Midway fun

We took the kids to the Stampede on Wednesday night.  Abigail was a little bit too short for most of the rides, so she was pretty upset about that.  She really wanted to go on the carousel. 

I was thinking about it when we got home, that we didn't take the girls last year.  Abigail is at the stage where she wants to do everything her big sister does and she would have had a fit when Annika went on rides and she didn't. 

I dug out the pictures we took of the girls at the stampede two years ago.  They were so little back then. 

Fast forward two years....

And here's Abigail's favourite ride of all.  She went on it twice.  But, again, she was too short, so I had to go with her. 

Saturday snapshot ~ Wigging out!

In the 70's, my Mom had a wig that she would wear.  I'm not quite sure why, since it pretty much looked like her real hair.  I also don't know how I inherited it, but it's been sitting in my house for years.  I know when I was in high school I wore it for a dress up day.  I should see if I can scrounge up a picture. 

Anyway, it has now been passed down to my girls, who decided to wear it the other day.  Aren't they cute Moogie?

The beach

My British nanny and I took the girls to the beach last week.  Tyler stayed with Moogie, since I didn't want to have a time limit on our time there.  It was so much fun.  They are definitely at the age where they're trying to be a little bit more adventurous, and I love that I get to be along for the ride!

There was much fun to be had, except I wasn't too fond of taking half of the beach home with me in my swimsuit, thanks to Annika and Abigail!

Annika kept piling the dirt on, Abigail kept trying to wash it off.  That is, until she decided to join Annika and started putting dirt....on my face.  See how everyone comes rushing to my aid?

Oh right, that's because they're too busy taking pictures of it.

I reciprocated and buried Annika....twice.  She's a good sport.  She even let me dunk her in the lake to wash off.

Caedmon brought his Mom, Ashley and his aunt, Jodi with him.  It was right smack dab in the middle of his nap time, but he did pretty well regardless.  Don't you love that smile?  That's how my little guy is going to look next summer, I can't wait!

Jodi's on the left, Ashley's on the right.  Jodi was studying very hard for an exam.  You can tell right?  

I was so proud of Abigail.  At the beginning of the day, she didn't want to go in the water without me, she was a little bit scared.  Near the end of the day, she had commandeered Caedmon's dinosaur and gone off swimming all by herself.  I'm constantly being surprised by these girls.

Cute Things Abigail Says (Part Five)

Abigail came into the room the other day with chocolate milk in her mouth, which she proceeded to spew all over my body. 

Me:  What are you doing?
Abigail:  I trying to make you laugh.  You're not laughing.
Me:  No, I'm not laughing.
Abigail:  OK, I'll dance like a monkey instead.

So she did.

Saturday Snapshot ~ The new science officer

He's about as serious as a Vulcan too!

Grandma's birthday

It was Clark's Mom's birthday on Tuesday.  She shares her birthday with Disneyland.  How cool is that?  We met them halfway in Taber to have dinner together and to celebrate.  The girls were so excited, they told anyone that would listen that it was their Grandma's birthday.  They picked out birthday cards for her all by themselves, and drew pictures in the card and on the envelope, and I found something on pinterest we could make her that she would be able to use. 

DYI tea towels.  I saw it and thought it was pretty cool.  The only thing I would change is next time, I'm going to buy colored sharpies.  Annika's artwork is always full of color, that it didn't really do the tea towel justice by tracing it in black. 

Here are pictures of the girl's artwork, and what it turned into!

Abigail:

Annika:

She said that it was her and her sister under a rainbow.  I thought that was sweet!

I think maybe the next time I do this, (which I definitely will, it turned out really well) I might make them into pillows.  I'll have to think about that!



You never know how much you miss air conditioning.....

