making islands where no islands should go

oh what a day. we left the house shortly after nine and didn't return until almost five! the children's festival, granville island, swings, more swings and lot's of walking were on the agenda, oh and a sandbox with a brand new bucket and shovel. i mention that last one because it would seem that somehow my baby became a little boy and that little boy instinctively knows how to shovel sand into his bucket all by himself.

speaking of babies and boys, my first impression of the children's festival wasn't so great. we were perusing the "preschoolers tent" to see if there was anything age appropriate for cohen, mostly it was for the slightly older set though, train sets and dress up clothes, tunnel mazes and puppet shows, but there was also a "baby corner" which had many plush things to fall onto and large wood objects to stack. much to our luck there was no one playing in the area and so i proceeded to set cohen loose only to be approached moments later and told that this section is for babies only. huh? was my only response and so she repeated. well...how do you define that? she didn't understand so i explained. her reply was "under a year". i told her his age, explained that he was indeed a baby, but either she didn't believe me or decided that despite his age he was still not baby enough and told us we weren't allowed. my mouth went sour and smoke started billowing in my head, but i left anyway. needless to say, anything that happened after that was beside the point as my opinion had already been shaped. the make your own music tent had terrible feedback, the change tent was dingy and dirty, and the grass was all wet and muddy, but there were lots of kids laughing, kites flying and my little boy was smiling. still, i wouldn't go out of my way to do it again, at least not for a few years.

i never mentioned but last friday morning cohen's grandma took him to her house all the way until saturday night (that is nearly 36 baby free hours for those who don't feel like doing the math. wait, am i a bad mother because that is exciting and not sad for me??)! it went very well and he seemed to have had a great time, even sleeping for ten hours straight at grandma's (i know, what the?!?!? why doesn't he do that at home?). he wasn't the only one that slept ten hours though, for the first time in almost eleven months i slept the whole night through and got up on my own accord too! it was heaven. hopefully grandma will want to do it again sometime soon!

now for your amusement another round of cohen out takes.



and one cute one for good measure