The time has come to say goodbye ...

After nearly 2 years, more than 200 posts and a lot of thought, Paul and I have decided to bring e-Claire to a close. Our reason is simple: it's time for Claire's life to be private. While I'll always share photos and stories of Claire with family and friends, we feel it's time to do this is a more private manner than the Web.

A big factor in making this decision is that I tend to be a frequent blogger, sharing a lot of information and many photos. I do so partly because I'm turning these posts into books and I'd like the books to be as "complete" as I can imagine. However, as Claire grows older, it seems less appropriate to share this in a public forum. We contemplated simply posting to our blog less often or with less information but I know I'd then want to tell the full story or make additional entries elsewhere, and as a result, I'd be managing two entities which is too much for me. I also know that if I were to try to do both - a blog and a private book - one or both things would be incomplete or disjointed. To my orderly self, that would be unacceptable.

It was never my intention to even blog as long as I have; I found, however, that I really enjoyed it and that it was less time-consuming for me than the traditional scrapbooking I used to do. I also really appreciated that blogging enabled family and friends to feel as if they really know Claire even if they do not see her very often in person. And on a selfish note, I came to love the interaction I had through blogging with our travel mates, family and friends. For someone who loved the social aspect of working in an office, I think I would have really missed work and felt isolated if I did not have our blog and those of our friends to follow. You all truly helped me in my transition to a stay-at-home mom.

For our friends and travel mates who continue to blog, please know that we fully support - and LOVE - your continued blogging. Our decision to cease posting on e-Claire is based on our own circumstances and, as afore-mentioned, my obsessive-compulsive blogging tendencies.

While I still have a voice on Blogger, I want to thank everyone who has visited e-Claire, either as a regular or as a once-in-a-while observer. We very much appreciate your friendship, support and love for our daughter. All the best,

Monica, Paul and Claire

Happy Canada Day!

Dirt and garbage bags

Many of you know that I really enjoy shopping for Claire and dressing her up in a manner befitting her beauty. Well, let me warn you: you're about to see the other extreme.

Yesterday, we spent most of the day working on an area of our yard that has been sadly ignored for some time. Paul and my brother Stu removed sod and moved dirt around (strategically, not just throwing it around for fun) while Claire and I weeded and yes, moved dirt around for fun (truly). I knew from planting our bedding plants in pots a couple of weeks ago that Claire enjoyed digging around a bit, but wow, does she love playing in dirt. At one point, she actually exclaimed, "I love you, dirt!". She got right in there and helped me weed too. She's really good at it; she pulls from near the bottom and pulls up the whole weed, root and all.

When she finally got tired of weeding, I gave her a couple of orange poppies to play with. I couldn't believe my eyes when she showed me a few minutes later that she had "planted" them in the dirt. Those little flowers looked so cute sticking up from the ground. I should have taken a picture.

Anyway, as I mentioned before, I really do enjoy seeing Claire all dolled up. But I also don't mind seeing her dirty if it means she's having a blast. Here she is, moments after we came inside from our gardening adventures:

In case you're wondering why she was wearing a dress, well, it's because that's ALL she wants to wear these days. Seriously.

Lest you think these pictures are all I have to offer in regard to the "other extreme", I also have some photos from today for you. We attended the Big Comfy Couch and Franklin the Turtle shows at the zoo today. Unfortunately, it was pouring rain and the show was outside, with no tent or anything. So what did I dress Claire in for the occasion? A lovely coat, jeans, rubber boots ... and a garbage bag. Yes. A garbage bag. And since I just got it from someone at the zoo handing them out, I didn't really get the chance to fashion it into a stylin' little dress or anything. I'm sorry, Claire-bear.

Paul and Claire next to Beth, Ava and Helena.

(In case you're wondering if I sat comfortably under an umbrella the entire time, the answer is no, I also took my turns holding Claire but we just didn't get pics.)

Claire didn't respond much to the show but she did say after it was over that she liked it. I do think she would have liked it more if it had been nice outside and if umbrellas had not been obscuring our view of the stage. Hmmm. And perhaps the garbage bag had something to do with it ...

E F G missing in action

Presenting, Claire Caiwen singing the ABC song:

Father's Day camping trip

Last night, Claire and I took Daddy camping for Father's Day. Okay, so Paul still had to do a lot of the work but for anyone who knows me, I'm not much of a tenting kind of gal (was as a child, not so much as an adult). Paul knew this was a treat.

