PR Party

Ben and I recently became Permanent Residents of Canada! This means we have most of the same rights and privileges as citizens - the only relevant one we don't have is the right to vote. Of particular note is the fact that we no longer need to pay for work permits each year in order to continue living and working here, and we no longer need to keep getting new I-94 visa waivers every 3 months in order to visit the USA. Hooray!

We started the PR process almost 2 years ago, via sponsorship through Ben's work, and it involved lots of paperwork, thorough medical checks, a fingerprint check for me (apparently I'm more suspicious than Ben), a fair chunk of money, and a long wait. So our eventual approval was cause for celebration!

On Saturday, March 16th, we hosted a "PR Party"! We donned our red and white and shared a delicious potluck with some of our local friends under the Canadian flag.

Parties at our house these days have a few more kids in attendance than they used to! This evening there were 13 adults and 7 kids!

Aydin and Claire

John and Chloe

Claire

Gemma

Joel and Finley

Ted and Rach with Finley (who gave Rach the privilege of
being the first person other than us that he's smiled at!)

Us with Helene and Chloe

We even managed to catch Finley's smile on camera for the first (and so far only) time - here he is charming Rach...

Awww :)

Thanks for helping us celebrate our PR!

Winter Farmers Market

On Saturday, we went to the Vancouver Farmers Market at the Nat Bailey Stadium. This is the market's winter venue, which we'd only been to once before. We used to frequent one of the market's summer venues quite a lot when we first moved here.

Just in case you weren't sure...

Nat Bailey Stadium

Finley enjoying the market :)

The winter market had grown a lot since we were last there 3 years ago - most notably due to the addition of a number of street food carts. The food carts are a fairly recent addition to Vancouver's foodie scene and are very popular. 17 food cart vendors were granted licences to operate via a council-run lottery in 2010/2011, with the number increased to 99 this year. Many of the food cart vendors are on Twitter/Facebook etc to advise their followers of where they are located that day/ what they're serving/ what they've run out of, etc!

Guanaco Salvadoran Cuisine

Cassava root fries from the Guanaco truck

Le Tigre - amusing tagline!

Pig on the Street - we shared "The Porker"

"The Porker" - absolutely scrumptious!
(I think Finley wanted a bite...)

It started raining as the market's closing time neared. We sheltered under a vacant tent!

Now that we've seen how much bigger and better the winter market has become, we've resolved to go more often. "The Porker" alone is worth the trip!

Finley's friends

We are very happy that we have a few good friends around here who have also had babies within a few weeks of Finley's birth.  Here are some before and after shots!

Three of us were due in January with our first baby...

Me, Helene, Nicole - in early November

Tyson & Nicole, me & Ben, Helene & John

Me, Nicole, Helene - at the end of December

...And here we are a few months later!

Out and about - in the Public Market at Granville Island
(Nicole's photo)

John and Helene had a baby girl, Chloe, who is 3 weeks older than Finley...

Finley (6.5 weeks), Chloe (9.5 weeks)

Tyson and Nicole had a baby girl, Acadia ("Cadi"), who is 2 weeks older than Finley...

Cadi (2.5 weeks), Finley (3 days)

Cadi (7 weeks), Finley (5 weeks) - at IKEA

With another friend as well - Julia (left, 9 months) - at IKEA

Also, Kelly and Janae's second baby was due a month before Finley...

Me and Janae - in November

They had a baby boy, Charlie, who is 5.5 weeks older than Finley.  Although Kelly, Janae and Etta moved from Vancouver to Whidbey Island (3 hours away) last year, some visits and play dates are definitely in order!  They stopped in to see us and meet Finley last weekend...

Finley  (5.5 weeks), Charlie (11 weeks)

Janae, Charlie, Etta, Kelly

Finley is lucky to have a great group of friends already!

Finley's first 6 weeks

Here are some of our favourite photos of Finley during his first 6 weeks...

Week 1

Week 2

Week 3

Week 4

Week 5

Week 6