Wolfie feeds himself lentil soup - mid November 2008 - 6 & 1/2 months. Just getting comfortable with this eating thing.

Wolfie plays the Cymbals

Also from November, Wolfie learns to play the cymbals.

Wolfie's sleep-aid

This is a little out of order date wise (it's from November), but here's what we get when we wake up Wolfie when he has had a good nap . 

Merry Christmas!

Pictures of Wolf from yesterday

So far Wolfie has been a little shortchanged with the number of pictures we've posted of him. But, just because we haven't posted any pictures of him doesn't mean we don't have any. We do. We just haven't posted them. But I took some pictures of him yesterday and thought I'd post them. Especially since my sister Desiree was displeased with the picture of him with the fake hair. She said she couldn't really tell what he looked like.

Hopefully these pictures will satisfy....

Marlena and Wolfie Bonding

Here is a little video of Marlena and Wolfie. The first little clip is from April, the second from May and the last one is from August. Enjoy!

Marlena's First Visit to the Dentist

At the beginning of October, Marlena went to the dentist for the first time. A pediatric dentist, they had TVs on the ceiling. The Backyardigans were on when Marlena's appointment started and it kept her attention throughout the whole visit.

Here are some short clips of her experience.

Video from Halloween... finally

Here, finally, is a video from Halloween. Well, a video of Marlena hollowing out pumpkins, and some pictures of Marlena from Halloween Night. The videos from that night didn't turn out too well. And then she peed in her costume.

She got a bit of candy, not enough, in my opinion, since I was the one who ate her booty. Still, I think she had a good time and will be looking forward to it next year.

What is that on earth?

"What is that on earth?" is the newest phrase Marlena is trying out. I think she's trying to say "What on earth is that", but isn't quite getting it right. I do think the phrase is quite appropriate for this picture of Wolfie.


We were at a friend's house last week and her daughter had a head band with the long blond hair attached. Marlena wasn't interested in trying it on, poor Wolfie didn't really get a say in the matter, but I thought he looked quite funny. Like one of those troll dolls. The joys of having a baby.

In reality, he isn't quite as bald as he looks. At 6 months, Marlena had male-pattern-baldness going on - lots of hair around the ears and back, but none on top. Wolfie, on the other hand, has a more hair. It's quite light so you can't really see it, but it's growing everywhere on his head in a consistent manner.

Other milestones include sitting up, but he doesn't seem to like to roll over. Not from front to back, not from back to front. He's done it a few times, but doesn't show much interest in doing it regularly. He does manage to move around his crib quite a bit. I'll lay him down with his head pointing north and when I go to pick him up at the end of his nap, his head pointing in a totally different direction.

He has discovered banging things together and seems to get a lot of enjoyment out of that. I'll have to post the video I have of him banging the lids of Marlena's toy pots together. Actually I have a lot of videos I need to post... I'll start soon... I promise...

In the meantime, here is a picture of Marlena, from the same day we took the picture of Wolfie above, with her friend rocking out with her tennis racket guitar.

I'm blue and you're red.

I've been meaning to post this 'cause it was just too cute. The other day, I was looking at the value of our house and when I saw how much it had gone down I got bummed out. I came out of our bedroom and when I saw Marlena I told her, "Marlena, I'm blue."

Marlena's response: "I'm red."

I just had to laugh.

Marlena at the Strawberry Fields

So I figured out how to use the video editing software that came with our camera - hooray - and now I'll be able to string together multiple videos and hopefully they'll be a little more interesting. I can cut out the (to me) boring parts, and stick the good parts together. Which is what I've done with the different videos Don took this morning when he and Marlena went to go pick strawberries.

Enjoy the video!

Wolfie at 8 Weeks

Today I made a little video of Wolfie playing in his gym, something he really seems to enjoy. He caught on pretty quickly that he can use his hands and feet to hit things and make noise. And he can actually spend quite a bit of time just doing that.

I have to say, he is a little cutie patootie, especially in his golf shirt onsie!

Fresh Picture of Marlena & Wolfie

Here's a recent picture of Marlena and Wolfie. Marlena sure loves her little brother and is thrilled to be holding him. As he started fussing she started telling him "It's OK Wolfie" and other stuff that she's heard me say.

Wolfie is doing pretty goodbut we are having burping issues... or maybe gas issues. It's hard to burp all the gas out of him. Sometimes it starts bothering him half an hour later, even though he was thoroughly burped during his feeding. I'm wondering if it could be something I'm eating that's causing this. I hear dairy can be irritating to little stomachs, even if it comes through mommy first.

He's changed a little bit in the last while. He's lost all the hair on the top of his head! I was scrubbing his head with a baby brush to get the dry skin off, the cradle cap, and with the dry skin all the hair on top came off. If the hair on the sides of his head were longer, I'd be tempted to try and do a comb-over, just for laughs.

