A day in pictures

The photo website Flickr had a 24 hours of Flickr on Saturday May 5. Basically you take a bunch of pictures that day and decide on 1 to sum up your day.
I thought that would be a fun thing to do, so we tried to have some fun outings with the family.

In the morning we went out to White Rock, the weather was a little overcast, but the sun popped out every once in a while. We brought the kite with us and headed to the beach.





Aaron and Kyle both loved running through the puddles, good thing for rubber boots and waterprook pants.






Kyle is not as alone as he seems:-)






Time for snack.




We also walked around the town a bit and then headed home for lunch and nap time.

In the afternoon we headed down to Fort Langley to check out the town and I took the kids to see the caboose, which they enjoyed.





And hanging around the tracks as well.

Then after we met up with some friends from church at Derby Reach park.
We had a nice dinner grilled over the campstove and hung out for a while.
The kids enjoyed running around the park and throwing rocks in the river.





I had an enjoyable Cinqo de Mayo and I think the kids were for the most part well behaved.
I was able to take about 90 pictures that day and it was hard to choose 1 picture to sum up my day, but ultimately I chose this one. Good times.





If you want to see what other people submitted to Flickr as their picture of the day you can click here.

Love my Belly

I was paying for my purchases at a store yesterday and heard a bit of giggling behind me. So I looked over to see a little girl kind of hiding behind her mom laughing in embarrassment. She was looking in the direction of Kyle. When I looked over at Kyle he was standing there smiling, lifting up his shirt to show off his big belly. It was quite funny.

Bye Bye Soo

Last night I decided it was time to say good bye to "Soo". Kyle has used this same soother for the past few months and would not use a different one. Needless to say the thing was in pretty bad shape and I was getting a little afraid that it may break apart while he was sucking on it. So at about 7:00 last night I told him he should go put it in the garbage. He did it quite easily and he even said good bye to it ( I prompted him). BUT at 7:30 at bed time the consequences of what he did finally hit him. It all made sense to him now and he let the tears flow. The tears only lasted a few minutes but he was probably up until 9:00 in bed talking away, trying to sooth himself to sleep. I felt a little guilty because it seemed like he thought I had tricked him. BUT this was going to happen at some point soon anyways. So night #1 is finished and our punishment for this is a child that woke up at 6:30 this morning and has been pretty cranky since. Good thing he's going to Grandma's for a while this morning :)

Sleepin' and hangin'

Kyle woke up quite early this morning. He was crying and throwing up.
We weren't sure what was wrong. He must have had sort of bug in his stomach,
because after breakfast he was feeling a bit better, but fell asleep on the couch.
The after lunch and he had another nap and he seems to be doing better now.

A week ago Aaron went to his friend Alyssa's birthday party at The Little Gym.
Here is Aaron having fun hanging upside down.

Aaron runs the mini Sun Run

Last Sunday in our annual family tradition we went to the Sun Run. This year was Aaron's turn to try to mini Sun Run which is 2.5K and starts an hour earlier than the official Sun Run.


Shelby was Aaron's escort this year and they did a great job together. I think Aaron ran most of the way. The mini Sun Run is not officially timed but they crossed the finish line in just over 20 minutes.



I unfortunately missed Aaron and Shelby's race as I was confused about where the race ended, luckily my parents were there to take some pictures.

At the official Run , Mike and my Dad ran in our family and also a bunch of people in our church formed a Sun Run team. Our team finished 7th in it's category which isn't too bad. I finished in 51:56, which isn't a great time for me, but I thought I did OK. Finishing 1 second ahead of my brother made it all that much sweeter though.
There's always next year.

Self-explanitory?

Coaster fun!

Our sister-in-law Sara over in Japan blogged about her roller coaster adventures at Fujiku Highland with some video by Jamie of their adventures. This reminded me of the video I took of the Mindbender roller coaster at West Edmonton Mall almost 4 years ago.

Hold on!

Easter in the Okanagan

We ventured up to Westbank for the Easter weekend to celebrate Shelby's grandpa's (Papa) 75th birthday. Shelby's parents came over from the island and we headed up to the Okanagan on Good Friday. The weather was great every day expect on Monday, but we were heading home that day, so it didn't matter. Shelby and her dad were sick most of the weekend, so it wasn't as enjoyable for them.
During the day on Saturday I took the kids to the park which they enjoyed.









We didn't have Aaron's bathing suit with us, but he still wanted to test out the water.

On Saturday night we headed up to the Lost Moose which overlooks Penticton to have dinner for Papa. Most of Shelby's moms side of the family was there as well.
There were a few things to keep the kids entertained while we waited for dinner.







Here is a self portrait shot of me and the Penticton city lights below.

After dinner we headed to Papa and Grandma's house for some cake.



It was a late night and we didn't get home till 10:30.
The kids slept on the way back to Westbank.



Even with a late night it didn't stop the kids from waking up at 6:30. Since it was Easter morning they had some new Easter presents to play with, including a new Thomas musical caboose and some tracks and some play cars. Then they went outside to look for some Easter eggs and this year Kyle was able to join in on the hunt.



