doggy days of summer

at the beginning of july, we had newton (yellow lab) in our home for a week, and gabe LOVED it! he would "walk" the dog, lie on the dog, pull his tail, screech and shout at him, and in general, just had a riot with newton. when i got home from returning newton at PADS, gabe was looking all over the house for him. and he'd look back at me, say "ma?" and hold his arms as if to question me "where's the dog?". i felt so bad for my buddy...he tried so hard to find the dog.

and then i got the call to bring home another dog, tango (black lab). of course, i jumped at the chance to dogsit for 2 weeks, and brought him home last sunday afternoon. by sunday night the dog's fate was sealed and he was on a return trip to PADS on monday. where newton was an uber-tolerant dog, the same was thought of tango. unfortunately he didn't take so kindly to having a toddler leaning/lying on him. so after a brief warning growl, and not enough quick action on my part, tango snapped and tried to bite gabe. fortunately gabe was moving away from the dog anyways, and only got a cheekful of dog slobber, but had he been a second slower, there definitely would've been more serious repercussions.

our dogless days didn't last long though! we brought acadia (black lab) into our home a few days later. i jumped at the chance to have her...she was actually raised by the family that adopted nugget and raised his sister (diamond). they have 3 kids in their household, so i knew she`d be fine with gabe. unfortunately at some point over the weekend she got into one of our garbage bins and threw up last night at her new sitters' house :( it was the first time a dog (of any age) has gone through my bins. mental note...close the bathroom doors and cover the bins!

and today i got another call from PADS, and we'll have paige (chocolate lab) with us in mid-August for a few days. i LOVE my volunteer work :-)

farewell

my uncle tosh loved the hot weather, so it seemed fitting for him that we said farewell on the hottest day of the summer (so far). i don't know if many churches are air conditioned, but the one we were at definitely wasn't. it must've gotten close to 40 degrees in the chapel...and unfortunately mid-service the heat claimed a victim. one of the elders in attendance passed out and had to be taken to the hospital. by the time she left in the ambulance, she was conscious and seemed to be ok. phew!

it was a really long day today...the morning service, reception lunch, cremation service, and then dinner at the riverrock casino. there's a story behind the casino, and it's cute :-) july 12 would have been my uncle's 3 year anniversary since he received stem cells from one of his sisters. he really had hoped to be released from the hospital by this date, and wanted his friends and family to join him at the casino for some gambling. sadly, since he passed before this could happen, my aunt decided what better way to honour his memory than dinner at the buffet and some gambling after dinner. the "joke" would be to see who would win big tonight...i was hoping it would be my auntie joyce. the latest update from my parents was that my uncle terry was up $90.

since we knew it was going to be a long and emotional day, chris and i were armed with all of gabe's favourites: goldfish crackers, puffed wheat, mangoes, animal crackers, juice, raisin buns, and most importantly, the ipods :-) the service itself was an hour-long, and gabe was a real trooper. since we had to get there early, we let gabe run loose and burn off his energy and explore, until we absolutely had to be seated. once the service started, so did the ipods :-) for the most part, gabe sat quietly in the pew and watched his cartoons. occasionally he would look around the church, decide it was too quiet, and yell out "ma!".

while it was never my intention to turn gabe into a tv junkie, on days like this it's come in extremely handy :-) as long as he has kai-lan to watch, he's a happy child. even if there's no sound accompanying it, he'll be ok. it's gotten us through this funeral, flights to/from vegas and toronto, car-rides when we need to keep him awake as we run late for his naptime at home, and long (social) meals!

everything else we've tried hasn't been met with as much success...stacking cups, leapfrog junior (even with a kai-lan book!), crayons...he just loses interest rapidly...they have about a 3 minute lifespan :P and now my mom's caving in...she might be buying an ipod for her outings with gabe. this, in addition to the weekly "gabriel" shopping of 3 books and 2 hats she just bought for him :-)


how did our parents raise us without modern technology?!

21 months old!

i've finally decided that it's time to put away some of gabe's "baby" toys and upgrade to new and better toys. so we hit toys r us today and came out with $100 worth of goodies. sadly, we only got 3 items...a shopping cart (he LOVES pushing things around), wooden alphabet / number / word blocks, and a thomas the train mega bloks set. up next...the get out and grill bbq! but first we need to rearrange some furniture in the condo to make some room. and lastly, i found a great activity table today, but again...we need more space :P my mom's also been shopping up a storm for gabe...new shape sorters, stacking cups, swimming pool (which we can FINALLY use this week!), books, and a few more "little" things for him.

we're really trying to emphasize gabe's speech development. i was an average child and starting talking at 12 months old. my brother didn't talk until he was 3, and ended up in a specialized program to help with his development. hopefully we'll avoid this path :P there's a limit to how far we can push gabe to "talk" without frustrating any of us. we thought "please", or a version of it, would be the next word in his vocabulary, but all we've managed to get is serious arm-flapping...sometimes he looks like he might take flight from the flapping. it's pretty funny :)


my parents and i are definitely seeing the 2 sides of gabriel. my parents don't let him get away with murder (as grandparents might do), in fact, my mom is very strict and gabe knows the rules at her house. at our home, we're definitely more "rule-free" and anything goes. gabe also realizes i'm the one leaving him to go to work, so when i get home, he just wants to spend time with me. as much as i would love to sit and play or entertain gabe, my next priority is to get dinner on the table for us. and some days that's the worst time of day...i end up with a tantrumy toddler standing on my feet, pushing me aside, screaming at me while i'm cooking. the other day at my parents house, they were flabbergasted by the tantrum he threw with me since they almost never get this behaviour from him. which is a good thing...i don't have to worry about poor behaviour with the "babysitters", and they get to spoil him rotten. i love it!

it's not only the tantrums that are different, but the eating routine. there have been a few skipped meals at home because gabe won't eat what i've prepared. he's never missed a meal with my parents and eats all of the food presented to him, including vegetables that he's passed on w/me. it's incredibly frustrating to see this deviousness from a toddler, but i'm trying to let it go...at least i know 4 days a week he's getting well-balanced meals from the 4 food groups.

when gabe was a baby, i had the best intentions in the world. i never imagined he'd be a tv-junkie at this age, but with the summer finally arriving, i've gotten a few more headaches than normal so i've got a rotation of ni-hao kai-lan, backyardigans, and go diego go. we've also noticed it's harder for gabe to behave in public, so we've been playing our ipods to keep him entertained and quiet (more on this in my next post).

for now, i think we're seeing a preview of what the (terrible) 2's are going to bring us. parenthood...what a journey :P