Family

Great Wolf Lodge, WA

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IMGP6609 While my husband and I were lapping up the sun in the Seychelles we decided that we should take the kids somewhere fun (I think it was guilt), so we booked a little weekend get away to the Great Wolf Lodge in Washington state.  If you haven’t heard of Great Wolf Lodge it’s a chain of an indoor water parks/hotels and ultimate kid paradise.  I am not a huge fan of water parks, I don’t know why.  Maybe I am too old…but this trip wasn’t about me it was for the kiddies aged 5 and 2.

 

 

So we packed up the car and headed to the border via the ferry.  We live on an island so most trips require a plane or ferry, fun times.  We dropped off a car at the ferry terminal (Black Ball/Coho) the night before to try to secure a spot on the first ferry of the day, and it was a good plan because we hadn’t made a reservation and space was tight.  We then drove for 3 hours to Great Wolf Lodge, it all went pretty well and involved a game or two of Eye Spy.

Fisherman’s Wharf Victoria BC
Harbour ferry ballet
Empress Hotel, Victoria BC
Waiting for the ferry to load
On the ferry
Eye eye captain

When we got to our room our oldest was elated because he got to sleep in a bunk bed, the top bunk of course.  He was so excited before we left, not about the water park, but about the bunk bed.  We could have saved a lot of money and just bought him a bunk bed.  Our youngest was not interested in sleeping in a bunk bed, he thought that our bed was his (he sleeps in a double bed at home so it’s not a huge stretch).  After we got over both the elation and the trauma of sleeping in bunk beds, we hit the water park.  But first a stop at the magic wand store.  There is a game that all of the kids and adults were playing that involved a wand that lit up objects around the hotel.  The guy in the wand store said that it was geared to 7+, so we got the wand and walked around the hotel lighting things up, but we weren’t on the quest.  But those on the quest were running around the hotel, and appeared totally into it.

Top of the world
Get me down
Peek boo
Ready for bed

So on to the water park.  There was a great kids play area which kept both kids pretty occupied until bed time.

Great Wolf Lodge, WA
Great Wolf Lodge, WA
Great Wolf Lodge, WA
Great Wolf Lodge, WA

 

We went to the clock tower for story time.  And tucked the little peeps into their bunks just to do it all over again the next day.

Story time at the clock tower
Story time at the clock tower

 

The hotel was on the pricier side but not unreasonable and it included entrance to the water park for 3 days.  The prices were pretty inline with what we would normally pay in restaurants and hotels so no complaints here.  The only suggestion for improvement I would have is in the housekeeping department.  In the pool area there was a lot of food/containers on the ground/tables, really other guest should just put their garbage in the bin, but if not then the hotel should be cleaning up the common areas.  Also our room wasn’t cleaned and when I called down to request it be cleaned the housekeeping staff were gone for the day.  Not a huge deal except we have a little person in diapers.  In a place that caters to families housekeeping should be flexible enough to work around naps.  In most hotels I wouldn’t ever suggest it but in a family resort it is to be expected.

I imagine that another trip to the Great Wolf Lodge will be in my future, I am not a fortune-teller but I am a push over for my little peeps.

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Made by Mom with LOVE

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Just over a month ago my parent came to visit.  No visit from the grandparents is complete without presents, at least in my experience.  Parents (myself included) can be a little picky about toys and gifts for their kids and often for good reason.  Those little people are always putting things in their mouths, so parents want to make sure that the toys are BPA free, non-toxic and age appropriate.  But sometimes the list goes beyond safety.  People can have preferences about toys with TV/Disney characters, noise, plastic versus more environmentally friendly materials, the quantity of toys, the quality of toys and the list goes on.  No judgement here.  Parenting is a tough gig.  I personally have a preference for handmade versus mass manufactured toys, but that same preference stretches to furniture, coffee mugs, cookies, socks…  It’s no surprise that I also want my kiddies to be surrounded by handmade objects.  That being said, I am happy when anyone is thoughtful enough to remember my kids and send them gifts of any kind.  Variety is a good thing too.

So when Grandma and Grandpa arrived with their bag of tricks imagine my delight when these little guys came out.

