BLOG OCTOBER 2011

Tuesday October 31st, 2011

Happy Hallowe'en!

It's gotta be the best holiday for a kid. The girls are super pumped for trick or treating and for our Hallowe'en party. Rain chose to dress as Supergirl, opposite her kindie boyfriend William, who came dressed as Superman. Piper also picked her favourite superhero and went as Scarlett Witch (who is she you ask? She's an Avenger). Rain's costume we bought at a store, Piper's we had to make from scratch. The girls got to dress up for school and they were in the kindie parade (they went through the school and high school next door in costume). We then had kids and parents over after school for pizza, crafts and mayhem before turning the pack loose on the street when it started to get dark. The girls lasted about an hour and half. Even Squee held his own for an hour in the stroller. Torren went dressed as the fattest skeleton you'll ever meet...we called him baby bones. He loved his costume and got upset at me when I had to take it off to change his diaper. Piper got scared at one house that was playing spooky music, Rain got scared a couple of times when a dog greeted her at the door. Other than that though we lucked out and had a fairly warm and nice evening out.

Rain calls our cat Kanin a pattern cat. Not because she has stripoes but because she goes in and out, in and our, in and out...all morning long. We had our first professional photo shoot last week too....it went well and I can't wait to get the photos back. The girls and Torren were completely hamming it up and going all out modelling for the shoot. I'm sure we'll get some amusing reults. It's not like these kids have never had their photo taken before.

School has become boring for the girls. They both complain about going and although they don't pt up a fuss when I make them go, they tell me that they are tired of the same classroom activities and that a lot of the things they are learning are the same as last year. They do however come home singing songs they've leanred in school almost everyday and week. Their teacher is really great with teaching them songs to help remember things. They had me in stitches th eother night with a song that has very simple words about a a baby shark, mommy shark, daddy shark, grandma shark, grandpa shark, swimming, saw a shark, swimmimng fast, lost my arm, lost my leg, happy shark. It all has hand motions that go with each verse. It was awesome and gets stuck in my head. (do do do do do do do)

Torren has mastered saying u-oh and sasha....he loves to say Sasha. He also has started to "woof" when he hears or sees a dog. He can point as various things in a baby picture book (most of them food items), and loves his book "Moo, Baa La La La". He can follow simple instructions like putting things in a bucket or basket. He likes his beatles figures and will go and get them when I ask him where the beatles are? He still digs Rock Band and listening to music (he bops his feet in the car when we have a CD on). He is realy interested in expanding his vocabulary even if he can't say the words himself. It's an amazing stage...so curious and so happy when he gets and answer.

Supergirl, Batwoman and the Scarlett Witch.



Scarlett Witch throws a hex.



Supergirl flies off the deck.



Baby Bones.



Supergirl.



Scarlett Witch.



Opa the Clown.



The skeletons and the skateboard.



Torren stealing snacks from kids lunchboxes after school. He has a reputation amongst the kids and parents as the toddler who wil eat anything (as long as it comes out of one of those magic feeding boxes he sees them carrying)



Sitting in a colendar. Comfy.



Torren's whistle...a plastic themometer cover. It makes a high pitched sound and only Torren seems to be able to do it.



Wonder Hades, faithfull sidekick of Super Squee.



Our house decorated for Hallowe'en. The girls and I hit the dollar stores to add to our decorations from last year. They had fun picking out new items to spookify our house.



What's the scariest thing on Halloween? How about a scary-looking clown hiding in your deckbox.



Or better yet...a scary-looking clown hiding in your deckbox WITH a bat!



Our pumpkins...the girls designed them this year.



A fun statue we saw on someone's lawn...it uses 3 pumpkins



This is Scarlett Witch. Mutant Avenger with a hex power to make random things happpen. Piper likes her because she wears red and pink.



Attiyah and me chilling at St.Anne's spa



Ahhh...so realxing...an qiuet



Statue nose pick

Tuesday October 19th, 2011

So the girls have been off on a 2 week break from school and we've been busy. After the Thanksgiving weeeknd we had some friends, Sagan and Cedwyn, come to visit and we went to the zoo. Torren was facsinated with Cedwyn's hair clip and was alwasy trying to pull it out of her hair. They were very cute togther, climbing stairs, looking at animals together, exchanging looks.

We out our Hallowe'en decorations up. We had to make a few trips to the dollar store to get some new accessories this year. The house looks great...spooky (although I was able to persuade Rain away from the plastic body parts she wanted to buy and leave all over the garden).

