Family Fun

Can it be? Jaden's Three!!!

2012-02-16T20:00:00.002-08:00

How can it be that my little boy is three years old already? Time flies when you're busy with three kids, I guess.We had his friend Nadiya over to celebrate on his birthday. She is just three days older than Jaden so we made a cake for both of them.But nothing like the amazing cake Auntie Kendra made for his party the next day!Thomas is the current favorite around here. He got his first set for Christmas and he plays with it all day, every day.Here they are with their cousins. Well, the little ones anyway.

Snow Day

2012-01-18T11:28:00.001-08:00

We skipped school on Monday and it was closed on Tuesday so we had some fun in the snow:

Kaitlyn's Birthday Present

2011-12-10T14:32:00.000-08:00

This is Kaitlyn's birthday present - a kitty! Kaitlyn named her Taya.

She is about 12 weeks old and not very brave right now.

But she will snuggle on your lap, which is really the whole point of having a cat.

November

2011-11-23T16:31:00.000-08:00

In the beginning of November Darcy's brother Dale and his wife Cee came out for a visit. They haven't been out for 3 1/2 years! They hadn't even seen Jaden yet, so we had a good (but short) visit with the whole family.

Jaden really took a liking to "Just Dale" (he didn't want to be called "uncle Dale, just Dale" so that's what we called him!)

Rachael and Kaitlyn really like their "baby" Nika, the worlds smallest dog!

Darcy celebrated a milestone birthday this month. Here he is with his two brothers.

Jadenis getting really good at coloring. Look at how he stayed in the lines!

And we had our first snow of the season. It was pretty and stayed off the roads so it was nice. Kaitlyn will turn 8 in a few days. Time sure flies.

Big Boy Bed

2011-10-19T13:42:00.000-07:00

Yesterday Jaden figured out how to climb out of his crib, so it was time to set up the Big Boy Bed. The first night he woke up a few times (his favorite pillow kept falling down) but he stayed in bed! Now if only he would nap there!

Summer Review

2011-09-09T14:08:00.000-07:00

Since I was seriously lacking in my bloging over the summer, here's a recap of some of the things we did this summer:

we had some playdates with our cousins;

my grandparents celebrated their 65th (!!!) anniversary and my Grandpa's 90th birthday.

I think there's 24 great-grandkids with another on the way.

We ate lots of berries (yummy!)

and icecream and gelato, too.

We went to White Rock

where we had fish & chips

and saw the big train.

We went to Burnaby Village

and rode the carousel.

We went to the beach

and built some cool sand castles.

We went to the park

with our twins (Kaitlyn and her BFF)

and went exploring.

And we went to the waterslides. It was a fun summer!

First Day of School

2011-09-07T10:13:00.000-07:00

I must appologize for my lack of posting during summer, but with the cameras on the new cell phones it makes it a lot harder to upload from 3 camera sources than just one. I'll try and get everything up to date one of these days, but in the mean time school has started again!

I cannot believe my little Rachael is already in Grade 5!!! This is her last year in elementary school!!! I am so not ready to think about next year so we'll just try and keep her a little kid for another year. (Good luck, I know.)

And little Kaitlyn is in Grade 3! Man, time flies. Wasn't she just 3 years old last year? Crazy.

At least Jaden is still my little boy, though he had to pose for first-day-of-school pictures, too. Don't grow up too fast like your sisters, Jaden.

The Beach

2011-07-29T15:03:00.000-07:00

Finally we had weather warm enough to go to the beach! It's a family tradition that when we go to the "good sand beach" Darcy digs a hole and fills it with water which is kind of gross to look at but gets very warm very quickly. Well now we have three kids, so this means three holes. That's a lot of digging, so we don't mess around with no wimpy beach shovels, we bring out the big guns!

Rachael and Kaitlyn decided to connect theirs and somehow this lead to the idea that they should connect all three, and then remove the "island" in the middle, making a huge Mickey Mouse shaped swimming hole.

We thought about asking if we could borrow that big digger behind Jaden...

Uncle Gord helped shovel and even Jaden did his part.

The kids had fun playing in the puddle

and in the lake, too

But when it was time to go Darcy and Gord decided to break the walls of the puddle, which the kids tried desperatly to repair.

Here's hoping for some more sunny days!

Awards

2011-06-28T13:30:00.000-07:00

The other day Rachael brought home a notice that she was going to be recieving an award at the school's awards assembly today. (Awards are given only to kids in grade 4 & 5.) "It's no big deal, Mom," Rachael said to me. But being the pround mom that I am I came armed with my camera ready to document the moment for posterity's sake. After singing O Canada in both french and english and handing out the birthday pencils for the month of June they started on the awards. Rachael was called up for a Citizenship award. Aww, that's great! She's always a nice kid.

Then she got called up for another award. I wasn't expecting that, but hey, great! This one was for Outstanding Effort. Cool. She always tries her best. I like that. And two awards is great!

Then she got called up for another award! This one was for Academic Achievement. Her report cards have always been great, but I wasn't expecting an honor roll award. Way to go, girl!

Wow, three certificates is impressive. I sure wasn't expecting that! But they weren't quite done yet. Those kids who received all three certificates also got a medal! (Ok, it's really plastic, but still.) Now that's impressive.

Not only did she get all the awards they were handing out, but her two best friends got them all, too. What a great group of girls! Alex and Alexa wanted Jaden to join them for this picture.

Way to go, Rachael! We're proud of you and love you lots!

A Dog's Life

2011-06-27T14:02:00.000-07:00

Rachael wanted to celebrate her dog Caspian's first birthday, and since the weather was sunny (for once) we took him to the creek.

Sports Day

2011-06-24T14:37:00.000-07:00

When Darcy grew up in "Smallville" his school's version of Sports Day was really more like Track & Field. So since work is a little bit slow right now he took the day off to go watch his girls at a "real" Sports Day. Rachael, being one of the big kids on campus, was in charge of creating and supervising an event for the younger kids to do.

(Apparently wearing the 3D glasses with the lenses popped out is "in" right now.)

Then after lunch the older kids got to play team events.

They had a lot of fun and thankfully the rain held off.

Grandma came and rescued Jaden from the torture of only being allowed to watch and took him back to her house for the rest of the morning.

The Three "R"'s

2011-06-24T14:29:00.000-07:00

No, this time we're not talking about reading, writing and arithmatic, we're talking about Reduce, Reuse, Recycle.

I went with Rachael's class last Friday to the recycling plant.

