Gondola over Vancouver.

    
    
  Right now she’s whining because she doesn’t want her pictures taken, but a couple minutes earlier she was crying because we wouldn’t let her go cuddle the bear.  
Helen Jeanette had 3 bee encounters during our lunch at the ski lodge. Encounter #1 shown here, she waved then gave the bee a hug and then talked nonstop about the bee. Encounter #2 she saw the bee and clung tightly to me. Encounter #3 she clung to Chris and burst into tears. All of these were within half an hour. Encounter #3 was closely followed by the picture below which may explain it.

    
  The kids love public transportation!  
    
  This family of 3 raccoons kept coming out during the baluga show, apparently they are used to being fed even though the aquarium staff was very clear that it was illegal. Many people there were excited to see them but it scared the pants off me and I was very quick to get Helen Jeanette picked up.  
Peking duck!

Helen Jeanette calls herself this, she is just asking to have an adventure story written.

There are some tidbits worth sharing so I am going to list them here.

• At his 6 month well-child check up Killian weighed 18 lb 3.4 oz. Helen Jeanette weighed 18 lb 10.6 oz at her 9 month check up. At 7 months old we just transitioned Killian to a convertible car seat even though Helen Jeanette didn’t make the switch until 12 months. He’s a big, chunky, healthy boy!
• Helen Jeanette is talking up a storm! We’ve had a couple particularly memorable lines such as “Daddy read book, Mommy prop feet, look computer.” She also has started interrupting during prayers to say her own prayer such as “THANK YOU LORD MAMA PAMPA” or just cutting off her Opa with an adamant “AMEN”. Her spanish is also coming along really well, but we don’t hear too much of it because she saves it for Silvia.
• Killian is moving everywhere using the army crawl/scoot method. We’ve seen a couple attempts to crawl normally but no success so far. He’s trying to pull up but he’s concentrating most of his attempts to stand on moving into a downward dog position and then trying to stand up.

There’s a lot more going on but the kids are fussying for me so I’ll have to add more as I get time.