The rest of our Summer Part 1

I've located our camera so now I can have a fun update on the rest of our summer....

Before Spencer started up again into his schooling for another intensive 8 weeks we thought we would take our final weekend to go camping.  So we picked a place that we had never been before and just went for the night.  We packed up our car and off we went to Elk Island National Park.  We loved it.  It is close and we all enjoyed camping.  Despite the name of the park we didn't actually see any Elk, but the park is home to a great herd of Buffalo that stopped us a few times on the road and we also saw some coyotes.  We did get a few showers but that didn't last long. 

Our campsite was smaller than we were use to but it had everything that we needed in close proximity.  We even did this while Aaron was learning to potty train.  You can pretty much go and do anything with pull ups!

Here we are enjoying our popcorn.  We didn't have a camp stove it died last year and since we were only going camping for one night we decided to just cook over a fire.  This was a little tricky....our fire building skills were a bit rusty and it took longer than we wanted to get going, then if we were really good campfire cooks, we would have waited until the fire died down.  But the kids were hungry so we had most of our meals with the campfire kiss to them. 

The kids loved chasing the dragon flies around since they were pleantiful due to the large number of misquitoes that we experienced this year.  The kids had fun just hang out and being outside.  We checked out the beach that was pretty close, but it was a bit cooler and windy and acutally more rocky.  You can't swim in the water there but they did have a park to play on, some hikes to go on,  some interpretive programs and a living boardwalk. 

 We hiked around the boardwalk that takes you around the shore of one of the lakes there and in the water you could see all sorts of little bugs and water critters.  Evan made me promise that the next day before we left that we would come back and bring our net and a container to scoop up some water life to enjoy.  So that is exactly what we did.  The kids loved being there and trying to scoop up everything that moved.  They learned about sharing and enjoyed watching all the bugs float and swim, just when they had a container full of things, Aaron would try their patience by dumping it all back into the lake....not to worry though they were more than happy to capture all the bugs again. 

There is a snail, tadpole and a leech along with some smaller insects that you can't really see in this picture. 

This was actually at the park, it is a ukrainian house from some of the first settlers in that area.  It is traditional in design.  We couldn't go inside this one, but after we packed up we drove to Ukrainian Heritage Village that was like 2 minutes away.  This is an interpretive site and it was really good and interesting to go to.  Megan actually studied about Ukraine in school this past year.  So she actually got to see houses, schools, farms, churches etc, from the Ukraine Stettlers in Alberta.  The guides and actors were really good.  You could go inside the various buildings and ask questions and they would answer like they were back in the day.  It is a fantistic place to visit. 

It is quite a bit of walking but Spencer happened to get us on a wagon ride that took us to some of the parts that were further away in the park.  So here are the kids in a school.  They loved sitting in the desks and using the chalk boards. 

Here we are in front of the grain elevator and a train. The early settlers worked hard to make a life for themselves and to be able to provide a better life for thier families.

Aaron's birthday

My little guy turned 2 at the end of July. It seems like this year has just flown by.

We just had a quiet family party for him after Spencer got home from work. Followed by cake and ice cream and the opening up of presents.

It was a wonderful way to celebrate our "little big guy" as we sometimes like to call him.

He started out his day in a favorite way....by having a sweet cereal. Froot Loops are his favorite and it sounds so cute when he says it.

He then helped me make his cupcakes. He always comes running over, dragging a chair behind him so he can stand on it and "help".

Here is he blowing out the candles on his "cake". Yep, cupcakes with different types of sports balls. He loves balls. He owns over 20 different ones himself. Often in church he'll get me to draw pictures of different balls. Basketball, soccer ball, baseball, football, tennis ball, marbles, gum ball, meat ball, snow ball, ball of yarn, eyeball, bowling ball; You name it, if I can draw it he is so pleased and it keeps him quiet and entertained. So how could we not celebrate this birthday without balls. He is good a throwing and working on the catching part.

Here is a huge balloon that Spencer bought for the party at the dollar store. I asked Spen to pick up one of those preinflated balloons at the dollar store...but he got this instead.

Here is some of the gift opening. He got a transformer, more Hot Wheels stuff, a lacing kit, a Diago DVD and a bubble blower. I love young children as they are usually easy to please. He loved and plays with his toys so well. Now he can add his toys to Evans and they usually have a good time.

Here's to Aaron:

• Hearty eater
• Potty trained
• Loves Thomas the Tank Engine
• Loves to play at the park
• Loves to read books
• Draws on my walls
• Can speak in short sentences (reminds me of Megan at this age)
• likes to wrestle
• Dancing machine

We love you Aaron and are glad that your a part of our family. Happy Birthday!

