Seriously, VERY anticipated, we love having Karyn on her once a year pilgrimage to visit our family. This year she drove down which always makes her arrival more of a surprise.

This year she chose to come down in August. Her timing was pretty perfect. The right week to see Trinity and Emanuel test for belt levels in Karate, to see Echo’s dance recital (solo act version), see off Ken and the boys before their first 5K run AND celebrate an early birthday for Echo. Yup, we kept her busy!

We had all sorts of fun. Karyn is one of the very few who has now met our Momo in person. They got along swimmingly.

Then in a last minute plan we went out to meet the Schwartz family at a splash park. We sent the twins and dads out to play Pokemon. It was a little on the cool side, but fun was had.

Bedtime stories were read with Aunty of course.

And Karyn and I ducked off to check out a larger quilting and yarn shop and then on the way home stop at a series of outlets where we enjoyed Five Guys.

We took our favourite walk to the Catholic Church.

And took her to our favourite beach. That was just Karyn and my supervision on that one. We managed it!

Then over to the Schwartz family’s for dinner and Mystro time.

Karyn and I snuck off a second time for a marathon shop at Mall of America. Ken has still not accepted the flowered Dr. Martins I bought at an absolute steal. Never could afford a pair as a teenager.

Friday was our early birthday fun. A trip to the zoo no less. Birthday girls’ choice. Karyn is working on becoming an amazing photographer.

Then a nice long dinner adults only after the dance recital. And the week was over.

Hugs at dawn on Saturday and a tearful good bye and the visit was over in the blink of an eye! She came bearing snacks and gifts from her previous travels but the best part was just the time we got with her. Never enough, but so very precious and well loved. Can’t wait until next year!!!

And here is the overflow of awesome!

Here I go, March 2018… catching up in a timely manner. YES! Or not… my fast and furious blogging took a hit with the much anticipated Karyn visit AND a semi surprise last minute Shauna and Jeff down from Canada weekend. And then life in general kicked my butt… but here I am.

So… March, what was March… it ended in Easter weekend. So we had our own little egg hunt in the house. The twins did the hiding for the younger 3.

We also decorated eggs.

And even made square ones!

The other “themed” day was St. Patrick’s Day. We had all sorts of green stuff going on.

I jumped all in on working on Irish and Celtic knots. I have purchased a few books and some lovely satin cord. Definitely a skill I need to find time in the fall to continue with.

I invested in some gorgeous reversible sari skirts which I can tell you NOW I wore ALL summer. There is something amazing about wearing bright colours and patterns that swish when you walk.

There was plenty of time spent at the YMCA, of course. I hope it has been at least somewhat fun for the staff to be such a major part of my kids’ growth and enjoyment!

I took a walk down memory lane and bought a Tamagotchi! If you don’t know what that is… well I won’t ask your age, cuz that could end up sad.

There was plenty of time spent petting the fluff that is the chinchilla.

Echo lost teeth, important teeth – the front ones – and they took FOREVER to grow back in.

I got in my crafting time. Crochet keeps me sane after all.

And we did plenty of school.

Ken and I even snuck in some dinners out dressed to impress.

And we helped celebrate Jeffrey’s birthday. Which ALSO means, Mystro pics! You can thank me later!

I love how the twins can be before and after pics at the same time.

My final thought on this quick WAY belated peek back at March… WOW was my hair long!!! And that is that.

Well, you can already see pictures from Halloween HERE, as usually it was a fun time.

Neko-Chan and her Halloween prop

Echo’s wedding dress photos are HERE.

October was also Ken’s birthday… his 40th if you can believe it! We kept it low key, just as the birthday boy requested. He is not a big party animal. But he also was given an award for his hard work involved in getting his mental health under control and advocating for the association that helped him. We got to dress up and everything!

New outfit and all

It was a fun sort of duo season month with time to jump in leaves (and rake them up, slightly less fun)…

Gavin

And a bit of snow to toy with as well.

We even had TWO foreign visitors, Jeff flew down from Canada to hang out. Never a bad thing, friends and family flying down when we still can’t return ourselves.

With Jeff there is ALWAYS yummy curry.

And Karyn!!! A shorter visit than her normal yearly visit but we packed in the fun and hugs and … shopping of course!

UNO

So we may enable each other… just a little… and we like it that way!

We had our yearly pumpkin patch trip with our friend Trish and her two kids. Always fun and thankfully on a day when the weather mostly cooperated.

I am so grateful that Trish is willing to embrace our loud and crazy family.

Ken made pumpkin pie from scratch.

The twins took on acolyting at church.

We worked on all sorts of school stuff from crafts to book work and more.

We had the Novaks over for VR fun.

I continued my obsession with Neko-Chan pictures.

We had a bonfire with the Schwartz family and I got my cat fix.

I worked my buns off at the YMCA, with the family in tow, of course.

Emanuel and Trinity even got their YELLOW belts!!

And I crafted, my sanity is very closely tied to crafting it seems.

Seasonal!

Of course more images to enjoy. Fall really was pretty last year!

Face painting!

…asleep