We made a bird feeder

out of reused household materials

and got a tour of the plant.

We learned all kinds of things there.

Did you know they get more money for the recycled milk jugs if you take the lids off?

Gone Fishing

2011-06-15T19:14:00.000-07:00

Kaitlyn went with her class on a field trip to the fish hatchery where they got to go fishing.

Kaitlyn was the first one to catch a fish (most of the students didn't catch anything.)

Fortunately the fishery guy was there to help her land the fish so I could just catch some pictures with my camera.

I think it was a cut throat trout but that's a bit of a guess.

After the photo op they released it back to the pond.

They had lots of fun, but the best part of all was that Kaitlyn got to be in the same group as her best friend Emilie.

Young At Art

2011-06-13T13:47:00.000-07:00

Rachael had her first Art Show on Friday. Auntie Kendra bought her flowers and everything!

She had about 8 pieces on display, but her favorite one is the pencil drawing of sheep you can see here over her right shoulder.

Next year Kaitlyn is going to join her in art class. I'm going to need a bigger fridge to display all this amazing art work :-)

June

2011-06-10T16:12:00.000-07:00

So, I realize I haven't made a post in a little while, so this is kind of a make-up-for-lost-time post.

Last Friday was a beautiful sunny day so we decided the kids needed to go on a field trip instead of being stuck in the classroom. So we went to the aquarium. The kids had lots of fun. We stopped at the park
and we walked down to the beach by the seawall and saw some marine life au natural.

*****

On Monday Gramps and Gram took Jaden and Johnathan to the zoo.
The cousins had a great time, and I know Gramps and Gram did, too. (And great weather to boot!)

*****

Today was Rachael's first track meet. The weather was overcast, but it didn't rain on us, and it wasn't blisteringly hot for the runners. She had a lot of fun, and Daddy even took the day off work to come watch.

Yummy

2011-05-07T12:46:00.001-07:00

I'm thinking the whole family likes my new toy...

A Sunny Easter Egg Hunt

2011-04-24T14:34:00.000-07:00

The sun was smiling on us this year at our 11th annual Easter Egg Hunt! Sure beats last year's rain storm. This year instead of looking for eggs with specific stickers on them the kids had to match their treats to what was on their piece of paper. It was not as easy as it looked, but I guess as kids get older you've got to get a bit trickier. Grandma took Sammy and Jaden on a nature walk where they found a fun tree stump! (Not sure why, but Blogger insists on a huge gap here - scroll down, there's more.)

Along with hunting eggs was lots of playing. And more playing. And dog-piles on the trampoline. Have a tree? Grandma will climb! This time Coli went with her. And food!

What's a party without food?

This year we had a bit of a Mexican theme. So the kids made cake-pop maracas. Very Easter-ish.

And what's more Mexican at a party than a pinata?

All the kids had a chance to whack it before it broke.

Happy Easter, everyone!

Pretty in Purple

2011-04-17T10:01:00.000-07:00

Rachael and Daddy started painting her new room this morning. We got a dark pink primer so hopefully we won't need to do 5 coats of the dark purple.

Rachael's Birthday Party

2011-04-09T12:46:00.000-07:00

Rachael's birthday party was a little late this year (and this post is even later - sorry about that!) because her best friend was away for three weeks, so we had to wait until she got back. She had her party at the pool again this year. Last time we were in a room right off the pool deck. I knew we wouldn't be in that room this year but thought we'd be in the room sort of above the pool. But we weren't in a room at all! No, they set up some tables in the MAIN HALLWAY!!! Which wouldn't have been so bad excecpt for the fact that we have a two-year-old, who we had to chase the entire hour before we went swimming. Grrr.

But the girls had fun. They played a few rounds of Statue/Museum, opened presents and ate birthday cake (once again made by the amazing Auntie Kendra!).

Then we were off to the pool for some swimming.

Jaden really was looking forward to swimming and had lots of fun.

Happy Birthday, Rachael! I can't believe you're 10 already!

You Know It's Spring When...

2011-03-24T13:56:00.000-07:00

...you have your first picnic of the season! (Even if it is in the driveway instead of the backyard because the dog killed our grass - and would eat the food!)

A Whole Decade!

2011-03-24T09:55:00.000-07:00

Hard to believe, but Rachael is now 10 years old! How did that happen? In anticipation of her new room downstairs we got her some furniture for her birthday. Rachael's birthday is in the middle of Spring Break so we're having her party with friends later. On her real birthday we went to Gramps and Grams' house and the girls stayed for a sleepover.

Happy Birthday, Rachael!

What Are Those?

2011-03-07T13:43:00.000-08:00

One of the places we went to visit this weekend was the Victoria Butterfly Gardens. We saw lots of beautiful butterflies who weren't very cooperative when it came to taking pictures.

After we had been there a while and we were getting ready to leave I asked the kids if there was anything that they still wanted to see. Jaden said, "Dine-dine." Dinosaurs? You want to see dinosaurs? I don't remember seeing any dinosaurs here. You show me.

So he wandered around for a while looking for these dinosaurs he was sure he saw

and

after

while

lead

here:

I guess those long necks do look sort of Brontosaurus-like, now that I think about it!

Be A Tourist In Your Cousins Home Town

2011-03-07T13:19:00.000-08:00

We went to Victoria this weekend. The girls skipped school Friday and we hopped on a ferry over to the island to do some sight seeing. We had Darcy's cousin pick us up some "Be a Tourist In You Own Town" tickets - for $10.50 we got to see lots of things for free or for reduced prices. Even the hotel was cheaper.

The first thing we went to see was Miniature World. I remember going when I was 12 or so and knew the kids would like it. Jaden loved watching all the choo choo trains.Even the weather cooperated with us. It was sunnyish but still not very warm. On Saturday we went to see the Parliament building. Amazing how they built with such detail so long before all these fancy machines we have now. We couldn't go inside because they are closed on weekends.

We went to the Undersea Gardens and got to hold some Sea Stars

and then we went to the Royal BC Museum. We spent hours here just looking at all they had to see. We also saw an IMAX about horses.Sunday was our last day but we didn't need to catch the ferry until 3:00 so we had lots of time for fun. First we went to the Beacon Hill Children's Farm.

They had some cute baby goats Rachael fell in love with.

Then we went to the Victoria Butterfly Gardens. They also had birds, fish and flamingos there.

