Drumroll please....

Erin, as requested, here you go!
(I cannot WAIT to show this at Loic's wedding, poor kid)

So.So.So Awesome.

-E

Dance sensations

Today Jody produced, started in and edited a music video featuring herself, Loic and Maelle.  I was the camera person and it was pretty much totally a riot.  We need to get Loic into a dance class!  Jody, maybe they would let you and I join in too?!

I will let her post it if she wants to but thought I would share one picture - sorry Jody!!!  :)

They are being a scary Monkey and a scary Giraffe/cheetah/?

Loic said so many funny things today - that kid is a riot.  He also pointed to the mouth of a toy whale and said "Is that the baleen?" and he was totally right.  Smart boy!

He also just went to bed wearing underwear.  Oh my gosh, he has been wearing a diaper to bed because he is hit or miss on not peeing at night.  We shall see what happens tonight!

My car is now back at the dealer.  To their credit, they were nice to us today.  I have a feeling the only reason they were nice is because I caved and brought Rob with me.  I was basically ignored - even thought it is my car and I paid the bill - but I can let that go if they actually fix the leak.  

-E

Shopping South of the Border

Today, Jody, Maelle and I took a trip to the states to do some shopping.
Back in my pre-kid days this might have meant clothes but not now, now I shop for food :)

We started out at REI where I bought some "if I have to go back to work I need new black flat fancy boots" boots.  They are so comfy and lovely and I love them.  The only other thing I am going to buy is a lunch kit for myself.

We then went to the kids consignment store next door to Trader Joe's where we bought Maelle some new to her pants and two dresses - that store is awesome.  The clothes are all from 0.99 cents to $5 and they have a huge selection.  Next up was Trader Joe's - a usual stop for us.  I only got some quinoa there (and maybe some gummy candy and a chocolate bar).

Then we were off to Target where I got a lot of staples for our pantry and found these:

Oh my gosh.  Jody and I almost got into a fight in the fridge section at Target over these; thank god they had enough!  We both bought the chocolate-coffee ones and the raspberry-chocolate ones.  After dinner Rob and I each had one and these are seriously good.  Why can we not buy Chobani in Canada?!  Why?!  At 100 calories these are totally amazing and I am quite picky when it comes to yoghurt (meaning I hate most yoghurts) but I could eat a lot of these every day.  I told Rob I was rationing these out between us and the bad news is that baby also loves them :)

We then split lunch at Olive Garden - seriously, we were both totally full plus baby had some and we split one meal!

All in all a fun day.  Maelle was so, so well behaved.  She napped on the way down and on the way home and while we shopped she chatted away to us and anyone who would look at her.  While we were out Rob took Loic on a bus, sea bus, sky train adventure to Science World!  Then, he had a play date at our house for 4 dads and 5 kids - brave man that Rob is, very brave :)

Tomorrow - we head down to the Honda Dealer....ugh.

-E

My garden! and a dino dig and dogs and cookies

Rob moved a lot of soil today to make this:

So awesome!!  It was a nice day outside today too.

Loic and I 'helped' him for a while this afternoon while Maelle napped.  I did manage to get two of the three blueberry plants in - I mulched them with fir shavings and used some peat I had to to dig them in, they are in front of the beds themselves.  I just need to dig out the sod in front of the middle garden bed and put in the third blueberry.  Oh and I will send off my soil for testing this week, don't worry Ryan :)

Yesterday it poured with rain so Loic, Maelle, Jody and I went to the Ecology centre.  We had a good time and we bought Loic a paleontologist hat!  Once we got home, Jody came up with the idea to do a dinosaur dig in the kitchen.  She suggested we bury toy dino's in FLOUR but I figured dried beans was a much cleaner option!  What a great idea she had!  Loic wore his hat and insisted that he needed a paleontologist vest so a vest he wore.  He also had a tent, a horse and digging tools - oh and he had a field notebook too.  (Can you tell Jody and I are a bit nerdy?)  He loved it.

Jody played assistant and helped Loic trace out his findings, it was pretty darn cute

Since it was so rainy out yesterday I didn't get the dogs out until after dinner.  We have Duncan staying with us and while I am sure he was not impressed to wait until after we ate dinner, we did have a nice walk after dinner because it finally stopped raining.  I just took the two big boys and listened to my ipod while I walked and it was quite nice.  These two have been buddies since they were puppies.  While they don't play as much as they did, they do still play a mean game of tug every once in a while.

