A Rather Large Birthday Party, and Ethan Builds a Bed for Elmo.

Last evening I took the kids to a party for a boy we know from playschool, playgroup, and dancing class.









There must have been at least 20 kids there! They wisely held the party in a event room at the community centre. With all the available toys from playgroup, the kids had lots to do. Evelyn enjoyed the extra playtime with her friends Elizabeth (in the striped shirt) and Hannah (on the slide).




The birthday boy's Dad brought out his guitar and kept the kids entertained with songs like "old McDonald" and "Frog at the bottom of the sea". Ethan was SO into the guitar and music. He was like a little groupie.



The kids went to bed as usual, and before I went to bed I checked in on Ethan. He has been getting out of bed lately. He turns his light on an plays very quietly, then falls asleep onthe floor.

A few days ago we found him with his head under the bed. He startled when I took a picture, and wacked his head on the bedframe not once, but twice. He then snuggled in further and pulled his 'hank' over his head.

Well, last night he went a bit further. He emptied out the bottom drawer of his dresser and tossed all the clothes on the floor. Then, he moved all his dirty clothes from the floor of his closet to a pile on top of his downe quilt.

Then, he took his pillow from his bed and made a little bed for Elmo and Ernie in the closet where his clothes had been.

After all this work (very quietly done work I must say) he fell asleep near his door. I thought it was very kind of him to sacrifice his pillow for his Elmo doll. We put him back into bed and he settled into sleep.

A visit to a farm

Today, in-between Preschool and Dancing, we stopped by one of my co-workers farms to pick up a lamb roast for Thanksgiving. Karen was kind enough to show us around and introduce the kids to her animals. We saw a horse, a couple llamas, some chicken, a large herd of sheep and lambs, cows, and a bunny. Oh, and some cats and dogs too (it would not be a proper farm without those!)






They also had two huge white dogs with long thick coats whose job is to protect the sheep from coyotes. They also kept a llama in the sheep pasture with the dogs. The llama is much taller than the dogs, so can see farther. When it sees or senses something it perceives as dangerous, it calls out an alarm that sounds like a person laughing. This calls the dogs to attention and they will run to the perimeter to scout out what the danger is. While the dogs scout, the llama herds the sheep to a safer area in the pasture and stays with them while keeping them together. The dogs will deal with any coyote and the llama will keep the sheep as calm as possible. I thought it was amazing that two totally different types of animals could work together so seamlessly, and could communicate with each other to achieve the common goal of protecting another type of animal. It was interesting.

They raise 4 or 5 different breeds of sheep. Some were light brown with black faces and hooves. I think their breed was called Suffolk... Others were dark brown over the entire front half of their bodies and white at the back half. It almost looked like they were wearing long sleeved shirts and pants! Some were all chocolate brown, others had patches of black brown and white, still others were white all over. I had never seen so many breeds at once. It was fun to watch them.





The chickens had seen better days. They were a rather elderly flock and many were going bald on their rumps. Karen said they would only be good for canning the meat because they were so old. I had not realized that chickens could go bald! They looked a bit like baboons with their bright red rumps sticking out and flashing everyone!

Mama's Little Helper

This afternoon, I was adding a few more things to the garbage before I changed the bag. Without my asking, Ethan went into the cupboard, pulled out a replacement bag, and gave it to me. "Wow", I thought, "what a great helper.

I left the full bag on the floor and proceeded to do a couple other things. A moment later, I heard Ethan thunking down the stairs. I investigated and saw him trying to put his boots on, with the garbage sitting beside him on the stairs. "Are you taking the garbage out for Mommy?" I asked. "Yes! Garbage, outside" was his reply.

I quickly ran to get the camera and caught him in the act of his first, (completely independent) chore. What a WONDERFUL helper!

An October Visit

In celebration of our birthdays (# 29 and 28) K-A came out for a short visit Oct 1-3. We picked her up after we went to the Zoo. After, we went to Ikea. I told Evelyn about our planned Ikea visit last week and she literally jumped up and down with excitement. She counted down the sleeps and talked continually about going into the play room with the balls and all the kids.

The next day was a playschool day. We took Ethan around town and looked in some (actually, all) of the shops, went for lunch, visited the library, and picked Evelyn up.

On Friday, K-A and I visitied the Telus World of Science to see the Body Worlds exhibit. It was wonderful. I really enjoyed it. After, we went to Olive Garden for a light lunch, then to the airport. It was a short but very nice visit.

A trip to the Zoo where Evelyn rides a Pony.

On Oct 1st, I took the kids to the Valley Zoo in Edmonton. It was overall very disappointing. The only food served was ice cream, the animals looked depressed and their living spaces were tiny. Evelyn liked looking at the Elephant eat it's lunch. Ethan liked riding the little train. Just before we left, I decided to check out an area we had not seen. It offered pony rides, so I let Evelyn try.

The look on her face from the moment she sat on 'Sugar' to the time she got off was one of pride, excitement and joy. I think that was my favourite part of our visit.

Bev's Birthday

I turned 29 on Sept 23rd. This was the same day Evelyn started school and dance. We spent the whole day from 10 am to 4 pm in Boyle. I think I am going to dread Tuesdays. It is a really long time to spend in a very small village. And, a really long time for Ethan to go without at nap.

After dance class, I picked up some Chinese food for dinner. Our friend Melissa came over for dinner and Ryan managed to get me an ice cream cake from the Marble Slab. He was in Edmonton the previous week, and picked it up then, kept it at school all week and brought it home on my birthday. It was really yummy.

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.