And we even had time to go to the Scratch Patch in Mineral World where the girls each got to pick out some pretty rocks to take home. Unfortunately we were too busy chasing Jaden around to get any pictures. We had lots of fun on the weekend, but chasing a two year old around everywhere doesn't exactly make it relaxing. Good memories, though.

Reading Link Challenge

2011-03-07T13:06:00.000-08:00

Rachael participated in the Reading Link Challenge at school this year. The top 7 readers in her class each read the same 6 or 7 books. Their team was the Flaming Canadians and they challenged the other teams in the other grade 4 & 5 classes in their school. A librarian from the public library came and asked the teams questions about the books and the Flaming Canadians won! They then went to the public library and competed against other schools.

Some of the questions were really hard - like "How much did the flash light cost," and "What was the exact name of the steamboat." They did great but did not win.

Rachael did win one of the books she read, though. She later traded it for her favorite book, "Riding Freedom" which was won by one of the boys on her team.

Once they got back to school they had a drum presentation in which all the kids got to play drums. They presented their speaches in the morning, had pizza for lunch, went to compete in the Reading Link Challenge after lunch, and then came back in time to play the drums. A pretty good day of school if you ask me.

Jaden's 2nd Birthday Party

2011-02-21T16:46:00.000-08:00

This was not only Jaden's 2nd birthday party because he turned two,

it's also his second two-year-old party!

Wow, does that mean he gets 10 parties when he's 10? Um, no.

We had the family over to celebrate and Auntie Kendra didn't disappoint! Jaden loves diggers so what could be better than a cake with diggers on it that you can play with later! And rocks that you can eat. Yummy.

Jaden and Johnathan got to sit at their own table at supper time. Big boys.

The tools were a big hit!

And every boy needs a fire truck or two.

Jaden tried to sing along at "Happy Birthday" time and then blew out the two candles we lit.

He's growing up so fast.

Jaden's New Room

2011-02-11T15:46:00.000-08:00

Because Jaden's room gets so hot in the summer we decided to switch it with the craft room. And because Darcy had a slow week this week we decided now was the time to do it.

We got some hand-me-down curtains from cousins and got paint to match.

I'm avoiding a big-boy-bed as long as possible!

And this is the new craft room.

I purged the kids' junk and even managed to squeeze in my ancient sewing maching.

Jaden's Two!!!

2011-02-11T15:39:00.000-08:00

Hard to believe, but Jaden had his second birthday yesterday. Jaden helped make his birthday cake. Then he got to lick the bowl.

We had his friend Nadiya over to help celebrate. It was her birthday just three days before Jaden's.

Jaden got some cars for his birthday.

All boys love cars.

And then we had birthday cake.

Happy birthday little man!

Hawaii - Day Eight

2011-01-21T10:09:00.000-08:00

Our final day in Hawaii was nice and sunny so we headed to the beach one last time. After checking out of our hotel we hopped on a trolly for a ride around Waikiki.

We got out at the mall and walked back to the hotel where we were being picked up by a shuttle bus to the airport.

So long, Paradise. We'll be back.

Hawaii - Day Seven

2011-01-20T16:25:00.000-08:00

It was not the warmest day on our final full day in paradise so we decided to walk along the Ala Wai canal from one end to the other and then along the main strip back to our hotel. That may not sound like much it's a LONG walk! We stopped for lunch along the way to help break up the trip. It didn't help that Darcy was wearing shoes that hurt his feet! Silly boy. I think the whole trip took over three hours.

It tried to clear up a bit in the afternoon so we sat on the beach and read some before going to the Top of Waikiki revolving restaraunt.

It was 20 stories up

and had a great view.

Hawaii - Day Six

2011-01-20T14:01:00.000-08:00

Another cloudy but warm day in Hawaii when we woke up Wednesday morning. But we had planned a drive to the North Shore, anyway, so the clouds didn't matter. Our first stop along the way was the Dole plantation. We learned how to pick out the perfect pineapple. (It should have no smell, the "eyes" should all be the same size, it shouldn't be soft, and color doesn't matter.) We also learned how to take the top of the pineapple and start your own pineapple plant at home. Somehow, I just don't think it would taste the same as a Hawaiian grown one.

This is what pineapple plants look like.

In the Dole Plant there was a guy making picture-letter names, so we got some for each of the kids.

After the pineapples we went on to the North Shore. We stopped at Hale'iwa Beach and watched some surfers.

It was very windy that day, but still not cold.

(I could get used that that not-cold part, real fast!)

The waves along the North Shore only got to be about 10-12 feet high. Sometimes they can get as high as 30 feet!!!

A local told us to hunt down Giovanni's Shrimp Truck because they made the best shrimp ever! We found it and had some. It was fine, but not the best ever, sorry.

We drove past the Polynesian Cultural Centre on our way back to where we were the day before. Being so windy out we decided to stop at the Blowhole one more time to see if we could see anything, and we weren't disappointed!

Then we went on to Hanauma Bay.

The waves were pretty big until they crashed on the coral reef, then the whole bay was very calm.

Calm, but the wind stirred up the water so it wasn't very clear. They said it was the worst day for snorkeling there in 5 years! But you come that far, you gotta go, anyway.

So we did, but not for very long.

We'll have to go back again on a nice calm sunny day and do it again.

(Oh, if you insist! :-)

For supper that night we went to the Cheesecake Factory.

We had a very unique salad called a Luau Salad that had all kinds of fun stuff in it.

Hawaii - Day Five

2011-01-20T13:24:00.000-08:00

Bright and early Tuesday morning we got picked up to rent a car. Road signs in Hawaii are terrible! There were lots of signs to get on the highway going west, but were than any for going east? No. I guess the locals don't want to share their glorious beaches with the tourists. Having a map that was somewhat less than complete didn't help, either. But eventually we found the highway and headed eastward. The nice thing about travelling with no kids along was we could stop wherever looked interesting.

We saw lots of coconuts washed up on shore. We thought about using our newly-aquired knowledge of how to open them from the Polynesians, but didn't.

It would have been the perfect day to go snorkeling at Hanauma Bay, but they were closed on Tuesdays. We stopped at the Blowhole, but the waves weren't big enough to blow anything. There was an amazing little bay there. No place to change, though, so we kept going.

We were told that the "first" beach was no good and we should keep going to the "second" beach, also known as Makapu'u Beach. The water was aqua blue, the sand was golden (and not at all hot to step on) and the waves there that day were amazing!