These two are good buddies, hard to believe they are over 10 years old now!

Jody had a bad day yesterday so my helper and I made a treat for her this morning.  We made chocolate chip salted caramel bars; they are sinfully good.  

He did a very, very good job unwrapping the caramels!  

We talked about how if he finished his task he could have two or if he wanted one right away he could have one but he waited and picked two (because he is a smart kid :))

Loic had soccer this morning and while he liked it, he wasn't a big fan of the mini game the kids had - he didn't want to get into the middle of the pushing to get the ball.  I think the other kids have done a few classes already, we will get a ball and help him get the hang of it.  He likes the rest of the games they play and loves to kick the ball around.

-E

*Shakes fist at Pacific Honda*

My car is still leaking.
On my receipt (that was way too much $ to begin with) it clearly states that they repaired and then TESTED my car to ensure it was not leaking.  Now, one week later, the tire well in the trunk is slowly filling with water.
We are off to the Honda dealer tomorrow.  Wish us (and them) luck!

-E

Oh dogs

This morning, Loic, Maelle, Tyler and I met up with Jody, Lucy and Ryan for a (wet) dog walk.  We went to Ambleside and the dogs had a really good time.  Loic did too and it was a bit of a fight to get him to leave the beach and walk back to the car because he was too busy throwing rocks into the ocean!  Toby stayed home because his back seems to be bugging him today.

Blurry pic showing Loic in his rain gear - we sure get a lot of use out of that muddy buddy!

After our walk, I took Tyler home and the kids and I went to the grocery store.  When we got home from the store, it looked like someone had been murdered in our house.  Blood everywhere - all over the floor and the walls; Tyler has cut his tail again.  This was by far the worst that I have seen - it took me 3.5 hours of cleaning to clean the walls and floor.  When I looked at his tail, I found a tiny cut.  His tail is now wrapped up and will stay like that for a long time I am afraid, it takes forever to heal and we have been down this road many times before.  It is times like this that I start to think that docking tails is a good idea!!

Really hard to appreciate the damage done today - this is a small shot of the blood sprayed on the walls....he gets so happy every single time we come home that the tail sprays blood everywhere

Yesterday, Jody and I went outside to the backyard with: Loic, Tyler, Toby, Lucy, Abby and Ryan.  While it was sunny, it was also cold out!  The dogs had a good time chasing each other and destroying toys (Tyler) and Loic made fart sounds with a water toy for 25 minutes straight while laughing hysterically.  Ahhh boys.  Toby and Lucy ran around like crazy dogs until Abby decided that she did not want Toby to play with her Lucy :)  I cannot wait for the sun to really come out so that we can sit in the yard again!

"Naughty Terriers in the Sun"

-E

96 square feet

Rob built three raised beds for me today for the front garden!  We are finally turing that lawn into something productive.  He didn't actually have a helper, I took him and the dogs out for two hours and Maelle napped while he worked.

I am going to plant three of my blueberry plants at the foot of each of the beds; the last blueberry can stay in the back garden near the apple trees I have out there.   I need to find an apple tree for the front yard and maybe next year we will do another raised bed for a cut flower garden and then the front space will be well used.

Next weekend we will go to the transfer station to buy a few yards of soil (just under 4 I think) to fill the beds and we will then do a soil test (thanks Ryan) to see what we need to add to the garden beds.  THEN I can start planting!  I have ordered seeds and I am raring to go.  I will move the three blueberry plants next weekend though, that will satisfy my need to plant something.  Oh and we need to add some cardboard to the base of those raised beds ASAP, we can do that one night this week.

Fun times!!  In the back garden we have 1/3 planted with garlic, two apple trees, a red currant tree that has so far gotten large but hasn't produced a single thing, one baby ground cherry plant and my compost bins.  This year I will do another 1/3 with potatoes and the other 1/3 is up in the air right now. I know the 4th blueberry will be in there so between the ground cherry, blueberry, currant and apples there won't be a lot of room.  Maybe I will do a square of corn?  Not sure yet.

Other than my new veggie boxes, I am going to see what my perennial garden looks like this year (it runs the length of the driveway) and the back perennial garden should look nice and filled in this year.  My hosta garden is awesome and we will have to see if the apple tree we planted in the lawn is alive this spring!  It wasn't exactly dug up with a lot of roots.... :)

Next weekend: move blueberries, add soil, send off soil test.

-E