Just in case Claire had a bad night or something, we went somewhere close by - really close by. We left our place at 4:15 yesterday afternoon and twelve minutes later, we were not only at the campground but I had already registered us and bought firewood. For someone like me who thinks she hears terrifying wildlife outside the tent every minute or so, I was happy to be camping in the middle of the city.

We were happy to find that Claire is an awesome little camper! Her favourite part of the evening seemed to be going into the tent to play. We had to make it clear that come bedtime, there would be no jumping around. Thankfully, at bedtime she did settle down nicely and she ended up sleeping soundly until 8 a.m.

Claire loved collecting spruce tree needles, rocks and a lot of dirt (you should have seen her fingernails!). We even saw some wildlife with three beavers busily working in the creek next to us.

Claire's first foray into camp fare revealed that she loves hot dogs: and doesn't like marshmallows, even if they are prepared to a delicious burnt crisp. This is Paul demonstrating how to bite into a marshmallow (she had been trying to pick off little pieces instead). Next came the Jiffy Pop ... ... but Claire doesn't seem overly crazy about popcorn. I think she liked the process, though. Next time we'll have to try s'mores and banana boats to see if she likes those any better.

I found out that all (well, some) of my old skills from Brownies and Girl Guides still exist and that I'm not actually a horrible camper as an adult. Perhaps the little pep talk I gave myself actually worked. In any event, we all had a really good time and I'm pretty sure we'll do a few more overnight camping trips again this summer.

Lots of love to you, Paul, this day and every day. Happy Father's Day.

A very Happy Father's Day to all the other dads we know and love. We hope you are all having a great day.

Claire at 26 months

Claire is tired of the yucky weather we've been having. She's been singing this song a lot lately:

By the way, I have no idea how "come again another day" became "babu, babu, babu" to her. We've been getting outside between rainy spells but still, we'd like some sunshine please!

On the one day we had sunshine last week, Claire and I did some planting. I found Claire some great little Dora gardening gloves at Zellers, which she actually kept on for some time. She was an awesome little helper. She especially loves watering, even lifting the foliage at times to water right into the soil. I think our girl's got a tiny green thumb!

I think I mentioned in a previous post that Claire is fascinated by the mail. She loves playing "mail", and writes up truly lovely letters with great squigglies all across the page. I've even seen her flip the page over to continue the squigglies after reaching the bottom of a page. She also has a renewed interest in cooking with her kitchen. Fairly regularly, I'm told that "Supper's ready!" or at the very least, that "tea's ready!". It's cute to see her carry her make-believe tea to the table because she walks incredibly slowly and carefully with the cups.

Claire has been singing up a storm again lately. The other day, she was singing "Mama, Daddy" to the tune of Frere Jacques. Other favourites include Ba Ba Black Sheep, the ABCs, Ring around the Rosey, the Wheels on the Bus, Down by the Bay, the Hokey Pokey and some Kindermusik songs (Ahoy there mates!). I've got to find a way to be more stealthy with the camera, though, because whenever I try to record her singing, she stops.

Our Saskatchewan trip, and in particular her sleepovers at Baba and Dido's, seem to have matured Claire a lot. Ever since the trip, she hasn't cried when I left her at her nursery school. It seems she finally trusts that when I leave, I will indeed return. Claire's vocabularly also continued to grow in Saskatoon and has taken off even more now at home. Every day, she says more new words and puts new ones together into phrases and sentences. Her counting is coming along too. Before bed in Saskatoon, I'd hear her practising: "One, two, three, four, five, six, 9! Yay!" Despite skipping seven and eight, she apparently does understand that 8 is in the mix somehow because she often says "eight, nine, ten" (especially when pretending to dial the phone). She'll also say all the numbers correctly if we count with her.

Also while in Saskatoon, it occured to me that she didn't really know the words to the phrase, "I love you". Instead, when I asked her if she wanted to tell someone she loved them, she would go "ahahaha" in a singsong voice. So one night while getting ready for bed, I had her repeat after me again and again, "I ... love ... you". As soon as she had it down pat (albeit said very slowly), Paul called and she said it over the phone to him. I'm sure he loved that! Since then, she's also learned the phrase in Mandarin and has come to say the phrases in a more regular tempo. Here's a clip of Claire recording a short video for Daddy a week or two ago (this was before she picked up the tempo on "I love you"):

Becoming tradition ...

Claire, Mom and I visited the Berry Barn near Saskatoon last year as well as this one. We think it may have to be our little tradition whenever Claire and I can manage a holiday in Saskatoon.

