First Day of Preschool and Dancing

Evelyn was able to go to preschool this year. She was born 12 days after the cut off, so we were not sure they could take her. She is really enjoying it. She goes Tuesdays and Thursdays from 10 am -1 pm. They bring their own lunches and have a lot of playtime. She has done a couple small crafts as well.













She has also started a dance class on Tuesdays from 3-3:45pm. She is lukewarm about dancing. She never really talks about it or asks when she gets to go. We were able to watch the first class, but otherwise, we have to leave and come back. The class I watched, they played with little instruments and rolled the exercise balls around. Most of the kids zoned out after about 20 min. All the girls wear these weird footwear called 'foot undies'. They look like boys underwear with suede on the balls of the foot. Bizarre. I figure I'll have her finish the year and then we'll see if she wants to continue.

September Days

The above slideshow is a collection of the best pics of September. These are all from our walks and hanging around. (Literally) We had really nice weather for most of the month. I scrape frost off the car a few times, but overall, it was really nice. I'll put a few pics from the slideshow into this post for those readers who have photobucket blocked at work.

Ryan's 30th Birthday

Ryan left his 20's behind him on Sept 7th. No midlife crisis ... yet. We celebrated quietly at home with a homemade chocolate cake. I actually baked 2 cakes. One yummy homemade one that overflowed the pan and caused a small oven fire. I had to take it out, trim off some of the overflow, clean up the oven and then complete baking it. It ended up crumbling and I could not use it for decorating. So, I made a packaged chocolate cake to decorate. I kept all the ruined cake crumbles in a bowl and we snacked on that for the next few days. It turned out almost like a brownie.

























During the celebrations, the weather turned very windy and dark. Then, about 30 min later, it lightened up and we enjoyed a big rainbow. The rest of the nature pics are from the rest of September. The leaves are mostly fallen now. It is such a short season. I really enjoyed all the colour while it lasted!

"Evelyn's Mountain Adventure" by Evelyn Grace Cracknell

Below is a story written by Evelyn Grace Cracknell, hopefully her first of many stories. It's told in her words with a little bit of help from her dad. Eventually we'll add pictures and it'll be a picture book, hence the breaks after every sentence or two.

Evelyn’s Mountain Adventure

Evelyn likes the mountains. She likes the mountain goats.

The mountains are on the way to Nana’s house. They’re super big.

The last time Evelyn went to the mountains she had a big adventure.

She had to pee so she went to the outhouse. Evelyn didn’t like outhouses. She was scared of them.

This outhouse looked like it was about to fall. But if she didn’t go now she’d have to wait until she got to Brianne’s house. So she went in the little potty.

After she went pee, Evelyn met a mountain goat. “Hello,” she said. “The ladybugs love me. Would you like to borrow a movie?”

“No thanks,” said the mountain goat. “But would you like to go for a ride? I can take you on a great mountain adventure.”

“Sure,” said Evelyn. Evelyn hopped on the mountain goat and the mountain goat started to run. Evelyn laughed.

The mountain goat and Evelyn climbed all the way to the top of the mountain. Evelyn put her hands up to her eyes like they were special goggles. Now she could see far, far away.

“Look, I see Nana’s house. I see Brianne’s house. I see Daniel’s house,” yelled Evelyn pointing. “I have to go pee.”

The mountain goat took Evelyn back to the outhouse so she could use the bathroom again.

“I’ve been so brave and I don’t have any garbage,” said Evelyn. “Thanks for taking me on a great adventure.”

The mountain goat nodded and went back into the forest. Evelyn waved good-bye. She would never forget her super mountain adventure.

Politics

Well, Hmmm, 2 days ago, this decision was nowhere on our horizon. As you are all well aware, there is a Federal Election coming up. Our riding is in the middle of Oil Country. Ft.McMurray/Athabasca. The only parties with candidates were the Conservatives and the Liberals. (Really, those are the parties that represent the majority of the people in this are) Ryan and I were feeling conflicted. We really wanted to vote in this election, but we did not want to vote for either option. We have always leaned left on the political spectrum. So, Ryan decided to do something about the situation, rather than abstain from voting, or vote for a party we don't want.

