Living the life and blowing the nose

We’ve been rather busy lately and - woo hoo - I think I may have finally emerged from the fog of my headache-induced wintersleep. I started playing soccer again and both Effie and Fergus are really taking to the game like never before as well. Eff enjoys drills that involve lots of running and dribbling and Ferg is really keen on tackling, booting the ball really hard and making “key saves”, judo style.

Key goal!


Key shot!


Key save!


Key fans!


Key cuddles!


Ferg’s juggling skillz and self-filmed dribbling:


We all went and saw Grease last weekend (massively exciting photo of empty set below):


Oooh, Monopoly has recently been excavated from the crawl space. I love this game and the kids are loving it too ever since playing some wacky Canadian version up at MattSamandNoah’s. The only problem is that the games last so long forcing us to keep the board out over a long period of time. This really cuts into our nightly tidying/ cleaning policy (cue laugh track).




And today, Gillian and Effie found Original 6 NHL Monopoly at a garage sale!?!


The garden grows...




We've continued with a bit of cycling but until Gillian gets her new bike (old one stolen), it's a bit difficult to go on family rides...


The clubhouse gained a few more bits last weekend:


Effie's popsicle stick version of a fort:


The caterpillars are now in the chrysalis stage:


But one eager beaver has already butterflied up:


Bye bye hotdog-mustard-relish...


But most important of all... I’ve been wondering a lot lately why people have boxes of kleenex in the back of their vehicles, up by the window. Perhaps others have wondered the same thing!?!?! I mean, come on people, is that box o' nose-blowers really all that accessible? The reason this bothers me so much is that I recently realized I go through a lot of tissues – I’m constantly blowing my nose! Easy access to kleenex is something that is always on my mind. In fact, counting the office, the house and various vehicles, I currently have no fewer than 14 boxes of kleenex on the go. Fascinating stuff!

Happy Mother's Day Mum!

I am from a parking meter, Swiss Chalet, and Asti Spumante.
I am from tea with lots of milk and the Aqua Gum tree, a huge branch of which we broke once and were oblivious enough to think no one would notice!
I am from forsythia and cottonwood and romneya coulteri, from Sammy and Sarah and Josh, and Bridie who loved pinball machines.
I am from "family business" and family money, from Kathryns, a Frederic, and an RJK.
I am from hot tempers and "I'm Proud of You" medals, from Johnny Horton, Dot Rigney brownies, making batik fabric and peach freezer jam.
I am from lies and truth, from finding love, and believing in yourself so hard the rest of the world just falls away.
I am from Don Mills, Muskoka, and beach accesses to the Pacific Ocean, from creme brulee you would eat off the floor, ginger snaps (made with chicken fat not butter), and cheese dreams broiled on a quiet night.
I am from you reading stories for so long before bed that YOUR head bobbed in sleep, from milk all over the table when I dumped the pitcher to see who made it.
I am from the drawer of the What Not (filled with photos of everyone but me), from giant cakes iced with sailboats and footballs, and from the courage to life your life differently.

I love you mum. Thank you for everything. Thank you for me. And thank you for believing in me.
~tiki

Clubhouse

Raphael (guy from cabin down below) and kids started building a fort type thingy this weekend. Darn annoying that Raphael: poor Gillian's been pouring over tree house building books for at least 5 years trying to come up with the right design, etc. then along he comes with an idea and the next day its all digging and sawing and hammering...

The week past

Effie's new art class "whimsical faces and far away places" is pretty darn cool. Some of her recent drawings/ mixed media:



Ferg hangs out at the beach during art class. Not a bad gig:



Effie now has her own room (she was ready for it six months ago):


It received a lot of vacuuming the first couple of days...


Today, Fergus decided to ride a two wheeler for the first time:



Too cocky for one's first day? (short clip)

A third of the way through 2010

Hockey, Flags and Crazy Chicks

Game on

I think it has been well documented here that Fergus is very rarely still. He moves about when he sleeps and when he eats, he runs most of the time instead of walking and usually he kung fus his way from living room to kitchen. The exception is when he is watching a movie, playing a video game or working in Club Penguin, Webkinz, etc on the computer, as then he is generally in one place (also: on the potty... but that’s a subject for a separate post!).

His “screen time” (hate that term) kinda grounds him/ gives him time to recharge. Though we guide him of course, he mainly figures out for himself when he needs to do what. Just like how our kids will consume candy and cereal one day and plates of fruit and veg the next, they flip from sedentary to active not necessarily on a daily basis but as their bodies inform them over the course of a longer period of time.

So I suppose, given their erratic schedules, our kids fall in the category of 88% of children and youth who are not meeting Canada’s guidelines of 90 minutes of physical activity a day. This stat comes from an Active Healthy Kids report released today - predictably labelled a Report Card on Physical Activity - in which they give Screen Time an “F”. The report indicates that Canadian youth are accumulating 6 to 7 hours of screen time per day and that high screen time is associated with reduced academic achievement and high-risk behaviours such as smoking, drinking and sexual intercourse!?!!?!?!?!

