Emanuel picked a real tough one this time! Apparently the Nodosaurus is a sneaky dinosaur, not only is it only in North America but only two incomplete skeletons have been found and those AGES ago. Although THREE places are listed when you read up on it. As well, no skulls found! Add to that VERY few images and the fact that more than a couple of my new favourite dino websites did NOT cover this dinosaur and it was rather slim pickings. Even with these difficulties I DO have some information to share as well as a video. Don’t get me wrong, it is a VERY simple video, just two girls reading info about the dinosaur but Emanuel was excited to have something to watch however brief!

Now onto the nitty gritty… the links for the (limited) information we found. About.com had a little blurb in their herbivorous dinosaurs section right HERE. I rather preferred this site’s chapter format with basically an honest – we really don’t know much – HERE. Wiki had a short article HERE. And as usual, EnchantedLearning had something HERE (I REALLY miss my subscription with all those print out privileges!!!). Coloringpages101 had the best image for colouring HERE. Emanuel was rather impressed by the pattern the armour on this dinosaur. KidsDinos.com had something for us under their Cretaceous period list HERE. This plant eating 4 legged (5 toed??) dinosaur was often compared to a hedgehog in the literature due to its inability to fight back (no club on tail) and rather hunched down and did the hedgehog thing – no soft bits exposed. I had to make Emanuel his own fact page and we printed out the skeleton image on the Wiki article. 

Terrific picture

July 6-9

Friday marked the beginning of TWO adventures… We coordinated with Karyn AND Esther to work everything out relatively smoothly. We drove from the Bleau’s in the morning stopping off at Karyn’s work to collect her keys and say hello… oh and drop off two owls for Lauralee and Victoria! From there it was time to drop off the female portion of our little family at Karyn’s apartment in time to terrorize the cat and tidy the rooms. 

With Esther running behind schedule (as per usual) even with a quick stop off at Dollarama for a few necessities (ie. toothpaste for Trinity) we had enough time to get the dishes mostly done and carpet vacuumed before she appeared for a quick snuggle and visit. 

SNUGGLES

 That marked the beginning of the boys’ adventure – Aunty Esther collected them at Kristen and Fydo’s where Ken was finishing up with our sort  through and helping with some furniture movement into their now almost completely finished basement and they were off to the city for THEIR holiday from US!! 

In the meantime the girls and I sat back and enjoyed the quiet that is Karyn’s apartment and waited on Karyn finishing work. Now how to spend the evening? Well with girly things including doing HAIR…

Note the pro action with Echo

And blowing bubbles.

Bubbles

And apparently eating cereal with unicorns!!!!

Snack time with Unicorns

The next day it was time to enjoy our day to the fullest. I had received something rather special in the mail thanks to Karyn… a birthday card from my Dad and StepMom with spending cash. Karyn’s bank was open so we were able to change it over to Canadian and it was  time to head to the mall and get to the serious business of shopping!! But before that a special homemade breakfast by Karyn – raspberry pancakes, fresh bacon from the Farmer’s Market and Pepsi… cuz we rock that way!

Pre breakfast sunshine

Note the sheep inclusion

Breaky

Let’s see… we started at the MACS counter where I purchased a brand new foundation with some extra sponges. 

Dressed to impress

Then there was the Body Shop (of which there are TWO in Minnesota… I checked! One in Mall of America and the other at the airport??) with its clearance items and a lovely 3.00 lip colour. We wandered some more just to see what there was to see and then headed over to Winners where Trinity got a special shirt – Hello Kitty of course – for being such a well behaved girl. 

You can see the shirt here

I waffled over a maxi dress that after checking out Old Navy with no success I returned to purchase along with a new pair of sunglasses (finally, that morning my old ones just sort of popped apart after years of use and abuse!)… 

Shoe break

Don’t forget lunch! A mall lunch of anything we felt like… Trinity had frozen yogurt and I got myself some Umi Sushi Express. Don’t forget our traditional poutine which was Karyn’s meal of choice. 

Lunch at the food court

We were SUPPOSED to have dinner with the guys as Ted and Sean came up to help Ken search through his Magic cards for the ones he plans on selling (seriously we downsized EVERYTHING). BUT they got all jumbled in their meal choices so we gave up on waiting and ordered in another favourite! Indian Flame Indian Food!!!!! SOOOO good!

