Merry Christmas!!

Christmas Eve, getting our new pajamas (and a cuddly friend):



Our Christmas Tree:



Stockings after Santa comes:



Christmas morning with some new presents:



Ice cream is so yummy, it has to be smothered in the hair! Christmas morning crepes:

Santa is creepy if you're 1 year old

Not sure what we think about this guy:

Free Rice!!!

Looking for something useful to pass the time with? Go to http://freerice.com/index.php and play the vocabulary game! For every word you get correct, 10 grains of rice are donated through the United Nations to help feed hungry people around the world. You play for a few minutes, expand your vocabulary, and sooner than you know it, you've sent a bowl of rice to somebody that needs it!

Halloween fun!

We had a great time last night! Our big boy had a fun Halloween party at school in the morning, and we spent the rest of the day alternately playing "Trick or Treat" with his toys as well as doing Halloween crafts and colouring in anticipation of the evening fun! He had such a great time going to everybody's house on the street, and loving the decorations of people who went "all out" for the occasion! Our little one went with us. After, Nana and Bop stopped in, as well as Roger to join in the fun! Grandma and Grandpa had also come by the day before for a huge surprise and gave Halloween presents and spent the day playing!

Make your own slide shows and scrapbooks

Boo at the Zoo!

Make your own slide shows and scrapbooks

Oma

Last week we celebrated the life of Katie Fast, our Grandma and Oma. So many beautiful memories from the family.

Happy Birthday Nana/Happy Thanksgiving/When's Halloween Celebration

As I was looking at our pictures from yesterday, I realized that this is the second year in a row where after supper the kids ended up in costumes! We had a really nice party for Nana's birthday, and celebrated Thanksgiving all at the same time! Thanks for a super fun night!

Last year's costumes:

From one generation to the next!

When our little one's mommy was born, his Auntie Pam wanted to get her new little sister a gift, which is this sweet little cat toy! Looks like our little one likes the cat, too, Auntie Pam! Thanks from both of us for this thoughtful gift (and thank you to Nana and Bop for most likely facilitating this purchase made by -at the time - a 3 year old Pam)!

Ahhhh! Swimming lessons started!

Our boys started their swimming lessons today! It was very cute! Our big boy is in his own class ("Salamander") and Our little one is in a baby class ("Starfish") where they sing songs, do actions, and practice things like "floating" on back and front or "jumping" off the side!

He enjoyed trying to smack me with a shovel he found floating by... very interested in physical comedy! Big Boy's class passed by at one point and big boy gave his little brother a little kiss! So cute! In his class I saw that they were using a bucket to put water on their own head, or the head of the teacher... so Big Boy bobbed over to me and poured water on my head... the teacher was somewhat surprised (and amused) because he probably thought Big Boy just poured water on some stranger's head! Funny! We had a great time! It's nice to see our little one loves the water, and that Big Boy is quite confident with swimming, jumping, and blowing bubbles as well!

Our day at A-Maze-In Corn!!!

Well!!! A few weeks ago Big Boy took out a Caillou video from the library that was about fall! Aside from telling me that I'm going to make a ghost cake for Halloween, and wanting me to get out all the Halloween decorations at the beginning of September, he learned where pumpkins come from and that he wanted to go visit a pumpkin patch! I've never been to one myself, but it sounded fun! So! Intent on facilitating his child-led education, I set off to find out where we could find local pumpkin patches that are open to the public! Even though it wasn't a "pumpkin patch", A-Maze-In Corn (as you who have gone before already know) has a pumpkin barn, and even a pumpkin train that will take you back to your car in the parking lot (and they DID... they took us right to our van)... so it became more of an adventure because they have a lot of other things to do there - not to mention the corn maze that he loved!

We visited their petting barn,

rode a pony,

climbed their hay bales (Kieran's favourite),

went through the maze,

and of course visited the pumpkin barn and picked a few little pumpkins!
















After another visit to the hay bales, we took the pumpkin train back to the van!









We loved it so much that we decided to make it a yearly event... next year maybe we'll book a picnic site (with bbq, seating, firepit) and make a day of it!

special pictures

Thanks for these beautiful b+w pictures, Naomi, and thanks for your help with them, Mom!

Some more that I took at our beach:

Then I guess I didn't put pictures of Big Boy's first day of school, then his "first day dinner" at Red Lobster (his favourite restaurant... loooooves fish):

Then I took some neat "Sepia" pictures which sort of happened while I was messing around with the camera, trying to find how to turn the sounds back on (I never did find out, but these pictures are neat):

Well! Look who's trying to talk! Our little one has decoded the word "Hi" and wants to share it as much as he can! Whenever we say "hi" to him, his little face lights up because he finally has figured out one way to communicate! Both these videos should work, I watched them both to make sure... it just might take a bit, but they will play! You seem to have to click the play button twice... seems to work that way!


He is also quite taken with this walker... this is the first time he ever used it! He immediately started zooming around the yard and hasn't looked back since! He can't look back... it makes him fall over!

Both those events happened in the same weekend... on the same day in fact - September 15th!

Massive floods devastate South Asia

I just got an e-mail from World Vision about the floods in South Asia:

"Floods have swept across South Asia, driving an estimated 19 million people from their homes in Bangladesh, India and Nepal. As many as 1,000 people have died. Frightened villagers are stranded, waiting for help. "

Visit World Vision to find out how to help:

http://www.worldvision.ca/home/give-a-gift/floods-devastating-south-asia/

Beach days!

We've been at the beach a lot in the past while, during all this hot weather!

Our little one seems to be "at home" with the beach life!

He loves the water:

beach toys:

and generally relaxing!

Big Boy has found some ways to spend his time on the beach too:

We had a great time at the beginning of July at L.William as well!

THEN AND NOW

Then:

and now:

Our little one is now almost 7 months old, and he sure is trying his hardest to keep up with his big brother!

We've been enjoying a lot of time at the lake together, but playing in the sand can sure be exhausting!

Our little one's baptism

Our little one had a special day today! It was his baptism... mostly he was very sleepy, but he enjoyed getting lots of cuddles from everyone! It was a long day for our boys, but they both were so great all day! Big Boy completely fell asleep when everyone left, but woke up and played a bit before bed! What a fun day!

Warm day!

We had one very warm day in May so far... well a few warm days, but May 9th was 31 celsius! There was nothing better to do but sleep...

.... or play in the cool shade!

Later there was soccer, but somehow the shade made it seem not too hot!