Caleb in Vancouver

This post will likely be mostly pictures as I am doing it while Caleb is taking a nap... which means I could have anywhere from 15 minutes to three hours. I'm sorry for the delay, Caleb and I returned from Vancouver late last Wednesday and promptly got colds. Another first for Caleb. We had a great time visiting with my sister Marie and her family. Caleb got to meet his cousins for the first time, go on a plane for the first time, leave Canada for the first time and go in the ocean for the first time... quite a momentous trip. Here are some highlights, I didn't take as many pictures as I meant to but between Caleb and his cousins we had four kids under four to deal with... this cut into my photography time :).

Here is Caleb checking himself out in the mirror at the Calgary airport during a stopover. They actually have really nice baby care rooms there but for some reason they have put the power outlet right by the change table... smart eh!
The trip to Vancouver was great, Caleb slept or played for the whole time. The trip back to Yellowknife was so unspeakably bad that I'm not going to go into details. I'm just going to apologize to whomever was on either of our flights.


Here is Caleb meeting his auntie Amy for the first time. We also had a nice visit from Grandma and Uncle Jeff (sorry no pictures). It was great to see them again and Caleb loved showing off his smile.

Two sisters and two babies. This is Marie and baby Hannah.

Caleb finally having a reason to wear his sun hat. We truly enjoyed the warmer weather in Vancouver. It was lovely to be able to go outside and not have to worry about the cold or the wind. However we also did get our fair share of rain while we were there, Caleb didn't enjoy that quite as much.


On morning Marie, Caleb and I were up before any of the other kids. Marie was holding Caleb while I got ready. When I got back she had two babies and Jacob to manage. I suppose this is how the mothers of twins do it.


Jacob and Sarah (Caleb's cousins) playing outside in their backyard. I really enjoyed connecting with them again. I hadn't seen them in almost a year and it was incredible to see how much they had grown and changed.


Caleb and Hannah playing on a baby mat. You can see the difference in head control and strength between a 3 month old (Caleb) and a 6 week baby (Hannah).


Caleb snoozing at the cabin in Point Roberts (on the coast of Washington) his first trip out of Canada... I don't think he even noticed.


Dipping his toes into the Pacific ocean. Surprisingly there was very little crying during this as the water was actually quite cold. Only three more oceans to go.



Getting ready to leave the cabin. For those of you who have seen our carseat up here you know that it usually has this big sheepskin cuddle bag on it that covers him completely. He looked so strange in there without it.

And finally pictures of Diavik. As part of Byron's new job he went there for a tour of the mine. As you can see in the picture below, it is an open pit mine up in the tundra. I'm not sure this picture really captures the scale of the gigantic hole in the earth. From the pictures I think the mine is every boy's dream with lots of huge (think the size of a small house) trucks, other machines and dynamite.

Lastly, here is a video of Caleb giggling for real (aka awake and actually thinking something is funny).

Caleb's Great Dream

I just about forgot... I managed to catch Caleb giggling in his sleep. Too cute.

Random things in Yellowknife

It's been a busy but relatively typical few weeks up here in Yellowknife. Caleb continues to bring a lot of joy to our lives but he has begun to have a few episodes of teething which aren't fun for either him or us. Byron's work tends to be very busy for the first week of each month, so it was nice when that was finally finished.


Here is a little comparison to an earlier picture that you may remember. These sunglasses definitely fit a lot better now. He still needs to practice wearing them, they only lasted for a few seconds before he tried to pull them off.

It's 'break-up' here in Yellowknife. This is the few weeks of spring where it has melted enough that the ice road over Great Slave Lake is no longer stable enough to drive on, but it hasn't melted enough for the ferry to cross the MacKenzie river. So for these weeks we have no road access to the South (or anywhere for that matter). In general you can still get everything you need but it does tend to be a little sporadic (i.e. one day no milk, the next day lots of milk but no fruit). Air Chilled Chicken anyone?? Maybe not.

Here was a day, not too long ago (if you look at the date it was April 24th) when it was -15 in the morning. This was a really cold and frustrating week(yes, the chilliness lasted for a week). We had a beautiful weekend just before this (up to +12) and then to go back down to -15 was a little soul destroying. Let's hope it's the end of temperatures like that for a while.


Caleb giving Buttercup a hug. This is about a week ago and you can see that he's really trying to grab onto Buttercup but isn't quite managing it. At this point he was only grabbing onto things with his fingers (not wrapping his thumb around), not very efficient.

And here, just a few short days later, Caleb discovered his opposable thumb (hooray). You can see the toy in his right hand. It was actually suspended above him and he managed to grab it and pull it off. He loves to lie on his mat (for up to 30 minutes) and grab at the toys above him.

And finally, Caleb's friend Winifred Mae was baptized today. Caleb was quite a good sport and slept through most of the service. That's all for now. Caleb and I (Jen) are off to Vancouver to visit his cousins. We'll try to take lots of pictures (We're also hoping to see Grandma, and maybe some other aunts and uncles).