Beanie's new buddy

What a weekend.....We had a great trip to the coast for this year's annual War Amps seminar. Despite some dodgy weather on Friday, we were able to depart from our local airport and make to our final destination without issue. After an airport lunch at A&W, we took the airport bus into the city and met up with Auntie V and her little guy M for a 45 minute visit at our hotel before we kicked off our War Amps weekend. Bean was pretty excited to be part of it all. During our first meal, he spent most of the time just looking around at all the other kids and pointing out their little arms and legs to me. It's like a whole new world had opened up. He wasn't quite sure about one man, who has multiple limb deficiencies. It made for a good conversation about accepting people who look different than us. We had a relatively early night on Friday which was a good thing as Saturday was a full day. Bean loved having his own bed in our hotel room and managed to set himself up in a big pillow fort with all the pillows from both beds.

Bean was up like clockwork at 6am. We enjoyed the morning sessions, which were mostly all about playing for him. He connected with another little boy, C, who will be five next month. The two of them were inseparable after that. They ran around together playing with the toys and being boys. Bean and I went out for a walk after lunch to enjoy some rare Vancouver sunshine and his mood started to turn. So back at the hotel I made a judgement call and gave him the option of a nap in order to go swimming later. We both managed to sleep for 2 hours, waking up just in time for the last session of the day which was all about options for arm amputees. Bean, of course spent the whole session running around and playing with C, but I managed to get completely overwhelmed by the options for prosthetics and the responsibilities of introducing them to your child. We enjoyed dinner with C's family and then got denied our swimming date when we discovered the pool had been closed because someone had been sick in it the night before so it was being re-chlorinated! Bean took the news gracefully and we still had a late 9pm bedtime.

This morning was more information (and playing for Bean). We headed out to the airport at lunchtime and said our farewells to C's family. Luckily they live just up the valley a few hours from us, so hopefully we'll get to see them in the summer when they pass through town. Our luck continued when we were able to fly back home, especially considering the morning flight had been cancelled due to weather. We returned home to a beautifully clean house and a lamb dinner ready for eating.

Sounds like Papa and Schmoo had an equally as successful weekend. Schmoo had a playdate on Friday morning and then enjoyed movie watching and swimming at the local pool on Saturday with Papa. They were both full of energy and giggles when we returned. Spring has obviously arrived as the kids were able to enjoy an hour in the backyard with Papa while I ran to the store after dinner tonight. The backyard is still covered in snow, but there's hope to be found in the green grass corner.

It's been a busy evening getting things organized for the week ahead. We're all back to our regular routine tomorrow - school and work. Plus Bean's the special helper at school and he's taking cupcakes to celebrate his birthday, of course!