Tag Archive | Skylanders

So… This Thing Called Spring…

April 1-3

We keep getting chills and snow but spring is finally in sight! However, as in past years, we did NOT do any sort of April Fools in our home. Moderation is not really a great skill among our boys and I really did not want to risk escalation of silly little jokes into tears and frustration in the ranks.

The month started on a Tuesday… so we had the following Saturday and Home Depot to look forward to… in fact we have a birthday party AND a sleepover to look forward to as well! Talk about starting a month with a bang! I am doubly excited about the sleepover as the boys have been asking for AGES to have someone come over and stay and all of a sudden I have two Novak boys fall into my lap. PERFECT!

We do need to celebrate a new month. How better to do so than with an educational video and fresh buttered popcorn? So Planet Dinosaur went into the PS3 and everyone settled in for a few hours of dinosaurs.101_6621

On Wednesday the kids worked on playing a game Gavin came up with – combining a Squinky gameboard with their Skylanders. It was not explained to me but everyone seemed to agree on the rules and get along REALLY well!101_6622

Thursday was a total fun day for us. We wandered a few stores to run errands including a wonderful children’s clothing consignment store that Darcy showed me where we found a play dress for Trinity and flipflops for the girls at a steal. They have a colouring contest going on right now with pictures of the fish they got for the store where you try to name it. Each of the kids did up one to send back in. My favourite name was Emanuel’s – Swish The Fish!

Dollar store booty

Dollar store booty

Brand new play dress for a steal

Brand new play dress for a steal

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We also had our weekly Sam’s Club run… with lunch there this time! 8.00 and all of us were fed… with a variety of things. Seriously EIGHT DOLLARS for SEVEN PEOPLE… the math is grand!!!10153833_10152332084481151_313307060_n

Which led to a FRUIT SALAD BAR for supper!

Which led to a FRUIT SALAD BAR for supper!

On the way home we saw the start of the last (we hope) mini blizzard. There were tons of warnings starting on the the Thursday evening until later Friday. Just a big sudden dump of snow! The kids were not impressed.

Started with rain

Started with rain

To this...

To this…

Ending like this once again

Ending like this once again

We also planted our grass for Easter egg pictures… it was a neat idea I saw on Facebook to make real grass for Easter baskets.101_6631

101_6632And that was that… time to look forward to a fun weekend that STARTS on Friday with a birthday party! And to celebrate the fact that Miss Trinity does NOT need glasses (as was figured out on Monday oops.. forgot  to relay that!).10152044_10152326262471151_776173553_n

This entry was posted on 10/04/2014, in Uncategorized. 2 Comments

History, Snacks and Other Fun

February 22-25

What to do on a weekend when we plan to be home for it? Well… have company! Childhood friend Christopher and his wife Renee who is due any day with their 3rd (boy) and their sons Nathan and Evan. They came over for lunch and playtime. Younger than our boys the kids still managed to have a lot of fun. Of course Skylanders came out and Legos and such. It was nice to have company over where the adults could just sit around and chat (or craft).101_6276

Walking Tacos

Walking Tacos

We ended our Saturday calmly with a movie. Really not much to report beyond a great visit with old friends.101_6278

Sunday was totally a crafty day… after Sunday school. I had to get EVERYTHING out and package up my big commission from a friend up north… she requested I make her a variety of critters for her to gift etc this year… I think I covered the spectrum and had a blast honing my skills while doing it. Is it ever hard to wait until she gets it to find out her thoughts!!!101_6279

And then for a more local (but still mailing away) craft… one I have not done in ages – an infant knotted tutu. Using glitter tulle so I am on the hunt for the escaped glitter now. Really glitter is EVIL!101_6280

Monday was back to work… and back to swimming for the twins. I am really impressed how much more RELAXED they are each time.