This year's annual pic:

Last year's pic in the same location (with my brother Richard):
Claire kept steering us back to this swing. After a while I couldn't go on it anymore (motion sickness!) but Mom happily kept swinging with Claire.

The Saskatoon berry bushes were all in bloom when we were there. Claire loved running between the rows of bushes:
Claire with the South Saskatchewan River behind her. I think our little Jiangxi-born, Alberta-raised girl is really a Saskatchewan girl at heart just like her mama.
And this, after so very many posts, concludes our Saskatchewan story. Whew, I'm tired. Now I can finally get to our laundry ...

Fun times with Grandma

During our nearly two-week stay at my mom's house, Claire, Mom and I were pretty much inseparable. It was great to spend so much time with my mom - something I hadn't done since my university, pre-marriage days. Claire really loved it too (and not just because of all the great outdoor toys!).

Soon after Claire and I "moved in", my mom witnessed Claire's stripping tendencies. For quite some time now, Claire will all of a sudden declare she's hot and strip down to her diaper. Mom thinks that Claire looks like Mowgli from the Jungle Book when she has only her diaper on so that became her nickname whenever she stripped:

As usual, my mom made some of my favourite meals during our visit. One of them is pizza. I love how happy Claire and Mom look in the photo below as they spread out the pizza dough. It was really cute to watch Claire help Grandma spread out the dough because Claire kept glancing at my Mom's hands to see whether to kneed, press, pinch, etc.

In the photo below, Claire was sitting opposite my Mom when suddenly something my mom said struck Claire as absolutely hilarious. You can always tell Claire thinks something is particularly funny when she covers her mouth as she laughs. I wish I could remember what Mom said ...
Claire and Mom in the meditation garden at the Forestry Farm:
Mom also got to meet Rae, Girard and Bryn, as well as Darlene (grandma to Caia, whom Mom had already met). I couldn't resist snapping a few photos of the proud grandmas together with the girls:

Stay tuned for another post coming to a blog near you (yeah, this one) featuring Grandma and Claire at the Berry Barn!

Thanks for hosting us, Mom!

Great Grandma Pauline

Paul's Grandma Pauline lives in Saskatoon and we were able to visit her twice during our stay there. She's so fun to visit! Like her daughter Joanne (Paul's mom), it's obvious how much joy she has in seeing Claire. Grandma Pauline always remarks on Claire's sweet and easygoing nature ("I've never heard her cry!"). She was also impressed this visit with Claire's ability to put her own shoes on (on the correct feet too!) and her ease in opening my diaper bag to put away the colouring book and crayons Grandma gave her.

Like most grandmas, Grandma Pauline always spoils Claire with loads of treats. This time it was Smarties, suckers and money for ice cream. Check out both of Claire's hands in the photos below.

Thanks Grandma!!

Good friends and godparents

During our Saskatoon visit, Mom, Claire and I did a day trip to my hometown of Humboldt. It was fun to cruise around and see what's changed and what hasn't but more than that, we were there to visit good family friends Elaine and Dennis, as well as my godparents, Auntie Olga and Uncle Richard.

Elaine and Dennis have several grandchildren - all but one of them are boys - and Claire had a blast checking out all the cool cars, trucks and tools at their house. I'm not sure if Claire remembered Elaine and Dennis from when they visited us in March but she warmed up to them really fast again anyway.

Mom, Elaine and Claire getting reacquainted:

Claire and Elaine in the backseat of our car before going for a cruise through town:

Later that afternoon, we visited my Auntie Olga (my dad's sister) and Uncle Richard. I was thrilled that Claire finally got to meet these important people in my life. My Auntie Olga is one of the sweetest and warmest people on earth. Apparently, people said the same thing about her mom (my grandma) who died when Dad was young. They have five girls who are all married with children. It was really nice to hear what everyone is up to and to see pictures of the individual families, since I remember attending most of the girls' weddings as a kid.

Claire, Auntie Olga, Uncle Richard and my mom:

Claire saw me kneel for a picture a little earlier so I guess she felt she should strike the same pose:

As we were leaving, I gave Auntie a big hug. Right away, Claire was there saying "me too", not about to miss out on a hug from Auntie.

Thanks to both families for making our day trip a great one!

More fun with cousins

Cousins Liam and Sonia live about a block from Grandma so we saw them a lot too - especially Sonia because she joined us for lunch each day.

All the big toys in Grandma's back yard are actually Liam and Sonia's old things. I was thrilled they allowed it to be moved to Grandma's so that they and Claire could have hours of fun play together. Both kids are awesome with Claire. Liam's dad teases him about being too rough but he was honestly super-gentle with Claire. Sonia's 13 and I was really touched that she'd get right into the playhouse with Claire and play along with her. I know that Claire really felt special that her big cousin paid attention to her.

