EXTRA EXTRA READ ALL ABOUT IT

I wrote my attention grabbing blog title in all caps to disguise the fact that I have again left blogging for too long and have many subjects to cover.

But now I have undermined my own genius with excessive explanation.

NEWS:

Ryan is now an Apple employee. A few hours a week he will providing expert service at the Apple Store in Southgate so if anyone needs advice on how to spend lots of money, he will be available to help you along the way.

I've had a few fun nights out with Emily. We've decided that instead of indulging in sweets, we will start walking and talking. I think it will be beautiful.

The deck is done! Please stay tuned for a blog post devoted to the wonderful work of TWP Carpentry.

Ryan attended an Eskimos game with his Dad, Rob, Broc and friends.

I ran my first Malmo Parents Meeting at my house and it was not as scary as I imagined it to be.

We worried a bit about Mom's health this past little while, but she has pulled through with nary a word of complaint.

I've been lucky to play the piano for Natalie a little bit, as she takes voice lessons. She has a great talent!

Ryan and I got to attend our first Oiler's game with our shared season's tickets.
We sat in the true fans section, a.k.a. the nosebleeds.
But it was a great time....despite the loss.
At least they gave us two goals to cheer about, yay!

The view from nearly as far away as you can get from the ice!

Every time I take Maddie to school, I drive by this "art," but have never gotten close
to it until we took the LRT home from the game. I remember watching them build it thinking, "What the heck is that going to be....?!"
So, now I have touched the giant disembodied feet. I have truly lived.

Maddie is getting quite good at the interwebs. It's a little scary actually.

While the boys were putting the finishing touches on the deck one Saturday, we braved the cool weather for a little while to show our support, then promptly headed inside.

Cold weather is very tough on a girl who likes to wear dresses for every occasion.
Tyler was so cute, trying to copy what Maddie was doing.

We still had fun inside though.

Claire loves to lay and scoot on the floor. :)

One morning I woke up to this and it made me happy.

I swear she is slowly winning this cat's affections.

Claire is doing so well at riding! I know I have posted a million pictures of her like this, but it's great to have something that she enjoys and that we can see measurable progress in!

After that first blast of snow, we've been enjoying lovely days this past week. I'm trying hard to forget that it is November and that weather can change very quickly!

Two random Madeline quotes:

Mom, does the sun have a mustache and wings?

Mom, I love your feelings.

Forgive me, for I have sinned...

...it's been 16 days since my last blog. I will attempt to condense our activities, but I think we all know that it will still be too long.

Claire had a special Read-In week at school. They focused on literacy and I got to read her favourite books to the class during circle time one morning. It was fun to see her interact with her friends. We had our first IPP meeting and everything's looking very positive. She's so happy at school!

Claire's been doing great at riding. Yesterday I forgot her neck brace at home, and so I wasn't sure how she would do, but she rode the whole time and held her head up high. I wonder if we'll need to use it as much anymore!

Madeline has also been busy at school. She continues her quest to share with others and not stick out her tongue at everyone. I got to go with her on her Fall Nature Walk.

She loves nature?

I got a nice girl's night out with Kathy. We should do that more often! I've been busy with transcriptions for the university and am now helping with a couple of papers based on one of the projects. It's so exciting! Malmo Preschool stuff is also keeping me occupied.

Ryan's been busy with Young Mens and school. He's also been applying for part time jobs to subsidize our income for a little while. We've got our fingers crossed for one right now. He also helped Olivia and Rob move into their new place in Edmonton! We're glad to have them close!

Meet Ryan's new best friend.

I think M has had just as much fun with the box.

On Thanksgiving Monday we had some family pictures done. We've only got a sneak peek so far but here it is.

We had a great holiday at Mom and Dad's, as usual.

The traditional football game was played and for the first time, did not end in a tie!

Ye olde teame piktures

Madeline and I chose to languidly cheer for the teams after exploring the parks.

Love this picture

Mom. Trying to make us all fat with her pie-y goodness.

This is how Miss Claire spent most of the afternoon. What a sweetheart. :)

We were lucky to have the Jensens come and stay with us for a few days.

