Boys and a little baby gecko

The boys found the dried body of a super tiny little gecko (maybe 1.5in long) - baked into the deck, but being boys they had to check it out and investigate thoroughly.

It had no eyeballs anymore so Nathan said that it had "flung its eyeballs out of its head" because he knew that they could fling their tails off when they are trying to escape predation (the tail wiggles, the body remains still, and it creates a distraction for the predator to go after the tail... then it can get away and grow a new tail)... unfortunately he knew this from experience after playing a bit too roughly with a gecko one day :(.

Daniel kept saying "walk, walk" and then would say sadly "dead, dead".

Munkittrick visit - January

Kelly and Patty Munkittrick, from Quispamsis NB, were our next wonderful guests in January.

Patty helped me keep the boys busy each day (nice for me!) and they loved every minute of the extra attention.



We took a trip down to Key West - I had never been yet so it was good to finally see what was down there. The boys were pretty good - though by the afternoon they started going downhill so Kelly started offering them for sale to folks walking by on the street - the highest bid was $5. Interesting town - and we all stood at the most southern point of the continental US (though we could see more land past us which seemed odd ?).




Trip with Patty, myself, and the boys to Crane Point where they saw lots of local flora and fauna and got to dress up like pirates in one of the park's features.



Kelly and Steve went fishing a few times - I don't have the pics yet (on Kelly's camera) but I will post some when I get them (big catches were sailfish, bull dolphin (mahi mahi), king mackerel, and more that I can't remember).

Artsy shot - Kelly walking on the beach to search for shells at sunrise.

Boys hugging - Awwwwww....

Rare, rare moment of the boys being nice and cuddly with one another. They got matching PJs when I went to an outlet to find warmer pajamas when the weather got cold!

Cold snap - iguanas falling out of trees

I heard about iguanas falling out of trees when they air temperatures get around 5C - they go into a suspended animation, and then can fall out of the tree they are in....

So when BLee found a motionless iguana we figured it would be gone by morning when it warmed up,... but it was still there, guess the tree was too high, or he bonked his head on the way down :(.

Time to catch up on posts - BLee visit

We had our first 2010 visitor from Jan 5-13. BLee Williams from Saint John, NB came down to show Steve how to work some of his fancy equipment like a little remote operated vehicle (ROV) called "Ray".

The boys both had super fun with BLee - he has a boy Nathan's age so he knows what it is all about!

Poor BLee only had one nice weather day as he was here during the super cold snap down here in Florida - jackets had to be worn the rest of the time.

Daniel Interrogation

Here are Daniel's responses to a few simple questions... click play on the video.

What is your name?
What colour are your eyes?
What colour is your hair?
etc.

You will notice a few answers are repeated... his new favourite word is "eight" and although is favourite colour is "lella" (yellow) when we got the camera, everything became "red".

video to come....

Florida Booking calendar

Daniel - talking now...?

Daniel is starting to talk but sometimes things don't come out just quite right...

This is what he says when he wants 'Mommy to come to the beach'....

Daniel and mommy's favourite sign

Daniel learned a few words in sign language when he was younger and this is my personal favourite - I wanted to video it before he stopped doing it and started saying it - since he talking lots and lots these days.

Manatees returned to the canal

Waahoo... we saw the manatees again in the canal - here are a couple of the better videos. It was almost sunset so the light makes for grainy shots - but they are still cool!!!! There were 3 big ones out there swimming together.

Merry Xmas - Tante Andréa

This one took a few tries... :) can't post them all, but it took 5 takes.

Daniel showing off the 'tree'

Well I didn't want to spend $50US on a real tree brought down here from Michigan so this is our first tree so far (I have a second one but don't have pics yet.. they will come later).

Daniel is pointing out the features of the tree and showing off his counting abilities... 'one.... two.... one... two...".

Daniel's 2nd Birthday (Dec 6th)

Daniel celebrated his 2nd birthday in the sun and surf of Florida. Luckily we had some friends visiting so we had some other folks to wear sponge bob square pants hats! Mark, Lisa, and their little guy Riley helped sing Happy Birthday and eat some birthday cake and cupcakes (most adults ate the cupcakes after witnessing Daniel put the last candle out with a bit too much 'gusto' and saliva!).

Merry Xmas - Levesque's (lower)

Merry Christmas to Karine and Beatrice - have a wonderful first Christmas together! :)

Merry Xmas - Levesque's in Montreal (upper)

Merry Christmas to Tante Ghislaine and Oncle Andre - via Nathan.

Merry Xmas - Landry's

Merry Christmas to the Landry's via Nathan.

