When all else fails.

When the feeder gets sick of the kid spitting food back at you, and all normal distraction methods have failed, it's on to extreme measures. Bust out the lap top, find Tigger and Pooh on youtube and voila, instantly no more spitting.

I've never seen anything like it, from full power spitting "there is no way I'm going to eat this" to "I'll eat anything you put in my mouth" in a couple of seconds. You will note the feeder is appropriately attired with cooking apron, plus the laptop keyboard is fully covered in protection ready mode.

Bike ride number one.

Now that we have got little Emily a helmet (and it's still too big) it was out for the inaugural family bike ride.

Well into the ride, and taking a close look at the image you can see that Emily is a happy passenger, and Candace is a concerned looking pilot.

One happy passenger.

Baby Backpacking....

We went for a wee tramp on the weekend with our friends Guy and Cheryl and their little girl Mia. Both families just recently purchased some Macpac baby carriers and were eager to try them out in the bush, so we found a flattish trail and went for it.
New Zealand bush never fails to impress as you can see with the beautiful hues of green moss, luscious ferns and intricately weaved branches on the trees.





Mia and Emily enjoyed their picnic together, even pausing at one stage to give each other a back rub.


However, Mia tuckered herself out with all the excitement on Daddy's back and decided to have a small rest from all the tough tramping.



We had a great time and Emily liked being out of the stroller on our adventure, and seeing everything from adult height. She waved at alot of things in the forest and would check everything out when Bryce stopped to let her touch the moss and the trees.
Many more adventures to come.

I love my blanket

Emily had a bit of a freak out the other night which had us thinking she was cracking some more teeth or something similar. Turns out she just wanted her favourite blanket which was being washed. Once she got it back, she gave it the love.

Ta-daa!!

Emily's first self propelled bike ride from Candace K on Vimeo.

How to make a father happy.

Little Emily hasn't mastered walking on her own, but with the help of handlebars...

Total solo distance covered in the first training session, 2m before crashing sideways to the grass.

Interval training is proving to be the best strategy at 10 months. Case in point, stair climbing. She can go all out for about 15 stairs, but then takes a break and holds on the the next step with her teeth, all four of them.

10 Months!

It's getting hard to take the photo. 10 months old and growing up fast.

She can finally ride, well almost...

Bryce has bought Emily her first bike seat and took her around the lounge (in his arms) and backyard (on the bike) in the seat today. She seems excited to be sitting in it, although she has no idea what it's all about. But it sure makes her Daddy excited so she laughs alot because he is laughing. We are just awaiting the helmet to arrive and the entire family will finally be on bikes!

Bryce and his business colleague/friend Bruno-Luc from Quebec after a visit this week. We have discovered that not only do these two men get along really well, but they both are very particular about their "belongings" and find frustration when their routine gets messed around; such as the peanut butter in the cupboard being put in the wrong place! Fascinating to listen to these two confide in each other all their little idiosyncracies.

This is the after shot, of our daughter feeding herself 2 blackberries. I couldn't believe only 2 berries could make this much mess.

Our cat is finding more and more unique sleeping hideaways to relax without fear of being grabbed at by a toddler.

Our summer holiday

We headed up north to a place called Whanarua Bay, in the East Cape of New Zealand for our holiday this year - with our good friends Mark, Rachel and their daughter Holly. It was a great week filled with good food, lots of beach time, games, laughs and amazement watching the girls play together and learn from each other. It was fantastic because Emily and Holly synchronized their nap times and that made it really easy for us parents to get good workouts and bike rides done while the girls slept in the morning. Then we would all go have lunch on the beach and play in the sand and waves and then the afternoon nap would allow some book reading or just chillin out. The Mojitos usually made an appearance sometime after that. Pretty tough schedule really!