The life guard on duty there said there was a bit of an undertow and we shouldn't use our boogie board, but body surfing was still fun. The waves were about 6ft high. So much fun, but it definitely wasn't kid friendly. Good thing they weren't along!

After body surfing we dried out on the beach and finished reading our books. (If you look closely at this picture you can see a light house and some parachutes. There were about 6 of them and they would just float around in circles without ever coming down! Ok, I suppose eventually they came down, but they would stay up there for a long time!)

From there we went and found lunch and another glorious beach, Kalama beach. That beach just streched on and on for miles! We walked from one end almost to the other and back again.

Along the way we saw a sand chicken! If you know Darcy at all, you'll know that he's always joking with the kids about chickens, so if we told them we saw a chicken on the beach they wouldn't believe him without a picture to prove it.

After Kalama beach we went to Manoa falls and saw lots of unique plants. This is Darcy's hand against this leaf.

I can't imagine how old some of those trees must be.

The hike up got a little slippery but where else do you see steps like this?

We made it to the falls just in time to get back down before it got dark, then headed of for seafood at Red Lobster. Yummy!

Hawaii - Day Four

2011-01-19T14:03:00.000-08:00

After another yummy pineapple breakfast on the beach

we were off to the Polynesian Cultural Centre for the day.

A bus picked us up at 10:30 and "Cousin Boyd" gave us a tour on the way to the other side of the island. Once we got there, we upgraded our tickets to have a guided tour that included lunch. The price of the upgrade wasn't much more than what lunch would have cost us, anyway. In one of the "villages" we stopped at they showed us some of the instruments they played including the conch shell, a nose flute and drums. Darcy volunteered to help in the drum presentation and I got the whole thing on video. When we got home Jaden had to watch it 5 times in a row - he loved it! As a thanks-for-participating they gave Darcy a hat woven out of leaves that had a fish on top. From the drums we went to the "river" where they showed us some of the traditional dances of the different nations. Unfortunately for us, the clouds decided that would be a good time to unleash a torrential downpour! Thank goodness we had those attractive ponchos. At least the kept us dry, and even though it was wet, it still wasn't cold out. "Cousin Rudy" showed us the canoes they used to travel in,

we saw how they opened coconuts

and how they made fire. At supper time we had a luau complete with fresh flower lei's, a king and queen, and a pig roasted in a hole in the ground. The meal included "poi" which is anything mashed (like potatoes) and even a purple poi bun! The evening show as amazing! (Unfortunately no cameras were allowed) "Cousin Boyd" who was our tour guide on the bus was the main "fire guy". It's amazing what they can do.

Hawaii - Day Three

2011-01-19T09:52:00.000-08:00

Sunday in Hawaii was spent on the beach, soaking up the sun

and splashing in the waves.

We also went shopping in the international village market and went to a steak place for supper. Darcy had steak he could cut with his fork and I tried Wild Boar pasta. Tastes like ham. Where else can you try wild boar?

Hawaii - Day Two

2011-01-18T16:11:00.000-08:00

Breakfast was included in our hotel package. They gave us a lunch kit and we went down on the pool deck to grab breakfast-to-go (lots of fresh pineapple all week long - yummy!) and went down and had breakfast on the beach. (How cool is that!?)

The birds there were very brave. When we were eating breakfast one came up and pecked Darcy's toe!

We walked on the beach some

and saw some very cool trees.

A local told us we could walk from our hotel up to Diamond Head in about half an hour so we tried it. Along the way we saw Hawaiian Christmas trees

and great views.

Apparently there are two ways up Diamond Head - we followed the signs, but it ended up being the long way. A "half hour" walk turned into 2 hours! And that was just to the bottom! We got there just as they were closing and they told us to hurry up or we wouldn't make it out before they locked up. But they let us in for free. So we hustled up the mountain for another hour or so. After just walking for 2 hours. Kinda tiring, to say the least!

But the view from up top was amazing!

Not very volcano-ish, though. I don't know what I was expecting, but that wasn't it.

On the way down we met some nice people who offered us a ride back to our hotel in their mustang convertable. First time in a convertable, and what a great place to go for a ride!

One thing that was weird about Hawaii was their moon. A quarter moon at home is either a sliver of light on the left or the right, but in Hawaii it was "upside-down"! Not a great picture, but you get the idea.

Stay tuned for more...

Hawaii - Day One

2011-01-18T11:18:00.000-08:00

For those of you who don't know, Darcy and I just got back from a fabulous week in Hawaii - without the kids (thanks to grandparents who volunteered to babysit!) We flew out on Friday the 7th at 2:00pm on a 6+ hour flight - and my usually motion-sick hubby did great! I found some non-drowsy Gravol and he didn't feel sick at all (which is a minor miracle, considering every other time we've flown he's been completely out of it - and those were only hour-long flights!)!

We got off the plane around 7pm Hawaiian time (9pm here) and one of the first things I noticed (after we walked passed the bus fumes and cigarette smoke) was the smell of the warm tropical sea air. The last time I was anywhere near a warm climate was in California 20 years ago (gosh, that makes me sound OLD!), so I guess I must have recognized the smell from the tropical butterfly room at the aquarium. So glad to finally smell the real thing :-)

It was also amazing how everywhere we went there were open-air buildings. This is our hotel lobby. You can see the trees next to the hotel across the street. So foreign to us on the Wet Coast but perfect for Hawaii!

We hopped on a shuttle bus that took us to our hotel

right across the street from the beach. This was what our room looked like,

and here's the view from our balcony.

That night we walked up and down the main strip and grabbed a very late supper (I think it was about 11pm back home) at Cheeseburger in Paradise, which claimed to have the world's best cheeseburgers, but clearly they've never had mine.

More to come about the rest of the trip.

Second Christmas

2010-12-29T20:19:00.000-08:00

Yesterday we had "second" Christmas with Darcy's family. After waffles for brunch we opened some gifts. Naturally, there were lots of presents for the kids.

Grandma really liked the calendar we made for her.

Jaden and Grandpa liked the Magna-Doodle. And Mommy likes that Jaden can draw, but not on everything!

Jaden found a new Christmas decoration to hang on the tree.

That night the kids wore new PJ's to bed.

Merry "second" Christmas!

First Christmas

2010-12-27T15:27:00.000-08:00

This year we're having two Christmases - the first was on the 25th and the second will be tomorrow, on the 28th. The girls were so excited Christmas morning, while Jaden still had the, "Why did you wake me up?" look about him.

He figured it out pretty fast, and then he was excited, too.