Summer Holidays

Our big trip this summer was to drive down to Montana. I am slowly realizing the reasons and benefits of an actual holiday. It was so nice not to have any committments, no church callings, no work pressures and very lax schedules. It was nice to get away from it all even if just for a week. Megan wished to stay longer since it was such an enjoyable experience and fun time.

I was prepared for the drive this time with the portable DVD player, I downloaded some fun kids songs to listen to and packed a few new toys to keep the kids entertained not to mention the treats that they looked forward to. We made a few stops to break it up and drove as far as my parents house on day one to stay and stayed and slept there. The next day we drove the final few hours and took it at a bit of a slower pace. Logan's pass was still closed so we had to drive around, I had forgot how narrow the roads are and how twisty. I was starting to feel sick when we were finished with the worst of it.

We had such wonderful weather most days. It would rain at night for us, so we were able to get out during the day and do things. Grandma and Grandpa Ord did a great job of showing us around and spending time with us. There is really more things to do than we had time for, but this is what we spent our time doing....

Here we are out of the van and stretching our legs. Out on a walk around the complex (notice the book in Megan's hand!) that we were staying at. My BIL and SIL have a home away from home down in MT and let us use thier place. I know that they described to us what we could expect....but it was even better than we imagined. It had everything that we needed and there were awesome ammenities at the complex that we enjoyed.

We visited Whitefish City Beach. The day we went was really nice. We got there just in time as it kept filling up. We packed up a picnic lunch and headed off. The kids just love to play in the sand and swim in the water. We soon found out that some of our blow up toys had holes in them. Thank goodness that we had a few extra toys to play with. We all got some good sun that day.

After our day at the beach we went into Whitefish and found a little ice cream shop to enjoy a cool refreshing treat. We found a great deal $2 a cone, I remember Spencer being so impressed that MT doesn't have any sales tax so he quickly figured out our cost and was retreiving the money when the gal behind the counter said that will be $8.16? What? Afterwards we found out that in Whitefish they have a 2% resort fee on most things. Oh, well the ice cream was good.

Another day we headed up Whitefish Mountain...they have some hiking, gondola rides and an alpine slide going on during the summer months. We thought that would be great. The weather that day was nice and hot. We didn't do anything except go on the Alpine Slide. The kids loved it. You ride down on a little cart, which you can control the speed of and then you can ride up the ski lift to the top for free.

Here is Spencer and Aaron. Aaron loved the ride. Both boys weren't tall enough to ride by themselves. Megan loved the opportunity to ride by herself. She was a bit nervous at first but her and Evan wanted to go again. So they did. Aaron also wanted another ride but we ran out of tickets.

Here we are riding up the chair lift. Getting a bird's eye view of things on the ground. I was a bit nervous riding on the lift with the kids. We did fine, no injuries or deaths to report.

Spencer and I almost went Zip lining down the mountain. But it didn't work out for us that trip, maybe next time. That would have definately would have been one of those unique life time moments.

Another day we went to see the Hungry Horse Dam. The Best Dam town in the west (their town slogan). It was quite amazing to see and learn how they built the dam. It is quite an engineering wonder.

After visiting the dam, we stopped at a near by lake for a quick bite to eat and to throw rocks in the water. It was funny to see people actually swimming in the water and more people were coming to canoe. We are used to having water being so cold, but most of these lakes aren't fed by the mountains. So when we felt the water with our hands, it was actually quite a nice temperature for swimming.

Another day we went shopping at kalispell with Grandma and Grandpa Ord. I wasn't too impressed with the prices of some things, but we did find some pretty good deals on some clothes and we picked up school supplies while we were there. We almost bought a Dyson vacuum at costco but decided against it. We spent some wonderful time with Grandma and Grandpa. We saw a movie in their club house theatre and made it swimming there too. The kids loved to spend time with them.

Here are a few last pictures of our stay. We had a great time and next year we just might follow Megan's advice and stay for 2 weeks!

Here we are with the local wild life (and I'm not talking about my kids!). We'll miss the quite peaceful nights and mornings.

Grandma and Grandpa Ord came with us to Glacier National Park and took us on a hike. It was nice to be in the mountains and see everything. We love to be in the mountains.

Logan's Pass officially opened up 3 days before we left so we were lucky enough to be able to drive over the pass and have that experience. This was the first time for Spencer and the kids to see that, so I drove so they could enjoy the views and see all the great scenery. It was so beautiful, the waterfalls were flowing heavily. This is at the top of the pass. Slippery snow. It was fun to try and walk on it, but it was sure slippery as people were falling down all over the place. We wrote our names in the huge snow banks and threw a few snow balls. We had a great vacation but were glad to be back in our own country and finally home again.

