February 10

Wow...A day of reprieve. It was an incredible plus 8 today in Montreal. No mittens, no scarf and the ice melting around me. I was able to take Gabriel to the park where he played on the play structure. It was a joy to see him squealing with delight as he climbed up the steps and made his way down the slide. Those are the moments...so simple and yet so incredibly precious. I am so grateful to be a part of it all...

February 14.We had a great day today. Vincent invited 2 of his really good friends and their partners for brunch and we ended up talking and eating around the table for 5 hours straight. The kids were really good sitting around the table with us but, of course, at some point Mathieu got bored so he was excused to watch cartoons. Gabriel, on his side, got excused to have a nap!!!

Gabriel has been quite the little parrot lately and seems to be picking up new words everyday. At this point, he is mixing up his french and his english a little bit( e.g. "pain please") but mostly seems to be starting to make the distinction between the two of us. With Mathieu's help I put together a list of words that he knows so that I can compare how much the list has changed in the future:

mama, papa, grandpapa ,grandmama, no, caca, do do, tatieu (Mathieu), Gabriel ,Gaby, baby, Hello, Hi, Allo, Bonjour,Bye Bye, Au revoir, lait , l'eau, bain, apple, wawa (water), jus, cookie, pain, cracker, cheese, cake, shito (prosciutto), apple, pizza, nana (banana), beaucoup, encore, boots, bijoux, bravo, yeah, petit (bon appetit) , choo choo , more, toes ,shoes, bedon, oreilles, ca (cat) ,chat, gog (dog), chien,tweet tweet (bird), tan kou (thank you) ,tiens, gotta go, snow, ball, book, car, monkey , panda , peeze (please), Doodlebops, papa a wor (papa's at work)

Last weekend, we went down to Quebec city to visit with Odette and to go to the Carnival. Fortunately, the weather was beautiful both days. Mathieu had a great time but was disappointed to have not seen the Bonhomme Carnival! We also got the wonderful news that Michel is getting married to Yuko this spring. There will be a ceremony in Japan in the summer so Vincent and I are working on plans to go.

Odette is doing much better and is now walking with the cane. The winter has been long though so she has been feeling a little housebound as she is not able to get out and about on her own. Hopefully, spring will make its way here soon!

This morning, Vincent is taking Mathieu to Kung Fu class and then I am going with him to the Doodlebops concert. We have had it marked on our calendar for weeks and Mathieu has been counting down the days.

On my side, I have been doing a little bit of job hunting in my field. It has been tricky since most of the postings are full time but I am not in a big hurry. In terms of the fitness, I did my exam last week and it went very well so I am also going to start working on teaching a few classes here and there. I am going to send my CV to Cardio Plein Air today.