1 tired Princess + 1 tired bunny + 1 hyper puppy = AHHH

Our hopes for a beautiful Halloween evening came in the weather department however seemed to be missing in all other areas. Sarah was tired from the moment she got up this morning so I was fearful that the night might be a bit of a challenge. Since it was so nice out I thought that Megan might enjoy going for a walk with the whole neighbourhood gang. We can barely keep her inside most days when she sees the rest of the kids on the block playing outside. Alas on this particular evening she apparently wasn't up for a leisurely walk. So for a few blocks I carried my tired bunny and then dropped her back of with dad to hand out candy.

This left me with the tired princess and the hyper puppy. As we do most years we walked around the neighbourhood with our close friends Marnel, Presley and Drew. Presley is a few years older than Sarah and Drew is a few months older than Ethan. The first few houses we were having fun however as the kids got more excited (and likely as the candy they had snuck from home kicked in) the fights began. Presley being older and faster than Sarah always got to the door first which on this particular night was a travesty for my little princess. Even though Presley waited for Sarah to push the doorbell half the time, Sarah was too upset to be consoled by this gesture. Ethan and Drew on the other hand were happy to walk up to the door together however no step seemed to be big enough for the two of them. After some jostling and pushing ( the kids) and after trying all the parenting tricks in the book (me) --ie --reasoning, encouragement, bribing, threatening and ignoring-- Marnel and I agreed that as much as we were enjoying our walk ( ha ha) it might be best to divide and conquer separate streets. Not really wanting more candy but enjoying such a beautiful night we went a bit farther than we have in the years past. This only lead to even more tired kids who claimed they had no strength left to carry their bags which at this point was the indicator that it was time to go home. While they would have walked UP to a few more houses I didn't like the idea of me being the one who was then actually doing the trick or treating. Once home we jumped into the car to make a quick trip over to Trevor's boss' house not far away.She loves Halloween, has her house all decorated and only gives out full size chocolate bars. I am sure kids are lined up at her house right from school each Halloween! Thankfully the kids were on their best behavior for the 5 minutes we were there- whew--it could have been ugly!! Once home they rummaged and selected their treat for the night and then it was off to bed for a good nights sleep ( ha ha who are we kidding - all that sugar had them up for hours!). Whoever started Halloween must have been an aunt or uncle. No parent in their right mind would create such a wild day.

Extra Pics of Sarah at her Sparks Halloween Party & her school party Trevor and I got to go to

Sarah, Molly & Grace

Today we said Goodbye to a Friend

As many of you know who have been ready the blog on a regular basis we had a friend dying of cancer. Brad died at 10:30 am on Trevor's birthday. As we hadn't seen him in the last few years the whole experience was a bit surreal however today we went to the funeral and reality hit very quickly. Seeing Tracy and her three boys looking so amazingly strong and sad all at the same time was heartbreaking. As they were showing a slide show of Brad throughout the years it was clear what is really important in life. Family and friends are what count in the end. Not what you have or what you don't have. It is the love of those people that make life worth celebrating. Even though we had not seen Brad in awhile, he will be missed. Our prayers go out to Tracy, Josh, Jacob and Jeremy as they try and move forward as best they can without Brad. We know he will be watching over them from wherever he is. We are thankful he is painfree and at peace.

Pumpkin Deliveries

This year Trevor's parents grew some pumpkins in their back yard. When they came up to visit they brought about 6 of them for us. Now six pumpkins would be a lot to carve even if they were little but these ones were less than little. A couple of them were huge. When it finally came time to carve them we did 2 things. First we took the wagon and delivered one to each of the neighbours. The poor Patterson's got stuck with the tiny pumpkin because Sarah had decided that it was the perfect size for Thomas. The kids has so much fun taking them around I am sure they would have gone 2 more blocks if we had more pumpkins and more friends in the area. The second thing we did was invite Trevor and Stephanie over to babysit the kids. Since they love carving pumpkins AND we happened to have pumpkins to carve AND they needed an activity to do with the kids ... it all worked out great. The kids had a fun time (not sure about Trev and Steph).

Where's The Cake?

After a month of birthdays and parties and cakes, neither Trevor nor I could stomach the thought of eating more cake. So when it came time for his birthday we agreed that we would go cakeless this year. Ethan was quite upset however and kept asking "where's the cake?". To make up for no cake I let the kids help me make breakfast for Trevor. They were thrilled to crack the eggs (sorry about the shells Trev) and pour the juice (BOUNTY - the quicker picker upper!). It was almost painful to make them eat their breakfast first but I was trying to give Trevor as much time to sleep in as possible. This is difficult to do when you have kids that get up by 7 each morning! I managed to hold them off until 8:30 and then we were off. As we made our way down the hall with the breakfast on the tray Sarah suddenly yelled "Wait" and darted into her room. She came back and announced that she had only given daddy a card before so she needed to give him this money. In her hand she had a $5.00 bill that she had gotten for her own birthday. Aww. So with bill in hand she burst into the room and dove on the bed, gave him his $and announced that we had made him breakfast. Thrilled with the whole experience the kids joined him on the bed and even helped him eat his breakfast. I think they all would agree that that was more fun than cake anyway. (well Ethan continued to be disturbed by the lack of cake but Trev liked the breakfast and the snuggles with the kids)

Girls and Their Shoes

Well what can I say-- Megan is addicted to shoes. She loves to walk around with shoes in her hand, take hers off, put mine on. She can find her shoes in a pile of 10 and she can get Ethan and Sarah's when I ask her to. I foresee an expense future!

