P U M P K I N

I absolutely love Autumn! I must admit this one may top them all! I have my very own baby and a new Nephew! My wonderful, darling, amazing sister had a baby on Oct. 24th. I can heart fully say she deserves an award, a medal, trophy, front page of the paper....something along those lines. She gave birth peacefully at home in a birth pool to a 12 lbs 13 oz baby! Amazing right? Superstar status. Awesome mom for life award. I am so proud of her! I get to see them all this weekend! Elijah and I will take the plane to Calgary on Sunday and I cannot wait. From the photos alone I can tell he is a darling "little" pumpkin!

Here are some pictures from our Autumn adventure today. Just a short bus ride from our house is a community nothing short of magical. People riding horses down the tree lined roads, pristine homes with stables, farms, and to top it all off the glorious colors of fall.

 

I love how Elijah slept through our entire adventure...what a guy!

Thank you to Decey for sending this pumpkin suit in the mail...what a perfect surprise!

Okay and to top off a perfect pumpkin day...make pumpkin muffins...and eat the whole lot...okay so I was going to bring them to our sign language class tomorrow...how can one resist. I loved baking muffins again, it made me feel like I was going to wake up at 5:00am and teach a yoga intensive, oh muffins.

Here is a link to the recipe: ttp://www.catcancook.com/easy-pumpkin-muffin-recipe/
I added dates and cut up candied ginger instead of raisins. They were amazing! I always use her muffin recipes and they turn out simply marvelous.

Bursting with excitment!

Today is a simply wonderful day!! As some may not know yet -and- it is not my news to share... I will spare all the amazing details...but I am bursting that I am a Zia once again! Eeeek...Auntie status rocks!! Yippee! Okay that is all I will say. Who can sleep with such excitement?!

It has been great weather here, clear sky's and no rain...so I have made the most out of the pre "winter" weather and vowed to go out and do something interesting each day. I am convinced Elijah loves our Autumn outings, and when we dwell too long at home he looks longingly up to the window like he is saying "take me outside". I listen.

On Thursday we had a lovely dinner date with some Oceanographers and had some of the best Hummus ever...mmm...Friday we went to East Van and perused the coolest fabric and craft shops.

Saturday we ventured out the Fall York House School Market...how crazy are private schools? It looked more like a fancy upscale Art Museum. I peeked into the music room and it was filled with steel drums, bongos, guitars, sound equipment and not a single handbell or recorder in sight.

Yes, I planned our matching outfits.

Sunday we celebrated Diwali (Indian Festival of Light) at the Roundhouse theatre. Elijah needed to experience loud Indian music, sparkly dresses and hear the glorious sound of a harmonium. 

Oh and we passed a $5.95 sushi place...who can pass that up? They are practically giving it away.

What a fabulous day! I am way to excited to sleep!

Big Little Guy

Elijah is now 17 pounds and is as handsome as ever!

He is loving his new Giraffe from Clara!

Three months and counting at the Apple Festival

We spent Elijah's three month Birthday at the Apple Festival! What fun! It was at the UBC Botanical gardens, and it was a glorious day. We decided to venture there on our own as Dad was busily writing a paper. Funny now once I think of it, we went to the university on Elijah's two month birthday as well!

Elijah woke up from a nap to see these ladies doing a jig and he was quite enthralled. We moved on to the apple tasting tent where you could taste 60 varieties of new and heritage apples grown in British Columbia. I would have loved that when I was pregnant...I could not get enough apples.

I spent some extra time watching the young Circus West Performers, It was great to see the group of them on unicycles happily riding down a shale path hill! I will try to teach Elijah that Circus is simply the best, and perhaps he will naturally want to be involved at a tender age (they start classes at five). Or is that living vicariously through my child? When I was in London I would have loved  to go to Circus School after Mime school -if it was not so darn expensive for International students- hmm I digress.

They had another tent with a display of 200 apple varieties and demonstrations of grafting and cider-pressing. It is amazing that so many apples are grown here, the white gloved apple lady would be in her glory. Who is she? Perhaps if you have an apple tree in Calgary she will come to visit.

All the festivities left my little man pretty tired and he slept soundly on the bus all the way home. I was pretty tired too, but eating an entire bag of dried apples perked me right up.

Granville

For my Hubby on his 28th Birthday...

Twenty Eight things I Love about You..
1)Going from Danny to Dan to Dad was a natural progression.

