On December 17th we hosted a small cocktail party, and Nathan was given some gifts to open. Recovering from early-stage pneumonia, and a bad cold, it took him about an hour to warm up to the crowd. However, once I showed him how to unwrap gifts, he fell to it with toddle zeal. Here he is opening Leah's stilts:
And of course he soon dived into the other gifts, and there was no stopping him.
After our guests left, we celebrated our family Christmas. David and I think that this will be the last year we travel at Christmas, which is a little sad in some ways. But I look forward to starting our own traditions. David's already rumbling about Whistler, but he hasn't seen me ski yet, and I haven't told him about my chairlift phobia... but we've got another 11 months to iron out the kinks.
Here's Nathan uncovering one of his favourite toys. Just yesterday he discovered, to his great delight that he can also play the piano with his feet.
The end of that week, we found ourselves flying to Toronto, leaving the snow and cold of Vancouver behind for the warm climes of sunny Ontario. I know, I know. Global warming has really hit home this year. We have had multiple wind and snow storms, and in this house, have suffered at least 5 power outages. I say "this house" because we appear to be in some weird grid that can't keep the power on when winds get above 20 km an hour. (No, I'm not bitter at all.)
So we hit Toronto on the 23rd with no snow to be found at all. Anywhere. Hell, it was warmer than Vancouver. Seeing as "snow" is one of the 20 words in Nathan's vocabulary, I was 1 short on being able to impress my parents with my son's verbal prowess. Okay, yes, I know, he's supposed to have a couple hundred words by 22 months, but who's counting.
Nathan arrived in Waterloo, wowed the crowd, and soon was at home, dictating what should and shouldn't be done.
He was happy to be telling Dad what to do with the train set (thanks to Jon and Becky for loaning us a ton of toys for the visit!), telling me to pick up dropped cheerios, or monopolizing the couch as he watched the perennial favourite: Blues Clues. That stuff is like crack.
You'll notice the toddler tummy had almost disappeared given his bad cold/pneumonia and the resulting intestinal upset from the antibiotics. 
Christmas arrived shortly after we did, and we celebrated with Jon, Becky, Madeleine and Olivia. The kids each had about 7 presents to open... that almost wore Nate out completely. Thankfully, the adults pulled names out of a hat, allowing us to spend a civilized amount on each other, while spoiling the kids instead. Naturally, Nate's haul caused us to add a third suitcase to our journey home.
One of the universally favourite toys amongst the young 'uns was a weird rubber ball that had spines, and, to Nate's delight could be squished out. Even Dad was intrigued by the thing. What is it that they say, old age brings your second childhood? (Kidding, dad, just kidding ;0) )
Once the madness and dust settled, we enjoyed a fantastic visit. David relaxed and rarely did work. He even read a book. Mom, dad, David and I all played several games of Trivial Pursuit and, miracle of all miracles, David didn't annihilate us. (He's obviously out of practice.) We went out for a dinner on our own, thanks to mom and dad's babysitting. We also caught the James Bond flick with Jon and Becky on another night... those two nights out alone represent 1/3 of what we usually get over the course of an entire year!
Here are the final pics in an image-heavy post. Nate the "artiste", tasting the few, the only snow flakes to fall during our visit:
And a few more... i just can't resist. (The photo of Nate at the bathroom door is him playing his favourite game. He closes himself inside a room or a closet, and waits for the adult to knock on the door and ask, "Where's Nathan?" He then pops out and with a great screech and grin, having "fooled" us all regarding his whereabouts. If the adult is really mean (or sick of the game) s/he can not knock and wait to see how long it takes Nathan to poke his head out of the door with a wicked grin and a "Hey, here I am. Okay you don't see me. Okay, I'm going to close the door again and you knock. Okay?" look.)