He decided (with my full support) to enter the running as a candidate for the Green Party. It just seemed right to have an alternative voice to try to temper the gross misuse of our natural resources.

We are in the heart of Oil Country. The majority of people depend on oil for their living - directly or indirectly. The desire to make that extra buck has led Oil to sacrifice the environment, our water, and precious agricultural land. These are resources that are vital to the health and survival of all of Canada. It is time for Albertans to become more considerate of nature and become stewards of it's wellbeing.

Do we expect to win the seat? No. That would be quite a feat! We just want to give the people who live in our area a choice that tells others "Enough!" "It's time to change our values and start to take care of our country's physical needs"

So, the next 3 weeks are going to be very busy around here. We are new to this political thing and we will learn as we go. It will be quite an experience! How many people can say "I ran for office in a Federal election"!?!

My Grandma's memorial

My grandmother passed away on July 22. My family got together in Gibsons on Aug 18 to remember her.

Here are some pictures of that memorial and a few of her over the years.

We planted a magniloa tree in her honour and mixed her ashes into the soil around the tree. Everyone took a turn mixing her into the dirt and spreading it under the tree. Later, we all took a turn watering the tree. The tree will bloom around her birthday. Big white blossoms.

A big suitcase filled with photos surfaced as her kids cleared out her room. I never knew these photos existed. I really enjoyed looking through them. Many were old family snapshots from when her kids were young. Others were family snapshots from when my Grandmother was young. I also saw her wedding picture, her parents 50th anniversary picture, and another of her parents as young adults. In many ways I felt like I was learning about a whole new part of who she was. My aunt will be scanning the best of those pictures and I am looking forward to having those files.

And finally, a few pics from the last few times I saw her.

Monkeys

They had a lot of fun playing together on Monday. Ethan lost it on the way home....again... and quickly fell asleep when we got home... again. At least he had a good nap!

The leaves are starting to turn yellow and red. I've had frost on my windshield twice. Summer is gone. :-( It happened literally overnight. One day, Evelyn is playing in the sprinkler and we had to have the fans on in the house. The next, day I had frost on my windshield and we had to turn the furnace on. It was a good summer.

A walk to the park

Ethan totally lost it on the way home. He refused to walk and chose to scream and lay down instead. As soon as we got home, he crawled into bed and fell asleep. Ahhh, sweet silence!

I just tried out the scrapbook option on photobucket. Here is the result.

A post from Ryan's Card Blog.

Sunday, August 24, 2008

Come to the Dark Side, My Child

If collecting cards and the like is really "the Dark Side" that my wife thinks it is, I'm bringing my daughter with me.

Before I got into cards I collected stickers. My sister and I wrote away to ads for the "Pineapple Club" we found in Archie comics and in the Muppet Magazine. Six to eight weeks later we each had more stickers than we could do with -literally. So we stuck the sheets in photo albums and looked through them regularly comparing what each of us had adn lamenting what we didn't.

A couple years later this gave way to a He-Man sticker book from Panini. Much like cards, you'd buy the album and then grab packs of stickers, building your set and finishing your sticker book at the same time. This was an instance of unfortunately/fortunately. Unfortunately the the corner store ran out of He-Man stickers shortly after I got my sticker book. Fortunately, they got a Transformers one after that. For the next couple of months all of my allowance went towards stickers for that book. I think I may have even done extra work in exchange for more stickers.

After the store ran out of Transformers stickers I got into hockey and from there I was into cards. I credit these Panini sticker albums as getting me into cards in the first place. They were a bridge of sorts from one hobby and into another. Now it's time to get my daughter started.

Like a lot of three-year-olds, Evelyn loves Dora the Explorer. She also loves to get special treats for doing a good job, overcoming a fear or trying something new. I don't like comparing my kids to dogs, but it's much the same as rewarding a dog with a cookie for fetching the paper, going doodie outside or sitting. And just as the tail wags with joy and anticipation, Evelyn comes running when I reach into the closet and pull out a pack of Dora stickers for a job well done.

For the price of five packs of 2008 Topps Baseball I picked up a Dora album from Panini and a box of 50 packs of stickers. So now when Evelyn does a good job with something (right now it's sleeping through the night without screaming about the shadow of the curtain rod that she swears is a shark) she gets a pack of stickers.