Megans Birthday

My little girl turned 9! Yikes. Where does the time go?

We decided for her birthday festivities this year to invite some friends to go swimming with us and then come back to our place for a pizza dinner, games, present opening and games.

Since Megan's birthday falls during summer holidays we tried to hold it earlier this year so more of her friends could come, maybe next year we need to hold it even earlier. Two of Megan's friends were able to join us and we all had a fun time.

Here they are playing unwrap the present game. Luckily for our guests they each took home one of the prizes. Next we splashed around at the pool. They each got their own pool noodles to have some extra fun in the pool.

, After all that we come home to a pizza dinner and opened some fabulous gifts (book, necklace, littlest pet shop, gift card, body lotion/spray, clothes and finally from us an Ipod Nano). With age comes great responsibility and even greater privileges. The Nano has proven to be a life savor for us on long car trips.

Her cake selection this year was a Rolo cake. It was super yummy!

some highlights about Megan....

• loves to read, read, read
• reads out loud the funny parts and shares all the interesting facts that she learns
• is a fantastic big sister
• second mother to Aaron, He will often go to her for sympathy when I don't give him any
• loves music -- listening and playing
• is a swimmer and a gymnast
• considers herself a Wii Master. Enjoys playing Animal Crossing and any new and challenging game we get from the library.

We love you Meagn and are so glad that you're a part of our family. Happy Birthday1

Canada Day

In the morning I got the kids together and dropped Spencer off at the office to study and we headed out the the Legislature Pancake breakfast. It was alright. Pancakes, watermelon, and juice. I was a little disappointed that they didn't have any sausages. But oh well. Maybe next year I'll skip the breakfast and do the Canada Day run instead.

We took in the Silly Summer Parade on Whyte Ave then headed back to a nearby school for a BBQ and games/playground/bouncy houses. The weather was great and the kids had a fun time.

Here we are waiting for the parade to start. The parade was small and mostly associated with all things from strathcona, since that is the Business Association that put it on. My kids are always disappointed with parades in big cities, since no candy is thrown. They loved going to visit grandma and grandpa Burt for the Cardston parade. They didn't even want to go the the Captial EX parade....they immediately asked if there was going to be candy. When I informed them that there wasn't....they said no thanks.

Here is the BBQ that we enjoyed. They of course had free Canada Day Birthday Cake, which all my kids enjoyed.

Aaron loved seeing this Canadian Maple leaf.

June Month in Review

Busy Busy Busy....

The end of....June is such a busy month. If you have children involved in any extra curricular things this is the month most of them end. So that is some of what we have been experiencing.

Both the kids finished gymnastics. They both really enjoyed themselves and learned that they can do alot of things with persistence, effort and a "can do" attitude. The gym was close to where we live and both of thier classes ran at the same time, so I only had to watch and entertain Aaron for an hour. This is Megan going into a cartwheel.

Evan showing us his "sticky bug" abilities.

As part of Megan's gym circulum the grade 3 went for swimming lessons. She was able to finish off the last few requirements need to pass off her Level 2 in the Red Cross swimming program. Way to go Megan.

Megan also finished her first year of piano. I think that I can safely say that she is thoroughly enjoying learning to play the piano. However she doesn't enjoy me standing behind her ,while she is practicing, counting outloud. She has progressed very nicely and is currently into her second level book. She breezed through the Primer and Level One book this year.

Now I look forward to the break from all the organized activites that we participate in. I do enjoy being able to have my kids do all these things and develop thier talents. The summer is unstructured for us for the most part. We do lots of outside/festival/holiday trips and try to enjoy any and all warm summer days that lay ahead. Resting up for the on slaught of what is to come in the fall again.

Mid June

We saw these little cuties at the Strathcona Farmers Market and I thought that it would be fun to make with Megan and it was and they are fun and tasty. Recipe: 2 Nilla Waffers, 1 peppermint pattie, Green dyed coconut for the lettuce, Icing -- red for ketchup, yellow for mustard and just a dab of icing on the bottom of the pattie to hold in place. It is definately a sweet treat.

June 17

Father's Day....due to the mail strike our own father's didn't recieve anything but phone calls this year....however after a long day I managed to drag myself out and pick up some gifts for Spencer at Wally World. (I'll never do that again, it was so busy, ugh maybe next year I'll be better prepared).

He recieved this snake pencil/pen holder from Evan. This was an in school field trip that they did. They had a someone with a clay company come and teach the kids how to make them. Spencer was excited about all his homemade gifts, he currently has them on this desk at work.

