HAPPY BIRTHDAY CHARLOTTE !!!!!

We miss you.

July 20th is Julia's cousin Charlotte's birthday. We hope that this is your best year ever.

Hot Fun in the GTA

Julia has been spending lots of time in the pool with Grandma and Zak and kd. Playing is serious business for Miss Julia. She gets so focused when she's stirring water in a bucket.

The swealtering heat continues on. We keep hearing that there's going to be thunder storms but they have yet to really arrive. Julia seems to manage pretty well in the humidity. She found some Mardi Gras necklaces and was thrilled with her new look. I finally made her take them off when I realized that the back of her neck was turning red and green.

We played in the playground at Great Grandma Julia's:

Julia had a wonderful time putting pennies back in the glass container.

We are just about to head out the door to Great Grandma Julia's. We made a blueberry coffee cake with blueberries from the St. Jacob's market. Take care and stay cool!

A Few More Road Pics...

The heat is on! Holy moly it's warm in the big smoke. While I have been loving the hot hot heat, I think it takes its toll on Mark. Today we went to St. Jacob's. The weather was 28C but with the humidity it felt like 37C. I guess that really is on the hot side...
I was downloading some pictures from today and came across a few from our days driving through the USA and decided to post a few more.
Julia loved playing on the luggage carrier at the hotel. Here she is ready to go swimming but in no mood to leave her new discovery:

I love this picture of Mark and Julia in Montpelier most especially because Julia was dancing in his arms when I took it:

Here is our tuckered out little travel buddy. She was so so good in the car considering she was immobilized for the better part of three days.

Next we have Mark and Julia at the former hotel at the top of Mt. Washington. No altitude sickness for my babes. We were super keen to keep Julia's head covered up from the sun's strong rays though.

Finally we arrived on Marchington Circle and waited for Grandma Margaret to come home from work so we could surprise her a day early!

Cross-country to Toronto

We departed from Fredericton by Thursday July 8. We were only 30 hours behind our estimated time of departure. Heck, whaddasitmatter? we're on summer vacation.

On the first day, we sped our way along the road in our favourite car "Pepin" to the United States border and onwards past Skowheggan, Mexico, Peru on Route 2. We drove to outlying Rumford, Maine where we stayed at a classic New England motorlodge in the mountains that was in need of a reno twenty years ago. On our first day, we really only stopped once. Julia was a super-star traveller. I would say that her highlight was the coin-op children's carousel ride at the Bangor Mall, which she never even found out could move since we didn't put any coins in. Her second favourite highlight was probably getting out of her car-seat at the motor-lodge where she ran around in the parking lot for about a half-hour before she discovered the telephone with a cord in our room.

On the second day, we went through some beautiful small towns named Gorham and Gilead.

At Gorham, New Hampshire, we decided to head into the White Mountains to climb up Mount Washington in the Presidential Range with Julia - in our car! The peak was in the clouds which made for a thrilling ascent and summit of the mountain. Before reaching the summit, we drove above the clouds. Too kool. I was impressed by the road and surprised by the fact that narrow winding dirt roads with deathly drop-offs are still kosher in the U.S.A. - land of the infamous abusers of the personal claims law-suit. Anyway, we loved it and recommend it to all but those who are afraid of heights and for those I recommend the cog-railroad or the coachride.

Mount Washington Summit 6288 ft - We enjoyed a picnic lunch ABOVE the clouds!

In this next photo, those are clouds that you see, not exhaust from the train:

After the mountain, we drove to Littleton, Vermont where stopped to stretch our legs and to get a break from our roasting-car. We parked by an independant movie theatre and walked down the street, visiting shops that Julia would love such as a head shop/spirituality-type shop where Julia loved the chimes, hacky-sacs and escpecially the magnetite rocks. We also took a major pit-stop at the children's section of the Village Book Store. Finally, we stopped in a beautifully restored cafe for a soft-serve ice cream and a ginger-ale before loading up on crappy American joe at Dunkin Donuts. We continued on to Montpelier for another leg-stretcher where we ate at the Samosa Man restaurant across from the historic opera house and fire station. Some Quebec'ers kindly informed us about a toystore around the corner where we spent the last part of our visit before hitting the highway in search of a motel. We drove half-way to Waterbury-Stowe before we found a four-star Best Western nestled in the Vermont hills. We were ready to call it quits and lucked out by getting the last room available in the hotel. The three of us went for a swim before calling it a night.