What follows is some great daddy-daughter time as we rip into the pack, sort through the five stickers within and put them into the sticker book. Evelyn's already proving to be a regular Joe Collector getting extra giddy when a shiny, sparkly sticker (the equivilent of Dora chrome refractors) pops out. "Oooooo, shiny! Look, Daddy, it sparkles!" We've got about 50 stickers in the album, roughly 25 percent of the set, so far. Yet Evelyn knows exactly which stickers she has and doesn't have simply by looking at them.

"Evelyn are you sure you have that one? It's just Map and a simple background. There's one like that on every page."

"No, daddy. We have it."

Sure enough, I flip to the place in the album where this generic sticker belongs and map is staring me in the face, taunting me for questioning my daughter even in a trivial matter such as this. Doubles are set aside for a friend Evelyn met while visiting our hometown over the summer and kept away from her brother at all costs.

I'm not pushing for my daughter to join me in the wild world of card collecting, but if she sees me sorting through some piles or is curious by a certain card, I'll sit down with her and tell her the story of that card. For every card does have a story and every story should be passed on. And if from that Evelyn wants to join her dad, dagger grins from my wife aside, I'll hold onto every moment we share together ripping packs, sorting and debating whether or not it's a double. I'll just have to remind my wife that it's about the quality time we're spending together and not the extra 400-count boxes the card shelf is accumulating.

Posted by Ryan Cracknell at 3:16 PM

August adventures

We are home, we are well, and this is what we have been up to: Ethan and Evelyn have been playing well together. He really looks up to her and, as you can see, he loves to copy her. Just before this pic was taken, they were both trying to stretch their mouths with their fingers. Unfortunately those pics turned up blurry. It was very cute.




We made crazy face sandwiches. Both kids ate everything on the plate. Cream Cheese and jam sandwiches, avocado, carrots, grapes, and watermelon. Yummy!







I made cupcakes with the kids. (Hence the earlier pic of them in their aprons) This is result of eating the cupcakes. Hmm, one of these kids is a cleaner eater than the other... In Ethan's defence, Evelyn did have vanilla icing, not chocolate.

I love that Evelyn actually posed for this pic and smiled at the camera.



Ryan found a Luchador (Mexican wrestler) mask at a mexican market in LA. It works so well with Ethan's spidey PJ's.









The weather was rainy and cold for about a week, but has just warmed up signifigantly. The kids have enjoyed playing in the flower sprinkler. Most of the time the game goes like this: Evelyn takes control of the flower and sprays Ethan every time he attempts to come close. Ethan makes a hasty retreat whenever she sprays him, then regroups and tries again.





Evelyn went to a ball last night. I (Princess Mommy) helped her dress for the event, though she directed me on what was needed. "I need a necklace! Now...I need a princess hat, and a crown!" I think she looks like an ocean princess.

Comments recently overheard:
Evelyn, looking at the rain outside and considering taking a walk in it says "The rain helps me grow so I can go in the big pool"

Random comment from Evelyn. She was thinking about how she will get to go to Disneyland when she is 10. She understands that this is a long time away. "Can all my friends go on the Dumbo ride at Disneyland? We better wait on the bench!"

And an exerpt from Ryan's card trading blog tradercracks.blogspot.com

This post has nothing to do with sports, cards or sports cards. Rather, it's a transcript (taken from memory so I may have a couple of quotes off by a word or two) of a conversation my three-year-old daughter and I had walking back from flying a kite at the park.

"Daddy, do birds poop?"

"Yes, dear. All birds poop."

"Birds poop?"

"Yes."

"Do robins poop?"

"Robins are birds, so yes, robins poop. All animals poop."

We walk by a street sign.

"Do signs poop?"

"Signs don't live so they don't poop."

A butterfly flutters by.

"Caterpillars poop. Do butterflies poop?"

"Yes, Evelyn, they do."

"How about trees. Do they poop?"

"No, but they have sap. So if trees pooped that would be the closest thing."

"Oh."

After that the rest of the walk home was pretty quiet. I think this is the first time in my life poop has been the highlight of my day.