Camping adventures

Bronwen and I went on a last-minute camping adventure on Wednesday night.... and I'm so glad that we did!

I have some adventurous mama friends who had it all mostly much organized, so all I had to do was pack and show up. The weather was nice.. about 14 and sunny during the day. It did drop down to 4 degrees at night, but we were surprisingly not too cold. The babies woke up several times during the night, but that is pretty much to be expected. 

I dare say we were a little proud of ourselves- 2 moms with 5 month olds, one 30 weeks pregnant with a toddler- setting up camp, keeping the little ones happy, fire building and cooking/cleanup... hurray for multitasking! I think this will be the first of hopefully a few trips with our church mom's group this summer. I know there are several other interested ladies, and with the freedom of maternity leave/ stay at home moms we can go during the week when the park isn't packed full. (though, it is a little early to be super full yet anyway). We went to Butter Pot Provincial Park, only about 30 mins away from town.

 ' here, try these. If you pretend to eat them, your mum will get worried. I tried one once.. they're not very good!' Sharing rocks with Sophie.

cozy

our tent for Bronwen and I

toasty fire.. we needed it at night and especially the next morning!

Bronwen waiting for us to load up the truck

I didn't take too many pictures... but hopefully there will be more trips! We will have to bring our husbands along as well sometime.

Late May weekends

We had a lovely weekend over here in St. John's. It was a taste of summer... temperatures around 20 degrees, and not too much wind!

On Friday I met up with some mama friends at Bowring Park, a beautiful park in St. John's with walking trails, duck ponds, a big playground and a swimming pool. We sat on a  blanket right next to the playground and had a picnic. Bronwen had free run of the playground but I could still see her which was nice. The other babies are all quite young still so they don't yet require chasing.

Here is Bronwen eyeing another kid on the playground. She knows she can climb stairs like that too.

After the park, we went to Lester's Farm.. it is a nursery, market, garden centre and petting farm for the kids just down the road. I had never been there before, surprisingly. Bronwen wasn't too interested in the animals (I can see why... those were some aggressive goats) and just wanted to run around. I bought some herbs for my back deck herb garden.

On Saturday we had crepes for breakfast- yum, love Saturday morning breakfasts around here. We went for a hike by Quidi Vidi Lake. It was really windy, so Bronwen wasn't allowed to be released from her carrier. There was a very real threat of a 22 lb toddler getting blown off the cliff, so we thought we better play it safe

And yesterday, we relaxed! A lovely weekend. 

May long weekend

Well, in typical Newfoundland fashion- the North Atlantic provided us with a very cold, wet and damp long weekend. But, we made the best of it.

Saturday started off with some delicious french toast. Complete with 'fluffy bread' from Sobeys, and strawberries.(I did not take a picture, it was too delicious).

We walked downtown to one of our favourite coffee shops, Fixed. It was their first birthday so they had free espresso. We also had a yummy piece of carrot cake with it. The camera was a bit foggy when I first turned it on, but here are Brian and Bronwen warming up in the coffee shop. I see a resemblance..

Smiling at the people walking by..also very excited to eat the orange slice that came with the cake.

Out the window...the grass is getting greener!

Contemplating life in one of her favourite spots.

I wonder if I can get past this speaker...

 Stack, stack, stack.

We did have a BBQ- just ate inside instead of outside. Homemade patties and Dutch spiced gouda! I tried my hand at hamburger buns, but they came out kind of small so we made mini-burgers... (aka the fashionable slider?). This is our first BBQ of the season (at our own house at least) after finally getting a new propane tank. Very delicious!

As a side note.. if you like hamburgers, you should try to make your own hamburger patties-- they are delicious! Just ground beef, 1 egg and oats (to hold it all together), and seasoning the way you like it (we often just do salt and pepper). Shape into patties and grill! (or freeze for later use).

Weekend on the water

We just got back last night from an awesome weekend in Trinity, an outport Newfoundland village. Our friends Ralf and Karina have a cabin there and kindly invited us to come out and spend the weekend with them and their twin boys. The weather was absolutely beautiful as well. It was a relaxing trip and nice to get out of town for a bit.

