big sister Zoe

Zoe is ever more settling into the role of big sister. This morning as I put him in the swing (so I could get her some "rainbow" icecream), she said, "Look mom, I'm close to Finneas".. which is still rare. I plan to get their pictures taken on Wednesday.. hopefully together!

Zoe is finally starting to eat regular child-sized meals, and isn't too picky. Last night she requested some Celery to go with her diner ;)

oat milk

I was making oatmeal one morning, and Zoe wanted some in her own bowl, but not heated.. yes she at the oats uncooked, with lots of milk and now calls it "Oat milk". This morning she helped herself several times to my oatmeal (with bananas), calling it "oat milk". She'd say, "I think that looks pretty good. Don't you think so?" and then grab another spoonful.

nutritional power of paper?

I'm starting to wonder if there is nutritional power in paper and if I should consider its contribution to Zoe's diet. Its not that we let her eat the paper, its that she does... This morning we ripped 5 separate instances of napkins from her hands, half eaten. We decided at some point we she just ignore her, that she was doing it for attention. But 1 minute later, she's tipping her head back and starts to choke on it.. seriously choke.. that was too scary, now she's off the paper, something we just can't ignore. Scary.

I'm too big

Zoe often confuses "I'm too big" and "I'm too small".. but this morning, either would work for this story:

She looked at the tv while watching a cartoon and said, "The TV is very big. I'm too big" and a few more phrases I can't remember and actions I can't properly describe, but the big picture is that she wanted to jump into the tv and become part of the show. This isn't the first time. Once while reading "Tilly's tutu" (or whatever the book is called), she really, really wanted to jump in. Bruce told her that we'd have Nana draw a picture of her in the book (and we got into a fight over this because I told him that telling Zoe that one can draw in her books was not an option.. I always seem to get lost in the law of things). Zoe was really upset about this book.. she wanted Tilly to be her friend (and said as much).. same thing with the tv characters from I think "Backyardigans", her new favorite show.

I want to fly!

Zoe's favorite movie of the moment is Peter Pan (Disney classic). She seems to like John the most (kid with top hat and umbrella) and role plays with her dad. We have a black umbrella and she wants to go on adventures.. she always insists that she is John... Dad gets to be Wendy (under protest).. sometimes Mom is Wendy and Dad can be Peter Pan. Her favorite is the Follow the leader song.

Last night we went for a walk and she demanded to fly. Nothing her Dad would do satisfied her need to fly; I seriously think she thought he could make her fly, for real. He told her they'd look for fairy dust and try to make it happen.

f-ing thing

well, I'm embarrassed to even post this, but maybe someday Zoe will be embarrassed by it too...

In the past bit, discussions (secret talk for fighting) around Zoe has reached top levels and Zoe has picked up new vocabulary words.. I hardly ever use "the F word", but apparently did and now two mornings in a row, Zoe has cutely refereed to "f-ing thing" in repeated succession.

she also uses more gentle swear terms like: "Holy shoot" (from Anna), "darn" (from me)

She also uses other phrases like:
"Can I interest you in..." (from her Dad)

Tice's wedding...

The kids did fine on our trip to Tice's wedding. We flew into Toronto on standby-buddy-passes, made our direct flight; then drove to Niagara Falls, meeting up with Nana and Grandpa (pictured right) for a few minutes. Our hotel had a power outage in the place we were supposed to stay, so the room was smaller the first night.. but on the second night they made up for it and we had a huge place with a front room, huge bathroom with a two person tub (picture to come soon) and plenty of sleeping space (pull out for Zoe, King size bed for us).. and did I mention the view (pics soon).


Then we just walked around the falls the next day, got a bit wet.. the kids were too young to do much of the boating things and they both collapsed so we went back to the hotel. This was probbly Zoe's favorite part of the trip.. she took about 3 baths a day... we'd walk into the hotel, she'd go straight to the tub, strip, turn on the water, and get in.. her own personal pool.

At one point, I even got in tub with Finn and Zoe.. their first bath together... Zoe was so cute.. she gave him a hug, was happy to have him near her, it was precious.

Then we drove to Erie.. meeting up with the family at our beach house.

The first event was Friday night, we tried to meet up with Tice at his house before, but he got tired of waiting for us and went to the race track. Then for dinner, but unknown to us, the kids couldn't come to the bar after 9pm, so we dined by ourselves and went back to the homestead. The next day we went to Tice's for a while, and then to the beach wedding.

Some pictures from the wedding... first from the photographer, then the family. I'll embed some soon.
http://photogenesiserie.com/slideshow/Ashurst/
http://ticeandmikahswedding.shutterfly.com/
http://gallery.me.com/raashurst#100038
http://picasaweb.google.com/tanne.dabb/AshurstGoochJune2009?authkey=Gv1sRgCPf3j5vnwIGoiwE&feat=email#

The beach wedding was hard for a 2 year old.. Zoe wouldn't stand still enough to get in the photographs with family..





I finally talked her into it by asking her to bring two hand fulls of sand to the picture for the camera.. that would work for 30 seconds and she would be off again.



Auntie Carrie was clever and brought snacks for Zoe:


Bruce spent the actual ceremony time manning two kids, trying to keep Zoe out the water.. that didn't work either.. in the pictures after the wedding you can see her dress covered in sand.. it was wet half-way up.




















Here is a picture of parts of the new family:
















The next day was the BBQ.. Zoe spent the day with her new Cousin Taylor (17) who was very caring and entertained her well for a long part of the day.. they were good buds. The rest of the time was spent on the play set next store (see the pics). She got along well with her aunts and uncles too.. even bonding enough to give Tice a hug goodbye.

The plane ride back was fine, another stand-by direct to Victoria. Zoe at this age does seem to get very apprehensive of bumps in the air... often she has concented to a nap during prelonged episodes of turbulence... this trip back was like that. (and it was good she was asleep for the landing.. that was really bumpy!).

going to work

Two week in a row, I've brought Zoe and Finn to my office on Fridays (Anna's day off). The first week, Bruce took her to his office for a short bit... but I came to check on them, and he was in the print room, leaving Zoe alone in his office (for about 2 minutes)... I made some comment on how bad of an idea this was.. and when we opened the door, Zoe was standing on his chair banging on his computer.. she looked at us and said immediately, "Sorry".. I said, "Zoe, sorry for what".. she answers her typical answer, "I made a terrible mess!" (she was quite proud of it).. well she had broken "the brain" toy, colored with markers all over his chair, tore up some paper.. all in 2 minutes.