Rachael and Kaitlyn helped Jaden get his presents started for him. That way it was almost like opening even more presents!

Jaden's favorite presents were the digger that makes noise and the box it came in. I decided to take the digger out of the original packaging before wrapping it and am I ever glad I did! It took about half an hour to get it out of the box!

After breakfast we went to Gramps and Grams house for more Christmas fun with the cousins.

Jaden and Johnathan are all set for sand box fun with their new digger sets.

The kids also got a new toboggan! Now all we need is snow. Or not - I'm fine with that, too.

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Christmas Time

2010-12-22T14:35:00.000-08:00

I'm not sure what it is, but something about these mugs of hot chocolate I made for the girls and their friends seems festive. I came down from doing laundry and found the mugs all neatly placed on the napkins and it looked Christmas-y. (OK, I straightened the chairs, but still!) Rachael can't ask for a dog this Christmas! She still loves Caspian, but he's a lot of work and still very much a puppy, which can be annoying sometimes. Jaden is riding his Christmas train with all his favorite things - his blanket, Hobbes, Bear and Piwow (pillow). Being the curious boy that he is we couldn't put the presents under the tree early this year unless we wanted them all opened! He'll be much more into opening presents than he was last year. Christmas is so much more fun when you can spend it with little kids.

Nov 28

2010-11-29T14:07:00.000-08:00

Yesterday the Granparents came over to celebrate Kaitlyn's birthday with us.

Kaitlyn also wanted to set up the Christmas tree, even though it wasn't quite after her birthday yet. Here she is posing in her new dress from Grandma.

Rachael is somewhat less cooperative in her new outfit from Grandma.

Jaden didn't get a new outfit, but wanted lots of pictures with Hobbes in front of the tree. Who can resist?

Kaitlyn's 7th Birthday Party

2010-11-27T17:08:00.000-08:00

Kaitlyn had her 7th birthday party yesterday. How could she possibly be 7 already?

They played a few games like Musical Pillows

and Clean Your Room - the sock fight game.

Then they watched How To Train Your Dragon.

Auntie Kendra made a Tinkerbell cake for Kaitlyn this year. It even sparkled!

And of course there were presents.

Everyone had fun, especially the birthday girl.

O Christmas Tree

2010-11-26T14:19:00.000-08:00

Since we have a busy weekend with Kaitlyn's birthday, and there's no school today we decided to go out in the snow and pick out our Christmas tree today.

Jaden wanted this little guy,

but the rest of us opted for a big one. Good thing Daddy came with us to carry it! We won't decorate it until after Kaitlyn's birthday but now we've got it!

First Snow

2010-11-26T14:03:00.000-08:00

We got our first dump of snow for the season yesterday.

It was the first time Jaden remembered seeing snow. He kept saying it was "raining".

When we went out to play in the snow the first thing he wanted to do was what he always wants to do - "sing".

It was the first snow for the puppy, too. He still liked playing with his ball.

Jaden eventually got down off his swing and started cleaning everything because it was "dirty". He cleaned the ladder, the railings and even the trees!

Being a toddler, everything still goes in the mouth - even the snow on the trees! Better than yellow snow, I guess!

Happy Birthday, Daddy!

2010-11-08T12:39:00.000-08:00

Today is my Daddy's birthday so I made him a cake! I did this while my big sisters were at school.

That way I could lick all the spoons by myself.

I made a big mess making this cake,

so I helped clean it up.

Yummy!

Back to the Patch

2010-10-12T18:27:00.000-07:00

Kaitlyn was terribly disappointed that she couldn't come to the pumpkin patch when I took Jaden for his sweater pictures with Johnathan, so we decided to go on Thanksgiving Monday - the busiest weekend of the year, but at least we had nice weather.

This time we found lots more fun things to do. There was a giant bouncy pillow, we went on the hay ride to the pumpkin patch but we didn't bring any home this time because we just got a bunch from Gramps & Gram. We went to the petting zoo and bunny town and Jaden found a tractor just his size while the girls found big slides and a zip line.

Pumpkin Patch

2010-10-07T13:49:00.000-07:00

After an unfortunate delay caused by a power failure (couldn't open the garage door! Why don't they come with battery back-up?) Jaden and I went to meet Andree, Johnathan and Elizabeth at the pumpkin patch.

We went for the sole purpose of getting some cute pictures of the boys (in their new sweaters hand made with love by Gram) but the boys were far too distracted with interesting things to look at than to bother with giving smiles for the camera.

It's a good thing they're cute even without the smiles!

The boys had great fun "driving" a tractor.

Jaden doesn't know who this is (Tow Mater - for those of you who haven't seen the movie Cars), but in a few years he'll think this picture is pretty cool.

Our Trip To Whistler

2010-10-03T16:23:00.000-07:00

...also known as The Trip We Saw A Million Diggers. More about that later.

We had lots of fun and great weather on our trip. We stayed in a hotel right in the Village so we were able to park our car and just walk everywhere for the rest of the weekend.

We saw the Olympic Rings,

and found a playground with a neat swing and a view of some diggers. We saw so many diggers on our drive up on Friday that we decided to keep a tally and count them on the way home. Guess how many diggers we saw from Whistler Village to our house (not counting the ones in the village or up the mountain.) I'll tell you at the end of the post.

On Saturday we went up the gondolas on the Peak2Peak ride. Thanks to Kaitlyn being still a "tot" (in grade 2? - not that I'm complaining or anything) she and Jaden got to ride up for free! Bonus. We went up the mountain in one gondola

and then across to Blackcomb on another which breaks three world records: Worlds longest free span lift of it's kind; World's highest lift of it's kind; and World's longest continuous lift system. We went there and back again, so we went on four rides. Gotta love those fall colors! Amazing views up there!

We even saw a few bears from the safety of the air. (Don't you see? You can totally tell that black dot is a bear!) At the top of the mountain was a giant inukshuk

and snow! Not much, but enough that we had to get a picture of Rachael in her shorts and t-shirt in the snow. We tried to tell her that it was cold up here, but she didn't believe us. We had an amazing time, and after so much fun it's hard to stay awake. So did you guess how many diggers we saw? And I mean just diggers, not the rollers or dump trucks or things like that. (And not counting diggers that were in sales yards.) Ready??? One hundred eleven diggers. Yes, that's 111 diggers on a Sunday. I'm sure we saw more on Friday driving up. That's a lot of diggers.

