A week at the lake Aug 15 - 22

We got to spend a week at the lake again this summer. We rented the Girl Guide camp on Kootenay Lake, the same camp where we got married at. We didn't have too many friends or family come visit us while we were at the lake, but it was very relaxing just the three of us.

Elyse loved to play in the water

The cheapest toys yet... rocks!

Our boat, and all the calm water that we couldn't take advantage of for wake boarding due to a lack of a third person to hold Elyse and spot for us. We did got out on the water every time some one came for a visit.

We took a day to go for a hike. We got up really early on Tuesday morning to catch the ferry to the north side of the lake, after a 16 km drive on rough gravel road we made it to the parking lot at Kokanee Glacier Park.

Elyse loved the ferry ride!

We made it to Kokanee Lake, 4.5 Km and 2000 ft of vertical in only 2 hours! (FYI - this is where Michel Trudeau died, (youngest son of Pierre Trudeau) he was swept into the lake following an avalanche)

We don't have any fire bans around here, due to our fairly rainy summer, here is a nice shot of one of our camp fires.

The moon wasn't full while we were out at the lake, but every night it got bigger and brighter. I wish I had a tri-pod, but this shot turned out pretty good.

We had to leave the camp by noon on Sunday, which was a good thing as this is what happened Sunday afternoon. Rain! Rain! and more Rain!

Like Father, Like Daughter

Scott's mom sent me a scaned photo of Scott wearing a bowl on his head. Elyse sure does look like her dad!

9 Month Update

Elyse is now 9 months old!!

She weighs 16 lbs 10 oz and is 27 1/4 " long

- Elyse didn't put on much weight or grow very long this past month, I guess all her food is going into moving her body
- Elyse is still crawling like crazy and absolutely everything goes into her mouth
- She also pulls up on everything and can move along the entire length of the couch, but not really confident to move from the couch to the chair
- She can hold on with only one hand while she is standing
- She can now clap her hands together
- She waves both hands in the air - we call it "Jazz Hands"
- She wiggles her whole body when you ask her to "dance" or "shake it"
- She is getting the concept of waving hi and bye with one hand
- While she holds a toy in one hand, she pokes and plays with the toy with the other hand
- You can see she is learning to problem solve, there was a bucket full of toys just out of her reach, but there was a string attached to the bucket. She pulled the string to bring the bucket full of blocks closer to her
- We took her camping in Osoyoos, and she did great sleeping in a tent for the first time
- We also started sleep training, she is going to bed with out nursing to sleep. She does cry but we only have to go into her room once to settle her back down and then she is out. She is still up once during the night to nurse, but it is way better than the hour long nursing sessions to get her to go to sleep, and the up every couple of hours all night

The new foods that she has tried this month are:
Raspberry, cranberry apple sauce
Mango apple sauce
Ground Beef
Oatmeal
Turkey
Blue Berries
Cheerios
Mango
Kiwi
Rice with Orzo
Corn Flakes
Cauliflower
Yogurt
Lettus
Mashed Potatoes with Garlic
Raspberries

And much to my displeasure, she LOVES Bananas *Yuck* But I still give them to her lots

Elyse loves all kinds of books, so I put all of her board books down on the bottom shelves so she can "read" them her self

She sure is a cutie

What monkey! Attacking the camera

Scott's Birthday

We celebrated Scott's birthday with just the 3 of us. I made a really yummy carrot cake (I got the recipe from my sister). And we spent the afternoon out on the boat, wake boarding on the Kootenay River. 

"Happy Birthday Daddy" - Elyse really wanted those candles

Elyse helping Scott open his presents

Scott got a wetsuit from his parents - He hopes it will extend the wake boarding season. Maybe he'll be able to get into the water in May!

It fits like a glove!

New Hiking Backpack

We are planning on doing a little bit of hiking. The stroller that we have just won't go on some of the trails we are thinking of going on. So I went out to find a hiking backpack to carry Elyse, we thought of borrowing one from friends but I found this one at the second hand store. A great investment for only $12.50!

Elyse sure does love riding around in it

August Long Weekend July 31 & Aug 1

We had an awsome long weekend, our friend Shaun, from Calgary joined us. We took the boat out on Kootenay Lake both Saturday and Sunday. The weather was a bit off so we spent alot of time on the beach, instead of out on the water wakeboarding. We weren't sure what the weather was going to do, and we didn't want to get caught across the lake, so we found a beach on the west side of the lake, called Honeymoon Beach. It is a boat access only beach, and is fairly popular with people from the brewery.

Honeymoon beach, on Saturday. We were the only ones there as the weather was a bit off. 

Honeymoon Beach on Sunday - I think there was 7 boats in total

Shaun, Scott and Elyse on Saturday. Having a hot dog roast for lunch

Shaun's spectaular wipe out. We have deemed it to be the best wipe out so far behind our boat. He caught a ski, tried to ride it out and ended up doing a superman with the rope before letting go.

Shaun and Elyse hanging out on the beach