Don’t eat me
Peg Knight, Dragon and Castle
Peg Knight

My mother is a maker and these are her creations.  They are made of birch wood, non-toxic paint, and real felt (not that recycled pop bottle stuff from the dollar store that I use).  But most importantly because they are made by my mom for her grandchildren they are made with LOVE and that is much more important that anything else.

PS.  Mom I sent you a pic on Pinterest of a rocket and some astronaut peg dolls.  Hint, Hint.

Below are some of the toys I made for my kiddies.  Click on the pictures to link to the blog posts.

blocks 1felt fish

bear 1snake 4rocksball 2

 

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Back to School – Week One

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pom poms

Around the country kids went back to school but not here in British Columbia, we are in a holding pattern with the young ones because of a teacher’s strike.  But I went back to school this week.  I am officially a graduate student attempting to complete an MBA, online from home with a child hanging off each arm. Sounds appealing doesn’t it, what was I thinking.  Perhaps I will learn over the course of getting an MBA how to study from home with a five year old and two year old.  I am doubtful that they will teach that in an MBA program which is unfortunate, but it would be worth the price of tuition.

 

I did learn a couple of things this week though:

  • My five year old can make his own lunch, hooray.  I went to check on him the other day while his brother was at daycare and to see if he wanted lunch and he announced that he had already eaten.  He had made himself a sandwich with ingredients from the fridge, and cleaned up after he had finished.  He did eat right off the table because the plates are out of reach, so what I learned from this little exercise is…move the plastic plates to the bottom cupboard
  • My five year old can dress my two year old, and sometimes my two year old will let him, another huge win on the mothering front
  • My two year old can be occupied with putting pom-poms into a jar, and dumping them out again, for at least an hour.  Note to self, glass mason jars and two year olds don’t play well together.  Seems like something I should know, but I was a little preoccupied when I gave him a glass jar of pom-poms.  Obviously after cleaning up a broken jar I have learned my lesson.  In case you were wondering what kind of idiot keeps pom-poms in a glass jar the answer is ME.
  • Post secondary education like having babies is hard and should be done when you are young.  There is a reason why people used to have kids in their twenties and not their thirties or forties, again a lesson that I learned after the fact.  University falls into the same category, I am exhausted after the first week.
  • and the most important lesson is now that I am a student I can drink like one, bring on the beer bong, but we have to do it at 7pm, so I can get up at 6:00am or I risk a tiny person trying to pry open my eye lids.
nap time
Taking a study break

Until next time…

Date Night Apple Pie

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ready for bakingAre you looking for something to do on date night?  Have you baked a pie together?  We are always looking for things to do together at home after the kids go to bed, it seems that we get stuck doing the same things every week.  But this week was a little different, this week we baked an apple pie.  When I was out pedaling the excess plums around our neighbourhood, one neighbour insisted that we take apples in exchange for the plums.  So with a basket of local apples we set to work.  My husband is an excellent cook, but we rarely cook together because we have two little kids.  Its hard enough for one person to cook in our house never mind both of us together, someone needs to keep the kids from terrorizing each other.   So it was a nice treat to be able to be in the kitchen together without someone holding on to my arm, sitting on my foot or yelling at me.  Even if you don’t have kids cooking or baking together can be a nice change if you don’t do it often.

My husband cleaned the apples and prepared the filling while I made the crust.  This is a dairy free apple pie because we have one little person who has an issue with dairy, but you can easily substitute butter in the same quantity below.

Rolling out the crust
Crust in the pie plate

 

Pie Crust

Ingredients

  • 2 3/4 cups flour
  • 2 tablespoons sugar
  • 1 1/4 teaspoon salt
  • 1 cup chilled margarine (margarine was in the freezer for about 10 minutes)
  • 1/3 cup ice water

Instructions

  1. Mix flour, sugar, and salt together
  2. Using a pastry cutter blend margarine into flour mixture until it looks like small peas.  I used my Kitchenaid mixer without an issue.
  3. Sprinkle water mixture while mixing until the dough forms into a ball.  You don’t want the dough to be too soft.
  4. Cut the dough into 2 balls, a larger one for the bottom and a slightly smaller one for the top.
  5. Put the balls into the fridge.
  6. Grease a 9″ or 9.5″ pie plate.
  7. Prepare the surface for rolling out the pie crust with flour, and flour the rolling-pin.
  8. Take the larger ball from the fridge and roll it out, and place the rolled dough into the pie plate.
  9. Fill the crust with the apple filling
  10. Roll out the top of the pie crust and place over the apples.
  11. Pinch the edges closed, and make holes in the top with a fork for the heat to escape while baking.
  12. Bake at 425 degrees for 40 minutes or until the top is lightly browned.
Ready to eat
Preparing the apples
Apple goodness

Pie Filling

Ingredients

  • 8 medium apples
  • 1/3 cup melted margarine
  • 1/2 cup of brown sugar
  • cinnamon – as much or little as you like
  • Chocolate chips, or chopped nuts – as many or few as you like
  • 1/2 cup of brown sugar

Directions

  1. Wash, peel and core the apples
  2. Melt the margarine
  3. Toss apples in margarine, sugar and cinnamon
  4. Mix in chocolate chips, or nuts as you wish
  5. Pour the apple mixture into the prepared pie crust

Keep cooking, and dating.

 

 

 

 

Logan’s Birthday Take 2

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IMGP2111

I love to entertain, and I am often looking for any opportunity to throw a party.  Logan had 2 birthday parties for his second birthday, one with family and one with friends.  I know that throwing parties can be a lot of work, and some people just groan at the thought of throwing one.  But it’s not work when you really enjoy the preparation and the party planning.  In truth Logan’s birthday was just another reason to get friends together and have a chat, get caught up and have a bite to eat.

Logan is learning to speak and is putting words together in an attempt to communicate in sentences.  Pulling a party theme from his common words and phrases we came up with a woof woof puppies theme.  Food consisted of hot dogs, smokies in crescent rolls, chips, veggies, and plums from the yard.  It wouldn’t be a party with out Happy Cupcakes which were also dog themed.  For the doggie bags I made the kids dog ears, and puppy treats (malt balls).  There were also balloons dog themed of course.

Dog themed cupcakes and dog dish cake
Doggie bags
Puppy treats
Dog ears
Dog ears
Dog ears
Sasha with his dog ears
Logan modelling his dog ears
Logan and his happy cupcakes

Pictures of the Logan and his friends at the party.

Keep celebrating!

1-2-3-4-5

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When Sasha turned one I made him a t-shirt for the occasion.  A simple shirt with the letters ONE.  For some reason I thought that maybe I might get the ages mixed up when looking at pictures from the past.  Looking back there isn’t really a chance of that, at least not yet.  Maybe in 40 years but not today.  Logan turns two today and it doesn’t seem like yesterday that I left the hospital with a newborn, but it also doesn’t seem like that was two years ago.   Here is a little trip down memory lane, of my boys in their birthday shirts.  That saying that they really do grow up fast is so true.

 

Sasha age 3
Sasha age 4
Sasha age 5

Keep celebrating!!

Logan’s 2nd Birthday

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Logan turns 2 in less than a month, but we celebrated a little early this year.  We live 5,000 km away from all of our family so family birthday parties don’t happen often.  This past week we were fortunate to have my parents, sister and niece in town so we took advantage and threw Logan a pre-birthday party.  He is still a little young to understand what a birthday is but he is old enough to understand cupcakes.  I made him some Bear cupcakes at least that is what they were supposed to be.

bear cupcakes

Here are some of the pictures of the birthday boy, and his party guests.

Camping Take 2

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For anyone that read my blog about our first camping experience, you might be questioning my judgement right about now.  But rest assured I am a fast learner.  For starters we camped 25 minutes from home at Goldstream Provincial Park which is very kid friendly, more so than Gordon Bay Provincial Park on Lake Cowichan.  Stanko and Sasha headed up to set up camp while Logan napped and I finished work on Friday.  Logan and I arrived once everything was setup, and Stanko was cooking dinner.  After dinner we played in the playground.

Then Logan and I packed up and went home to our warm clean beds, hot showers, electricity and flush toilets.  Told you I was a fast learner.  If it wasn’t for the smoke detector going off at 12:30 (no fire) and my little toddler padding around the house at 2:00am, it would have been perfect.

master 2

The next day Logan and I headed up to the campsite to see how our campers made out, and to bring the many items that they had forgotten.  We had a little bike ride, and then I left for a massage appointment.  Now this is the type of camping I like.

After a trip to the mall for a little shopping I headed back to the camp ground in time for dinner.  We ate and went for a little hike.

After our hike we roasted marshmallows over the BBQ because there was a fire ban on but what’s camping without the traditional smores.  What a great camping trip!  Maybe once Logan is old enough to enjoy sleeping in a tent I will be forced to once again, but until then I am loving this style of camping.

 

Celebrating Canada and Nana

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I might get a little sappy on you with this one, just a warning. Canada Day is a special holiday for me, and believe it or not it doesn’t have anything to do with celebrating Canada.  While I was in my twenties before kids & marriage every year just before Canada Day I would make a call to the cottage to see if it was ok to come for the Canada day long weekend.  My Nana would always answer, your room is waiting and we would love to have you.  We would always have a chat about the weather, the weekend, and whatever.  I miss those chats.  I could still call the cottage and see if I could come for the weekend but someone else would answer and it wouldn’t be quite the same.  The last time I saw Nana was on a Canada Day long weekend just weeks after we found out that she had cancer.  We had a great visit but it was the last Canada Day that we got to spend together.

canada day cake

Every Canada Day she made this simple and delicious cake, or tricked my aunt or I into making it.  I think that she used to make the base out of angel food cake but I make mine vanilla, with vanilla icing and topped with cut up strawberries in the shape of the Canadian flag.  I have been making it for years to celebrate Canada but more importantly to keep traditions alive and to celebrate Nana.

 

 

We played tourist in Victoria today by taking the Hippo Bus it’s an amphibian bus so we got a land and water tour.  Here are some of my favourite pics.

After that we went to a Canada Day event in Esquimalt complete with a bouncy castle, Hayley Wickenheiser, and the Mounties playing hockey.  It doesn’t get much more Canadian than that, EH.  I will let you guess what was the most exciting part for a 2 & 5-year-old.  As you can see Logan was not quite so sure about the RCMP, but all in all a fun day.

Canada Day

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We are getting ready for the big event on July 1st.  My very patriotic 5-year-old has inspired the making of Canada day t-shirts.  This craft is probably the easiest that I have ever blogged about, so no excuses.  It was a very good thing that it was fast because one child was riding a scooter over my feet, while the other was climbing on the dining table.  Crafting with kids what more do I need to say.

1 (2)

Materials:

  • Red craft paint
  • Textile medium – optional
  • HANDS – come on I know you have those, feet, or paws would also suffice
  • White T-shirt
  • Paint brush

Instructions:

1. In reality you should always wash clothing before you print on it, but who has time for that – so lets say optional

2. Put paper towels inside the shirt (3 layers) to make sure that the paint doesn’t bleed through to the back of the shirt

3. Lay the t-shirt stuffed with paper towels all smoothed out on a flat surface

4. Mix the paint with textile medium per the textile medium bottle instructions.  Textile medium helps the paint stick and not fade when washed.  It also waters down the paint making it easier to work with and faster to dry but if you are planning to wear this only for one day you are safe to skip the textile medium.

5. Make the kids wash their hands, unless you want cookie, pasta, juice and who knows what else as part of the maple leaf

6. Have the kids practice stamping the shirt with unpainted, clean and dry hands (I know that’s a lot to ask)

7. Paint one kids hand red – TIP paint one kids hand at a time if you have more than one kiddo

8. Help them place their hand on the shirt, and press it down (gently)

9. Get those hands washed before you have red hand prints on the couch and dog

10. Using a paint brush paint the solid sides of the Canadian flag, if you are not brave enough to free hand it, then use painters tape to make rectangles, but only after the hand prints are dry.  My rectangles not perfect but I think are in keeping with aesthetic of the hand print.

11. Let the shirts dry completely, I would leave them over night to be safe.

12. Iron to heat set the flag and if you are feeling like super mom iron out the wrinkles.

We live in a great country so get out and celebrate on July 1st.  Happy Canada Day!