Sarah on the other hand is not such a shoe girl. She can never find a matching pair and is happy to wear runners with her dresses. The other day we were walking to church and she said "that lady has nice shoes" I looked and around and said 'which lady?" she quickly pointed to the only lady around us. She was about 85 years old and was wearing .... brace yourself ... beige orthopaedic runners- you know the ones - the ones that make the foot look like they are 3x the width of a normal foot. Yep -those are the shoes that Sarah thought were nice! I definitely won't be letting her pick out her own shoes for awhile :)

Out of the Mouth of a 3 year old!

Every morning it is a challenge to get Ethan out the door. We can barely get him out of bed so to actually get him dressed, fed and into the car is a small miracle. One of the ways that works is to make it a game. The other day as Ethan got in his car seat he yelled out "Momma I'm gonna beat you up! " Kinda taken aback for a moment I looked back and noticed that he was furiously buckling up his seat belt and once done he yelled "Yeah I beat you Up!!!". It didn't take long to figure out that he meant he had beat me but I couldn't stop laughing the whole way to the sitter.

Another morning he was hurrying again only this time he announced that he was Ethan Feedy Pants!! Some day when he can say his 'sp's it won't be so funny but as for today he is my favorite "Feedy Pants" in the world!!

The Hurrier I Go the Behinder I Get

When I was a little girl my Grandma and Grandpa Quinn had these two pictures on their wall in the guest room. The first one had a drawing of person (I think it was a little old lady) and it said kwityurbellyachin. As a kid just learning to spell I remember clearly thinking that that was some German word and it was only when I was older that I realized it actually said something! The other picture said the hurrier I go the behinder I get. That is about how I feel these days. Being back to work has meant life is a bit chaotic at times. The house is a constant mess and I curse all those who can keep their house neat and tidy for longer than 5 minutes! (you know who y'all are! -- oops - sounded kinda American there for a second with the y'all - the training I was at all week was given by a guy from New York - guess he made a bigger impression on me than I thought) Anyway I am missing writing on the blog these days but have often found myself on the couch at night thinking of the blog yet for some reason my body doesn't move towards the computer. Funny moments continue to happen though so I am going to continue to try and keep up. Hope all is well with everyone who has stopped by to catch up with us!

Once Upon a Time...

Once Upon a Time there was a little girl born on October 6th, 2002. She had bright beautiful eyes, and a happy smile. As she got older she grew to love fairy tales, princesses and dressing up. So when it came time for her 5th birthday it was easy to decide what type of theme to have- A Once Upon a Time Party. Everyone was invited to dress up however they wanted and come for an afternoon of fun. On the agenda -- Pin the hair on Rapunzel and musical magical carpets (like musical chairs but with magical carpets - well with towels that you pretend are magical carpets). We also created our own fairy tale that will definitely go down in history as a classic. (perhaps not classic like Cinderella but classic nonetheless).

First for the party was of course the trio of characters that already live at the castle.

Sarah aka Cinderella or Rapunzel - depended on the hour you asked her

Ethan the Dragon

Little Red Maggie

Princess Ainsley Princess Annika Princess Mattea

Sir Evan Princess Presely Sir Christian

Let's get this party started

Sir Christian takin a rest on a Musical Magical Carpet

Last Carpet - room for all (except for the dragon who is absent from all pictures as he didn't like the first carpet available to him so refused to play the rest of the game!)

"Rapunzel" Pinning her hair on

Cake Time!!

Ainsley & Sarah with her new fairy head piece

Sarah and Annika opening Polly pockets

Christian, Sarah and Mattea- all dressed up - kinda like any other day they play

Potential Queen and King?

Two Princess friends

Another pic of Little Red- couldn't resist - she looked so cute!

Sarah Grace -5 years old.

Thanks to everyone who helped make Sarah's birthday lots of fun!

You know, the one with the little ice cream cones

The night before Sarah's birthday we gave her the chance to pick a place to go for supper. We were going with Uncle Trevor and Auntie Stephie so we asked her to step it up a notch from the regular Quizno's Subs. Her choice - "the one with the little ice cream cones." Having been there in the past we knew she meant East Side Mario's. Just like her mom she remembers where you can get a good dessert!

Of course Trev and Steph where chosen to sit in the coveted spots next to Sarah. It was like we were just there to butter the bread and pay the bill- hee hee

Ethan and Daddy

Mommy and Megan

Ahh- the Ice Cream - now here's what we really came for!

The Pumpkin Maze

I am so behind in bloggin that I can't even remember when these pictures were taken. I am dating this post from the picture date not today's date. We have had sick kids for 14 days straight so I haven't had much time (or frankly the energy) to catch up on my blog. Hopefully over the next few days I will get back into. October is such a busy month for us that we have lots to tell about.

These pictures are of a pumpkin maze that is not far from our house. We took half the neighbourhood and as usual had a blast. It's a big green house full of bails set up in a maze with dead ends, secret shortcuts and a huge pumpkin at the end.

Ethan and his new friend

Megan - she kinda looked like a scarecrow herself today - time for a haircut!

Sarah after she found her way to the middle

Presley

Sarah, Mattea & Presley

A rare picture of the boys standing still- Christian, Ian & Connor

Hurry up and take the picture already - I thought this place was for us to have fun not for you to take pictures!

Hangin' on the edge of her seat

Not sure what had Megan hangin' on the edge of her seat but this is where I found her today.Perhaps she has a facebook account that I am not aware of. She seems to have taken a liking for the computer and can often be found "typing" away. If she's not typing she is happily shutting it off by pushing that ever so tempting blue button right at her level!