Happy Halloween

Today was the big day for treats for all, Abby and Tori dressed up for a great party at Miss. Trish's. Abby won the funniest costume and Tori won for scariest costume. Then tonight we went to church for the trunk or treat. We all decorate our trunks and the kids get to walk around the parking lot and gather candy. Here is our trunk this year:

The girls made the rounds while I handed out candy:

Then we all went inside for nothing better than corn dogs, hot cider and some scary/fun games.

Happy Birthday Victoria

Today is Tori's 1st birthday. So here is a little tribute to her first year...

From the day her sister found out she was not longer the only child:

To the day she was born:

To her first Christmas:

To her 6 month photo shoot:

To her first solid foods:To her first steps, way to early for all of us:

To now, with her happy smile, happy birthday little girl!

We celebrated with a little cake and lots of frosting that seemed to end up on way to many noses...

Trick or Treat for Health

As is our tradition we visited the trick or treat for health at the medical plaza this year. As many of you know last year after this grand event I went into labor and had Tori, so I was nice to not have that experience this year. It is a fun event that has everything from cookie decorating to the doctors offices that hand out candy, pencils, or Abby favorite toothbrushes, and of course the local sponsors which hand out freebies to their restaurants. This year there were also some new additions including the fun bus, horsey rides for the kids to name a few. Every year it gets bigger and bigger so we figured out to go early which seemed to work best and still gave us plenty of time to go explore with the kids.

Abby wasn't feeling too good, but we couldn't talk her out of going especially since she got to wear you new green power rangers outfit. Since she wasn't feeling great, we had to cancel our plans go take the girls to my parents for the night, so we would go out for dinner and a late movie to celebrate our anniversary. I can't believe it has already been 5 years.

Oh well happy anniversary to us anyway, one of the small joys of having little ones.

Here are some pictures from the day.

Abby in her hip costume, shooting the bad guys!

Waiting for the nice mad behind her to blow up a balloon for her!

Tori sporting her ferocious tigger the tiger costume.

Abby and Dad just hanging out.

Abby enjoying some of that great candy, and she will be using the toothbrush right after that!

Anniversary

Well it has been five short or long years, depends on who you ask...just kidding. We have two wonderful children and a whole lot of stories to share.
We are planning on going out this weekend to celebrate. Abby has been asking to spend the night at grandma's and grandpa's so we are planning on dropping the kids off for the night with my parents. We might even stay out past 11, yikes!!

Pumpkin patch and a day for Mom

Today I went to Time out for Women all day with my mom and sisters. It was a wonderful day to just sit and be fed as you heard inspiring people talk about their experiences and lives and give us all something to take away at the end of the day.

Chris took the girls and had a fun Daddy daughter day out. They went to a pumpkin patch down by my parents house and they had all kinds of fun things to do. Abby enjoyed the slide, bouncing thing, and the hay maze. Tori seemed to also enjoy herself.

Abby playing on the slide:

Abby with a whole lot of pumpkins, cute outfit Dad:

Abby and Tori in the huge pile of pumpkins:

After the pumpkin patch, Dad decided that a little food was necessary. So off to Red Robin he went. He got a lot of "wow you have your hands full" but they both did really well and of course who could tell since it was loud in there anyway.

Here is Abby doing her "homework"

And a successful outing always ends with a nap, right at least for 2 of them:

Wedding Bells

Congratulations to Tyler and Brianna he finally popped the questions and she said......................YES

Popcorn anyone?

Did you know that October is National popcorn month. For those of you who love a great popcorn I recomend Dale and Thomas they have the best popcorn and this month you can get free popcorn by going to their site. You just have to pay for shipping which is about 6 bucks, and a great deal. Last year we ordered several "free" orders, but it looks like this year they are limiting you to only 1 order...we may just try to sneak in at least one more.

Costume sadness

Well I finally broke down today and bought Abby her Halloween costume. I ordered it today so I hope it gets here in time. I was so excited this year for something fun like a princess but she is fixated on the gold power ranger. However what I found was that you can't find the gold power ranger to save your life (or pay about as much for one) so she has settled on the green power ranger. Then trying to find one in her size was another big challenge. Well we found this one in extra small, so I hope it will be close or I might need to do some alternations to get it to work. I hope it is cuter then it appears once I get it.

Gourmet Dinner

I asked Abby on the way home tonight what she wanted for dinner and her answer was Spider man mac and cheese and a sandwich and taco's. Interesting combination I admit and I tried to talk her into just one of those, but she was admit that is what she wanted. So as requested we had Kraft mac and cheese with Spider man on the box, grilled cheese, cheese quesadilla's, tortilla chips, green beans and to top it off, hot chocolate. Oh the joy of eating such odd combinations!
I chose to just have a taco salad and no hot chocolate, not near as exciting.

Moving along

Since Tori started to walk a couple of months ago, she has found that she has to be carrying something as she goes. I am not sure why walking alone is not enough. I tried to take a picture of her carrying Dad's shoes, but when I pulled out the camera, she dropped the shoes and made a bee line for me. Needless to say this was as good as I could get.Here is another cute one. With Abby she would never have received a cookie let along chocolate chip and in the car, the craziness of it all. She seemed to really go to town on this one!

