Buen Viaje!

Thats Bon Voyage in Spanish for anyone who cares. Throw in 'hola' and you have our entire Spanish vocabulary. Hopefully its all we will need!

Anyway, we will be back in a week, most likely well rested with some color to our skin. You wouldn't know we lived in Australia only 5 years ago. Poor Reed must think his parents are severely anaemic we are so pale. Cuba is the perfect cure for pastyfaceitis!

Meanwhile, to keep everyone happy without their regular Reed updates, here are a couple of videos of Wonderbaby from this week. The first is him having a chuckle at mummy blowing raspberries on his belly. The second is Reed showing off his new sippy cup holding skills.

Now if only we could get him to drink from it!

See you all soon. :)

Uh Oh!

So we're off on our sunny vacation to Cuba in two days and we are starting to suspect we might have the sniffles. Which is always the way with holidays, you feel healthy for months but the moment you touch-down on foreign soil the flu hits. Hopefully this is only a mild cold that won't stop our sun-baking endeavours. Although after years of miserable weather in Canada its doubtful even ebola could stop us!

Speaking of miserable - its back to freezing here again. Which would normally result in much tantrum throwing (and not from Reed) yet this week we actually feel quite smug. Smmmuuuuuug. What a great word - one we don't get to use very often. Hopefully we will soon be throwing this word around like we throw garbage. With spring and summer on its way our spirits are definately high. Getting back to the life philosophies that brought us together in the first place is helping too. We lost them somewhere here in Canada - along with our confidence and courage. But we remember them again.

The philosophies we both agree on are that tomorrow doesn't always come so quit thinking about it. That fear is the only difference between successful people and the rest of us. That good advice comes from experienced people. That worry is a useless activity. That security is nice but adventure is amazing. But most importantly...never quit the dream and NEVER give up on being truly, madly happy. Not that we ever would!

They really do make sense.

But back to Cuba, for the endless people who honestly envision us holidaying during the missile crisis - its 2009 not the 1960's! Cuba is a very safe Canadian and European holiday hotspot thats exceptionally warm and beautiful (did we mention warm?!!), the Cuban people are meant to be some of the friendliest around and besides all that we plan on raising Reed to be open-minded towards all countries and cultures. Including those that don't fit into Westernizations neat little box.

Because really - who are we to judge?

Playdate

Reed had a playdate today with his regular buddy Ethan who is quite a bit younger at 7 weeks and mostly likes to watch from his mummy's arms (we'll be honest here, these playdates are mostly for the mummies!), however he was also joined today by Emily who is born on the same day as Wonderbaby only 8 hours earlier. He always did love the older ladies!

Aside from an eye poking incident in which Reed, mesmorized by Emily's big blues decided to investigate with his finger (this resulted in the obvious pout and crying from poor Emily who didn't appreciate Reed's curiousity) - the two of them played and grizzled and stole each other teethers for a couple of hours. Until the inevitable meltdown sent the two of them their separate ways.

Hopefully next time Wonderbaby will realize that beating up the girls is not always the best way to make them like you!

The Great Elmo Addiction

Reed is most definately an Elmo addict. His favourite toy is his singing and dancing Elmo and his favourite pair of shoes have a bright red Elmo on the top. Whenever Wonderbaby is in a less than happy mood we just plonk him in front of his fuzzy red friend and watch the smile light up his face.

Sadly this addiction has resulted in the untimely demise of our dancing Elmo. Reed over-hugged the poor thing and now Elmo's dance is more of a wobble while his song is slowly fading away. But Reed's face still lights up when he sees him.

So this little YouTube ditty has become our new weapon against Wonderbaby wobblies. Its really quite cute. So cute we are now proud members of the EAA. (Elmo Addicts Anonymous!)

(you can view Wonderbaby watching this YouTube video below)

Cuba - HERE WE COME!!

So finally some good news has come our way. Matts work has done something right and is letting him off the leash for an entire week (commencing March 26th) so we can go on a much needed family vacation. We've had savings put away for just this moment but never really had the chance to use it. We've either been moving (again!), working, studying, visiting family or just been plain broke. The good news is it turns out we won't have to use much of our holiday savings at all.

We are absolutely astounded at the price. For two and a half people to stay for seven nights at an All Inclusive secluded little resort right on the beach we thought we'd have to start working the streets. But nope - Cuba is so cheap we could have been flying there a couple of times a year. We're not even going to tell you how much as you'll just be insanely jealous! if you absolutely must torture yourselves you can visit a great little Canadian website called selloffvacations.com that specializes in cheap trips. Although there is a catch to having the opportunity for such a bargain - the economy needs to have collapsed and you need to live in Toronto all year round.

But that aside, we're very excited about getting some sun and sand after a horribly long winter and it will be nice to show Reed that the outside world really does exist. So Cuba - HERE WE COME!!

