A recap of Spring (it has been a while!)

For the most part, spring has been wonderful this year. Zachary is 18 months old now and he's become such a fun little guy to hang out with. Of course he is still the strong-willed little monkey he's always been, but it helps so much that he really understands us now and is able to communicate his needs more and more. This truly is a great stage.

In May we went to Vancouver for a week for a friend's wedding. Vancouver is such a beautiful city, and we kept saying "why don't we live here?!" the whole trip. Seriously, that place has everything…. Mountains, forests, the sea, the beach…. Everything, except our families. Big sigh.

Instead of staying in a hotel (which is always so much fun with babies, right?!), we rented a big apartment on Airbnb with my friend Brianna and her family. This worked out better than we ever could have imagined. They have 2 little kids, so all the little ones played together and entertained each other, while we got to hang out, drink wine and make delicious meals all together. Having your own kitchen makes all the difference when travelling with babies. I don't think we'll ever go back to hotels again… at least not until Zac is older.

 ^^ we took up a lot of sidewalk space! ^^

My friend Rebecca's wedding was so lovely. She got married at the Van Deusen botanical gardens, so the backdrop was simply stunning. And my little man looked pretty handsome too :)

After Vancouver we were back in Montreal only briefly, and it was such a tease! At that point it was still snowy and miserable up north, and for those few days in Montreal we were dining al fresco on our balcony, playing in the parks, and eating out at restaurants on their terraces. It was really hard to leave it!

Back up north, the snow did eventually melt away, and gradually the grass came out and leaves grew on the trees. Zac really does seem to like it up here. He is learning to speak Cree because he attends the local native daycare. He probably already understands more Cree than we do, and that's pretty bad considering we've been living up here for 3 years now!

^^ this boy loves to watch the washing machine run - he could watch it forever! ^^

Our next door neighbours are using our backyard for their teepee… which is a great arrangement for us because we get a teepee in our backyard!  I love looking at it when I wake up every morning. It reminds me of what a cool experience we're having by living up here.

Putting the teepee up was a lot of fun. Only the first 3 poles are tied together, then all the remaining poles are merely balanced on each other. And somehow the whole structure is incredibly secure.

The night we finished putting it up, there was this amazing halo around the sun (aka a sundog - which I'd only ever seen on really cold winter days). And as the sun set it encircled the teepee in that enchanting sort of way that takes your breath away and makes you feel like life is magical.

This is what it looks like inside a real, authentic teepee. The Cree use their teepees mainly to cook wild meat. They hang geese from the cross bars over the open flames and roast them for hours. Zac loves to watch. And he also loves to eat roasted goose (which they call Sigabon up here), he can eat an adult's portion of that stuff!

It's starting to feel like summer up here in the last few weeks. It's been warm , the black flies are back with a vengeance, and the days are long… really long! The sun rises at 4am these days and the birds are so loud they wake Zac up, and I can hear him say "tweet tweet tweet!" in his crib (he's all about animal sounds now). Thankfully he has learned to tune them out and go back to sleep…. most of the time.

So that has been our spring so far. As nice as it's becoming up here in the north, I'd be lying if I said I wasn't dying to be back home in the city. I just adore Montreal in the summertime. Two more weeks!

I'm sorry I haven't posted in forever, but right now, life is feeling manageable once again… so here you go. And I've missed you!
I hope you are doing well out there wherever you are.
oxo
Vanessa.