White Rock

2010-09-18T15:22:00.000-07:00

Since we somehow missed an opportunity to head into White Rock over the summer we were looking for a weather-permitting opportunity to amend that. So when Darcy came home from work of Friday (with supper almost on the table) he suggested that since the weather wasn't too bad we should go now!

So supper was put in the fridge for tomorrow and we drove off to White Rock for a supper of Fish & Chips on the beach. Well, Darcy and I had fish & chips; Rachael had a cheeseburger and Kaitlyn had chicken nuggets. But close enough.

While we were having supper Jaden got to see his first train up close.

Choo choo!

After supper we walked down to the pier to get some gelato from our favorite place across the road, only to find that all the gelato places were closed! At 7:30 on a Friday night!

We resigned ourselves to the fact that we may have to settle for Dairy Queen instead, when we finally found one that was open! One lonely gelato store on the whole beach. Thank goodness we parked near it or we would have missed it completely!

Art Class

2010-09-13T18:32:00.000-07:00

Rachael started art class today and had lots of fun. They're doing "Art Around the World" as a theme this year so they'll try a bunch of different styles and mediums. This was before the start of class, so that is not her picture behind her.

Siding

2010-09-11T18:32:00.000-07:00

Check out the House Blog for more updates!

Dance

2010-09-07T16:15:00.000-07:00

Kaitlyn had her first dance class of the year today, too.

First Day of School

2010-09-07T09:25:00.000-07:00

Rachael started her first day of Grade 4 (!!!) today

and Kaitlyn started Grade 2.

And Jaden didn't want to be left out of the picture taking

The Boys

2010-09-04T17:16:00.000-07:00

...a picture is worth a thousand words

Caspian

2010-08-20T10:32:00.000-07:00

We were finally able to pick up our puppy on Thursday.He was totally mellow the whole 30+ minute ride home and just sat quietly on Rachael's lap the whole time.There was so much for Caspian to explore.He likes his dog houseand loves to lie down under the cedars.Being only 7 weeks old he still needs lots of sleep.The girls slept in the garage with Caspian last night. I don't think anyone got very much sleep.

Puppy Love

2010-08-06T09:02:00.000-07:00

Rachael's dream is finally coming true: we're getting a puppy!Meet Caspian. He's a five week old Golden Retriever. It was hard to choose one puppy they were all so cute!Even Kaitlyn, who isn't much of a dog person, fell in love.He was born into a family with lots of kids - even a one year old boy who picks him up and pulls his tail and the puppies don't mind, so I know Caspian will be good with Jaden.Because he's only 5 weeks old we had to leave him behind until he gets his shots at 7 weeks. He'll be ready to come home after Aug 18th. It was hard to say goodbye.

One Smart Little Boy

2010-08-01T17:52:00.000-07:00

On Tuesday we got some presents from Auntie Kendra who just returned from Disney World. She got Jaden (who is approaching 18 months) a t-shirt and I said, "Look, Jaden, there's Mickey Mouse on your shirt." And that's about all I've mentioned to him about who Mickey Mouse is.So today he was wearing the shirt again while we were making cake (and using our mother-daughters matching Minnie Mouse aprons) and I put some of our new Disney World sprinkles on the cake. I said, "Look at that, there's Mickey Mouse head sprinkles!" And Jaden pulled on his shirt and pointed to Mickey Mouse! Now that's one smart little boy!

Look What We Built

2010-07-31T16:39:00.000-07:00

Check out the house blog to see how to build the world's biggest doghouse!Now all we need is the dog to go in it!

The Force Will Be With You Always... (Picture Added)

2010-07-27T21:23:00.000-07:00

...starting from babyhood! Auntie Kendra found these Star Wars baby toys when she was at Disney World, and knowing how much her brother loves Star Wars she just had to introduce Jaden to the characters. Jaden can even point out which one is Yoda!

Summer Stuff

2010-07-23T14:12:00.000-07:00

Lots has been going on so far this summer.
*Rachael and Kaitlyn had a sleepover at Gramps and Gram's last weekend. They built a scarecrow named Sadie the Lady and wrote a poem about how she doesn't like crows.*Jaden has been kinda grumpy but at least he's got his cute moments. He learned this from his big cousin.*Jaden got his first Road Rash the other day. He was driving his "car" down the driveway (not very fast) when he somehow got his foot in front of the wheel and flipped over on his face. The amazing thing is he somehow managed to miss landing on his nose and landed on his upper lip. It's got a nice scrape and was swollen for a while but now he's just got kind of a Hitler-looking mustache. He didn't cry for too long though. *The girls decided to have a bubble bath/pool which was lots of fun for Jaden, too. It took his mind off his sore lip, anyway!Lots more summer fun to come. Stay tuned...

So we picked her up from camp...

2010-07-17T19:47:00.000-07:00

...and the first thing she said to us was, "The food was disgusting!" But other than that she had a blast with her two best friends and is already making plans to go back with them next summer!(Check out more on the playhouse!)

Camp!

2010-07-11T21:15:00.000-07:00

Tonight we delivered Rachael off to her first week at camp.With her two best friends Alex and Alexa in tow she won't be missing us a bit!

Harrison

2010-07-11T13:15:00.000-07:00

We took the first trip of the season to Harrison on Wednesday. Jaden really got into the whole beach scene.Daddy dug his usual mud hole.We buried some legseven Jadens!Rachael had to most fun catching little fish. Most of them she (and Kaitlyn) caught with her bare hands, but sometimes she used a bucket. When we left she counted them as she let them go and she (generously!) counted 99! I don't think there were quite that many, but she did have a lot!PS - check out The House Blog for more playhouse updates.

Family Reunion

2010-07-07T13:06:00.000-07:00

For the July long weekend we went to Dutch Lake for a family reunion. There were 51 of us there, which is everybody but one family of 5. The weather wasn't the best, but we still had fun. Saturday was warm enough to go to the beach where Rachael had fun swimming,Kaitlyn had fun playing,and Jaden had fun splashing in the water.There were canoe trips,beautiful views,throwing rocks in the water,and finding wildlife. (This is a frog.)This is a painted turtle (the underside)This wildlife I could have done without! (She so does not get her love of snakes from her mother - you'll notice the "Daddy's Girl" t-shirt!)While the girls were picking up creepy crawlies, the boys picked flowers!So did Elizabeth.There was dirt to be played in and marshmallows to be roasted over the campfire.It rained somebut then we played games inside. We were celebrating Grandma's 90th birthday, Grandpa's 89th birthday and their 64 years of marriage. Now that's something to celebrate!

