on the first day of christmas...

isla with the nativity of our lord, at church on christmas eve.

mary and joseph have finally reached bethlehem! and a sleeping baby lies in the manger.

all the stars from mary's journey now light the sky.

new christmas jammies and a new flowery tea set (per request).

and a cold christmas outing to the park.

merry christmas, everyone!

we're goin' to the zoo...

a few weeks ago the kids and i went to the greater vancouver zoo with grandpa, uncle colin, aunt nicole, aunt jess, kate and john spencer. it's a really fun place--lots of space for the kids to run around and climb, a train ride around the zoo, a great playground, a big garden, etc. i almost felt like the animals were secondary, though they were fun to see too.

noah and kate climbed, ran, climbed, hopped in and out of strollers, checked out animals and climbed some more. i'm pretty sure they had a great time.

standing on one foot like flamingos.

waiting for the train to come--good thing grandpa was there to keep noah safe!

family visit

some of my east coast family was here recently for a visit. we had lots of good old fashioned bellingham fun, and we had AMAZING weather! it was really ideal. i'm sure it rained as soon as they drove away.
we spent a lovely leisurely afternoon at boulevard park. here's isla lou with grandma louise.

and here she is with great grandma katie.

aunt tiff and i did some biking with the kids...

and hiked up sehome hill.

and of course we had a chaotic family breakfast at nelson's!


followed by a glare-y family photo shoot outside. here are some cousins (chris, molly, danielle and me) and four generations of meyer women: me, oma, isla and my mom.

whistler weekend 2009

we had another lovely weekend in whistler with all of aaron's family. this was the first year john, jess and kids were able to come join us, and it was great to have them along. noah had tons of fun with kate. here they are riding the blackcomb gondola, in awe at the view.

("we're going up, up, up!" said kate. "now we're going down, down, down!" said noah. "how does it go up?" kate asked. "electricity," noah said. "how the electricity work?" kate asked. "it goes... it's too hard to tell," said noah. it is so funny listening to these two converse!)

isla and john spencer munched some toys together.

we checked out a few olympic sites. here are a few bandstras at the base of the ski jump. we also saw the luge/bobsled track in town. it'll be fun to watch the olympics next year and be able to imagine these places!

noah focused on the severe-weather snowplows.

aaron focused on firearms.

just kidding--but he, irene, colin, nicole and kevan did try their skills at the biathalon range. i think the consensus was that the girls were the sharpest shooters. meanwhile isla and i checked out the tiny whistler anglican/united/lutheran church with aaron's dad. we were the only guests, and stood out amongst the eight or so parishioners. it was a simple layservice, and nice to be part of. isla stole the show, of course.

and the highlight: cross-country skiing! we skied on the very last day the trails were open. the snow was a bit mushy, but it was still a lovely afternoon.

noah and isla snoozed in their little trailers for most of the ski. kate chatted the whole way!

hooray for whistler and family connections! i'm already looking forward to next year. (mostly so i can try yet again to finish knitting the hat for aaron i've worked on every year for the past three years... i'm not kidding!)

visitors from the east

nope, not the magi. my sister and our friends andrew and jess were both recently here for visits.

hillary was here for a little under a week, before her spring semester began again at gordon. it was really nice to see her. noah developed a very big crush on aunt hillary, following her around the house and even into the bathroom. (privacy is not a concept he understands.) they read many many books together, sang many songs, played lots with trains and trucks, made vegan cookies, watched a john deere tractor movie, checked out facebook, sent text-messages, primped, etc. noah was very sad to see her go, and also sad that he couldn't ride with her on the cool white bus to the airport. poor boy.

aunt irene was here the day hillary left, and to allay the sadness of hillary's departure, we all took a bus trip of our own to fairhaven and back (about 5 minutes each way). it was a simple but very fun adventure. in fairhaven we hit up the bookstore, the toy store, the bakery and the train station, then took the bus back to downtown and hit up a coffee shop. noah was thrilled. he was especially excited about watching a freight train go by at the station, and playing with the cars, trucks and trains at the toy store. (we were in there for over an hour, and his cheeks were rosy and his forehead sweaty from the intensity with which he was playing. it was very cute!)

here's aunt irene and isla lou at the train station:
then a few days later, we spent some time in vancouver and down here with our dear friends (and noah's godparents) jess and andrew. we went to jess's art show on granville island, (thankfully sans noah in the tiny craft shop).

here's jess with some of her tiny dresses

andrew and noah had tea together and munched puffins

and maryka, jess and i enjoyed some educational reading: entertainment weekly. so much to learn about the world!
now all our visitors are back home in the east, shoveling themselves out of snowstorm after snowstorm. we miss you, hillary, jess and andrew!

thanksgiving in oregon

we drove down to eugene, oregon for thanksgiving weekend to visit john, jess, kate and john spencer. we had a really nice weekend eating good food, walking around the neighborhood, holding babies, reading to toddlers, etc. jess also organized a craft day with some of her friends, which was relaxing (and baby-free...for about two hours) and fun. i worked a bit on the christmas stockings i'm hoping to make for our little family. highlights included:

a wild rumpus
many stories
rides on uncle aaronawkward pictures of baby cousinsfriday night movie night
and isla showing an interest in dolls