We love Spencer and he is such a wonderful father to our children. They literally run to greet him at the door at the end of the day. He guides and directs our family, reads, plays, dances, takes us on outings and helps us all stay active and busy. We think that he is super. Just like his new Superman/Super Spencer shirt. He is my "Hot Lips" and got his favorite...Dad's Oatmeal cookies along with the Little Critter book, Just Me and My Dad.

Megan made him a collage of sorts that she made at school this was one of her art projects. She loves to be crafty and loves art.

June 24

We celebrated Evan's 5th Birthday and had a pirate party! Arrr! Ahoy Mattes' We had a swashbuckling good time. So much fun you can have with that theme. Since he was turing 5 he got to invite 5 friends. Good fortune for him....all were able to attend. (We even had to move the day and time, due to my Grandmothers funeral, which we had to travel to later that same day).

We have been starting out each kids birthday with a box of a new sugary cereal that I don't usually buy. So of course he recieved a box of Captain Crunch. Which he did share so we all enjoyed a taste of the sweet goodness.

It felt like I drove all around town looking for predone invitations (trying to lighten my birthday planning load by buying somethings)...could I find any...No. So I gave in and made our own. They turned out really good. I had fun trying to make them look authentic by burning the edges. Those little pirate boys are some stickers that we found at Micheals.

I found this excellent and very doable pirate cake on the internet that I copied and this is what I came up with. The kids were all ohhh and ahhh when the cake came out all lit up. That was the best part.

All the kids played really well together and a two hour party is enough fun for this mom.

Some kids even came dressed up as pirates....we dressed up to a bit.

We played:

• Pop up pirate....where you stick the swords into the barrel and the pirate in the top pops up...


• Hallway bowling


• Hot Wheels


• Sword fighting (each pirate that came got their own foam sword)


• Un-wrap the present game (wrap a small gift in mulitple layers of wrapping/paper, then the kids have to roll a 5 with a die, if they do then they get to use two wooden spoons to try and unwrap the gift, before someone else rolls a five...etc.)
  

• Pinata treasure chest. The kids had a blast each taking a few wacks at that. It lasted for quite a long time....we finally just took it inside and I broke the rest of it open and the kids scrambled for the treasure.
  

Of course opening the presents is always the highlight. He got some great new toys to play with and to add to his collection. A book, puzzle, hotwheels and a track, K'nex, and transformers galore. He specifically asked me for some gum...which against my better judgement I gave him...at 5 he doesn't get the concept of gum....he chew, chew, chew, swallows or throws it away then gets out another piece.(I've already given him the lecture about me finding gum where it should not be...namely on the carpet!)

He has some really good friends and they helped him celebrate.

Some things about Evan...

• He finished preschool and is so excited for Kindergarten (to go to Megan's school)


• He can write the letters of the alphabet


• He is learning some of the 100 sight words


• Likes to be outside running/playing at any park (must be a boy thing)


• He can joke and tease his siblings.


• When he needs to be he can whisper and be super gentle.


• He has a big heart and sensitive feelings


• He loves his older boy cousins, he use to call them his brothers


• Still has ultra blonde hair and bright blue eyes


• He loves snacks and sweets


• Is a bit of a picky eater and has a strong will


• We love him and are so glad that he is part of our family.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY EVAN!!!

We are still here....

Things always get busy so blogging gets neglected...here goes a little about what's been keeping us busy.

Another school year is almost finished. Evan will be done this Friday. Megan not until the end of this month. So of course it is only polite to thank the teachers who have made a positive impact on my children's lives and had to entertain them, sorry I mean had the privilege to teach them this year. I think that teachers have one tough job....right behind being a parent.

I have this crazy obsession with teachers and apples...last year apple smelling candles...this year irresistible apple hand soap and fresh apple had sanitizer with a thank you card. (big sale on at Bath and Body Works. I got the soap for 1.34 and the sanitizer for .50 with the rubber carrying case for .50; I already had the cards. Total for this gift including card...$2.50) Awesome!



Here it is all wrapped up. Ready to go.

At the end of May I threw a baby shower for my sister and it turned out really great. She has a lot of great friends and a loving ward family to support her not to mention an awesome family. Megan and I travelled down to throw this shower for her. It was too quick of a trip. Megan said upon leaving Airdrie (after visiting with my brother and sister in law and family) that she didn't want to leave...why not I asked? Because this is where all my cousins are that are my age....that one pulled at my heart strings. I'm glad that she had a good time.

Parties are always fun to plan, but executing them is another story. Always so much work and you don't want to forget anything and you want it to be a fabulous party. Consider this the start of many party planning days ahead. June is the start of our family birthdays not to mention Canada day and a RS Mid-week picnic that is going on.....ahhhh. Sorry kids for neglecting you and sorry for a messy house....things will slow down soon I hope.