Lots of Exciting Firsts

Well, this past week and weekend has been chock full of lots of fun and exciting firsts for Alexander.

Alex's cousin, Jennifer (Kathy's eldest daughter) was playing in a basketball tournament in Cambridge this past weekend, so Alex got to go to his first basketball game, and also got to see his cousins, aunts and grandma at the games and at some other times over the weekend.

On Saturday night, following the last basketball game (Jennifer's team played really well and it was an exciting game, to say the least), we all went out for dinner at the Keg. Alex was wonderful for the whole dinner and didn't fuss at all.

Then, on Sunday morning, Chris and I took Alex over to the hotel where the family was staying and we took Alex for his first swim. Even though the water was a wee bit on the cold side (nice once you were in), Alex loved it. He took to it very well, and was soon splashing up a storm and grinning for his cousins who were swimming with us.

On Sunday night, Alex didn't sleep as well as he normally does, so we started the day off pretty exhausted and had also decided that today was the day we were taking Gulliver to the vet to be put down. His cancer was more aggressive than we were expecting it to be, and he was starting to show some signs of being very uncomfortable and unhappy and we hated to see him suffering. He had a rough night last night and had finally lost his appetite, so we knew it was the right time. It wasn't an easy thing to do, but our sorrow is balanced by our joy of having our son home with us and doing so well.

Alex must have sensed that we needed some cheering up today as he pulled out all of the stops to delight and amaze us. Not only did he show signs that he's learning to wave (although not necessarily at anyone in particular), he also pulled himself up into a standing position for the first time today (and repeated it over and over again throughout the day), but he also figured out how to get from crawling and being on his tummy to getting back to a sitting position.

He's such a joy to have around, and it's amazing how much he learns and figures out with each passing day. It's almost as if you can see the little baby brain working overtime as he learns each new thing and puts it into practice.

We've decided to go away this weekend for our first trip with Alex. We'll be going to Kingston to visit the grandparents, and also bring Alex into Chris' head office in Whitby so his co-workers can meet him. We'd been hoping to make a trip sometime soon, and with losing Gulliver so soon, we decided we needed to get away so we're able to distract ourselves a bit.

We'll be sure to post some more pictures and let you know how the trip goes.

I've posted a few new pictures in a new album. We had gone to a photographer in Burlington a few weeks ago, and I've been meaning to post some scans but wanted to wait until I had given a couple of copies to family before posting them here. For anyone looking for a fun and talented photographer, you might want to check out Kim at Kreative Edge (www.kreativeedge.net). We had our portraits taken there for the adoption dossier and knew we wanted to have Alex's first professional pictures done with her as well.