The playhouse is set under the spruce trees and who knew, but Claire was immediately obsessed with the spruce needles. They became her cooking ingredients while in the playhouse, the fuel for the little car, and pretty much everything and anything else. The little playhouse phone was missing the receiver but Claire quickly remedied that with a big stone from the yard. It's funny how quickly kids find solutions for things.

Claire had not one but three visits to Kinsmen Park while in Saskatoon: two with Baba and Dido and one with us. On the train, Sonia and I sat opposite Liam, Claire and Grandma (pictured below). I was really impressed with Claire's observation skills and memory after Baba and Dido took her for her first visit to Kinsmen. They told us she had gone on the train in a blue train car but she then told me later that the other train cars were red and yellow. She said "no" when I asked her about other colours. Sure enough, I saw for myself later that week that they only have blue, red and yellow train cars.

Thanks Sonia and Liam (and parents!) for spending time with us! It was great to catch up with you.

Mia mania!

While in Saskatoon, we had the good fortune of seeing a lot of Claire's cousin Mia, as my mom babysits her when my sister-in-law Cindy is at work. Claire adores Mia and followed her everywhere calling, "Mia! Mia ...". Mia was so sweet with Claire, holding her hand and helping her up and down the stairs - even though Claire didn't really need the help :). They played so well together, with the very imaginative Mia explaining to Claire what the particular game was of the moment. Quite often Mia declared that she was Claire's mom and I was the auntie and then left me as the babysitter while she went to "work".

Mia also happened to be a good influence in the eating department too. Whenever Mia helped herself to a snack, Claire insisted "me too" even if it was something she wouldn't touch at home (like cheese strings).

So often throughout the day, they'd climb on the couch together like this (with or without a snack, and oftentimes with a blanket spread over both of them):


In the late afternoon, they often held dance parties:


Most of our time, though, was spent outside where my mom had a bunch of outdoor toys for the kids. Here's Mia zipping through the yard pulling Claire in the wagon.I really love this last pic because both girls are looking at Grandma.

We were so happy to spend time with you, Mia! Thanks again for being so great with Claire!

Baba Dido's house

Claire hasn't begun using the conjunction "and" yet, so the title of this post is how she refers to Paul's parent's place.

Paul's dad put in a swing for Claire just in time for this visit and wow, did she love it! During our two weeks in Saskatoon, she must have spent hours in it. Paul's dad loves to swing her high and it suited Claire just fine - the wilder the better.

Here's a still shot of Claire enjoying the ride, followed by a video of one of Claire giggling during a wild ride.

Quieter times at Paul's parent's place involved us sitting around the fire enjoying each other's company, or simply watching Claire have fun. Since she's really into mail lately, she and Paul's mom, Joanne, had a lot of fun "typing" up notes and then delivering mail to everyone around the camp fire. At one point, Joanne prepared some mail for Claire but pretended she couldn't find her. Meanwhile, Claire was jumping up and down saying, "Me! Me! Me!" "Here I is, here I is!". I'm giggling just thinking about it again. Paul's mom always enjoys reading to Claire. When I took the following photo, I couldn't help but remember another photo, taken in June of 2007. I've posted the older photo below the latest one for comparison purposes. I can't believe how Claire has changed from a baby to a big girl in just a year.

We spent our first weekend in Saskatoon at "Baba Dido's house" and then moved over to my mom's until May 30th after Paul flew home on the Sunday of the long weekend. For our final weekend in Saskatoon, Paul flew back in and he and I (no Claire!) spent the weekend celebrating our wedding anniversary in a hotel while Claire spent two nights without us at Baba and Dido's. She had never spent a night away from me but she did really, really well. We saw her during the day and I could tell she was all right so it wasn't traumatic for me either. It actually worked out better than I could have ever expected. Thanks again, Joanne and Wally, for taking great care of Claire!

Kisses

Were you starting to wonder where the kissy pictures were? Wonder no more - here they are!

More of the cuties

"I'm so happy to see you, Bryn! Cheers!"


Caia and Claire in the sunshine:

Caia picked a flower and gave it to Claire. So sweet!

The only way we could get all three girls to stay seated was to bribe them with Sun Chips. At the time I thought it was a good plan but when I saw the pics, I realized the wide open or full mouths and orange lips perhaps weren't quite what we had in mind. No matter - here the girls are, as content as can be.