Since Shelby and her dad were sick and Shelby's mom was cooking Easter dinner, I took the boys out. We went on an adventure trying to kind a geocache in the area. It's a long story, but part of the walk/hike included me trying to find a bathroom.



And then taking a short cut up a trail only to get attacked by thistles or was it cactus. Ouch!

This picture was taken after the cacti incident, I think Kyle had enough at this point.
(Up too early?)



Then we headed to Kelowna because Aaron wanted to see the Ogopogo again!?




In the evening we had a nice Easter dinner with some family. There was lots of food to go around and the food was delicious.(Thanks to Pat and Shelby and Grandma's Waldorf salad).


(You like my cheesy grin?)

Monday we packed up and headed back to Langley.

That was Easter 2007 for us.

Kyle is 2!

Well our little Kyle turned 2 today. We had a little family get together yesterday. Shelby made a nice half ice cream half vanilla cake cake, if that makes sense. It was good good but Kyle does not like cake anymore so we got to enjoy it while he enjoyed goldfish crackers instead.




Kyle got some cool presents including a ride-on plane and a new tricycle






and some new clothes from Auntie and Unc Unc all the way from Japan




and Kyle has his very own backpack which Aaron picked out for him




Here is the latest family pic from yesterday,
but all the little/big boys look different now
that we all got our $5 haircuts today.




Here is a video from today which includes Aaron singing
Happy Birthday to Kyle and Kyle's Birthday Star as seen on CBC today.




We head up to the Okanangan for Easter weekend so
I'll try to update this blog next week from our trip up there.

Aaron's turns 4!

After many days counting down Aaron finally turned 4 last week.
Apparently now he is a 'big boy'
So we tell him big boys don't heat up their milk anymore and big boys don't throw temper tantrums. Seems in reality when you turn 4 you are not automatically a big boy.

On his birthday we had our family over and Shelby cooked a nice meal, but Aaron and Kyle got a surprise from Bump Bump Fries and that was a present in itself. After dinner there were vanilla cupcakes for cake. Aaron then got to open some of his presents including some all the way from Japan thanks to Auntie and Unc Unc.






Hmm icing!





Construction set!






Thomas the train!





Then last Saturday we had a joint birthday party for Aaron and Kyle at my parents farm, as Kyle's birthday is coming up really soon.


Unfortunately we could not stop the endless rain, but the farm party was still on!
I think the only people that noticed the rain were the parents.








There were 10 kids invited to the party but only 8 could come because of sickness going around.





Here are some pictures from the farm party.






The Aaron-sized tractor





Rain, what rain?






Kyle trying to hit the pinata!





Candy!






Searching for balls in the hay





The rain soaked tractor ride (thanks Jason)



The birthday kids




Getting a closer look



Looks who's the only one not eating cake...goldfish are better!



Despite the rain I think a good time was had by all, welcome to 4 Aaron qnd it's still a lot of sleeps till you turn 5!

Belly Button party

So today I had a few friends over with their kids. It just so happens that all of those kids were boys except for one 18 mos old girl. At one point during the morning one of my friends looks into the the sunroom to see a few boys jumping up and down with their shirts off. We thought it was funny but then they decided to come out and run around the house yelling Belly Button Party. We thought this was quite creative for a 6,4 and two 3 year olds to come up with. However by the end of the time here it escalated to them all of a sudden running around in just their underwear and socks and one even took it a step further. We had some funny moments but we thought we should probably shut the party down when they were just in their whitey tighties!

Growing Up

The moment has come for the change table to vacate the room. The crib and rocking chair are next to go. Yes, Kyle is in a big boy bed! We just put it in the room today and showed him that this was where he was going to sleep now. I thought we were going to have to try this a few times but as soon as he had his soother and special blankie he was fine. So he is now napping for the very first time in his new bed. I am quite excited to be getting rid of all the baby "stuff" but there is something a little sad about it all too. I'm sure the day the crib rolls out will be a day of reflecting for me. My babies are slowly growing up. Before I know it they will be out of the house...but I guess for now I should just hope that Kyle will again want to sleep in his big boy bed tonight.

The Kiddos

We'll try to post more pics of the kids on our blog instead of email, we'll see how this goes.
In 2 weeks there is a birthday party for Aaron and Kyle, so I am sure there will be more pictures to post then.

Here are some of the recent ones.

No more dots!

My sensor on my Nikon had a dust spot for the longest time, on most pictures you didn't notice it. I thought I would try cleaning the sensor myself but I didn't have the right materials and I ended up making this worse. Anyway I didn't have time to properly clean it before our Mexico trip and a lot of pictures were plagued by the evil dots. After our trip I went to different camera stores to get my camera cleaned. After a few stops I ended up at the Nikon Canada office in Richmond and I get a free sensor for my first cleaning...if only I had done this before my trip...a lesson learned.
Now we need better weather to go out and take more pictures. This one is from the recent snow we had and a rare moment of sunshine

How many countries can you type in 10 minutes?

