Rian & Elia's Reminisces: June 2006

Railings going in! Yippee!!

...and baby, that is real Western Cedar!

Thought it best to invest in the things we would look at the most! Not to mention this railing system with glass inserts seemed easy enough for lil Bro Kyle to install... how great a job is he doing!?!

England 1 - Equador 0

On to the quarter finals of the World Cup!

Hope they play better than they did this game...

[And before y'all think we're ruining our son, Rian can only watch TV when its an England - or Reading - game!]

Rian and his Dad at 'Relay for Life' walk for Cancer!

Fortunately, unlike last year's event, it was a beautiful sunny afternoon on the track.

Thanks everyone for your very generous sponsorship of Rian!
Dad was glad that carrying Rian was a good excuse to walk and not run!

But next year Rian won't need a lift... Thanks again!

The deck is getting there!

We decided that cedar was too 2005 (yep, and too expensive) so we've gone with 'pseudo-cedar'. Also known Cedar Naturaltone stain....

Looks good eh?!

Nova has become a 'deck-dog'

We managed to clean up enough to play a bit in the backyard this weekend.

At first, Rian (being the cautious kid he is) wasn't so sure about the paddling pool.

But when he thought it truly was safe, he crawled right in!

Also some pics at the local playground taken earlier in the week.

And for all you non-parents out there, you won't understand the appeal of a picture like above. I sure didn't before.

But isn't this cute in an icky-kind of way?!?

Rian in the playground!

While Uncle Kyle toiled on our deck, we escaped the chaos for a few hours and went to the local park.

Oops, maybe I shouldn't let Rian's Nanna see him playing in open sand (she knows a little too much about playground health & safety....)

But he had fun looking at the other kids and sliding down the slide!

Last but not least, we were staining the frame of the new deck late into the night... Progress is being made! Big up to Uncle Kyle!

The Decks of Hazard....

Ok, sorry 'bout the title but its kinda accurate - I was hoping to re-stain the crumbling deck in our backyard and then maybe get a new one built next year.

As I was getting my lil' bro Kyle to help me move the BBQ, he suddenly disappeared!!

We don't think the deck was that old (maybe 10 years), but wasn't well constructed.

Like they didn't use concrete, rather stuck a main post into the soil about 2 inches deep. And the wood was completely rotted through as I don't think it was protected before we moved in.

So we now have Kyle re-building us a much larger, and safer, deck! And he's doing a pretty awesome job too... ok, gardener he's not as seen here burying my flowers to make way for concrete...

Rian's been loving all the action going on! All the tools, all the 'whacking', all the dirt inside the house to crawl around in!

Here he is admiring the superior skill and craftmanship of his Uncle.

But when the going gets tough, the tough go to the dog's cage!

Rian and the Sams!

I've posted some more pics of our Sunday afternoon on the Bored Housewives Network

Just missing the cards but this could be a

mean game of blackjack!

My $$ is on one of the Sams...

Sams & Rian

Pictures from Rian's early months!

Rian and I were on the skytrain today and he was a total superstar, smiling at all of the other passengers and then loving it when they smiled back at him!

My son! It got me thinking to last year when I had a new little baby.

My 'fake-it-til-you-make-it' philosophy of parenting.

How grateful I felt that Rian was healthy and growing well! At 4 weeks old, I took him to the doctor's because I didn't think he cried enough!

How lucky I felt that I lived in the Commercial Drive area of East Vancouver where the under 6 months baby group had 40+ new parents.

In a 2 block radius of our house, there are 5 other babies within 3 months of Rian's age, including the wonderful Sams who are a few weeks apart.

As Rian's lovely, sometimes stubborn, friendly, poor sleeper yet mostly cheerful personality emerged in those first 3 months, I was overwhelmed and amazed.

"Babies don't need friends, Mommies need friends" is so true!