Happy Birthday Kenton!

Yesterday my baby turned 9 years old! My how the years go by. This is Kenton with his new present from mom and dad...a fire bellied toad. This is in addition to an aquarium full of fish, a hamster, hermit crabs and a cat who loves them all. My kids are lucky...their birthday always turns into a week-long celebration. First, we have the family celebration...all the grandparents and aunts and uncles come over for cake and coffee. Then is the birthday party for their school chums...this year will be a swimming party. Of course, none of these events usually fall exactly on their actual birthday, so they get to celebrate their birthday with a cake, a present from mom and dad, and their choice of what's for dinner. Oh, to be a kid again. Hope you have a great year ahead of you buddy...Happy Birthday Kenton!

Hamsters and Car Crashes!

Happy Mother's Day to all of you mom's out there! I had a wonderful weekend, but there were a few blips...Saturday was a typical mom's day, what with driving one kid to football, picking one up from a friend's, and a trip to the nursery to get some flowers (to pick out my own mother's day present I might add), amongst other things. Now in the middle of all this, I went in my youngest son's room to discover his hamster cage sitting on the middle of his bed, opened, with no hamster in it! There were shavings everywhere and all his fish food had been dumped out as well. At first, I thought the cat had gotten into some mischief, but realistically...if the cat had been the culprit, there would have been hamster carnage all over my house. As it turned out, the neighbour boy had made his self feel right at home. We did a quick sweep of the house and weren't sure what to do next when I heard a scratching noise coming from my bedroom. After turning out several dresser drawers, I found hammie looking at me from under my bedside table. What a happy ending!
The car crash part came the next day. I was feeling especially happy and obviously misjudged my speed and proximity when pulling around a parked car to pull in to my son's friends driveway...I clipped the poor guy's bumper and tore a hole in it! Not to mention, my whole side is scratched up. My husband took it amazingly well and I am very grateful to him for that. This story ended happily as well, seeing as we both have such good records that this will not affect our insurance. Whew!
Well, I guess now I'll see what other mischief I can get in to this week and let you know all about it! :)

Grade 7 Camp Pics

Here are a few pics I tried to post the other day and finally got to work!

Arbor Day Field Trip

Yeah, yeah....I know...I'm a sucker for punishment. Today I went on...let me count...my fourth or so, Arbor Day field trip. For those of you who don't know, Arbor Day is where we go to learn all about the different types of trees. At least this year we got to learn about different trees than last year. We all had a great day, except for the astonishingly cold weather. I think God is telling me that I need a hot tub with all the coldness I've been experiencing this week. On the bright side, according to my calculations, I have just one more year of Arbor Day. Then it will be on to other field trips, such as Playland and then, you guessed it...another Grade 7 camp out. I better be getting something good for all of this on Sunday. Will it be a popsicle stick photo frame? Or perhaps a popsicle stick pen holder? Whatever it is, I'm sure I'll love it!

Grade 7 Camping Trip

Well, I survived the Grade 7 camping trip with my son, Christopher! They needed extra volunteers for the girls' cabins, and wouldn't you know it, I got a few of the rowdy girls! Now, I'm great at yelling at my own kids, but apparently not at other people's. I thought I was being cool by letting them talk quietly past lights out, but unfortunately they missed the "quietly" part. The real fun started when a couple of them noticed a spider on the tent wall. The whole rest of the camp was just starting to settle down, when my girls all started screaming at the top of their lungs! The mom in the next cabin burst into our cabin and yelled at the girls, then one of the teachers followed. Then they started with the whole "We have to go to the bathroom" thing, so I told them if they had to go to the bathroom, they could go with me, one at a time. Needless to say, only one of them really had to go after that. I was pretty proud of myself for that one! The next morning, a few of the girls were told they were being assigned to the teachers cabin, so night two was excellent. Plus, I figured out how to stay warm by the second night. Bedtime aside, the camp was a lot of fun. It was well organized, the staff was great and they fed us good food! We did mountain biking, wall climbing, archery, the giant swing, swimming and survival skills. Now I have four years to forget how preteen girls are and look forward to round two!

Quick Blog Update

Hey folks...here's a quick blog update, with no fancy pics or anything. Yesterday I had an unexpected day off and the weather was gorgeous! I went for a walk, then took the kids to school and colored my hair. Then I decided to call my mom and we did lunch and a bit of shopping. The real excitement took place around dinner time, when the forest at the end of our road started on fire. I believe it was actually an old barn in the forest that was on fire, and firefighters had a bit of a tough time getting access to it. Today was back to the old grind though, as tomorrow will be. I'll be sure to let you know if anything exciting comes along! :)