Double Digits

While everyone else was celebrating St. Patrick's Day - we were celebrating Ashton's 10th birthday.  I can't believe he is 10 years old already.  We had low key celebrations this year.  Ashton had school and took rice krispie squares that I had mixed mars bars into to share with his class at school.  After school before I started teaching he opened presents.

More nerf guns - yippee!

Now I can find nerf bullets all over the house in assorted sizes!!

For supper we had Ashton's favorite meal - pancakes!!

After teaching we had birthday cake.  We decided it was for both the boys birthdays as with all the excitement with Bowen's birthday/baptism this year we never did have a birthday cake.

This past Saturday we finished off celebration and took the boys to the Cars in Movies exhibit at Heritage Park.  There weren't as many cars as I thought there might be but everyone still seemed to enjoy it.  Here are a few of the cars.

Not sure what Ashton's goofy face is about in this picture - but it makes me laugh!

The General Lee from Dukes of Hazards

The Delorean from Back to the Future

Herbie from The Love Bug

The Munster's Car

Then we took the boys to The Cheesecake Cafe for lunch.  I however seemed to be the only one who was hungry as everyone else brought most of their lunches home.  

I sure love my 10 year old boy.  He is such a great kid and has a fabulous personality that we all enjoy so much.  Happy Birthday Ashton!!

It's Great to Be Eight!

February 26th is Bowen's birthday.  This year was a very special year for Bowen as he turned 8 years old.  We didn't do very much on his actual birthday.  I made cupcakes for Bowen to take to his little friends at school.  The couple that were left at home were gobbled up so this is the only picture I was able to get.

A half eaten cupcake

Bowen had requested Oreo cupcakes.  So I just made a chocolate fudge cake and chopped up oreo cookies and stirred into the batter before baking.  Made a simple butter cream chocolate icing and topped with an mini oreo cookie.  Apparently they were a big hit at school.

I was teaching students the night of Bowen's birthday and we were babysitting Dane and Bennett, so we had one of Bowen's favorite suppers of hotdogs, chips and pop and then opened presents.

Since Bowen turned 8 he also gets to be baptized into our church.  He has been so excited.  This past Saturday was Bowen's baptism.  We sent out invitations to family and a few friends, and I made up a program.

Right after I sent out the invitations the Champion church got word they had to be out a few days before the baptism for renovations so we moved the baptism to the stake baptisms here in Calgary.

It was a wonderful day.  Bowen all ready for his big day.

Jason and Bowen ready at the church.

Bowen was so excited and nervous.  We were last of 5 children being baptized that day.  It went really quickly however.  They had an opening song, prayer and one of the Bishops spoke.  Then they had the moms come up and say a little something about their children.  Then they took the kids one by one to be baptized.  After the baptism our group came back into the chapel.  I handed out cards for everyone to write Bowen a little note (such a nice keepsake for him).  Then after Jason and Bowen had changed.  Bowen and I sang a musical number "When I Am Baptized".  Bowen was very emotional and feeling the spirit so Grandma came up and helped him finish the song.  It was beautiful.   Then Uncle Jared gave a wonderful talk on covenants.  Bowen was then confirmed a member of the church by his Dad and we finished with a song and prayer.

Then we all came back to our house for dinner.

We served chicken pot pie with biscuits, spinach salad and fruit with a candy bar for dessert.

After dinner Bowen opened some presents.  He received new scriptures from Jason and I, money, scripture markers, future missionary pin, sketch book, mega blocks, books, sacrament meeting activity book, bank, and candy.  What a lucky boy!

It is definitely great to be eight!!

Tough Lessons

Yesterday after school a little neighbour kid came to the door and asked Bowen if he wanted to come out and play.  Bowen asked me if it was alright and out he went.  A few minutes later he came back and he looked upset.  It took a bit of prying but he finally admitted to me that a few weeks ago he and his friend had broken something in the neighbour's backyard and he wasn't allowed to play in their backyard anymore.

We had a long discussion about admitting our mistakes and how he should have talked to us and to the parents of his friend as soon as it had happened.  With Bowen's baptism coming up on Saturday it was a good opportunity to talk to him about the steps of repentance and that it meant more than just saying sorry to me.

When Bowen's dad got home from work, he and Bowen went over to the neighbours to apologize.  He was pretty scared and a few tears were shed.  I was proud of Bowen for admitting he was wrong and trying to make it right.  He was happy that the mom told him she was pleased he had come to apologize and he was welcome to come over and play anytime.

