After the spring showers of last night the weather today was rather lovely, a nice breeze, some sunshine… mosquitoes???? That’s right, for a city that has a rather extensive spraying the park was over run with the little buggers.

So our picnic with Chris and Chris was cut a little short, we managed food, some play with the soccer ball, bubbles AND flying a kite. I just did not figure on there being so many bugs and did not bring our spray.

Juice box pro

Pregnant kite flying

Sadly when figuring out my day I had not imagined that our picnic would take so little time, this left me with little or no actual activity planned for schooling today. Luckily we have not yet done up our Father’s Day cards and I need to send out an envelope to my own father in Carolina. So the boys spent a nice portion of their afternoon colouring cards for their god-daddies and grandpa.

Card colouring (Gavin red)

Our tulips in the front yard are finally flowering.  A few pink ones to enjoy, though the twins were SURE they were called ROSES and not tulips. Actually, I am still not sure they actually believe me even now.

Our tulips

We got the opportunity to meet Ada’s parents who are here from New York for a month or two. They stopped by with Nathan and Ada on their way to Ada’s doctor’s appointment. They came bearing gifts! Some fruit for us to try…

Dragon Fruit

and a lovely Hersey lunch tin with chocolates in it! Mmm what a perfect gift for a pregnant woman! Lately I have not been able to get enough chocolate in the house to be actually content!

Mmm Chocolate!

We sold our 3rd IKEA crib today as well. Feels good to get rid of something that is not needed for our not so little family and help another person along with her newest addition. This is all done with the purpose of forcing Emanuel out of his toddler (crib) bed and into a bigger bed next year. I have already scoped out some really neat and affordable “futons” (Ken says sofa beds) from IKEA that are all one mattress for the twins and would cost us less than buying beds the normal way. That leaves Emanuel with the slightly higher bunk bed top (also IKEA but a used) as his big boy bed. Something a little funky for the twins and Emanuel gets to have his higher up hideaway.

It is hard to believe the week has hit midway. The weather has gotten rather blustery toward the evening and much more “spring in Alberta.” Time to dig out the bug spray and maybe even the rain boots.The upcoming weekend is a long weekend so I am working on Ken and in turn a couple other friends to see if we can AT LEAST get a picnic planned. The weather report is looking relatively safe at 15 cel for the weekend…

I have started the “big baby sort” early… Ada is due next month and I want to have her neutrals to her early and then a stack of “boy” and a stack of “girl” dependant on the outcome. It is fun to go through everything again and see what we saved. I actually have not given away a lot of our baby baby clothes since Quinn was born all the way in Minnesota so I could not bring him down things until he was a year old! So Baby Perrin the first is making out like a bandit! Which means I should get back to work!

Everyone in a row (Zander far right)

Another day of sunny heat, as per the weather report so we took the family BACK to the local conservatory this morning to enjoy the plants and flowers. The feature pyramid is just starting to be changed to a new one so while we were there workers were removing some of the flowers – something that entertained the boys to no end. The main reason for going was to (attempt apparently as she was less that willing to be our little model this time) take pictures of Trinity in the purple dress she received from her God-mommy Karyn. While making the 5 senses lapbooks we traced hands for a texture book and Trinity actually WANTED her hand traced as well, so I figured a copy of that and some pictures in the party dress would be a great little scrapbook page for each of her god-mommies.

All 4 of my Angels (Gavin left)

Sweetheart in the gazebo

Of course Trinity was MUCH more interested in creating her own flower inspired piece of art along with her brothers. So we did that as well. 4 very different interpretations on the contents of the same room. I do love seeing how each of our children “see” a room or an object.

Art for the moment

Top Zander, 2nd row Gavin then Trinity, bottom Emanuel

Thinking of crafts – I did get in some crafting myself last night – scrapbooking of course, this time my cousin Katie’s wedding (the stars in the bottom right corner are actually from her centre piece displays)…

Cousin Katie's wedding

and my favourite picture from Trinity’s birthday which was taken by Karyn. I used Karyn’s suggestion and the paper she helped me pick out at Michaels on Sunday to create a relatively simple but I think pretty page.