 One of the docks down by the water.

 Walking the quiet streets of the town.. Bronwen really enjoyed herself. She walked pretty much the entire length of the town all on her own. Getting better at going up and down hills, ramps, and definitely up steps (but not down steps quite yet).

 Waiting for breakfast.. Ralf made delicious thin pancakes for us both mornings.

 We took a trip out to the newly established Bonavista Social Club, opened last summer. They are a bakery/restaurant... everything is baked in this amazing brick oven. You pick your own pizza base and toppings and they bake it up for you. They also have sandwiches and salad. It was absolutely delicious!

 Another view inside the building. It is a converted woodworking shop.

 You can eat inside or out on the porch.. and this is the view from our table on the porch.

 Bronwen loves to ride on dad's shoulders... and hold on to his 'mane' for extra security.

 The greenhouse, where fresh greens are grown for salads and sandwiches.

 At our table on the porch. It's such an amazing spot.

 Our pizzas, out of the oven.

 Ready to eat! They are brought out on a handmade wooden cutting board. I had pesto with roasted peppers, mushrooms and chicken. Brian had tomato with caramelized onions, olives and spinach. Yum!

 Miska knows who is most likely to drop food. She waits politely.

 Bronwen's new friend, a very patient and calm dog (belonging to Ralf and Karina).

 My handsome husband, relaxing on the porch with a coffee.

 Bronwen with her buddies Marco and Sebastian.

 We did a hike called Fox Island, just up the road from Trinity. Such clear water!

Such a great weekend! A nice way to start off our spring and summer Newfoundland adventures.

May Days

 It's already May- spring is upon us! Temperatures in St. John's are still usually below 10 degrees, and drop close to zero at night- but it is definitely getting warmer, slowly but surely. We have the odd day that really and truly feels warm, without much wind, and last Friday was one of them. I was washing the car- Rubee really needed some TLC after all the salt and ice of the winter- and Bronwen was outside helping me. Well, by helping I mean finding some fun things to explore on the back porch....

Also, today it is 99 days till my due date with our little sprout!

I am enjoying how nice it is to already have all the baby 'stuff' that we need, mostly. We tried to keep the gadgets to a minimum with Bronwen for space and simplicity's sake, and got rid of the things that we didn't really find to be useful. I know that each baby is very different and may like different things- but either way, things like the baby swing that we had just take up too much room in our living area.

I was quite happy to find an Ikea crib on Kijiji, after keeping my eyes open for one for a while. The closest Ikea is in Montreal so it's usually only possible to buy their stuff used here, after a bit of hunting. But I really enjoy their cribs- they are solid and well made, as well as compact and cute! We bought the Diktad, an older model which is very similar to Bronwen's current crib. It is well used from 3 kids but still in great shape, and converts to a cute toddler bed.

We already have an infant car seat, change table, bouncer, and rocking chair... those are our 'big ticket' items. And lots of girlie baby clothes (though the seasons don't entirely line up with the sizes since Bronwen was a winter baby). If this little one is a boy, we will need to get some clothes, but we do have some cute little neutral newborn things (so tiny and cute!).

Our cloth diaper stash needed a bit of an expansion.. here are the 4 new Flip covers which came in the mail yesterday (along with 12 inserts). Aren't they cute? The 'Albert' patterned black one with the equations is to commemorate another engineering PhD baby (see this link).

I am thankful that we moved into a 3 bedroom apartment because it is going to be even more useful to us now! The third bedroom is slowly being transformed into the guest room/ craft desk room/ Bronwen's room. I'm planning on putting some of her special little knicknacks on the bookshelf (which our maintenance man Carl kindly put up for us recently), and putting her crib under the shelf (the new crib will be for the baby). With a couple special photos on the wall and maybe a little rug, it will become Bronwen's little corner quite nicely I think. :)

Tomorrow we are leaving to go to Trinity for the weekend! It's a cute little outport town about 2 1/2 hours away, and our friends Ralf and Karina have a cabin out there. They kindly invited us to spend the weekend there with them and their boys. The weather is looking good too and we're pretty excited! I'll make sure to take lots of pictures. Have a great weekend everyone!