Some lessons are tough to learn!

Valentine Weekend

Valentine weekend started with the boys preparing their valentines to take to their friends at school.

Ashton made his with lego candy, and Bowen chose suckers.

Then Thursday and Friday were Teacher's Convention so we surprised the boys and took them to Edmonton for a little get away.
 
Thursday morning we headed up - went to the West Edmonton Mall and did some shopping.  Jason was able to buy a new suit and Ashton bought a german coin (he's starting a coin collection).  Then we went for a nice supper at Moxies and back to the hotel for swimming and then bed.

Friday morning we headed to the Science Centre for the Harry Potter Exhibit.  It was awesome!  Unfortunately photography was not allowed so I don't have any pictures.  They had tons of memorabilia from the movies.  Costumes, wands, Mauraders map, the goblet, statue of dobby and other characters - the list goes on and on.  We had paid for the audio tour.  You would punch in a number on the remote and you could hear from the actors, costume designers, set makers etc.  It was really good.

The boys wanted a souvenir (which were all horribly overpriced I might add) so we got them each a commerative wand.

After spending a few hours at the Science Centre we headed back to West Ed and grabbed some lunch.  Then we spent a few hours at Galaxyland.  The boys had lots of fun going on rides.

Afterwards we grabbed supper and then to the hotel for more swimming and bed.

Saturday morning the boys decided rather than going to a movie that we had planned on, they wanted to try mini golfing.  So we went back to the mall and went mini golfing.  The boys had never tried before and did a great job and really liked it.  I hadn't mini golfed for years and I really enjoyed it too.

Then we did a bit more shopping.  I bought a few more maternity clothes, and the boys got new suits.  On the way to Edmonton our little DVD player for the truck had broken so Jason had noticed a sale at London Drugs so we decided to replace it.  We ended up getting dual DVD players that can either show the same movie or separate movies and then we bought them dollarstore headphones so we don't need to hear them.  It was bliss driving home.

It was a fun family valentine weekend!

30 Weeks!

This pregnancy seems to be flying by so quickly.  This Sunday will mark 30 weeks pregnant already.  Only 10 weeks to go!  I've been feeling pretty good.  I'm tired, and have lots of stretching and ligament pain but oh so worth it.  I had an ultrasound a couple of weeks ago and everything looks good with the baby so far.  The ultrasound technician wanted to find out the sex of the baby to put him or her on the correct growth chart.  I told her I didn't want to know so I shut my eyes as she took a look.  It was so hard to keep my eyes shut.  Part of me really wanted to peek!  I'm really glad I didn't though - it will be fun to have a surprise!

We have so much to do to get ready for the baby.  I'm really superstitious and haven't started doing anything yet.  But I've realized lately if I don't start getting some of it done - NOTHING is going to be ready.  We have started working on the boys room.  Two walls are painted and Bowen is getting excited about moving in with Ashton.  I sure hope they like sharing a room and are able to get some sleep!

Mom has been coming up every couple of weeks for a few days to help me out and that has been so great.  I was just saying to Jason the other night that the house was getting messy and I wondered when mom was coming again!  haha

I am getting quite the "belly".  I can only imagine how big it is going to get.  I'm loving all the kicks and pokes from the baby.  If this baby is as active on the outside as it is now - we are in trouble!!  My blood pressure has been really good, and just found out I have a glucose intolerance, but it has not developed into gestational diabetes so I'm grateful for that.  I should be able to maintain my blood sugar easily with my diet.  Everything is going better than I expected so far - another miracle!

29 Weeks and 5 days!!

Holiday Wrap Up

Boxing Day the whole family went to my mom's.  It was great to spend time together and the cousins loved playing together.  We opened family stockings from mom, the kids opened presents from Grandma and the adults exchanged gifts.

We had a wonderful turkey dinner with christmas pudding for dessert.

The next day we headed to Cardston to visit Jason's family.  All of his siblings and nieces and nephews were there except for Trevor and Jessica.  We had a great time together, exchanged gifts and had a yummy dinner.

The rest of the holiday we spent at home.  We had a nice quiet New Year's eve at home.  We put on a delicious spread and watched a movie with the boys.  I was fading but the boys were wide awake and made it til midnight.

Cheers to 2014!  I hope it is great year for all of us!!