I guess all this Hallowe'en decorating brought the girls to the idea to visit a cemetary. We popped into the union cemetary one day to see the gravestones. The girls were quite inquisitive about the names and dates on the stone.

We had a birthday party to go to last weekend...however Piper and Torren had stomach flu and spent a few days with upset tummies. Rain had fun bowling and partying with het beau William. Piper spent the day on the couch. Torren spent the night barfing. Poor kids.

Once the kids felt better we decided to go to the pumpkin farm (we'd been having cold rainy days for almost a week but we got one nice clear warm day). We called up some friends from school and made it a fun outing with other kids. They did the usual...see the chicken show, the corn maze, wagon ride, climb the straw bales, play on the play structures and go on the giant slide. Rain was climbing anything and everything she could find. At one point she scrambled up to the top of a five foot pole and preched on top. Torren was excited to get out walking and loved the geese, ducks, the corn we found in the maze and the small creek. We lucked out in both the weather and in how empty it was that day..it was like we had the place to ourselves.

Today we went to the Science Centre again with the girls friend McKenna. Again we did the usual things but lucked out again with it being quite empty by comparison. The girls got to try making sculptures with magic noodles, small packing peanut sized coloured noddles that would stick together when they were dipped in water. We were told they were made with cornstarch. Piper was especially into it and made several sculptures.

We had a great day at home earlier in the week when we spent half the day making a new art gallery on the living room wall. The girls put in a lot of effort and time in making their art. I'm not sure when we'll have the gallery exibition. I'll have to get some photos of it too. The same day the girls decided it would be a good ay to make armour. We have a bunch of boxes left over from our bathroom reno so we got out the silver duct tape and I got to work making a suit of armour. We have it half-built. I asked Rain to come up with a crest for the chest plate. She drew an octopus screaming. I wasn't expecting that. Sir Rain, Knight of the Screaming Octopus.

Torren has made a few leaps this week. He had started saying "Uh Oh." It's so cute. He walks about saying "uh oh. uh oh, uh oh...." He also figured out how to kick a ball. I was at the girls dance lesson and we were thowing a ping pong ball around the school hallway when he figured out on his own that it was easier to kick it. He also loves to put things in buckets and take them out again. Hes great when it comes to clean up time. He had the beatles figures out one evening and was carrying them about and putting them in a basket...them moving them to the bathroom, then back to the basket. He also showed great patience with setting the characters up on their feet and then knocking them over. He seemed to be drawn to the figure of George the most and carried him about for quite a while. Torren trying to take Cedwyn's hair clip off.



He almost got it. Cedwyn was displeased.



The hay bales at the pumpkin farm.



Corn testing.



Torren posing with pumpkins.



Rain on a post, Piper caught in the web.



The kids set up all their people around a house. They were all working together to put out a fire (so I was told).



This time the people with guarding the house (from what I don't know)



Our armour. Sir Rain of the Screaming Octopus



The Science Centre is A-OK!



Big feet...down the pumpkin farm superslide



Head first down the superslide



Rain, McKenna and Piper waiting for the tractor ride



Torren and me on the tractor ride

Tuesday October 11th, 2011

Happy Thanksgiving. We did our usualy double turkey dinner this year...one at Grandma and Grandpas and one at Stamps cottage. The girls love family get-togethers as usual. Auntie Mags brought a pinata to the dinner and the kids all took turns wacking at it with a stick. Rain ultimately busted it with her power baseball swing. Candy was had by all. The girls also got to try fishing off the dock. Torren had dinner strapped into his feeding chair but didn't eat much nutil he got to sit in a chair at the kids table and use a fork like everyone else. aFter he had eaten he discovered how to stand up on the chair backwards and tip it over. We caught him before he could go splat.

The girls have been obsessed with a new game on the ipad called "Stack the Countries". They have to answer a multiple choice question about world geography and if they get it right they get to drop a cartoon-like version of that country onto a board...once they stack enoiugh countries on top of each other they win the round and get rewarded a country too add to their world map. They were ecstatic the day they won Canada and added it to their map.

We've been serenaded many time with the national anthem as the girls practice for their big kindergarten event...singing at an OHL hockey game. They have choir practice before school a couple of time s week. They can't wait to sing it before the game. We had some neighbours over last night and their daughter Emily and the girls stood on their chairs and sang for us during dinner (at the top of their lungs of course).