Supper

After some more time on the balcony enjoying the sunny day the girls went to bed and we settled down for another special treat – Blue Eyes tea and cherries. Remember Blue Eyes from the Library High tea? Well I was able to pick some up from the source for the event and bring it to share with Karyn. And it was worth it! Combine the lovely tea and fresh fruit with HEDGEHOG time and silly movies – Spice Girls AND the Beatles movie… and our day was… AWESOME! 

Tea

Kitty

And hedgehogs oh my

Sunday morning was a little more stressful with a tired and hot baby and a cranky little girl. The weather has held out at warm for so long everyone just feels sticky. So we sent the girls along to Ken that afternoon and took a couple hours of together time which included finishing laundry AND going to DQ for food and ice cream. 

Ted and Trinity’s new sweater

Sean and Kristen

We ended up at Kristen and Fydo’s for some more visiting… Sean and Ted had already left but got to play with the girls some… and then it was time to say good bye, head back to Karyn’s for the stuff we left there and head back to town. WITHOUT the boys! As, until Sunday evening they were at Esther’s and then that evening gone over to see their cousin Jimmie. So not only did we see MORE people, do MORE things but we did it with TWO kids!! CRAZY!!!!!

Just the girls, note Trinity is ASLEEP!

And that was my weekend… WOW! 

Oh and a special thanks to Kristen who snapped this one one night this weekend!!

So homeschooling is definitely something we ALL love in this family but these sunny days (as mentioned yesterday) are kicking my bum! We have a nice routine though, Ken gets up with the kids and they have breakfast… one of the twins feeds Echo hers and outside they go. Run run run that energy out… and back in for Stuart Little. Trinity has decided that NOTHING will do but to have Daddy draw her mouse… this time in bed asleep. 

Chapter 2... They each picked a different portion of the chapter to draw!! I love Emanuel's Christmas ornaments - included random letters!

The story has not failed to deliver yet… today Stuart played in a piano, his parents destroyed a book in the name of parenting AND altered a beloved Christmas poem from mouse to louse… the kids were slightly confused as to WHY that was necessary! (I do not believe they were alone on that one)

We found some reusable sticker books for Trinity to play with which sort of kept her busy… well occupied with a side of HELP I CAN’T GET THIS STICKER OFF!!!

Sticker book...

We headed BACK out to the backyard for ANOTHER pool session for Echo… she managed (with careful mommy supervision) to work her OWN way into the pool – face first and against mommy’s strict instructions but with sputtering and giggling the whole time. Thank goodness Gavin followed instructions and made the pool super shallow! BUT we miscalculated and the place we put the pool apparently is shady ALL day so the water was COLD… so as soon as she got sorted she was squeaking every time she sat down for the first bit – CHILLY MOMMY! Trinity thought it was hilarious.

The water is cooooooold!!!

We were able, with Freecycle, to pass along our packing boxes… to the same woman who bought an old lion costume from me late last month! Apparently her daughter LOVES it! It was so nice to be able to help someone out TWICE!

And then there was the hedgehog expedition that Karyn, Lauralee and myself headed out on thanks to Kijiji. I am happy to say it was entertaining AND victorious! Welcome Prickie Pie to the extended Reinsch-Johnson family!!!

This was taken off of Twitter so not the best picture but I am told hedgehogs are very active and very hard to photograph

Now I am working on planning a crafting session with friends on Sunday while I eat my lovely FRESH fruit thanks to Kathy who was able to stop in at our favourite produce store (H&W) and pick me up a variety of fruit and veg all for around 20.00! THANK YOU!!! Total yum!

Mmmm

So another HOT day but an amazingly awesome one too! And it sounds like I may just have a couple new bookcases by the end of the weekend!

I love love love the Pop Art setting on my camera 🙂 Doesn't Echo look like a red head?

Further proof to myself that I AM doing the right thing with my kids... here is Gavin spontaneously teaching his baby sister the alphabet using BLOCKS... She didn't stick around for much but he told her all about the letter "T"... I teach my son so he can teach the world!!!