We visited Clark's parents two weekends ago.  Boy, was it hot.  They don't have air conditioning.  I miss it when we're there.  Growing up, my family had air conditioning, Clark's parents did not.  When we got married and purchased our first home together, I told Clark the only pre-requisite was that there was air conditioning.  He didn't think it was necessary, until after our first summer when we had it.  After that, he told me that we would never have a house that DIDN'T have air conditioning ever again.  I am more than ok with that.
Saturday, the girl's and I went into Lethbridge with Grandma and went on a garage sale extravaganza.  I was pretty proud of those girls.  They were polite at all of the places we went, said please and thank you and paid for their treasures by themselves.  The thing about being so cute is that they also scored a bunch of free stuff.  I think every single house we went to gave them at least one thing for free.  We lasted from about 9:30 in the morning until 2 in the afternoon.  Much longer than Clark thought.  Both girls fell asleep on the way back to Cardston.

Abigail found this doll with really wild blue hair...and it came with two little babies that also had wild hair.  She was pretty excited about the Momma and the babies.  I am a little disturbed by the fact that you take their feet off to get their pants off of them. 

We stopped at Wal-Mart on the way home and picked up two pools for the kids to cool down in.  The girls really liked Tyler's pool the best.  Probably because it was shallower, so the water wasn't as cold.

It looks like there is no water at all...but he's on a bit of a hill so it's pooled at his feet.

Two little monkeys, sitting in a pool.....

And here I think Tyler is thinking that his pool is getting awfully crowded.....

Totally random thing I learned about Clark:  He watches chuckwagon races and has ever since he was a little boy.  That in itself is surprising, but what blew me away was that he and his mother sat there and talked about the people that drive the chuckwagons...and he was actually knowledgable on the subject.  If you look at Clark, you would not know this about him.  Speaking of cowboys....here's a picture of one of the free things that Annika scored at a garage sale. 

Can't see very well?...ok, here's another one!

Saturday snapshot ~ Photo shoot

Ok, here you go.  The long awaited pictures from our barter.  I couldn't decide which pictures to show you, so I think you're going to get most of them!  I apologize in advance if you think it's too many...but I have REALLY CUTE KIDS!

Tyler wasn't too sure about this photo shoot stuff.  Notice the worried expression.

I think they were looking at me. I love how they are at least all looking in the same direction, even if it isn't at the camera!



There's that elusive smile!  The only one we got the whole day.

Teething babies sure drool a lot!

Annika was definitely the star of our shoot!  I think she did everything Joey asked of her without complaining.

This munchkin was battling a cold so she wasn't too cooperative.  I'm glad we got a couple of good shots...though I had to bribe her with her soother!

 Annika is such a good big sister!

I'll sew anything in exchange for.....

I miss the days when, if you were a doctor, and after delivering a baby, you got paid in chickens.  Or vegetables.  That's my kind of bartering.  Especially since we're a single income family, it's always nice to be able to exchange things with other people.  I don't know why I hadn't thought of it earlier.  Except, I'm not a doctor.  I do sew though.

I made Nena a car seat cover a while back.  Her mother, who is a crazy good photographer, asked me if I could make another car seat cover for her niece and give her a lesson in sewing so she could make some burp cloths.  She asked how much money I would charge her, and so I bartered with her. 

On my wall right now, I have pictures of our family.  The ones of Tyler are not nice.  He's screaming in all of them.  Clark isn't too fond of them.  I think it's kinda cute and I'm sure we'll laugh about it in the future, but I did want some pictures where he looked relatively happy.  Well, he's such a serious kid, I just wanted a picture where he wasn't crying. 

So, Joey and I traded services.  I sewed for her and she took wickedly awesome pictures of my children.  I am IN LOVE with them.  So much so, that I'm going to have to go out and buy more frames so I can put more pictures on my wall!  She then took really good pictures of the items I sewed for her as well.  They look much better in the pictures then they do in person!  Because she's such a busy lady, I ended up sewing the burp cloths for her as well, so I guess the sewing lesson will have to be in the near future.

Now I'm sure you're all wondering what exactly I had to sew in order to get pictures, so here you go.  My half of the bargain:

 Burp cloths ~ I really need to purchase a walking foot for my machine. It would have definitely been easier to make these!