Marlena the Pirate... Aaaargh!

One of Marlena's favorite books is called "How I Became a Pirate". It's about a little boy called Jeremy Jacob who is carried off by pirates. At first pirate life is good, but then he discovers pirates don't tuck little boys into bed and there are no books, so Jeremy returns home and helps the pirates bury their treasure in his backyard.

From this book, Marlena has learned to say "Aaaargh", and "Scury Dog" and "Shiver me timbers". The other day, we put a scarf over her head and showed her a picture of Jeremy Jacob with his pirate scarf on, and Marlena spent the morning as a pirate. Oma took her to the library to play on the computers and Marlena kept her pirate scarf on all morning. And, before she set out, I had to take some pictures!

Wolfie at 3 Weeks

Here's a picture I took of Wolfie this morning after his feeding. He's growing fast and sleeping lots... except between 4:30 and 9:00 pm. For some reason he doesn't stay down during that period, but we're working on it.

Some Videos of Wolfie

Some Wolfie pics

Hey this is Don. I have not been to this site for awhile so sorry for the multiple post I just sent out using Tanya's name.

I am going to try to attach some pics...

Wolfie has arrived

So, many of you have probably heard that Wolfred Jacob Isaak has arrived in spectacular form!

Here are his stats:

Name: Wolfred Jacob Isaak

Birthdate: April 25, 2008 at 6:38am (but maybe it was 6:35am)

Weight: 7lbs 7oz

Length: 20"

And yes, we had a home birth! Definitely not the plan, but there wasn't much time... and I thought we had time. It started at 2am with mild cramping that occured everytime I seemed to fall asleep again - maybe every 30 min. Things got a little intenser as 4am approached. A few groans escaped me and I told Don that he probably wasn't going to work today, but I wasn't sure it was real labour 'cause it still wasn't that intense.

Contractions started getting stronger between 5 and 6 - We talked to the doctor at about 6:20am but I still didn't think I was that far along because I was way more lucid this time around - I was waiting for the time where I wasn't aware of my surroundings. The contractions started getting really intense and I told Don that I was going to ask for an epidural. After talking to the dr, Don went to juice some apples. While he was gone I had a few more contractions, not many, where I started pushing as well because that made them more bearable. Then Don came back and my water broke like a balloon filled with water smashing against the sidewalk (fortunately this all occurred in the bathroom) - I think that stunned us both, but Don was a trouper. Then the pushing really started and I told Don to call 911 because I knew we weren't going make it to the hospital. The 911 operator told Don that I should lie down on my side, but that wasn't going to happen, he was there.... 2, maybe 3, pushes later his head came out, Don caught him and pulled the rest of him out. With my mom's help, we untangled him and I lay down with him on the bathroom floor and then the paramedics were there. They cut the cord and took me to the hospital where everything else went the way it was supposed to.

So much for my birth plan - altho' I did, once again, have the natural birth I wanted...

Wolfie, despite his quick arrival, is doing great. Thank God he was in a head down position! He latched on in the ambulance and has continued to do so since. Like Marlena, he is good at sucking. He's pooped and Don has experience the "fountaining effect" that we heard boys have while changing him. The pee tees from my mom will come in handy.

We don't have pictures ready yet, but he's not as cute-looking a baby as Marlena - he looks like a little old man. He has nicer fingernails than Marlena. His chin seems to be a bit receeded, but that could be because he's sucking his bottom lip. He doesn't have as much hair as Marlena did, and it certainly isn't as dark. I thought it was a bit wavy, but now I'm not so sure. He also wasn't as alert as Marlena was, but it could be that he was cold. He was under the heater for a while to get his body temp up. No jaundice.

Anyway, both he and I are doing very well. We'll send out pictures once we have them. If I had to do it again, I think the fast birth was better than the long drawn out one...

Tick Tock Tick Tock...

The clock is ticking - little Wolfie's estimated due date is today, but it looks like he's decided not to make his appearance just yet... Of course there are 4 hours and 20 minutes left in this day so if things go really fast, he could still squeak in... But I've heard the faster it goes, the more intense it is, so, to be honest, I don't want him here in the next 4 hours. But we are ready for him. His clothes are washed, his bed is made, his diapers are ready and my bag is packed.

Don, after talking with the obstetrician, has decided that my labour will be about 12 hours long - about 1/3 less than the last time. That's what the doctor suggested is about the norm. It'll be interesting to see if he's right. I just hope he, Don, hurries his butt home when things do start happening, since it looks like Wolfie will arrive during the week rather than on the weekend. At least I'm assuming I won't be a week late since this is child #2... I hope I won't...