The view from the deck of our bach (aka cottage)

Mark, Rachel and Holly - our fellow vacationers

A game of BLOW FOOTBALL between Bryce and I - harder than it looks

The boys doing the morning shift, letting the mommies have a sleep-in

The open plan lounge/kitchen/puzzle center/dance floor at the cottage

Interesting picture below. You may have to zoom in on the hind region of this specimen to get the full appreciation of the picture. I found some car keys sitting beside me on the beach and just about to get swept up in the waves. As we left the beach, we were contemplating what to do with these keys when this woman came running up to check the spot we had just been at. We asked her if she was looking for keys and she was surprised and then immediately relieved when she saw us holding them (must have fallen out of her bakcpack). Anyway, she skipped off happily and we all went on with our day, until....we looked a little closer at her backside. Turns out her keys weren't the only thing she forgot that day.

Bryce and Emily on his shoulder - he likes carrying her around but recently she has taken to sticking her fingers deep into his ears when on his shoulders, so it is not the most comfortable position for him. You'd think she would just take hold of his 'fro instead.

This is the dairy (convenience store) that was in the movie "Boy". With Bryce's encouragement, I admit I did re-enact some of the scenes by doing my own Michael Jackson moves in front of the store. I am sure Emily is glad she doesn't know yet how to be embarrassed of her parents.

Dinner and wine on the deck at the cottage. A beautiful view!

Emily and Holly - great friends and fellow connoiseurs of the '70's mix tape we found in the tape recorder. Both girls got their groove on all week, to the same 'wonderful' songs.

Holly and Emily in their beach attire

This is Emily trying endlessly to get on this shelf. She would climb onto it and then get upset because she was then stuck and couldn't sit up or turn; but then when we rescued her, she would go right back to climbing onto it again. She was simply drawn to the shelf....

A tired girl after all the excitement of the holiday

This is the 9 month picture (only about 2 weeks late though). George the bear is sure getting smaller with every month picture we take

Our little girl

Emily and her friends Cara and Sophie


Emily is on the move - we now have crawling races, and chases, and lots and lots of "house-al defence" - as in constantly protecting the rest of the house from Emily the crawling conqueror.

Fun times in 2011

Emily and Daddy playing on the 'rocking elephant'

Mommy got bored and decided that Emily's hair was now long enough to play with

This is what she looked like after we took the pigtails out

Emily in our bean bag

This one is for Nana, the outfit she got Em for Christmas - so cute

Christmas Day

Christmas Day at Trish and Craig's farm is always a fun and exciting time, and this year was no exception. Besides Emily and I trying to conquer a cold, we
enjoyed Christms weekend with John, Cushla, Trish, Craig and the kids Sammy and Henry, and Craig's mother Gladys. Christmas morning was fun; especially watching Emily soak in all the chaos of present opening. She managed very well, and although had no real idea of what was going on, absorbed enough of the excitement to nap really well all day.

On Boxing Day, we helped draft sheep with Craig and Trish. Drafting is the process of getting all the ewes and lambs into sheep pens and then pushing them through bunch by bunch until you have separated all the lambs from their moms. It is a bit sad to hear all the sheep crying out for their babies or moms but it's the "way of the farm". All of the sheep were being shorn ("sheared?") the next day so the wool needed to be separated between new lambs wool and old ewe wool. I enjoyed helping to move the sheep all around and trying to use my best imitation "dog bark" to assist my canine co-workers, we got the job done pretty smoothly! Emily joined us in her stroller and liked watching all the sheep moving around, but soon was over it and wanted a quiet place to nap. So I decided to take her back to the house for a nap. Craig asked me to go to the 4 wheeler and get the "rattle". I told him not to worry, as Emily didn't need it because she was gonna go back to the house. He looked at me weird, and said again "but if you just grab it, its on the steering wheel". I figured he hadn't heard me so said, "that's alright, I will just take Emily home for a nap". As I moved Emily's stroller out of the yards, Bryce came to help carry Em's stroller over a fence. He then walked over to the 4-wheeler and grabbed a rattle-like thing and I said,"whats that?". He said, "its a sheep rattle to use to move the sheep around the pen!". Oh, so Craig wanted the rattle for the sheep, not Emily......duh.