Littleton, Vermont

Montpelier, Vermont's most excellent toy store:

Ben and Jerry's Ice cream Factory Tour in Watyerbury, Vermont:

On Saturday morning, we gorged on the TRUE all-u-can-eat continental breakfast before going to the Ben and Jerry's ice cream factory before heading toward Burlington and beyond to Lake Champlain as Julia slept peacefully.

The entire route was beautiful, as was the weather. We crossed the border at Saint-Bernard, QC and drove off Montreal Island before stopping to eat at Subway and then visit the exotic petshop next door. Julia loved the fish and the kitties. After that, it was non-stop to Toronto with one gas-stop and no naps for Julia and lots of co-activity rotation with a parent (first Dad, then Mom) in the backseat. We arrived at Erin's Mom's house to surprise her but, unfortunately, no one was home....... By ten o'clock, we were in the house but our bodies felt like they were still on the road from the hours of vibration and road-noise from the day. It was good to stop......

videos tomorrow .......

The Cox Family Reunion at the Bray's Family Cottage

It's Monday morning and it's back to work for some BUT not for teachers 'cause IT'S SUMMER VACATION !!!!!

On Friday afternoon, we packed up the car and headed to Granma and Granpa Bray's cottage on Washademoak Lake. At the cottage, the beauty of Nature is on display in full force, a paradise of Greenery and Water. The first night, we played some cards and called it an early night.

Saturday morning, we began the food preparations for the large group of family members that would arrive throughout the day for the annual Cox Family reunion. My mother has one sister and two brothers. We were expecting around twenty people to attend this year. Many could not make it BUT we were excited to learn that my cousin Stephanie and her husband Adam would be arriving with their three-month-old son John. My sister and two of her children arrived at around noon. Her husband Felix and their two other children are currently in Germany visiting their Schwarz family.

Here are a few pictures from our visit.

Beach Babe

Mommy and Baby


Look into my eyes....


"I wonder why we're not lighting off the D-Day fireworks? I mean, come on.. !"

It's time to hit the beach - hard!!!


It's beach-o'clock; come to daddy !!!!


On the way to the beach



Splish, splash !

Annual Family Reunion

3 2 1 Blastoff !
Julia, Erin and I are preparing for a weekend family reunion at my parents' cottage on Washademoak Lake (45 minutes drive from our home in Fredericton). Each year, my parents host this annual family reunion that usually brings 20 - 30 family members together.

My dad and our family have joined resources to add a little life to Saturday night. As you can see, Julia is keen to safely light off the fireworks from a safe distance with her detonators.

Life is good.

It's Canada Day in Freddy Beach

Happy Canada Day to everyone across this great big land. I hope it's been a joyous day for everyone, whether that may entail a quiet ( didn't do one thing - yahoo - kinda day) or a wild one, or something in between.

We spent the day in Fredericton. This is what went down today: we started the day with pancakes and coffee - no, not for Julia, we played on the school grounds where Julia chose to do her first head-first ride down the baby-slide, we did yard-work, went canoeing up and down a local section of the Nashwaaksis River on Fredericton's Northside where we saw a grey heron, a mother duck and her ducklings, a hawk (that was probably hunting the ducklings), a turtle sitting on a log basking in the Sun, we ate some moussaka at my sister's house with my niece and nephew Charlotte and Noah, we went downtown to take in some live music but the rainclouds rolled in then we rolled home with Julia and right now Julia is in sleep-mode and we're about to watch "Alica in Wonderland" in our living room while Erin eats fries and vegie-gravy.

Happy Canada to all !!!!!!