Quote of the day

"Your poo song sounds magical today!"

Don't ask.

(Let's just say the boy still needs encouragement some days.)

Couch potatoes rejoice!

Tivo boxes are coming to Canada.

Finally, the Great White North is catching up to 2002.

Squirmin' worm

I love how babies this age communicate by kicking and squirming.

Boogie Days

Dexter has insomnia

It seems that Dexter has decided he wants to be just like his big brother and refuse to stay asleep for longer than an hour or two at a time. Hopefully it is just a phase. I'm working hard to get him into a daily routine that includes two naps in his crib, a tactic that never worked with Henry. But I have hope for Dexter. Hope!

In other news, I am watching The Amazing Race, but don't expect recaps. I barely have time to watch the show every week. So far, I've been enjoying it. No "young guys" team means the competition is wide open. And there's no other show on TV where you can watch a grown woman burst into hysterical tears because she can't milk a camel. Good stuff.

We're brothers. Can you tell?

Lately I had been thinking that Dexter really didn't look that similar to Henry. Then I looked through Henry's 3-month photos and was like, "never mind." From the nose up, the resemblance is striking. If it wasn't for Dexter's pointy chin and thinner face, they could be twins.

Baby chit-chat

I love Wednesdays

Today is definitely my favourite day of the week. Henry spends the a.m. in school, as usual. After lunch, I put the kids in our super-groovy new double stroller and walk over to a local community centre for activities! In a stroke of brilliant scheduling, this place offers a post-natal, mommy & me yoga class at the same time as a drop-off program for preschoolers. A miracle! Even better, the preschool class goes half an hour longer than yoga, so I can enjoy a coffee in relative peace at the nearby Starbucks before we all head home.

I like everything about the afternoon. The walk is beautiful--along a low-traffic road that runs up the hill from the canal, with views of the water. It's far enough to be a workout in its own right, especially when you're pushing a double stroller. Just having something to do would be great, but we actually really like the classes, too. The yoga is much more of a challenge than I was expecting. All the babies in the room make it hard to concentrate, and I usually have to stop what I'm doing at least once a class to tend to Dexter, but I do get a workout. And Henry LOVES the playgroup, primarily because the instructor is a dude. If you've spent time around Henry, you know that he much prefers the company of guys. If you put him in a room with 10 strangers (like, say, an airport departure gate), 9 of whom are smiling, friendly women who clearly love small children and are actively trying to get his attention by offering candy, and 1 of whom is a young guy wearing headphones and sunglasses, Henry will go talk to the guy every time. So he is very happy to have a guy leading playtime. Plus, all the other kids in the class happen to be boys, so it ends up being 2 hours of dinosaur role playing and dogpiles on the activity mats. Good times.

In short, Wednesdays make me feel like I'm living my yuppie maternity leave dream to the fullest.

3 months old!

Dexter is 3 months old today. This marks the official end of the "newborn" stage. He's had head control and been wearing 3-6 month size clothes for the last few weeks, so it feels like we actually left the newborn stage behind awhile ago. I have surprisingly mixed feelings about all this. Before he was born, I thought I might be impatient for the early baby stages to go by and his personality to emerge more fully. Instead I find myself relishing Dexter's baby-ness and really enjoying the simple pleasures a newborn offers. It helps that he has such a sweet disposition. Of course I love seeing him develop, but I'm just very aware of how fast the baby stage goes by, so I'm drinking it up while I can.

About that development. Well, Dexter's current favorite activity is making eye contact with a friendly face and having a little conversation that consists of cooing and giggling. It's not at all cute. Not at all. His head control is really good (he can now sit in one of those Bumbo contraptions), he grasps objects, and slowly but surely he's becoming mobile. Just some rolling around at this point, but I can no longer lay him down on a bed or couch and not worry about him crashing off it. He has more hair than Henry had at this age, but that's not saying much. Henry is still very affectionate with him; I suspect this won't change until Dexter starts to mess with his stuff. So we'll have at least a couple more months of peace before the lifelong sibling rivalry kicks in.