2) Your almond blue eyes that disappear when you smile.
3) Your crooked bottom teeth that are seamlessly juxtaposed by the perfectly straight top ones.

4) How you always assure me I am safe in the car because you are "Jeff Gordon professional race car driver"!

5)That you always do the dishes.
6)Your new amazing ability to cook gourmet food (brought on by my pregnancy mood of never wanting to cook and always wanting to eat).
7)When you loose something for like 30 seconds and you freak out...and it always ends up somewhere practical like your pocket or in your bag. Because who are we kidding you never loose anything.

8) How you take blame or full responsibility to make me feel better -like when I forgot the diaper bag after taking the bus all the way to my first mom and baby yoga class- and you assured me it was you, and bought everything I needed so I could still go.

9) Every time I cook it is your "FAVORITE" thing I have ever made, or you tell me how lucky you are that your wife is such a good cook (even if I have not made dinner for a week because I have opted to hold Elijah instead).

10) When you laugh so hard your eyes water.

11)Your divine love for school and accepting nothing less than perfect.

12) How you bake bread when you are stressed...what a zen attribute.

13) The way you play with your dreads when you study.

14) How you always play little games with Elijah.

15)That you notice if the sheets are less than 500 thread count.

16) That you love grocery shopping as much as me. Oh and eating. 

17) You are the best listener in the whole wide world.

18) That you always want me to be happy.

19) That you take care of me.

20) Seeing you rock out on stage and everyone dancing and loving it!
21) When I am upset you drop everything to make me feel better.

22) When you buy random little things for me that I would never buy -but secretly love- like lotto scratch tickets.

23) Seeing you in Savasana when I teach yoga.

24) Your calmness and patience.

25) How you always try to surprise me but it never really works.

26) How you love to dress up! What would I do with a man who did not love such a sublime thing as costume parties?
27) That you are my very best friend and we have been newly weds for 474 amazingly wonderful glorious days and...                                                                     
28) That I could think of a whole new list of of things I love about you...

...Happy day of Birth...I love you...

Giving Thanks

We were on the bus to Kitsilano and accidentally got off at the wrong stop, and we ran into some Lethbridge folk that Dan went to school with! What a lovely coincidence. They invited us for a potluck "nut free, soy free, gluten free, Thanksgiving extraVEGANza". I must admit I was guilty of thinking...what the heck am I going to make? Or more importantly what the heck are we going to eat? I loved the irony...it must be the same feeling meat eaters have when inviting us veggies over! That soon passed, as I am very used to vegans with allergies.

Sweet Candy Striped beets are so yummy!

 

 Pumpkin Soup

The soup turned out amazing! If anyone is looking to make an easy soup with their left over pumpkin puree, you should try this. Just saute garlic and onions add cut up cauliflower add a can of coconut milk, pumpkin puree, Asian five spice (cinnamon, clove, fennel, anise seed, ginger, licorice root) and yellow curry powder and if you would like some protein add some chickpeas a little water and some salt. Yum Yum!!

 We had such a lovely evening, almost everyone there was from Lethbridge! So we spent the majority of the evening reminiscing on how great L.A is! I know, I know...how can I live in Vancouver and lament over Lethbridge?? I miss all the wonderful friends, the studio, Sparks, and the easy drive to Calgary to see family. Anyways, Elijah had a fabulous time being passed around to all the pretty ladies and taking turns falling asleep in their arms. We had an amazing meal, followed by some fab gluten free pumpkin pie!

 

I am Thankful for...

 blue skies and my little man...

autumn leaves ...

and our new little family...

HAPPY THANKSGIVING

Rockstar Baby

So I bought a stroller, not just any stroller, a limited edition Jon Bon Jovi "Rockstar Baby" stroller. Seriously, him and his drummer Tico Torres designed it. Ha! If you can believe it, that is not the reason I purchased it. Really I just got a stellar deal on kijiji and it seemed like a good fit for Dan...being a rock star and all!

I must admit it was hard for me to put Elijah in a stroller, I just felt like I should always be carrying him...but as of today he is a few ounces shy of doubling his birth weight! Yup that is correct he was weighed in at 16 pounds! So I needed a stroller. To my surprise he really likes it, and I have enjoyed strolling around the lush streets of Vancouver.

Elijah and his Rockstar Daddy