July 21-26

The days in July are ticking away as is the kids’ time with their cousins before they make the move to Florida. So when we have the chance and they are over school is set aside in favour of play. But the week STARTED with half days.

Trinity finished her booklets about her July 4th experience and the 4 days of VBS (she did a page for each day)… sorry about the fuzzy pictures. We had a drawing and then a couple sentences that talked about her experience or what she learned.

The girls have been working together a lot lately. AND Miss Echo made her first real go at using scissors… it was… interesting!

Of course we took advantage of our recorded Wild Kratts episode. The same on Tuesday.

Tuesday was a backwards day with pool and tent trailer in the sunshine THEN school.

Wednesday was a day of worn out toddler… but there was a silver lining – Baba snuggles. She seemed to have caught a slight bug.

The weather is definitely holding lately. With the whispers of another cold winter I am chucking these guys out NOW to enjoy all the sunshine and run out the excess energy! Clothed or not!

Thursday was another of our limited time only cousin get togethers. It is so weird to be on the opposite side of the visit in Minnesota! We have tried to tell the kids to take advantage of their time with Gabbi and Zachary. And I think they did a decent job. Of course we had school in the morning before Nana and Baba returned with the cousins.

Then it was out into the yard… the tent trailer was finishing airing out before heading over to Joe and Faithe’s for them to stay in as they finish their cleaning out of their house for the big move.

And the backyard garden was just screaming for us to come and pick and poke around.

Don’t forget the pool! We inherited new water guns that were not slated to head to Florida for the kids to play with as well.

The next day it was breakfast all together made by Baba, of course. Followed by a very special tea party with REAL tea hosted by Miss Gabriella.

Chicken noodle supper rounded off the meals (a common cousin request).

So much cousin fun.

Saturday the cousins went home and we made do just as us. Inside and outside we made Saturday count WITHOUT electronics.

BUT that night… BONFIRE and just for Ken and myself! Shandai (my bestfriend from Canada who moved here blah blah blah) had moved into her new rental with her boyfriend Ravyn (super nice guy). We left our kids with Chris Schwartz until Nana and Baba could get home and had a blast… booze, food and a bonfire… oh and two snuggly kitties. Not only did we have a blast but Ken got in a nap. With the cats!

I have to admit… I have not drank so much in ages but it was so much fun! We were out past 3 am I think!!

I was finally able to gift my housewarming present… when I was growing up my mom always took spider plant cuttings potted when someone moved into a new house. I can never remember what plants are cat safe AND am not able to keep many plants right now so I figured why not make some to gift!! I also made some to sell. I have plastic pots for those. For Shandai’s I used tiny clay pots and saucers I purchased at Walmart.

So we have been busy and made good use of our days…And our evenings. Mid week Ken and I snuck away and went to Chris and Renee’s KIDS FREE to drink, have a bonfire and hang out.

Ok, Sometime this week I HAVE TO put up the old dinosaur blog posts that are languishing in drafts un-loved and alone. So be sure to check back for some BELATED dino fun! Anyway…

March 27-31

March 30th – Happy Birthday Little Brother!

The twins are really excited about coming up with new questions and then working together to answer them all. We use Ken’s netbook and hunker down and go one by one. It is hilarious as we find answers, sometimes follow links to further information. Some of the questions are an adventure for me too… things like Why are snails slow? Who created the first superhero? Are there more meat eaters or plant eaters on the planet?

We moved on from Google to working on our hunting skills with the I Spy game!

And best of all – a lengthy Skype call to Aunty Holly and Cousin Jimmie. Jimmie was on break from school so he had lots to show and the time to do it.

We ended the week with some creative endeavors. Gavin made some rather interesting cookies out of Play Doh. Trinity made up a cupcake.

The kids all did reflection journals. Working our way through Dirty Jobs episode by episode has been great fun!

We also started a new book for family reading time – Treasure Island. The kids are quite put out with me. I am reading it WITH them so they have TONS of questions I simply CANNOT answer. This is not a classic I have read! I think we will either read Little House in the Big Woods or Charlotte’s Web next (Gavin is quite worried about me reading the second one as he says… I do not like spiders so I shouldn’t have to read it.). For this story we are doing a pictorial summary of each chapter. Drawing out main points and the like. Something all ages can be involved in!

On the last weekend of March we had errands to run and quiet at home time to enjoy. I lucked out and in a walk through Walmart looking at Easter stuff we found FAKE eggs to dye. We plan on still making the real eggs with Nana but the fake ones could be saved and used year after year!

Trinity and I worked on ANOTHER special page in her scrapbook. After all Ken had ditched us for a guys’ only night over at Chris Schwartz after errands so it was time to be rather low key.

We tried something I saw on Facebook – making string eggs and found that we REALLY need to use the small water balloon balloons. (back onto the shopping list they went).

The kids just sat back and enjoyed the day with me.

On Sunday Ken got home in time to take them out to Sunday School.

Definitely a stay at home sort of day after that with a fort to build and music to make.

AND being the 30th a HAPPY HAPPY BIRTHDAY to my younger brother James! So we had a looooong lovely call. I miss the heck out of him and his family!!!

We ended March with a relatively quiet day at school.

And Ken and Emanuel running off to Scouts. I am so glad we decided to put him in this. He and Ken are enjoying it a lot. It is time to work on the extra stuff at home as well to get him I think what is called Arrow Points. luckily a lot of it is stuff we do at home through school. I just have to have us sit down and do some of this stuff we have done over the years again!

There goes March… did you blink and miss it too????

July 8-9

After so much fun and Nana and Baba returning in mere days I decided to call it and give the kids one whole week off! Well, once we planted our seeds of course. Two different kinds of green beans with cups and papertowels… we followed the basic instructions from Instructables HERE. The twins are jointly weekly recording and Trinity and Emanuel are putting their observations in the nature journals.

Out came the Play Doh…

Gavin

And then with the now firmly installed slide, a rash of screaming, laughing and fast sliding!

No fear!

We had the perfect weather to take out our alternative to the traditional water balloons. We used the instructions by the website How Does She? HERE. We did have to attempt regular sponge sponges when we couldn’t get to Dollar Tree before Aidan’s birthday party but I am  telling you now, not cool! The best is what they list on the site – plastic sponges from Dollar Tree. We bought 6 packages and I ended up with 29 due to sacrificing two for the paper making. They leave no plastic pieces on the lawn to collect, and all you need is a bucket with water. Echo didn’t even mind getting hit in moderation! Sponges were 1.00 for 10 and the elastics 1.00 or so as well and I have well over 3/4 of a bag of those left!!!

Add water…

Our sponges

What is better after a good waterfight in the sunshine than big glasses of lemonade???

We gave the potty and some juice in front of the tv a try… still no real results sadly. BUT we talk about our potty usage constantly. My goal is to give it a real push in September when we are once again living solo.

Of course it is the perfect time to have a tea party.

Picnic…

AND tea party

And end the evening with a lovely LATE dinner with the newest season of Futurama and some lovely Chinese food… just the two of us!!

Not a bad end to our two weeks without Nana and Baba!