(This picture and the one above is the resort, Villas Jibacoa, where we are staying. Its not the Ritz but it sure looks like heaven to us)

The Crawling Chronicles

Reed is definately becoming more skilled at crawling. While we still think it resembles a belly flop more than an actual crawl, the little tyke is getting faster at it. We'll post a video of Wonderbaby crawling to one of his favourite toys - the phone. While this is not an ideal situation as he has managed to dial complete strangers, it always gets his little body moving. In fact, since this video was taken he has added speed to the belly flop so now he gets around (and gets into trouble) extremely fast.

The second video is what happens when we won't let him have the phone or in this case the laptop and he temporarily forgets how to crawl. (forgets or refuses out of sheer laziness - we haven't figured out which yet!) So yes, our little Wonderbaby is already quite opinionated.

Weird Weird Weather

Canadians love to talk about the weather. They even have a television channel dedicated to talking about nothing but the weather for 24 hours a day. Thats how much they like to discuss it.

Well, having lived here for 4 1/2 years we understand why. The weather here is WEIRD!! Take the past two weeks. In this short space of time we have experienced both minus 31 degrees and a balmy 16 degrees. We've woken up to sun, sleet, snow and rain. We've had days where the air was completely still and days like today where it blows at hurricane speed.

In fact the only predictable thing about the weather here is that its completely unpredictable! We've often wondered what the original settlers of Toronto were thinking when they chose this spot. Our guess is they arrived during the three good months of summer and got quite a shock when winter hit!

It does make for good conversation though.

But back to OUR favourite topic, heres a short clip of Wonderbaby having a chuckle while his Daddy tries to eat him alive.

Video Overload!

Here are a few recent videos of Wonderbaby. Sorry about the quality but we need to compress them in order to get them to load onto YouTube. But at least everyone can see how big our little guy is getting.

The first is a video of Reeds last photo session with Baaabara. You can see why we have had to give this tradition up!





This video is of Reed trying bananas for the first time. We get the feeling he wasn't that impressed!



Here is wonderbaby practicing his crawling skills. Hes getting better everyday.

Reed Crowe??

While we were happily snapping photos of Wonderbaby in his preppy little summer outfit, he suddenly started doing a Russell Crowe impersonation for us. This is the 'Russell Crowe stumbling drunk out of a bar and yelling at the papparazzi while his minders try to hold him back' impersonation.

We think hes pretty good at it - in fact we might send them into Hello magazine.

The Little Jolly Jumper

And to put a smile on everyones face, heres Wonderbaby enjoying one of his all time favourite activities - bouncing in the Jolly Jumper. He could jump in it for hours. We could watch him jump forever! Its really the cutest thing.

Enjoy. :)

Sitting Pretty

Reed had a visit to his friendly pediatrician yesterday so we could have a doctor reassure us that yes, our baby is indeed teething. Which seemed a bit silly considering you can see the small pointy tooth poking out from his bottom gums AND he has bitten us with it numerous times. Still, with the constant crying and ear pulling we thought it best we confirm it wasn't something more sinister.

The verdict? He is teething. The doctor felt along his gums with her finger and reassured his very concerned mother that he was indeed sprouting new teeth. That the fussiness, sleep disturbances and constant night crying is all just part of the process. Lucky us!!

Aside from teething adventures we also have instructions from the doctor to help teach our superboy to sit. He is so obsessed with standing and trying to crawl that somewhere along the way hes missed a few steps. So now we have daily sitting boot camp where he is propped up against support pillows and forced to enjoy the view from his backside. We're guessing it won't take long before this is his favourite position. He is male after all.

And on another note, its going to be 14 degrees tomorrow. Which is much better than the minus 31 we endured only 3 days ago. In fact, its been another long miserable winter in Toronto and we are very glad we have made the decision not to endure another one. When it was just the two of us, digging ourselves out of the driveway and staying indoors 24/7 was annoying but bearable. At least we could down a glass of wine (or ten) to numb the boredom. Add a small, lively baby into the mix and it quickly moves from boring to very irritating.

We would love to be able to take him for daily walks and show him the world. Currently the poor boy thinks the world consists of Elmo, trips to the mall and Baby Einstein DVD's. The few times he has been out in his stroller he was either too tiny to enjoy it or bundled up like the Abominable Snowman. To live through another winter like this with a toddler in tow doesn't bare thinking about. So while we still have some snowy days left it keeps us sane realizing they will be our last.

In the meantime, Mummy and Reed have regular coffee and playdates with other Milton mommies (Milton is the suburb where we live) to help pass the time and Reed thoroughly enjoys making friends with anyone and everyone who'll throw a glance his way. He'd make a great politician.

We're Back!!!

Now that The Lynch Mob has a new addition, Reed Alexander Lynch (aka Wonderbaby) born September, 7th 2008, it seemed appropriate to resurrect our old blog.

This now means we can keep everyone up to date on the daily events in all of our lives while still keeping up with the Reed photo addiction through his totsite. For anyone who has forgotten, the web address is www.totsites.com/tot/lynchmob.

And just to start the blog ball rolling again here is a short youtube video of wonderbaby in his exersaucer. You will notice the drooling at the end, he has his first tooth coming through which is causing loads of saliva and even more loads of laundry. (we apologize for the low quality video as sadly we are still youtube novices)




So heres a big WELCOME BACK from The Lynch Mob!