I tried this the other day and got 75, I would have had 78 had I known hown to spell 3 countries right. Basically you type in the country name correctly and it adds it to the list.
See how you do
http://andys.org.uk/countryquiz

no cheating:-)

Hit the Cow!

One of the memorable stories from our recent Mexico trip was when Ray and I(Eric) were looking after the kids in the hotel room. We were in the other room when we heard Madi crying so we went in to see Madi there and Aaron sheepishly looking on. Ray asked Madi why she was crying and she said 'Aaron hit me!', so we inquired to Aaron as to why he hit Madi, and he replied 'Because she was a cow!'. That is kind of funny in itself. Madi was indeed pretending to be a cow and Aaron hit the cow. We had quite a chuckle about this. We are not sure why Aaron felt that cows need to be hit, maybe it was something he learned on the farm. Anyway it was quite a humorous moment that is sure to be brought up again.

The '500' put to use

Thanks to Jamie and Sara I got a waterproof bag for my Canon point and shoot camera. The bag model number is WP-500, so it was affecionately called the '500' We took this with us to Puerto Vallarta and had fun trying to take interesting pictures and also some video. This video is me experimenting going above and below water. I look forward to using this more in the summer.

What Kind of Intelligence Do You Have?

I(Eric) did a quick survey to figure out my type of intelligence, I think I am a bit of every thing but this is what the computer came up with, what is your intelligence type?

Your Dominant Intelligence is Logical-Mathematical Intelligence

You are great at finding patterns and relationships between things. Always curious about how things work, you love to set up experiments. You need for the world to make sense - and are good at making sense of it. You have a head for numbers and math ... and you can solve almost any logic puzzle. You would make a great scientist, engineer, computer programmer, researcher, accountant, or mathematician.

What Kind of Intelligence Do You Have?

The 2006 DVD is finished!

I finally finished the 2006 Family DVD. Seems every year it takes longer to do. I must have spent at least 80 hours working on "The Project". It comes lose to a running time of 2.5 hours. Watching the whole thing in one sitting would definitely be Aaron and Kyle overload, but we know we have a few hard core fans out there, ok they happen to be family too:-)
I am just glad it's done for another year.
Eric

Coolness

I was thinking today about how 10 years makes a difference. Aaron got a bike last weekend for our early Christmas. Today he wanted to learn how to ride it. So we got him all dressed up to go out, including his new helmet, knee pads and elbow pads. He lasted about 5 mins "learning" how to pedal. Really I just crouched down behind him and peddled for him. He thought it was just too hard so he gave up for the day. But after this I decided we would go for a walk since we were all already bundled up. This is where the 10 years comes in. Aaron thought it would be pretty cool if he could go for a walk with all his safety equipment on too. I convinced him that this stuff was for biking but inside I couldn't help laugh. If he was just 10 years older he would have thought wearing all that equipment was very uncool. So now I am thinking about the other things that seem cool to a 3 year old. How about loud T shirts or shoes that scream "Thomas" or "Dora". Hanging out with grandparents. Wearing a floaty body suit to go swimming or using an inflatable crab. Well at least as parents we are still "cool" to them! I'm sure it will be less than 10 years before that changes.

msdewey.com

Jason sent me the link to
msdewey.com

The Ms Dewey character will comment on your searches, some of them can be funny like if you search 'birth control'.

Aaron the latest South Park character

aaron-south park
Originally uploaded by eschurch.

Almost there!!

Frog Ahhhh

Ok so I go downstairs tonight to do some laundry and a scene right out of a horror story happens. I hear this really strange noise at the back door. My husband is out, I've just put the kids to bed....so I quickly lock the door just in case some wacko is trying to get in. Then I race to the front door and lock it too. Now it's time to call the dog, the guard dog, the yappy little american cocker spaniel! So after listening to the noise for a bit it stopped. I thought since the dog was here it was safe to open the back door now. Did I mention it's still daylight out. Yep, no one there, or at the front door or anywhere else for that matter but when I looked around the laundry room a little more all of a sudden something startles me. It's a frog, or toad I don't really know, I just didn't want it on me. So my mission for the next hour was trying to catch this darn frog without it getting anywhere near me. I tried to catch it where I originally found it but then it hopped across the room and right under my washing machine. I tried everything, the dustbuster, a long bendy stick, banging the washer, the flashlight, nothing worked so I decided maybe I would leave it for a bit...so it didn't think I was there anymore. So about 20 mins later I go back downstairs and check around the washing machine again and nothing. So I head down the hall to the bathroom to turn off the light I left on and what is sitting peacefully by the open bathroom door but the darn frog. This time I was able to corner it in the closet. It was stealth, hiding under the vacuum hose, and the closet doors but I would prevail. I did lose it for a couple of minutes I will admit only to find it at the bottom of my kids sand pail I had so cleverly put on its side to entice the frog in. Then I covered the top and off to the back yard the darn frog went to freedom. Now I can't help wondering if it was really just one frog!