Tuesday, July 31, 2012

The Summer To-Do List : Blue Jays Game

Have I mentioned we're Blue Jays fans? Since we are lucky enough to live in the same city as a baseball team as great as the Jays we think it is important to take our kids to a game or two. I grew up going to games at Tigers Stadium and loved it, I have great memories of the games. For our kids to experience the game, the stadium, the crowd and the peanuts underfoot, is wonderful.

This past Saturday we took Bo for his very first game, Buzz having been many times before. Bo slept for the most part, Buzz ate popcorn and got himself a foam finger. It was all very exciting! Bo did manage to open his eyes long enough for us to snap a pic. Although he does not look all that pleased in the photo he was very well behaved and wasn't bothered by all the sights and sounds.




The Jays won and after the game we all went down on the field so that Buzz could run the bases, stepping onto the field was thrilling! We almost always sit way up in the nosebleeds and so being able to go right down and walk on the field was a great experience, the place looked huge from there. 






I think the only drawback to going to the games is that we always seem to sit in a somewhat rowdy section, perhaps all the cheap seats are rowdy. This time the rowdy was coming from two separate bachelor parties that happened to be sitting next to one another, they were trying to one up each other with their behaviour. For the most part we take it in stride and security at the stadium are pretty good at keeping people from getting out of control. I suspect that there aren't quite so many trouble makers down in the more expensive seats, but as we can't afford to get those tickets, we will just have to put up with the bachelor parties. I suspect a family section up in the cheap seats would go over well. 


The staff at the games are always kind and courteous, when I asked one of them if they would take a family photo of us in front of the Jays dugout, they happily agreed to. This is our very first family photo as a family of four.




Although these outings aren't always easy they are well worth it. Buzz remembers the games and the experience, he talks about it for months afterwards. Taking our kids out into the world to explore, to see and do interesting things, to watch them experience incredible moments is simply an amazing experience.



Monday, July 23, 2012

Birthday Celebrations!

My family got together this past Sunday to celebrate a couple birthdays. Little K was celebrating his very first birthday, while my brother-in-law Mike was celebrating a birthday of a larger number. We all met at a place near Collingwood that my sister and her family were staying at and had a little party, complete with cake, decorations, and hats! Little K's Mama was very busy, we all had our own hat personalized with our first initial, she also whipped up a neon paper chain. I love paper chain! I think I might have to get some pretty paper and make one for above Buzz's room or something, so pretty! 




I volunteered to make cakes, one of them was gluten free golden cake, the other was chocolate. Both of the cakes were decorated very traditionally, with cherries and pretty icing. They were yum! I love decorating cakes like these, they are quick to do and end up being so pretty. To sugar the cherries I simply washed them, shook off the big drops of water, and sprinkled sugar on them, they looked beautiful and tasted great. I think if you were more picky about them being totally covered you could paint dry cherries with egg whites before sprinkling on the sugar. I would recommend sprinkling the sugar on the cherries instead of dipping them as that will keep the sugar in the bowl from getting all moist.



I added sprinkles to the little white cake as it was deemed Litte K's cake, then added a happy birthday banner. The cake was also dyed turqouise inside.





The chocolate cake ended up being a pretty blue also with a happy birthday banner on top.




Little K has not had sweets yet and so he enjoyed a delicious banana pudding.



It was great to see the entire family, Buzz loved having time to play with his cousins, he so rarely gets to see the older cousins that it was a treat indeed! 

Thursday, July 12, 2012

To-Do List

I've finally made our summer to-do list - yay! On sunny mornings when the day is stretching ahead of us we sometimes have trouble coming up with things that might be super fun to do, this list will hopefully help with that. There are a few big ticket items on the list (baseball game, going to the ROM) but for the most part the items on the list are simple and fairly easy to do on the fly.  




We've actually already started doing some things on the list, specifically getting a treat from the ice cream truck. This was a big exciting moment for Buzz, not only does he love ice cream treats, but he is in love with the ice cream truck that comes to our street. I let him choose whatever he wanted, he decided on a Sponge Bob ice cream treat, Ed and I had strawberry slush. We were all pleased with our treats.




Keep a look out for updates on our to-do list, with any luck will be able to keep ourselves busy and  have lots of fun this summer.