We had some more sporty drawing to enjoy. Art for Kids (on right) put up a stick figure figure skating… something Trinity was quick to say SHE wanted to draw.101_6281

We decided to create our own Olympic medals. I love the 4 different interpretations… Zander’s all had his name on them, Gavin recreated the official ones for this year… the other two were equally creative. I got our template from Activity Village HERE. We used the 3 sizes of circles to show the different places as I really didn’t want to print out enough that we had 4 sets of large circles!101_6282

Emanuel and I are working on our Magic Treehouse dinosaur themed story still. It is so much fun reading one on one with him. His own reading skills are increasing by leaps and bounds!101_6283

We added a new animal to our Wild Kratts list – the Meadow Vole. The twins have come up with a new idea along the same lines. They want to watch Dirty Jobs episodes with Mike Rowe and pick one of the jobs of the episode to research further. We have been working on our Google searching and how we type in a specific topic or sentence and then reading through articles… with adult supervision of course.101_6286

The weather is just too yuck for the little ones so we pulled out our rainy day fun bucket and did some creative sticker and face shape crafting. Echo especially found this  to be great fun!101_6287

101_6289Tuesday was a rather special day… of course we still did our basics including some Lego time…101_6291

BUT Tuesdays 5-8 pm are free admission at the Minnesota History Center!101_6295

101_6335There was tons to see and do and not enough time for us to do it all. We had only an hour (5-6) before we needed to be back for Ken to go to his weekly gaming night but we made good use of it. We went straight to the area that was the most hands on for the kids. I want to go back and see the prohibition era limited time display in the following weeks.

There was tons about the fur trade and the Native Americans…101_6304

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Reproducing bead patterns

Reproducing bead patterns

A great display about the use of Bison…101_6321

And so much more.101_6297

101_6312101_6326The 4 big kids and Ken tried out the mine area as Echo was having nothing to do with the noise and darker ambiance.101_6330

It was so much fun to head out and just enjoy learning about the state we now live in. Together time well worth it! And how to end the evening with Daddy gone to gaming? With a late snack food supper and a movie… THOUGH I hasten to say – fun mommy was only for ONE night… the next night we planned bacon wrapped pork and vegetables…101_6337

The joy of learning not only at home but out in the open air!

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This entry was posted on 20/03/2014, in Uncategorized. 2 Comments

Happy Birthday Boys!!

February 1-2

It is hard to believe that the twins are finally double digits… 10 years old! And Emanuel… 8! Where has the time gone???101_6081

Of course there was a day or two before that. On the 1st, which also fell on the first Saturday of the month was Home Depot Saturday. We actually had forgotten all about it with Ken’s surgery the week before, Chinese New Year and planning for Ken’s dental extraction. Thankfully a family friend called Nana to talk about something and mentioned her husband was out at it with one of their grandsons and we still had time to make it in!101_6061 Ken and myself had birthday party errands to run for the 2nd which was the best day for a family party for the boys what with Nana and Baba leaving for 9 weeks on the 6th. And while we were gone Nana had a full out hair parlour going… cuts, blow dries… it was great. We came back to some very dapper kids!

Sorry these are not my camera

Sorry these are not my camera

photo (83)photo (84)photo (86)photo (87)Of course the 2nd was a busy one… Sunday school first which leftmyself, Echo, Nana and Baba to get the final stuff done for the party. Balloons and cleaning – Skylanders colours!101_6065

Note the matching socks!

Note the matching socks!

We had the party at 11 am as Ken’s aunt Judy was working that weekend and Uncle Jim had to head off to work late in the afternoon. They brought Robbie and then we also had Joe and Faithe and their kids. My friend Shandai was supposed to come but was sick so we are hoping for a rain check with her before too long!101_6069 We had lunch first.101_6072 And presents…101_6076

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And then cake…101_6082

101_6086101_6088It was a great day ending in a quiet evening/afternoon with the Super Bowl. And we start the countdown to the great Nana and Baba exodus in earnest. Lots to do and little time to do it in!101_6070

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