Good times

This week has been a pretty intense one for John and I in some ways, but that won't really be seen in these photos and videos- somehow you hardly ever take a picture at your most stressed, right? Anyway, the good news is that we finished a big report we were working on and are excited to see what the next steps are for us here.

On to the pics and videos :-) This week I'll mix them together more or less in order.

My boys have a lot of fun together

Sam is really into wearing big shoes

This week we hosted baby club at our house for the first time. Since preschool is out for the summer, some big kids are coming too. This picture has Anya (blond girl) and Gaia (other girl in the back) with Mama Flo (left) and Mamas Josephine, Elize and Nicole on the right. I really enjoy the time I have with these women and kids.

Sam is kind of on the outside looking in these days since he's currently the youngest by far, but he'll be one of the biggest in September.
Matia (with Laura and Juliette behind) is a super kid- he's almost exactly a year older than Sam and they have a lot in common.

just a video of baby club (sam is super active and talkative compared to the others often)


Here's a pic to commemorate Sam's first Olympics. We loved watching the opening ceremony!


Today we watched women's basketball (where Sam learned this move)

And beach volleyball(where Sam learned this one :-) )

Today Sam and I went to the zoo with Mama Elize and her three kids, Vignol, Mike and Emmanuella. We had a great time even though the zoo isn't particularly spectacular (actually it's sort of sad). There is the only public park with playground equipment though and the kids had a lot of fun with that.

Emmanuella loved the swings

Sam did too :-)

The super big kids, Mike
and Vignol
Emmanuella tries sharing her ice cream with Sam
In a row looking at a monkey

John and I love the baby chimpanzees at the zoo. We could watch them for hours. There are four and they are all roughly Sam's age- remarkable similarities at times. Anyway, today we saw them being taken to the forest to have some outside time with their trainer for a few hours. One of them came straight to me and held onto my leg. Very unfortunately, it turns out that Sam is terrified of chimpanzees (and monkeys in general) so he wouldn't let me play with it at all.

Here's a long rambly video showing how Sam plays on his own these days (which is a nice break)

And here's a video of Sam watching new videos of Mimi and Papajack (in which they talk about a tricycle so he decides he's got to get down to go get his bike)