Wednesday, November 26, 2008

Growing Up and Playgroup Hijinks

We've crossed yet another barrier towards independence.

Today, Alex moved from being buckled into a five-point harness car seat to being in a booster seat with just a regular seatbelt.

He did pretty well with it, although we've been preparing him by buckling the belt over his harness. He seems quite delighted with having a little more wriggle room. He was reaching over to tap the seat beside him, a gesture that delighted Nathan to no end.

Nathan was quite the charmer in the playgroup today. He was actually the oldest child there. The staff brought out some figurines for him to play with and he made some interesting choices. First, he took the big bed and very carefully laid out the Mommy and Daddy dolls on it and then very gently covered them with a blanket. Then he took the two baby dolls and had them running around the dollhouse. I took the Mommy doll and tried to join in the fun.

He took the doll away from me with a sharp "No!" and then very carefully put her back in bed with the Daddy doll. I tried a few more times and after the third or fourth time, he put her back in the bed and then told me "All done." Then the baby dolls took turns running up and down the stairs.

I decided to try another tack and got a little girl doll out of the bin and set her up at the top of the stairs. Immediately, Nathan took the two baby dolls and began knocking the new doll down, pushing her around the various rooms, all the while shrieking at the top of his lungs. Eventually he used the baby dolls to push the little girl doll into the closet and closed the door. One of the staff members who had been watching commented: "You know, if I didn't know you, I'd be seriously worried about what goes on in your house."

Thursday, November 20, 2008

Holiday Wish Lists

Since we know everyone likes to get a head start on shopping, here are the Mackintosh family wish lists:

Family:
Toy chest
Digital picture frame (preferably one that can be wall mounted)
Membership to Cosmic Adventures


Alex:
Clothing: 4 year for pants, 5 year for pajamas and tops
Toys:
Colouring books
Hot Wheels
Lego (Duplo size)
Music: (he likes hip-hop music)
Will Smith Greatest Hits
Sharon, Lois and Bram (he has Great Big Hits 1)
Sesame Street Platinum All Time Favourites
DVDs:
4 Square (it's his new favourite show, we don't know if there is a DVD)
Other ideas:
Alphabet and number books (he's starting to be able to read)
Big print simple story books
Favourite characters: Elmo, Grover


Nathan:
Clothing: 18 month - 2 year (he could use some pants and pajamas)
Toys:
Hot Wheels or other toy cars
Blocks
Fisher Price School Bus (ours is broken)
Puzzles
Animal toys (the plastic/rubber realistic ones)


Jenn:
CDs:
Nickleback: Dark Horse
Celine Dion: My Love
Jordin Sparks (self-titled)
DVDs (widescreen always preferred):
Ironman
Incredible Hulk
Hell Boy II
Hancock
Mamma Mia
V for Vendetta
Comics:
Spider-man: Back to Black
Spider-man: One More Day
Gift certificates: Future Shop, Addition Elle, Chapters
Other ideas: iPod Travel

Dave:
Senators tickets
Gift certificates: Future Shop, Tip Top Tailors, AMC, Moxie's, Capone's, Chapters
DVDs:
Wall-E
One player strategy/brain-teaser logic games: board games or computer

We'll try to keep this site updated with new ideas and pull stuff if someone tells us they've bought it.

Happy Holidays everyone!

Wednesday, November 19, 2008

Reading Dr. Seuss



Stop! You must NOT hop on Pop!

Tuesday, November 18, 2008

Cake -- I has it


Thanksgiving included a chocolate cake this year.  It was well received.

Monday, November 17, 2008

Hallowe'en 2008

Mom put in a huge amount of effort for this year's Hallowe'en costumes.  We continue the theme of super heros, and the idea here was to set the cosumes up so that when we went to Hazeldean, there would be a theme as Nathan chased his brother around.

So, Alex is The Joker:




...and Nathan becomes Batman:



Unfortunately both boys were getting over recent sickness and were not up to running around the mall as in past years.

One thing which was surprising was the enthusiasm Alex had for people coming to the door.  He enjoyed having the door open, and seemed delighted that people were coming up to him.  He wasn't so much for handing out candy to the visitors, but he seemed really into the whole thing.