The car seat cover.  I love the fabric Joey picked.  It is so vibrant.

Now that I made you sit through those pictures, you're going to have to wait until tomorrow for the pictures of the kids.  Don't worry, it will be worth the wait.  While your waiting...if you think you need something sewn, decide what you want to barter with...I'll sew anything if the price is right!

Swimming

It has been SO HOT here this past week, that after Tyler went to bed tonight, the girls and I went outside into the backyard and sat in the pool.  But, as usually happens, we sat down and the rain clouds and wind came.  I think I hear thunder as I type this.  So, we lasted only about a 1/2 hour in the pool.  I was going to take pictures, but I didn't have an assistant who could help me make sure the camera didn't get wet (Clark was working tonight), so I apologize in advance for the pictureless post.  The girls said some pretty memorable things that I wanted to write down though.

Annika:
Our pool is shallow.  It is 8 feet around by 3 feet high.  Definitely not deep enough to swim in.  Annika was using her blowup turtle to float around, and while she is doing that she said, "It's a good thing I had swimming lessons, huh?"

Annika is getting more brave every day.  It is so fun to see.  The last time we went swimming, I tried to teach her how to hold her breath before she went under water so she wouldn't take in water.  Tonight, she managed to do it.  She was pretty excited.  She went inside and got her swim goggles, because now she knew how to swim under water.  She got the goggles on, put her eyes ~ and only her eyes~ under the water, then looked at me and said "I did it!  I went under water!"  I didn't have the heart to tell her that she hadn't really done it, she was just so proud of herself. 

Abigail:
Tyler has his own pool.  It's a little baby pool with a rainbow sun shade.  Abigail decided she wanted to swim in his pool rather than the big pool, so I stuck their little slide into the pool.  She had fun sliding down into the water.  While climbing the stairs one time, she stuck her leg out like a ballerina (or a fountain ~ or me when I play badminton, just ask my sister) and said "Mom!  Look what my leg can do!"  I just thought it was so funny!

After swimming for awhile, Abby looked at her fingers and said "Look!  My fingers have sprinkles!  Do your fingers have sprinkles?"  By sprinkles, she means wrinkles.  It will be a sad day for me when she starts to get that word right.

My right hand

Source

I am left handed.  Quite happily I might add.  Sometimes it's frustrating, but for the most part, I have no complaints.  I do things differently though.

I bowl with my right hand.
I play softball right handed.
I golf right handed.
I serve the ball in tennis with my left hand, then hit the ball with my right hand.
I weed with my right hand.
I stir things when cooking with my right hand....but when frying, I prefer to use my left hand as I like to hold the handle of the frying pan with my right hand.

And tonight, I realized that I prefer to thread the needle in my sewing machine with my right hand.
But, I like to thread the needle that I hand sew with by using my left hand.  It can get quite confusing in my world sometimes.

*...and I have the world's grubbiest hands.  My sister does not like holding them, left or right.*

Canada Day Recap

Well, even though it's been over a week since Canada Day, we're still in the same month, so I figure I'm doing OK!

Every year we buy the kids Canada t-shirts to wear.  After I purchased them, I realized that we would be going to church in the morning, and the girl's didn't have anything to wear on the bottom that matched with their shirts.  So, I made them red and white skirts.  Abigail has been battling a cold for a little while now, so she wasn't cooperating with pictures.  Just imagine her wearing the same thing as Annika.

Annika wanted me to take a picture of her wearing her "sunglasses".

This is the "normal" picture!

Mr. Tyler's shirt says "Home grown Canuck".  He was just too cute!

After nap time, we headed down to the park where the celebrations were happening.  The girls had to go on their favourite thing (a bouncy obstacle course)

That evening Clark took the girls to see the fireworks.  They were pretty tired, but seemed to perk up when it was time for them to go. I guess they had fun playing while waiting for them to start, but once they did start, they asked to go home.  They were asleep before he pulled up in front of the house.