my credit card in to park in the lot and then when I was ready to leave I could not get out of the lot, apparently all the machines were down. Had to go back into the airport and find someone to let me out of the lot, good times
• Crate came on Monday Dec 14th, shipped on July 23rd crazy, 5 months – ridiculous
• Good news, only one bowl broke and a Tupperware cracked. Peter should go into the packing business he did a good job.
• Sprague did a fantastic job drilling the crates shut so tight with screws that it did not dare pop open, a bit of a mission for Peter to take out but they held for the long journey.

Car

• Fantastic car, Peter did a great job
• Has a navigation system and you can not set the clock on it, all manuals tell you to press a button that we do not have in our car

Furniture

• Ordered furniture from Lazy boy, supposed to bring a couch, loveseat, 2 chairs, rug and 2 pillows
• We got 2 chairs and 2 pillows, that are the wrong ones – more phone calls
• Finally got the couch and loveseat with no more problems
• Got another call from Lazy boy that they were coming to deliver more items, we were expecting 2 more chairs and a rug. The guy says I have 2 tables for you - no thankyou never ordered those - send them back
• The saga continues

So there have been a few issues as we try and get settled but we are looking ok now.

Baby is due in 6 weeks so we are working on getting ourselves organized so that we dont have to do too much sorting out when the baby comes and can just enjoy and get used to the sleepless nights again.

Lucas is enjoying himself and is so happy to be around his Granparents he is always asking about them and wants to call or go and visit so it was a good move even though the craziness is following us. Lets hope the new baby brings some sanity to our lives

A quick note, baby brain has struck and I accidentally put our camera in the washing machine so new pictures may be slow coming - oops

Hockey Night in Canada

Seems to be every night there is hockey on T.V. It is a bit ridiculous and have to say I never missed it one bit in all the 5 years I was away. Would be happy for it not to be on now either but I guess that is the breaks you have to live with when you marry a hockey fan - yippee skippy.

One more week and we move into our house. Looking forward to starting life over again, getting things sorted and finding a routine of some sort.

Lucas has been very happy, he is talking lots still, actually non stop really. He loves to talk, not always making any sense at the moment, as he is trying to make sentences but words seem to be connected with random sounds. Cute but not quite understandable at this stage.

We have bought a new (used) car. 2005 Nissan Murano. I like it, it is a bit bigger than I had planned so it is taking a bit of getting used to but we are getting there. Lots of room for all the stuff we need to take places for Lucas. which will be nice, no more puzzling it into our little station wagon. The greatest thing about it is, unlike the white wagon, it is quite inside, I can't hear the wind barrelling by at high speeds, thank goodness. Lucas seems happy with it so far, as happy as he can be in the car I guess.

New babies in town. Pat and Lori had their little guy 10lbs 1ounce if you can call that little. They named him Tyson Cater. Brown and Rhonda had their tiwn girls the other day as well. Having babies seems to be the thing to do lately.

I am still hangining in there, have a while to go yet. Not due until the middle of February with the next one. Lucas is excited about the new baby, at least he is so far. He loves to give kisses and cuddles to my belly and talks about the baby all the time, if it is not mommy's baby it is his that he has in his belly, sometimes that baby is a chicken. Hope nothing comes out of that one.

Peter is still plugging away at his business, not sure how happy he is with it, I think time will tell. Seems he likes working from home though and Lucas loves to see him during the day which is nice.

Lucas now has a membership at the YMCA and we go there quite often, he loves playing on all the toys (Elmos especially) and bikes that they have. Lots of big kids to watch as well, they do some funny stuff sometimes makes him laugh, which makes me laugh as well.

It is Halloween tonight but we took a pass this year, Lucas is a bit young and his costume is still in NZ, hopefully it will be here before Christmas time. Would be nice to open up a box of all our stuff before next year, we will see though.

Lucas taking his dog for a walk, notice it is not a real one, it will be a long time before he has a real dog to walk - this one works well for now