Such Things

This Six Year Old Boy

We are so proud of our boy, Myles who is now six years old!!!  He brings so much joy and laughter to our home with his giggles,
his great sense of inquiry, his love of games and puzzles, his love of sports
and his excitement to be around his friends.  This year Myles had a skating party with lots of his classmates and a couple of his close friends. 
We hope your sixth year is the best one yet, Myles!!!

Happy Birthday and Happy Mother's Day

The mother's day part is just to wish all the moms out there a wonderful day. 

I want to celebrate an amazing girl that turned ten this weekend. 

We had her sleepover party last weekend, including a silly string fight, some crafts and sleeping in a tent downstairs.

There happened to be a super moon that very night and the girls were so excited to see it together.

We are so proud of the wonderful young lady that you are:  full of spunk, sensitivity, creativity, intelligence, fun and spontaneity. 

Happy, happy, happy birthday, Miranda!!!

Happy Birthday Myles!

Another birthday has come and gone.  This time it was Myles' 5th.  We celebrated with a good old-fashioned house party ("H" party) with hot dogs, hot potoatoes, Hot Wheels, air hockey etc.  Happy, happy birthday to an awesome, special boy who is full of fun, excitement, ideas, and to loves to celebrate with his friends.  Happy birthday, Myles!! 

How to Make a Graham Cracker Campsite

Well, I guess it's not too late for a wee summer craft.  I saw ideas like this and this on the internet when I was searching for ideas for a "camping" birthday party, and I thought, if kids love making gingerbread houses out of grahams at Christmas time,

I bet they would also enjoy making "graham tents" in the summertime. 

And so the kids made little "campsites" out of graham crackers, regular icing, an ice cream cone (for a tree) and a jelly bean campfire, with pretzel sticks for logs. 

We also made a birthday cake to match.

The graham campsites were very cute and enjoyed by all!

Camp Themed Birthday Party

We set up a tent, a wading pool, and Mark finished a playstructure that he was building for the kids, and voila, we have a "campsite", a "lake" and an "outdoor adventure center"!

The kids love making these candy skewers at the "canteen",

as well as these "smore packs" (1 scoop chocolate chips, 1 scoop Honey Grahams, and 2 scoops mini marshmellows).

"Ranger Mark" took the kids on a hike in the forest across the street where they searched for a "wild kat".

The kids found written clues as well as binoculars and magnifying glasses along the way.  The "wild kat" turned out to be Kit Kat bars in the end.  The kids collected all of their camping items and goodies in their "waterproof camper bag". 

Happy seventh birthday, to a friendly, fun-loving, caring, creative, thoughtful and insightful girl. 

We love you Megan!!!

Our Summer

I wanted to write a post called deep summer, about how we get into natural rhythms and routines without the hectic schedule of school and other activities, but alas, summer has already slipped away.  I'm always sad to see summer go.

It's our first day of school tomorrow and it makes me look back on the summer with fondness, and wishing for more.  We had so much sunshine all summer long!  We spent most of the month of August at our beach house and enjoyed some true cottage living complete with plenty of trips to the beach, visits from great friends and family, sweet Maggie's sixth birthday, hanging laundry out on the line, washing dishes by hand, projects like painting and clearing, rock polishing, making fresh squeezed lemonade and black berry pie, frequent trips to the outdoor pools here at home, and other summer goodness. 

We also witnessed the demolition of the old house on the property that we bought.  You can see a high-speed version of it on my husband, Mark's new blog called The Build. 

Now here's looking forward to all the great things a new season of school brings.

We Got Worms

Not a typical gift for an eight year old, but she loved it!

Miranda calls the worms her "pets".

She's very protective of them and is reading her worm composting book from cover to cover.

She told us that the worms need to stay out of the sun and she wanted to bring them into the house.  She'd probably be happy with them right next to her bed.  We compromised by putting them in the shed.

I'm going to be learning a lot about worm composting as well.  Do you have a worm compost?  Any tips or advice?

Sweet eight-year old girl.  Lovely in every way.  Thoughtful, kind, intelligent with a great imagination and lots of laughter.  You love to make up jokes,  learn about animals, to paint, to dance and to read.  We love you so much and cherish you each day. 

Hawaiian Birthday Party

There's that peacefulness before a party, before the guests arrive, when things are finally in place.

The dollarstore had loads of Hawaiian goodies.

The surfing station was ready to go.

The decorations were hung, and then came the best part:  the kids.

I didn't get a lot of photos without faces, but you can just imagine the splashing, laughing, bouncing on the trampoline, playing pass the coconut, and here's some hula lessons by the "hula master" himself.  Oh and we did the limbo too.

There was a "luau lunch" on planks of wood with tablecloths over top.  The kids sat on the grass.  The kids used toothpicks to skewer ham, cheese pineapple and maraschino cherries.  There was also tropical fruit, including papaya, mango, honeydew and cantaloupe. 

Mark made a volcano cake which erupted with jello mixed with lemon juice and baking soda.

Happy fifth Birthday to you, our sweet Maggie girl!

Seven

I don't know why this age seems even more important than age six. 

Maybe it's because you can do so much now, read novels and write your own stories, 

but you still have that innocence, believing in fairies and making wishes.

You love to play with your friends, but now it's up in your room and whispering about mysteries and secret places.

I can see your growing independence, mixed with that childish loveliness and laughter.

I'm so glad that you're my oldest daughter, proud to see you grow, and pleased to celebrate your seventh birthday, Miranda!  I love you so much!

Homemade Banana Bread

Thank you so much for your comments on my last post about Reggio in the classroom.  I've been meaning to post this project for weeks, but now that I am working again, I find I spend much less time at the computer than last year when I was at home full time.  I must say, I do enjoy the balance of teaching with being at home. 

When I'm at home I think a lot about two things:  cooking and cleaning.  Both which I come to resent at times, but I also enjoy both in the idea that I'm caring for and nurturing my family.  I remember when I was growing up, that I loved my Grandmother's home so much.  She was always in the kitchen cooking and baking and she was always there to listen, visit and serve up a great batch of goodies.  Thinking of my Grandma, I thought I'd love to create a collection of our favourite everyday recipes. 

If you are like me, you might have a cupboard that looks like this,

 

With favourite recipes in it that look like this,

This made me want to have a neat, organized book with all of our favourite recipes in one place. I thought a little binder would be great so we could keep adding recipes as we go. 

I thought I'd start our recipe book with one of the things we bake the most.  Banana bread.  We first got this recipe when Mark and I lived in Uganda and bananas (especially the small, sweet ones) were in abundance.  We have continued to bake lots of banana bread, because the kids love it and it's a great way to use up those old bananas. 

I'm not used to photographing food, so if you have any tips, please share...

I have been completely inspired by Molly Irwin's style in her December Daily album and to my surprise, she has a new and very beautiful book that she just created here.  Now I'm so eager to learn more about digital scrapbooking!

Here's the first pages of my recipe book that I've created in the Gimp.

I'd like to show more pages as I make it and I'm excited to see how it turns out!

I also added a couple of new photos to our Thomas party, that we got from Marks folks.  Making the train was just so much fun!