Wednesday, July 11, 2012

Buzz, Papa, and a Bag of Gummy Worms

Buzz is in love with the show Max and Ruby. Anyone with a toddler who watches television is probably aware of this show, but if you are not it is about a pair of bunny rabbits. Max and Ruby are brother and sister, they take care of each other do things that are apparently irresistibly interesting to a three year old (like making lemonade). Like any little bunny rabbit Max likes his candy, in particular gummy worms, Buzz has taken note of everything Max likes and often lets us know that he would like gummy worms too (among other things like wind up robots and green alien gorillas). This past weekend we met up with my parents at an antique market and after browsing the tables and tables of interesting things we sat down in the trees for a picnic. Buzz was delighted when his Papa pulled out a bag of gummy worms, my Dad was delighted at Buzz's delight, this is the resulting picture. A whole lot of happiness going around.




I suspect there will be more gummy worms during future visits with Papa.

Sunday, July 8, 2012

Updates on the Garden


We have been busy at the garden, everything is growing, some is ready to harvest. We ate the peas that are always the first to make an entrance, Buzz loved them the most. Our snap peas were so sweet they tasted like candy!

In the past Buzz has been afraid of swings, but this summer he discovered that they are delightfully fun. Luckily there is a swing at the garden and he hops on it whenever we are over there.




I stopped in to Starbucks to grab myself a nice cool coffee beverage and noticed a sign about their 'Grounds for your Garden' program. I happily picked up a free 5 lb bag of coffee grounds and distributed it thoughout the garden, this will hopefully enrich the soil. As a side benefit I had coffee grounds all over my hands and used them to exfoliate my skin a little - my hands have never been so soft! If you have a garden and are close to a Starbucks, head on over and grab yourself a bag of grounds for your own garden.




One of our garden neighbours gave us a few currants to taste - yum! I can't get over the bright red colour, so pretty in the sun. I love seeing them on the plants, catching that hint of ruby red under the leaves.




Buzz has had his share of tumbles at the garden already this year, for the most part he gets up and going right away. He is a rough and tumble kid who's not afraid to dust himself off and keep right on running. This tumble however took a little extra dusting, he even had dirt in his mouth. A quick wash off at the tap and he was as just fine. 




 Our first carrot of the season! We were anxious to see how they looked and so Ed pulled one up. I think its a cosmic red, Buzz and Ed shared it. While the carrots aren't quite ready to provide us with some decent eating, our first batch of beans are almost ready for us to can. We just got a few more packets of bean and carrot seeds in the mail so that when we pull our the peas out later this week we are able to plant something new.


 




A New Arrival

What was once a family three is now a rather blissful family of four. Our beautiful new son arrived safe and sound three weeks ago and we simply can't get enough of him. The transition from three to four has been surprisingly uneventful, he fits right in and we've just kept on doing the things we were already doing as a family, albeit a little slower and with a whole lot more diaper changes.

For the sake of my children's privacy I decided a whie back to not use thier real names on the blog. While they both have names steeped in family tradition and a little whimsy I don't feel all that comfortable sharing them. My eldest son is known as Buzz on this blog, the newest member of the family will be known as Bo.

My labour this time around was faster and easier than last time, while this is almost always the case with second labours I was a little surprised and obviously thrilled that this was the case for me. Bo was born at home (I had Buzz in hospital) with the aid of my midwives and my husband. The beauty of being at home was that we got to relax, sleep in our own bed, and Buzz was able to meet Bo very soon after he was born.








Bo is a beautiful baby, he looks a lot like baby Buzz, with darker hair. For the time at least he is sleeping as well as I could ever hope for, although I suspect that I am used to less sleep anyway. Buzz seems to like him well enough and is happy to show him off to anyone that is interested, he is very gentle with him. It seems as though there haven't been all that many changes with Bo's arrival, instead it is as though he has always been here. We are pretty much back to our normal on the go selves.

I will attempt to keep updating my blog these days, if I'm not writing it isn't for lack of wanting to, but rather for lack of time. I keep an ongoing list of blog posts that I want to write so that when I get a moment I have topics ready to go, the list is getting longer and longer - summer is exciting but busy!