While Claire was at school we spent a cool morning at the park.

Eva is such a good story teller!

Nerds squared.

Claire enjoyed having our friends over.

We were also lucky to go see the Wiggles for the first time! Here's my advocacy story. I called about tickets and discovered that wheelchair accessible tickets were 4 times as much as the least expensive ones, since they were closer. Based on proximity alone, this makes sense. But since we have no choice as to where to sit, this seemed unfair to me. After explaining the situation to the proper decision makers, they sold us the tickets for the cheaper price. Huzzah.

I was super impressed with those Wiggles. They were climbing all over the place. Especially Captain Feathersword. Who knew he was such a gymnast?! It makes his annoyingness much more bearable. Murray couldn't make it, so we had to make do with some guy named Ringo. At least he had the accent to go along with that red shirt!

The cool stage set-up.

A family picture, thanks to Ryan's long arms.

This was Maddie's reaction to seeing Dorothy the Dinosaur....awesome.

Claire loved it all - the lights, the music, the atmosphere.
It's very gratifying to watch her enjoy herself.

Can you tell we're having fun?!

Work on the deck is still coming along...we've enjoyed playing with the Patricks while the boys work, but maybe it's been too distractingly fun!

This is what we call "going to the moon."

I can't tell who's having more fun...

I shall my best to keep up with the blog to avoid these long-ish posts. But we all know that's a bunch of hooey.

Have a nice trip, see you next fall

We've been busy as usual. Here's an update:

This past week the girls and I have been going to Claire's school a bit early to participate in the Grace Martin Gallop. We were actually on the news for a couple of seconds. You can see the video here (go to about 18:05 to view the Good News segment).

Claire has been doing so well at riding. She's happier each class and really connects with her horse, Babe. It's been very fun to watch her.

Maddie and I on a lovely fall day, waiting for the riders to come outside.

Look at those beautiful leaves!

Claire sitting up so tall, enjoying the fall air.

We had a fun Conference weekend. We had lots of visitors. Rob and Kyle came over to "jam" on
Rock Band - one of our favourite activities. Even Claire got into the spirit with her rocker hair.

Kyle brought a very cool drum that everyone wanted to try.

The Thompsons came for a weekend visit and we had lots of fun.
We spent the morning at the museum for the CNIB Sensory Safari.
Every year they put on an exhibit for kids with visual impairments and they're able to touch and explore furs and stuffed birds and skeletons and bugs.

The kids raring to go at the museum.

Claire loved exploring the furs and feathers and textures.

The kids loved the bear. A nice man offered to take a picture with us all.

The kids enjoyed learning about toads, stingrays, lizards and more creatures.

"The bug guy" or "The guy with the hair" teaching the kids about stick bugs. I was even brave enough to touch the huge spider this time.....*shudder*.


We were lucky to be able to explore the rest of the museum as well.
There was a great interactive exhibit about The Wizard of Oz.
Here's our own group of characters.
Scarecrow (Brigham), Dorothy (Madeline), Lion (Ben) and Tin Man (Claire)
Liam was busy being a munchkin. :)

Claire and I, soaking in all the historical gravity of munchkin land.

After the museum we spent the rest of the day outside, kids playing,
guys decking around, ladies talking. It was lovely.

Under the trampoline was the fun place to hang out, shady and cool.

Tyler was king of the sandbox.

Madeline, Ben and Brigham on the teeter totter.

Kate, Em and I admiring our husbands' handiwork on the deck.

The manly men, Jason, Trevor and Ryan.

The parents got a nice night out for dinner and browsing around a bookstore
and then watched a weird movie. Alice in Wonderland. Odd.

Sunday brought our traditional crepe breakfast and trying to watch Conference. However, our couch is really comfy. And therefore, view the aftermath of watching at home.

Ryan's been very busy with school and YM's. They visited a Buddhist temple for an activity which was very interesting.

Madeline loves inheriting Claire's hand-me-downs. I wonder how long that will last? At any rate, she was trying on a "new" pair of shoes the other day that had loops for the straps to go through. She called me over and said, "Can you help me? I don't know how to do up the seatbelts on these." So cute.

More updates to come on the deck!