Garrett & Val

Wedding:  Saturday, July 23, 2011  Garrett & Valerie Watson

Weddings ... an opportunity to celebrate loved ones, be reminded of your commitment, and have a good time with old friends!
















GP & Val hosted a lovely casual wedding.  They were able to have the ceremony outdoors (despite the weather!).  Supper and the dance were held in a little community hall ... so we just set up a playpen in the basement and put Maklin down after supper.  Easy-peasy ... there were some other kids playing computer games in the basement; they kept an ear out and would come and get us if there were any issues, but Maklin just slept right through the DJ beats and thumping of the dance floor directly above him. Nice work kiddo!

OK - so this isn't the best picture ... we really did have a great time though!  

A cool feature at the wedding:  there was a photo booth set up in the corner where all night people could go and get picture taken for free.  You got a print of each set of photos, and the bride&groom also got a copy.  Cool idea!

The bride and I even got in a few belly shots:

I'm sure Maklin's all for love, and weddings, and all that jazz ... but the true highlight of the evening for him ... BUS!!

Out of town folks were shuttled from the hotel to the reception site in big yellow school buses ... Maklin was SO excited to see them pull into the parking lot.  The bus driver saw him, and invited him into the bus for a tour before he went on his next round (thank-you Mr. Bus Driver Man!!):

Mosquito Haven or Mosquito Hell??

Guess it depends on whether you were a mosquito ... or us!

If we removed the mosquitos from the equation -- we had a beautiful camping trip in the mountains!  Perfect weather, hot springs, excellent food, wildlife, 'hiking' (at least the kind of hiking you do with a prego mama and a toddler) ...

these mountain sheep wanted to be fed ... they were practically
digging in my pockets!

not exactly a sandbox ... but it did the trick!

When Maklin and Justin were out exploring in the campground ... they saw a black bear about 50ft away from them.

The outdoor bath never gets old:

Very little water left in the 'tub' by the time he was finished!

This trip marked the beginning of Maklin's mosquito trauma.  Anytime anyone says 'mosquito' he smacks his hands together and says "bad!"

I had to engage in battle with a tenacious squirrel who seemed quite determined to steal our supper.  Perhaps chicken satay and peanut sauce was a poor choice for camping food!!

Sunshine Pocket

We went camping this weekend with the Hermansons.

Gail, Caitlyn, and Seth Hermanson

Saturday morning lead to an emergency rescheduling of campsites ... the forecast for our intended destination was LOTS of rain and cold.  Not what you're looking for when you're camping with 5 kids (or really, if you're camping without kids).

We ended up heading further South and escaping the worst of it!  All in all, we had a really fun weekend.  Maklin had a huge nap on the drive home, and still went to bed exhausted!!

In sum, the kids had a great time - our campsite was sandwiched between a creek and a playground!

It wasn't very warm, but Maklin didn't care.  He was quite content to 'bathe' by the fire for about 30 minutes!

The small amount of rain we did get came at an unfortunate time, so I have no picture of my successful camping experiment: pepperoni mushroom pizza from scratch, in a cast-iron pan.  A few tweaks in technique for next time ... but it was awesome!!

Thank-you Hermansons for the good times -- and for the introduction to honey glazed donuts roasted over a campfire!  Looking forward to camping with you again in August!

loser beer*

Day two of a long weekend.  Spent the afternoon at the splash-park, then home for BBQ.  Stopped at the grocery store for buns and loser beer.

One step out of the store, we broke the box and blew one can.

Yay for the Chariot!  Maklin rode home cradled by the remaining (sticky & smelly) cans of loser beer.

The beer in his hand was the 2nd casualty; Mak managed to open it with his teeth and spray it on himself.

Yes -- we caught a few looks from people who saw a stroller with a baby surrounded by cans labelled 'MOLSON.'  Nice.

*loser beer = non-alcoholic beer; aka heaven to pregnant me on a hot summer day!