Merry Xmas - James's

Merry Christmas to the James's in Pinawa - via Nathan.

Merry Xmas - Grandma and Clough's in Ontario

Merry Christmas to Grandma Peake, Great Aunt Pat, and Great-Grandma and Great-Grandpa in Ontario from Nathan.

Merry Xmas - Grandmaman

Merry Christmas to Grandmaman from Nathan.

Merry Xmas - Kinley's

Merry Christmas to the Kinley's from Nathan (and Daniel... sort of).

Merry Christmas - Majewski's

Merry Christmas wish from Nathan and Daniel to the Majewski's in Winnipeg.

Have fun and safe travels on your Hawaii trip!

Great Adoption News

No, not in our immediate family but I am ridiculously overjoyed to announce that my cousin, Karine, and my great Manitoba neighbours, Rhonda and Garth, have both welcomed new additions to their families.

As an adoptee myself I am one of their biggest cheer leaders - but am also over-the-top proud that I was able to write reference letters for both of them during their adoption processes to talk about how they were THE perfect candidates to be adoptive parents.

My cousin Karine has welcomed her first little girl, Beatrice, who arrived in early November from Haiti. She is doing so well with her new mommy - and her grandparents think the world of this little cutie. I am not sure when I will get to meet Beatrice but I am so happy that she has fit into her new life with her new mommy so perfectly!!!!




Rhonda and Garth, my great neighbours in Pinawa MB, welcomed home new little Zoey (their second daughter), also in early November. Big sister Andie looks very proud too! I have not met Zoey yet because I left MB before she arrived - but I am looking forward to meeting her in the spring when I return to MB.



I am SOOO happy for both families and can not express how proud I am that you have found these little girls that were truly meant to be yours.

More big fish from the big Peake boys

Well the boys have started a baracuda competition - who can catch the biggest... Steve is winning as of Nov 20th.

Going out of the canal for a late afternoon fishing foray just out on the reef within a mile of our beach house. Daniel got to sit up top with Uncle Jon.



Jon caught a nice one - tried to hold it in the water to clean it up before a nice picture with the two of them but the fish decided to take off while he could... so no pic of him holding it...



Steve's catch #1



Steve's catch #2 - current competition winner barucuda - estimated to be more than 15 pounds.

Fishing in Florida...

Well the boys (big boys - Steve and Jon) finally figured out how to catch some fish.

This is a sampler of Jon's haul from 19 Nov.

Yellowtail snapper



Grouper



Baracuda - about 15lbs

Florida Booking Calendar

I will repost the calendar so folks don't have to search for it if they need to see it.

Use the arrow buttons to move ahead to future months.

Feeding tarpon off the docks at Robbies

We heard about an Islamorada tradition - feeding the tarpon at Robbies (restaurant and tourist place). So I hooked up the bike trailer the little boys and I rode down there to check it out this morning.

So for those that might now know, tarpon are a BIG fish...

"tarpon are large coastal fish growing up to 8 feet in length. They are large-headed, relatively slender silver-sided fish with extremely large scales."(from Wikipedia)

Make sure to click PLAY on the videos below (2 bottom images).

More FL widlife - BIG iguana

A big iguana up in a tree... I had no clue they had big ones like that down here - it was about 2 feet for just the body and then the long tail - hard to tell up in the tree.



And yes that is Daniel chasing it with a stick when it came down from the tree... gosh where do they learn to be such boys!

Play park extraordinaire - Marathon FL

We found a great play park about 30min from us in the town of Marathon. That is where we go grocery shopping so I went to the park with the little boys while Steve and his brother Jon went shopping around town.

Manatees in the canal!

A neighbour across the road called us over to tell us there were some visitors in the canal. Three manatees - looked like mama, papa, and baby. The neighbour fed them some lettuce but then thought better of it since I think they are near sacred and you should not feed them (wasn't us!).

They like to stick their heads out and drink the freshwater from the hoses by the boat docks.

Here are some still pics of the same animals:

Islamorada FL

Alright - made it to Florida for our sabbatical adventure.

The little boys and Michelle made it late on Nov 3rd and the first day was hot and sunny - since then (this is now Day 5) it has been SUPER windy and now we are expecting to have some effects of Hurricane Ida - so even more wind.

Here are some pics from Day 1.



Gee do you think they are relaxed and enjoying themselves so far??



Daniel enjoyed a nice float around thanks to Dad - Nathan lasted 3min, Daniel lasted about 30min.



Steve helping Nathan with some binoculars to look at Jon (way out in the distance) fishing.