Birthday Photo

We had special visitors today too – Chris and Chris came by with their two pet ferrets! Amazingly enough NONE of the kids were truly frightened of them though it seems ferrets are a definite excitement factor as the boys got a little too wild for my liking. BUT Trinity was a real trooper, ready to sit there and pet them and talk to them and even allow them to walk around her. I was surprised, I thought for sure she would be intimidated just by how quickly the move.

Ferret! (Zander left)

I actually finished (started last night) another stitched piece, this one for my cousin David. Sadly I can’t post it here until he has at least seen a picture of it, so hopefully in the next couple days…

The big treat for tonight was a round of the new game Aunty Karyn dropped off for the boys this weekend – Kai Lan Dragon Race… a little TOO much excitement for Trinity.

Fun with Kai Lan (Gavin front)

Finally some rain to cool off the night but wow has this weather been brutal! And of course when the weather is overwhelming the pregnancy mind really kicks in, worrying about things KEN says HE will worry about, forgetting everything but the basics (I called mom last night and by the time she answered forgot why I called!)… things out of my hands become looming worries… BUT on the plus side, the kids are almost done two sets of lapbooks (waiting on Daddy to have a few moments to put in some spare pages for overflow), we had a blast at  the conservatory yet again which ended with all 3 boys asking to go BACK another time and our life is pretty much like night and day from where we were this time last year. Which of course leads to Ken’s favourite promise – Kenny fix… and you know, he always has! Am I not a blessed and loved woman?

The picture Ken took

Where did spring go? We are facing full out summer heat today with a projected high of 31 cel. While this may excite some people the pregnant woman is NOT so happy about it! Definitely weather that is too warm to send the kids out for very long or myself sit out and relax in the backyard!

The slurpee + Trinity fall out was quick and long lasting… at midnight last night when I was utterly exhausted little Miss was unable to fall into a deep sleep so we finally had Ken take her out of the room to sit and play quietly. She FINALLY went to bed around 3 am… this is amazing for a little girl whose latest regular bedtime is 8pm. But that is the price we pay for being lenient with the sugar! Sometimes soft hearted mommy  had to pay the price!

With the heat keeping us inside in the shade over the early afternoon I finally found the time to bring out the Lightning McQueen work books that the twins got for their birthday this year. They start super simple with numbers and move into addition and subtraction, so one at a time I have them come up and do a page then go back down to the lovely cold of the basement playroom. My main goal is to get us past the teen numbers… for some reason the waters become muddy beyond the number 12.

Zander hard at work

Our zoo trip has sparked a definite interest in further animal studies. The boys want to go back next week and see the elephant and zebra again. My goal for those two animals is to make a poster of each… have the boys draw their own pictures, practice writing the names, etc etc. So this week I research those animals and see what fun activities we can find.

Since tomorrow is supposed to be ANOTHER hot one, we are spending some time at the local plant conservatory, they have some hotter areas but it will be fun to go back, take more pictures and have the boys learn more about gardening – our next focus for our schooling. We still need to work out our planting budget but today were enjoying the sudden burst of apple blossoms on our trees! Later this week we plan on taking some pictures with a branch from what is called the “bad apple” tree.

Riding around the apple tree (Gavin)

Of course once the hottest point of the day passed us by the kids were ready and raring to go to get into the pool. This is Trinity’s first year to really enjoy the water AND be in by herself, well as long as we keep the water level shallow. We are thinking of raising it a little and getting out the swim suits.

Back in the pool (Zander left)

I took my wedding and engagement ring off last night and put it on my necklace for now. The heat has my fingers just that tiny bit swollen where it is uncomfortable to leave them on. Odd feeling no rings on the fingers…

So basically a fun but WAY too hot day for the middle of May. Tomorrow we are off to the conservatory then home to finish our 5 Senses lapbooks and start the putting together of our animal folders/lapbooks. I will post all the links we used with our Lemur book when I post the finished piece. Other than that it is just too hot to think so I think I will go and watch mindless tv for a while.

Trying out the sunny day clothes