Sports Day & Frogs

2010-06-26T15:00:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was Sports Day at school. We had perfect weather for it. Rachael had fun with her two best friends,and Kaitlyn had fun with her best friend.Jaden even found a friend.After Sports Day we went to Kaitlyn's teacher's house for a "Frog Liberation Party." They had some frog eggs in their classroom that turned into tadpoles, and two had even grown four legs (but they still had the tail.) So after saying "au revior" the class went to return them to the wild.

The Play House!

2010-06-07T10:13:00.000-07:00

The playhouse is on its way to being built! Check out the house blog to see more!

15 Months Old

2010-05-26T13:51:00.000-07:00

It all started 8 years ago when Rachael was 15 months old. We went to Birch Bay with some friends and got some incredible pictures of Rachael and Joey on a little bench at the beach.When Kaitlyn came along, I needed to get some cute pictures for my wall of her at the same age.She is picking Forget-me-nots at Gram's house.

So now Jaden is 15 months old and I had to get some great pictures of him, too. He loves picking dandylions and buttercups, but that was too much like Kaitlyn's pictures (and also too girlie.) So I thought I'd get pictures of him popping bubbles, but this proved pretty difficult to take. Playing with rocks and sticks around the house didn't seem cute enough.

Then I remembered the Park I went to with Rachael on her field trip. It had a nice little creek in a grove of trees. So I packed him up and off we went for a photo shoot. A little boy throwing rocks in the creek. What could be more boy-ish than that?

Veggies

2010-05-13T16:39:00.000-07:00

So I finally got around to making a VeggieTales name to hang on Jaden's door, like his sisters have. They sure have grown since I first made them!

Happy Mother's Day

2010-05-09T19:07:00.000-07:00

Happy Mother's Day!

(Be sure to check out the House blog!)

Shoes

2010-04-23T10:51:00.000-07:00

Jaden sure loves his shoes! He gets so excited and will start hissing like a snake, "Sssss, ssss," which is his word for shoes. If you listen closely you can hear him say it.

And when he can't have his shoes, he makes his own! I love the "blink" at the start of the video when he thinks the camera flash will blind him. So cute!

Easter Traditions

2010-04-06T09:28:00.000-07:00

This year was the 10th year that Auntie Kendra put on an Easter Egg Hunt for the cousins. (Rachael was 3 weeks old at the first one!)It was a little rainy this year. Actually, it was pouring when it was time to hunt eggs, and right after it turned sunny! Figures. But the girls wanted to hunt in the rain, anyway.They got a little wet, but but they still had lots of fun.Jaden was very good at finding the shinny little chocolate eggs and putting them in his basket, but then he wanted to eat them, foil and everything! Not a good idea, seeing as they're choking hazards and all.This year instead of filling the eggs with goodies, they were filled with clues to find a big Easter basket full of fun stuff... like stringy paper! After the hunt the girls made

a sweet flower craft

while the boys just played.Thanks for another great Easter, everyone!

Rachael is 9!!!

2010-03-22T12:42:00.000-07:00

Where has the time gone? I can hardly believe my little girl is 9 years old already. She must be growing up because for her birthday she wanted skinny jeans! She never wears jeans! It makes her look too grown up.This year she convinced us to have her birthday party "somewhere". As in, not at home. So we had her party at the pool. She had lots of fun with her friends splashing around for a whilebefore eating another Auntie Kendra masterpiece.(A Littlest Pet Shop seal at a pool party.) It was a splashing good time!

Pardise is Calling Me...

2010-03-17T16:04:00.000-07:00

...see?(I got this in the mail from people wanting me to buy travel insurance. Sure is tempting...)

Bookworms

2010-03-06T16:16:00.000-08:00

Jaden and Nadiya reading books together.

The Big-Kid Look

2010-02-20T17:22:00.000-08:00

After trimming the hair out of Jaden's eyes more than once, it was time for a Big Boy Haircut. (Before)I wanted to wait until after his birthday because I knew it would make him look way too little-boyish. (After)And it does! The baby look is gone. And look, he even combs his hair!I think here he looks like his second-cousin Tim.

Kaitlyn's Drama Debut

2010-02-19T09:21:00.000-08:00

Kaitlyn performed in her first play at school on Wednesday. She was Narrator #3 in "The Mitten" - en francais, of course. (That way we couldn't tell if the kids messed up their lines!)They were so cute and they did a very good job.

Jaden's Birthday Party

2010-02-15T08:37:00.000-08:00

On Saturday we had a few friends and family come over to help celebrate Jaden's first birthday.There were presents of coursewhich his friends helped him open.As is tradition, Auntie Kendra made the birthday cake.Hobbes riding in the back of a dump truck. How cool is that?Jaden got to have his cake and eat it, too.(You don't want to know what his diaper looked like the next day!!!)

Jaden's First Birthday!

2010-02-11T13:16:00.000-08:00

Hard to believe, but Jaden is a whole year old already. Little boys grow up just as fast as little girls.Since his birthday was on a Wednesday this year, we are having his party on Saturday, but we still had to celebrate on the actual day, too.Jaden was fascinated by the candle. He wasn't really sure what to do with the cake, so he mostly just mushed it between his fingers.When he did finally take a bite, he must not have really cared for it because he didn't take many more bites after that.He would rather share his cake with us than eat it. (Fine by Mom!)

Olympic Spirit

2010-02-08T10:56:00.000-08:00

The Olympics have come to our town! Well, sort of. The Russian figure skaters are practicing at the local ice rink and on Saturday we went and saw two of the couples practice. Yuko Kavaguti and Aelxander Smirnov, and Vera Bazarova and Yuri Larionov practiced some of their jumps, spins and twists on the ice for us to see.Yesterday the Olympic Torch passed through our town, too. Being a once in a lifetime opportunity to see the Olympic Torch, us girls decided we should go see it, while the boys stayed home watching the Super Bore, which is on every year.

The girls made their own torches, we got free flags and free Olympic Coke,we saw torches of Olympics-pastand our own Canadian Torchand we saw the Olympic Torch brought in to the stadium.A once in a lifetime sight.

Video of Jaden's First Steps

2010-01-24T12:52:00.000-08:00

First Steps

2010-01-21T12:36:00.000-08:00

Jaden took his first steps today! (Ok, Daddy and the girls saw it a few days ago, but this was the first day I saw it, so it's the one that counts :-) He's starting to get more brave, but it will still be a little while until he's really walking. He's growing up fast.