Mom's little helper

Abby has taken to baking and loves to help measure and run the blender. We made a bunch of bars for Chris' work and so Abby and I baked away. When we cook for people outside our family I try to limit the licking and tasting before the food is cooked. So I tell her if she waits until it is all blended together she can have a spoon and lick the bowl. This has seemed to work.
I just can't wait for Christmas, that will be a blast!

Casa Bonita

The day finally came that I have been waiting for, for years!! I was able to take the girls to Casa Bonita. As many of you know I have a strange love with the place. Yes the food is bad and it isn't in a great location, but I loved it as a kid and love it still as an adult. I took Chris there shortly after we were married thinking he would have the same great love, but his comment was "so when are we going home?". Well the girls loved it Tori made a big old mess and with rice, chicken and the like. She especially loved the feel of the walls (the pretend rock stuff).

Abby also loved it. I admit I feel victim to the outrageously expensive light up toy (the stuff I never buy), shown here before braking the next morning, probably from the repeated banging on the wall, chair, herself, etc. Abby thought that the monkey was really cool especially in his green shorts. I was a bit disappointed that we couldn't go into the main area because it was all decorated for Halloween, and a bit to scary for the girls. But Abby made my night when she said "Can we come here again Mom?" My response was of course we can, and next time we can even see more things!

My birthday present

For my birthday this year, my parents bought me a beautiful Autumn Blaze Maple tree . As you may recall we received one as a wedding gift, but it didn't make it very long. It was beautiful why it lasted, but alas, it died (I sure hope that isn't a sign). Anyway I took a couple of shots before the tree...After the tree, I will keep you updated on the progress over the coming year. It should be beautiful next year.

Good deals

Nothing makes me feel as good as when I score some great clothes. Who doesn't love a good deal, well me for one...I am always looking for cute clothes for the girls. Abby has recently hit a growth spurt and so now she is in need of warmer clothes. I love the children's place and was able to get all the items below (3 shirts, 2 pants, a pair of shoes and a jean jacket) all for $35 including shipping!! I have been waiting for a week for them to arrive, I was so excited tonight and so I just had to share!

Happy Thanksgiving

Yes, for all you Canadians out there, today is the big day to relax, sleep in late and enjoy a wonderful turkey dinner. However we do still get enjoy the turkey dinner. I got lucky marying a Canadian, I get in to the cool crowd. We got our first invite 5 years ago, right after Chris moved here and before we were even married, and here we are now, 2 kids and a few more years behind us. Back then we would go to someone's house for dinner (the Tromners) but this year there were so many of us as word has got out about this awsome tradition, that we had to use a facility. Lucky for us Alice works for a funeral home, and so we were able to use their center. Yes kinda wierd to have Thanksgiving dinner at a funeral home, but unless you knew that is what it was you would have had no idea. We all enjoyed the night, food and friends and Joan and Alice did an awsome job of putting it together. We sure are blessed to have friends like that!

Dogs, Dogs, Dogs

We went to my parents for conference today and Tori was just too cute chasing after the dogs all day. This kid loves dogs, I can't get over how much so love them. I just couldn't get the one of her hugging or laying on the dogs, she would move every time I got the camera, so these will have to do.

Why yes, that is a remote control in her hand...she loves the things, not sure why maybe she knows what kind of powers they hold??

Fire Safety

Every year, the fire station has a big open house and every year I say hey, that would be fun we should go and every year we miss it. Well finally this year we went. I have found with kids you go when you can and go early, which is just what we did. I couldn't believe all the stuff they had including give aways, breakfast and of course the most fun of all sitting in the fire truck!

Here are some pictures from the day...
Abby in the fire truck buckling up
Abby checking everything out, see the nice tie around her neck, that is as some of us call it a piece of scrap material. She wouldn't leave home until it was on as a "tie".Tori loved the pancake breakfast, in the background you can see the table to practice calling 911.

They gave all the kids these cute fire chief hats, Tori wasn't so sure about how fun this was.

The mind of a 2 year old

Tonight Abby was a handful. First she was "helping" me by giving Mary (her baby doll) a bath. However, the problem with that is that Mary doesn't do so well with water. So she spent the rest of the night drying out. Then she wanted to go get her plastic toy from outside in the backerd (back yard) so out she went. She was nice enough to bring that in, but wanted to go back out. So she did, then proceeded to stick through the screen a twig, thanks! Well thinking how much trouble can she get in, I headed back to the kitchen to finish dinner. A couple minutes later she calls me back to the door, where she stands in just a shirt. She had gone out fully clothed, but now just held her clothes. Then she proceeded to tell me that she had peed in the backerd and that she took her shoes off so they wouldn't get pee on them.
All I have to say is that I would expect that from a little boy, but not a little girl, guess that goes to show, you never know what your child is capable of.

New calling

So much for sitting around with idle time on my hands. I was called as the 1st counselor in the Primary. Nothing like going from the flame to the fire. Oh did I mention that I have a primary program to put together for the 21st and that there were some pieces and parts of the old one to use. Not to make matters worse, but we only have 2 weeks and really only 1 more church day before we go "live".
I spent Saturday writing the outline, Sunday running around getting parts for all the children and Monday night finishing it up. Well I am happy to say that finished that tonight and handed it to the Primary President to get final approval. I am hoping he gets it back quickly so we can get it handed out so kinds learn their parts.
On a kinder, gentler side, I am so excited for this calling, the challange alone will get a great learning experience. For example, we have 96 children and only 3 teachers left. We will see how it goes next week!!