We've been having such wamr weather this past week....summer-like weather during the day. It was probably 30 degree at the beach the other day when we went down to the Lake. The shoreline was all covered in green slime as was the water near the edge. Did this stop the kids from playing? No it did not. The kids just went right in and started scooping out slime and using it lke modelling clay. They made slime castles. torren spent most of his time just walking about...running even. He is so happy when he's strutting about, going where he wants. He starting to try navigating slopes and different terrains like grass and rocky beaches. It's like a grand adventure.

Torren fell asleep at dinner one evening.



Fishing off the dock.



Torren eating Rain's thanksgiving leftovers.



Pinata candy craziness.



Torren in the leaves. YAY!.



Beach slime anyone?

Friday October 7th, 2011

Nature is the months theme so far I guess. So we started the month off by sending the kids to stay overnight with Nana and Opa, who took them to the theater to see a dance performance. Daddy and I went hiking up the creek with Torren to see if the salmon were running still. We saw about a dozen three-foot long salmon trying to make their way up a creek that was probablyonly a few inches at some points. Crazy fish. Later in the week we made a second pilgramidge to the creek (it's only a five minute walk from the girls school) with as many kids form their class as could come after school that day. Ten kids with parents in tow hiked up alongside the creek watching the crazy salmon jump and splash. The kids loved it and also enjoyed clmibing everything in sight.

I know I've mentioned the squirrel who visist us several times a day to get peanuts (which initially I was thwoing out for the blue jays) We have named the squirrel "Hungry" since he is fearless. There is a female who also comes (she is much more shy) we have named "Lady". Torren loves watching the squirrels who come right up the window to him.

We started taking Torren to a baby group at the library for stories and poems and songs. The first week he lay across my lap looking utterly bored. He was much more interested in the other babies than the woman leading the group. He was also very unimpressed when the puppet she had did not zoon across the room and try to eat his feet. The second week was pretty much the same thing. He started having way more fun after the class had ended and he was free to run about the room.

We also got out a babydoll for Torren so that I could show him how to be nice to another baby (gentle touch, kis the baby, hug the baby). Torren picked the baby up by the back of it's sleeper threw it down face first into the floor, then climed on it's back and hit it in the head with a toy a few times before repeating. We need some more practice.

While Torren was working on his UFC moves with the babydoll Rain and Piper were rehearsing their wedding to each other. It was hysterical because Rain or I kept doing something wrong and Piper would get all frustrated and stomp off, them come back and we'd start over again. I think we all got it right after about 6 tries. I guess that why we have wedding rehersals.

WE went to the zoo this past week since the weather has been just perfect all week. We saw a really neat chameleon and watched it eating it's lunch of crickets, shooting it's long stcky tongue to grab them. It happened so fast. We also stopped by the meerkats and watched them digging and digging, playing and standing at attention. Torren loved the big fish tank and the penguins. He also loved the freedom to walk wherever he wanted and explore.

Torren is starting to demonstrate that he understands what we say. He can follow simple instructions like "put the toy in the basket", or "Give that toy to Piper." He loves to hand things to you and then have you hand it back to him. He is even starting to say what we think are some words. I think he says "Hades, Yes, Daddy" and I could have sworn he said "What" to me. H eloves to imitate you when you do things like stick your hands in the air or clap, or make funny sounds. He loves to be squeezed so hard he makes noise as the air is squished out of him. He loves to wrestle and we shove him, knock him over or roll him on the bed as he tries to get away (giggling the whole time). He loves when we lie down on the floor and he can crawl about all over us (mostly over our heads).

Today he topled over while on the deck and looked over at me. When he made eye contact he srunched up his face and started to wail. When I looked away he stopped and walked closer. Then when I looked back he srunched up his face and started wailing again. What a ham eh?

Tonight in the bath he grabbed a toy and conked Piper really hard in the head. She started to cry, then he started to cry, then he wanted out, Rain just sat and ignored us all...it was a bit hectic trying to get everything under control again.

The girls had a class trip this past week to an apple orchard. Rain came home and told me that they tried lots of kinds of apples and that"vampire" apples were her favourite. I knew she meant 'Empire'...not vampire.

Salmon in the creek



Hungry the squirrel



A really cool looking cameleon we saw at the zoo



Rain's favourites..the meerkat. Can these creature be any cuter?



Torren and a penguin who kept bobbing up and down the window pane blowing bubbles, as if purposely keeping Torren entertained.



The giant fish tank at the zoo.



The salmon walk qith classmates after school one day.



Torren and his baby.