The report goes on to list a number of ways to rectify the “screen time problem” including having parents implement household rules and removing TVs and computers from a children’s bedroom. The last one is especially funny since Effie finally got her own room just this past week... a room that comes with a tv and a computer.

Screen Time is but one of twenty key areas that received crappy marks in the report. For example, schools are reprimanded for not actually implementing their physical activity policies and the federal government gets a failing mark for an inadequate level of financial investment. But of course, what made the news headlines? Screen time and video gaming in particular!

I’m happy to say that I enjoy Fergus’ love of video games, though he’s not exactly passionate about it (yet). Interestingly, I could say the same thing about his enjoyment of soccer, rollerblading, hide-n-seek, sawing trees... Ferg has been building his own levels in Smash Brothers lately. It’s really cool to see him doing this and although he seems far more interested in the making than in the playing, his creativity produces some interesting and challenging courses. He gained some level-building experience in Little Big Planet, back before Mitchel and KJ moved to silicone valley and of course now he’s saving up for the appropriate LBP supporting gaming system (ps3). Meanwhile, he played his first game of Halo recently up at MattSamandNoah’s!

Anyway, I’m not really trying to defend our activities so much as to highlight how, once again, blanket statements like “limit screen time” get fed to society as the gospel truth. Although, I guess if you sit at a desk all day you do need some rules to help guide you... barump-pump!

All this is just an excuse to link to some more positive commentary on gaming from Kelli. Yeah, computers and gaming sure screwed her family up! Clicky Clicky.

Condimently Named Larvae

It’s caterpillar season again. This year we hope to have a better butterfly to death-by-starving ratio (though it was splendid to see “Ketchup”, at least, take flight last spring). The kiddos have gone as far as to name all of them and they swear that they can somehow spot the difference between one ugly one inch caterpillar and the one next to it (names include: Mustard, Relish, Tiny, Tiny II, Smart, Mousey, Bugsy...).

Our little beasts are picky eaters and require a diet of either comfrey or thistle. However, my various thistle eradication projects have served the property well (at the expense of the caterpillar) since we could find but one measly plant on our walk last week.

Our search for thistles produced this quote-o-the-week from Fergus:
“Dad, don’t worry, we’re not lost. I’ve been on this trail before with Finn. I know it like the back of my head.”

Terrarium:


Stick, caterpillar, poo:

BBQ'd Bread

When your oven blows... eat more salad! That or start testing out how much the bbq can handle.

Gillian and Ferg monitoring the temperature for the bread:


Not bad looking (great tasting though!) but some more temperature testing is required.

In the year 2346...

...the aliens will wonder what's with all these purposefully placed tree branches all over the place.
Yet another "fort" has popped up...

Ferg's sticky note art

Heart Compass:


(untitled):


Mommy and Me:

Darling, it's all for you...

For the past few months Fergus has held onto the desire to one day be the backup goaltender for his favourite team, the Phoenix Coyotes. He’d be the guy on the bench with the hat on.

The other night he came to me with another idea (perhaps his job when the NHL is not in season): “Dad, when I grow up I’m going to be just like you except I’m going to work at a store and be the guy who helps people find the right aisles.” In addition, he informed me that - as a family member - I would have the privilege of going into the back of the store with him to check out all the boxes and stuff.

Fergus is really working hard on grasping this whole “working for a living” concept. He seems fascinated with why people have to go to work and that you can choose what you do in life. During our conversation the other night he wanted to know all about every job I had ever had and then asked me if I had ever been fired. He seemed a bit surprised and upset to hear me say that I had not, so he moved on to asking me if I had ever screwed up.

Of course I told him I had done so, many times, and proceeded to inform him about the summer I worked for the forest service fire protection office. I was up in a helicopter picking sample cones off trees (for some reason!) when we spotted some smoke coming from the base of a group of trees. I was asked to mark the tree with a roll of paper so that the suppression crew could more easily locate the site later on. So I chucked the roll out the window. As we flew away the pilot looked back at the tree and then informed me that we should swing around and do it again… and “this time let the roll unfurl!”

Fergus and I laughed and laughed (of course, for his purposes, I embellished things a little by saying it was toilet paper as opposed to cash register tape).

For now, Ferg is readying for his future in the Ice Capades...

Strawberries

Effie loves the strawberries… however, she is forever incapable of simply washing and then eating them like the rest of us. Instead, she puts each berry through a complicated ritual involving de-stemming, dicing and some strange macerating process while utilizing (possible hyperbole alert!) 1 sieve, 17 bowls, 3 knifes, 4 cutting boards and 8 drying towels. This leaves everything in the kitchen stained and me grumpy. I love her enthusiasm but, you know, self expression can be so darn messy!?! Then, the other night, she surprised everyone with a batch of meticulously prepared chocolate dipped smothered strawberries! In an instant she was once again our hero (though she did offer that the callebaut Belgian white chocolate she was forced to use was not quite up to snuff).

Bizaroo Game

And just like the NHL, this sport appears to allow fighting! Best quote: "Pause game, goalie has to bend stick":

Three Ski Vacation Videos

Trip up to Apex & sledding


First ski day


Second ski day

Downloading Effie's camera

From the backseat on the ride home from the Okanagan:









Effie's Spinach: