Family

Welcome Bennett

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I just had the fantastic opportunity to meet my newest nephew when he was brand new. He was just a week old when we arrived for cuddles. When my niece was born my sister had pinned photo ideas, bought little outfits and had a pretty good idea of the pictures she wanted me to capture. When Bennett was born just 16 months after his sister, my sister Erin wasn’t quite as organized. Sound familiar to any of you second, third, fourth time moms out there? I wasn’t as organized when my second arrived either. Bennett and I had a lovely time snapping away, here are some of my favourite shots. I know that the basket is too small but I threw it in anyway because he was fast asleep and he was being a great sport about the situation.

Are we almost done
Chilling with my friends
hmmmm
Seriously couldn’t you find a bigger basket
Boring

After nap time Ruby got in on the photo action. She is so full of life and a joy to photograph. Here are her new born pics, they really do grow up quickly.

oh oh
lol
Really, you don’t say
Stopping for a quick cuddle

I remember when we had photos taken when Logan was just 2 weeks old, and the ones with both kids were a bit of a disaster. Logan was screaming his head off, and Sasha was holding on to Logan for dear life. These pics were a little bit better. Although Bennett was poked in the eye more than once. No babies were harmed in the making of these photos!

Smells like a new baby

Ahoy Matey

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About three weeks ago my sister, brother-in-law and niece welcomed little Bennett into the family. In honour of the event and my sister’s love of cupcakes I made a little welcome cupcake dessert to celebrate his arrival. His room is decorated in a nautical theme so I ran with that for the cupcakes as well. Welcome to the family little guy.

anchor cupcakes

It only took 6 years…

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We live 5,000 kilometers from all of our family which makes some things a little tricky logistically. When our first son was born we investigated getting him baptized. We had decided that we would try and baptize the kids into my husband’s religion which proved to be very difficult. I say investigated because we live on an island where there isn’t a church of my husbands religion. There were also some pretty strict rules about who could be the children’s godparents. The best option that we had available would prove to be very expensive, involve ferry travel and included strangers as godparent’s. Not exactly the ideal situation. So for years we didn’t do anything because we felt that we hit a road block. The solution that we finally chose was to baptize the children in a church that was neither mine or my husbands. That might seem extreme, but it was actually the best option for all of us. We found a church which would baptize the children and welcome us all. The minister was lovely and organized a ceremony on a very short timeline. The minister removed all of the barriers which we had previously run up against, which in my mind is the way that religion should be anyway. We met with him on a Friday and baptized the children on Sunday while we were visiting family. This also allowed our family to be present and be involved in the ceremony. My mom arranged a little party last minute and the whole day came together without any issues.

In my regular style the event included cupcakes!

All I want for Christmas…

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I know that it’s nowhere near Christmas I’m just getting caught up on a few items on my to do list. This is a project that we (my husband and I) have been working on for a long time. Starting with the day that I first saw our current house 4 years ago. When I first saw what would be Logan’s room before Logan was even an idea I knew that the space would be perfect for a built-in bunk bed. But first we needed to get the house, get pregnant, and have the baby. When Logan was born we put the crib in the “nook” and I patiently waited until he was old enough to make the transition into a big bed which happened this fall. I wanted to build this about as much as a five-year old boy would want it. In September we went to Great Wolf Lodge and the boys spent their first night in a bunk bed.

That sparked Sasha to ask for a bunk bed for Christmas. After explaining that Santa doesn’t have room in his sleigh for a bunk bed, Stanko and I decided that it was time to build one in the “nook” in Logan’s room. We finished building it right before Christmas and Sasha promptly moved into Logan’s room. It took me the last 4 months to get it painted, hang the pictures, hem the drapes, and make more pillows.

I love that we have enough space so that the kids can be sleep together, apart, in the same room or in different rooms. If one of them is sick we can separate them into their own rooms, yet most of the time they opt to sleep together in Logan’s double bed. Sasha’s room goes unoccupied almost all of the time so it’s fair game for visitors.

My kids are my inspiration for most of my projects. The following items can be found in Logan’s room.

Here is the before…

before

During…

After…

If you are looking for me I will be napping in the bottom bunk with the drapes closed.

Celebrating 6 years

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My oldest turned 6 last weekend, which is reason enough to celebrate.  A few people asked me if I could believe it.  And honestly I can’t, I don’t know where the time went.  One day he was a tiny baby, and just last week he turned 6.  I was thinking this week if I had it all to do again would I have done it the same way?  Now being a super practical person I know that there is no such thing as second chances, but it’s interesting to think about just the same.  Would I have worked, traveled, and spent time studying while he was young?  I think that I would have, because he is an independent little boy whom I love and I can’t imagine him any other way.

I was struggling trying to decide what to do for his birthday now that he is in school.  Do you just invite a few kids, or no school friends, or the whole class?  We decided to invite all of the kids in his class, parents, siblings and a few of our friends and their families.  We ended up with a huge group, and Sasha announced that it was the best day of his life, which makes everything worth while.  It would have been even bigger if I didn’t kick out the hockey team that crashed his party, seriously.

I requested from a few families (until I lost track of who I had told) that if they were inclined to bring a present (because honestly even though we have asked for no presents in the past no one ever listens, and neither do I) to give an experience present.  Sasha received seeds to plant in the garden, movie passes, painting canvases, and gift cards which turned into a shopping spree among the piles of presents.  I must say that my husband was pretty happy with the remote control helicopter, and remote control car.  My husband even tried to convince Sasha that he would have to play with the helicopter until he turned 8 because the box said 8+.  Fun was had by all, the photos are evidence.

Sharing the Love

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I don’t know why I feel the need to celebrate every holiday or event with a t-shirt but for some reason I do.  I asked Sasha the other day what kind of shirt he wanted for Valentine’s day and he said one with a big heart on it.  So armed with a couple of white shirts and red felt I cut out some hearts, pinned them on and got Sasha’s approval.  By the looks of the photo you might be able to see that the first heart that I cut for him wasn’t big enough, unfortunately I was out of red felt.  I love that Sasha is interested and engaged in all things handmade so I am willing to find a way to make his vision a reality.  I was not in the mood to go to the store with 2 kids in tow to get one sheet of red felt, so a quick text to a crafty friend and I was ready to cut a very large heart for Sasha’s shirt.  With Sasha’s design approval I stitched the hearts on with embroidery thread.  Here are my boys in their love shirts, aren’t they the cutest?

valentines

Happy Valentine’s Day.

Snowball Fight

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I am going to apologize in advance to those of you that feel buried by the snow.  I miss the snow.  Winter isn’t quite the same without it.  We have the good fortune to live in a part of Canada that only sees snow occasionally. So far this Winter we had snow for 3 hours.  Which was just long enough for the kids to attempt to make snowballs.   I don’t however miss driving in snow, getting into a freezing car, or shoveling.  But I do miss playing in the snow, or at least I miss the opportunity for my kids to play in the snow.  As I was driving on the highway the other day the sun was shining and I was following a car with surfboards strapped to the roof, I came to the conclusion that Winter in Victoria is almost over.  I am not a weather forecaster but the crocuses in my garden are spouting and that seems to me a good indication that spring is on the way.  So it seems that it would be the perfect time to have a snowball fight.  In an attempt to share the fun of snow with my kids I made them a pile of yarn snowballs, and in keeping with the joy of getting up and seeing snow as a kid I placed them outside their bedroom door.  This is the result.

Sorting and Counting

On the twelfth day of Christmas…an angel

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angelThis is not a recent craft I made it in 1992 at the ripe old age of 15 for my Nana for Christmas.  She loved Christmas and she loved angels.  At the time I was pretty big into cross stitch.  My intention when I made this for her was to add to her Christmas decorations, her intention was to put it in her living room year round.  When she became an angel this picture was given back to me.  I hang it up every year for Christmas along with the Christmas ball she made for me and the very old but functional carousel ornamotion decoration that has her hand writing on the box.  I remember all of the Christmases we had together and I have some amazing memories of a great woman.  I won’t forget the year she fell in the bushes after a few glasses of wine, or the year she was practicing giving the finger which I caught on film and used as my Christmas card, or the Pistachio torte.  I’m sure she would be terrified to think I remember some of her funnier moments but I remember the good as well.  Have an awesome Christmas and make some great memories with friends and family.  Cherish every moment.

On the tenth day of Christmas…Elf Shoes

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IMG_20141207_091708A couple of weeks ago before I had decorated the house for Christmas the kids found our stockings lying around and proceeded to wear them as shoes.  They were giggling away as they showed me their elf shoes.  This inspired me to make them some felt elf shoes.  Sasha helped to pick out the colours and worked with me on the design.  Here is the Elf Shoe Pattern that fits toddler shoe sizes 8-12.

Instructions (Can be hand sewn or machine sewn)

  1. Cut out the number of felt pieces required based on the pattern
  2. Pin the soles and sides together, and sew
  3. sew the zig zag trim onto the top of the shoes
  4. Sew on the pom poms
  5. put dots or lines of puff paint on the bottom to stop the little ones from wiping out

On the seventh day of Christmas…Nuts & Bolts

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IMG_20141219_114954

When I was a kid there were some traditions surrounding Christmas.  The tree never went up until 2 weeks before Christmas, on Christmas morning breakfast had to be eaten before we got to see what Santa had left, and my parents always made Nuts & Bolts.  My parents would make nuts and bolts in the largest oven safe pan available which usually became home to the 20+ pound turkey days later.  When I first moved out west a package arrived at Christmas with nuts and bolts but since then I have been making my own large batch.  This year I had some help.

IMG_20141215_153844

Recipe
3 cups Shreddies
3 cups Multigrain Cherrios
3 cups pretzel sticks or twists
3 cups Cheetios cheese sticks
2 cups mixed nuts
1/2 cup butter
3 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
3 tsp onion powder
3 tsp garlic powder
3 tsp paprika

​Preheat oven to 250°F (120°C).  Combine Shreddies, Cheerios, pretzles, Cheetios and nuts in a large roasting pan.

Melt butter.  Mix into butter Worcestershire sauce, onion, garlic and paprika until blended.  Pour butter mixture over cereal mixture and toss gently to coat.

Bake, stirring every 30 minutes, for 2 hours.  Cool completely in pan on a rack.