Clavin and Hobbes (Again)

2010-01-14T10:40:00.000-08:00

Yesterday felt like the real Calvin was visiting my house. Jaden would get in to trouble in one place, so I'd drag him across the room, show him something he could play with and the next thing I knew he was into trouble again! Have the Terrible Two's started already? He's not even one! At least he's cute. I'm hoping for a better day today.

Fourth Christmas

2009-12-31T18:51:00.000-08:00

What happened to Third Christmas? With about 35 people in the house and so much activity going on, people were spread all over, and sadly, the camera did not get used much. But good times were still had by all. Fourth (and final) Christmas was at the Walls house.
Presents were openedand Jaden's favorite part was the wrapping paper! Shocking.
This was the year of matching vestsand hoodies.The girls played Wii and decorated a gingerbread stable for the nativity cookies Auntie Kendra made.Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Second Christmas

2009-12-26T14:55:00.000-08:00

How many Chrismtases are there, you ask? Why, this year there are four! The first was with the Abrahams', the second is with most of the Froeses, the third is with the Stobbes and the fourth is with all the (local) Froeses. Busy, busy!The girls were very excited Christmas morning. Jaden - not so much.But after watching Rachaeland Kaitlyn open a few presentshe got the hang of it. His favorite toy was his new truck.After breakfast the Froese family came over for the not-so-traditional Christmas meal of veraniki, and to spend time together.Merry Second Christmas!

Calvin and Hobbes

2009-12-21T15:49:00.000-08:00

Uncle Jeff was looking for a stuffed tiger that looked liked Calvin's best friend Hobbes.I hope this doesn't mean Jaden's going to grow up to be like Calvin!

First Christmas

2009-12-21T15:41:00.000-08:00

We've had our first Christmas already. And it was Jaden's first Christmas! He shared it with his new cousin Elizabeth who is only a week old.The Abrahams family came over for Christmas fun, food and fellowship.And of course presents! Lots of those.Jaden doesn't quite have the ripping-open-of-the-paper quite yet, but he does have the eating-of-the-paper down!One down and still three to go!Merry Christmas!

Ice Skating

2009-12-21T15:37:00.000-08:00

We kicked off Christmas Holidays with a trip to the skating rink with the Walls (well, most of them, anyway).The girls did really well for only having done it two or three times. Lots of fun!

New Niece

2009-12-15T10:53:00.000-08:00

Elizabeth Lynn was born to Brian and Andree on December 13th, weighing 8lbs 13oz. They were home les than 24 hours later so we didn't even get a chance to visit in the hospital! But we saw them at home. I got to hold her and the boys, too.

Oh Christmas Tree

2009-12-05T17:01:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas

Kaitlyn is 6!!!

2009-12-03T10:56:00.000-08:00

Where does the time go? My little Baby Girl is 6 already! This year she wanted to have some friends over for a party.Emilie, Latezya and Caitlin (Natasha couldn't make it) came over for some fun, games, cake and presentsAuntie Kendra made Kaitlyn a cute penguin cake.On her real birthday she opened more presents. All she wanted for her birthday was a pair of black boots like Latezya and Emilie. She loves those boots!

Family Pictures

2009-12-03T10:50:00.000-08:00

Stormy Weather

2009-11-18T09:52:00.000-08:00

It's been very windy around here lately. So windy that a tree fell on our house! (It was very loud!) Well, part of a tree. Mostly just the branches hit our house but another couple of inches over and there could have been some serious damage from the tree trunk.The tree is in the neighbour's yard, and it's mostly dead but soon will be all dead as he's going to cut it down to prevent further damage to surrounding houses (namely ours!) Our power went out right about the time the tree fell (11:30pm) and didn't come back on until 8am. More stormy weather is instore for us tonight. Trees, please stay where you are!

Happy Birthday

2009-11-08T19:36:00.000-08:00

Somebody's birthday is today!

We love you!
{ Now we can break out the Christmas music!}

It's NOT a Skirt!

2009-10-31T21:10:00.000-07:00

It's a kilt! Jaden dressed up like a Scotsman for Hallowe'en, thanks to Auntie Kendra's recent trip to Scotland. (Complete with Nessie, the Loch Ness Monster!)

(Not So) Little Gymnast

2009-10-28T19:13:00.000-07:00

Rachael got pictures taken with her gymnastics class last week.She absolutely loves gymnastics. Her favorite routine to do is on the trampoline. I asked her what was her least favorite thing to do, and she didn't have one! She loves it all!

Time to Baby-proof!

2009-10-27T16:42:00.000-07:00

Guess who's getting around more these days? Yep, Jaden can pull himself up quite easily now.And he's graduated from the army-crawl to a more traditional way of getting himself around. He has also figured out how to open drawers, but doesn't know that there's anything in them (yet!).

It's Big

2009-10-27T16:40:00.000-07:00

Here is our new dining room table. Doesn't it look big? And this is the small size! There's a leaf we can put in the middle and easily add the two extra chairs. In fact, we could add the two chairs at this size!

Guess Who's Coming To Dinner?

2009-10-16T13:55:00.000-07:00

You are! And when you come, we'll actually have room to sit around the table!

Yes, after 12 years we're saying goodbye to this too small, broken, very-well used, miss-matched table.We've bought a new dinning room tablewith 8 comfortable kid-friendly (ie. wipe-able!) chairs. Bon appetit!

Happy Thanksgiving

2009-10-13T11:23:00.000-07:00

After a yummy Thanksgiving dinner on Sunday, we just spent Thanksgiving Monday around the house. Rachael was playing with her best friend from school, so I took pictures of the other two kids. They turned out pretty cute.

Family Traditions

2009-10-02T12:47:00.000-07:00

What can I say? It runs in the family.
Have-exersaucer,-will-crawl-through!Rachael 10 monthsKaitlyn 10 monthsJaden 7.5 months

Chin Ups?

2009-10-01T17:09:00.000-07:00

Jaden sure is strong already. Today he was practicing chin ups. Here he was, hanging on for dear life under the kitchen counter stools, trying to figure out a way down. (Don't worry, I'm not that mean. I helped him down, ran and got the camera, then staged the whole thing.)

The Purple Princess

2009-09-29T16:22:00.000-07:00

Kaitlyn had her first ballet lessons last night and she loved it!In a sea of pink, she was the Purple Princess!They learned First Position,point the toes,twirl aroundand had lots of fun. She's looking forward to going back next week for more fun!