Other than that, I'm doing fine - highly emotional, with a sore lower back, and a big belly, but fine.

Here is another fairly recent picture of Marlena that another mom took

I spoke too soon...

Of course, after I posted last, Marlena stopped doing well in terms of sleeping in her "big girl bed". I started putting her back in her crib, and while that worked OK at night, at naptime it turned into an extended play session. So I watched Super Nanny... And what does Super Nanny do? She just puts the kid back into bed everytime the kid comes out. So that's what I've been doing with Marlena.

It's required a lot of patience. At night, when we - actually I should say "I" since Don goes into his lair to smoke cigars and work once he's given Marlena her bath - tried this, it took us - me - 1.5 hours until she fell asleep. Last night it took maybe half an hour or so. An improvement, but the trick is patience and no emotion and not saying a single word. Basically, showing no reaction you pick the child up, plop her back in bed, walk out and close the door. Of course, in the Super Nanny shows it seems to work much more quickly that in real life. Anyway, night time has been easy. Naptime is a whole different story. On Monday, there was no nap. I think that was my fault because I didn't start soon enough. Yesterday I started at 1pm, today same time. Yesterday it took 1.5 hours. Today about 45 minutes. I view it as a mental training for Marlena - the bars for the crib were physical, and she couldn't get out. Now I need to help her build mental bars for her big girl bed. Once I accepted that it'll just take time, the frustration disappeared and I was able to show no reaction. Of course some of the stuff she gets up to while we're doing this causes me big internal smiles, but that's where they stay. Or when she said "I need to play a little bit" yesterday, that was just too cute - but she got no reaction from this mommy.

Other news is that our place is finally coming together. Don and I agreed on an entertainment console, which will be delivered tomorrow. Our TV will no longer be sitting on the floor. We also bought a slightly larger desk for in our bedroom and the one we previously bought is now Marlena's craft table/couch table because there was no other place to put it that not only leave little Wolfie a place to play, but would also allow us to sit with Marlena at the table and play with her. Once the entertainment console is in place, the table will no longer block the TV and all will be hunky dory.

Pregnancy news - knock-on-wood, the pregnancy remains uneventful. Within the next few weeks we'll be bringing the admission papers to the hopital so we don't have to do that while in labour. I'm visiting the ob every 2 weeks at the moment - and at the end of March that will turn into every week. I was having trouble sleeping so we bought a memory foam mattress topper from Costco. We've slept on it 2 nights and it's made the bed more comfortable for me, but the bed feels quite a bit higher.

Other than that, nothing new is going on here. The weather is sunny and Marlena and I try to get outside every morning. And hopefully once her naps settle down, I'll be able to get a bit more done during her naptime.

Getting ready for the new arrival...

So it's been a while since I've posted... Looking at the date of the last post, I must have gotten pregnant shortly thereafter, and now, we're about 2 months away from the expected due date of our next child.

What have we been doing since Christmas? Well, I've been torturing Don by re-arranging our bedroom and living room. He's had to move our old entertainment unit our of our bedroom, then help move it so the house of the people who bought it off us. He's also had to move some shelves, again to people who bought it off us. He also was responsible for putting together Ikea shelves... with some haranguing from me, I'll admit. Putting Ikea stuff together is a true test of your relationship... Fortunately ours survived and our bedroom is much nicer for it. In fact, I'm sitting at the little desk in our bedroom and typing this while Marlena wipes down the crib for Wolfred - well the Pack'nPlay.

I managed to get that set up today, a huge relief. I'm not nearly as prepared for this little guy as I was for Marlena. But, now that I have a place for him to sleep, all I really need to do now is wash the bedsheets I have and the clothes I have.

Marlena has experienced some changes in her life too. She has moved out of her crib, quite successfully, I might add. I let her pick out the sheets she wanted from the huge selection I used. Did have to buy fitted sheets, tho', the ones I had, the elastic was done for. Anyway, she decided not to go for the brightly colored bedsheets, no, she has to choose the black and white geometric patterned one. And is pleased as punch with her new bed. Going down in the evening was easy-peasy. Getting her to not to look at books, open and close shutters, and just generally play, when being put down for her afternoon nap wasn't quite a easy. What did help, though, was that she caught a cold and didn't sleep very well one night. The next day she was ready for her nap and when down without too much trouble. Since then I haven't had to move her from her big bed back to the crib for her nap. After her nap, or when she wakes up in the morning, she opens the door to her bedroom and comes to ours and asks to climb in. Only once has it been too early. I'm sure it'll happen again, but until then, it's really kind of cute. She brings her dolls and a few books, and if it's the weekend, Don gets to entertain her.

Here's another picture of Marlena in her big girl bed...