Playing in the leaves!

We took these pictures a couple of weekends ago when the weather was a little warmer and when Daddy was home (Todd has been travelling a lot for work over the last about 2.5 months with a return date of November 26th with just two days home in between), but my cameras battery was dead when I went to upload them right away, and well because I have been a busy working single mom I have not had the chance to sit down and download them. So I took the opportunity today! :)

We miss you Daddy!

Halloween is tomorrow night, and my beautiful little girl is going to be a firefighter (completely her choice!). At dancing yesterday morning the girls were allowed to wear their costumes, well all the little girls (and I mean all) were either little princess or fairies, there was one little witch but she also had a tutu! and then there was my little firefighter! lol.

Are they not all adorable?! :)

Fun with editing!

I found this cool little online photo editing tool that makes your photo's have that vintagy feel! So I just took a couple of family photo's and re-created them! Enjoy :) 

Happy Thanksgiving 2011!

We gobbled gobbled until we wobbled wobbled on Sunday! We went to Bonnie and Bills house for dinner, and spent a lot of the time outside since it ended up being a gorgeous long weekend. 

We pulled numbers for secret Santa this year. I came up with a game that will allow opening our gift cards to take longer than 20 seconds, so I am hoping that it turns out fun for everyone on Christmas day! I know it is only the middle of October, how can we be thinking about Christmas when Halloween has not even arrived yet? 

Anyway now onto some Thanksgiving day pictures...

Do you notice Loralai's fancy hat? She made it at daycare, I thought she did such an awesome job! 

We then decided to take some fun new family photo's on Bonnie and Bills beautiful backyard grass! 

Hope everyone enjoyed their Thanksgiving as much as we did! 

Introducing...

Tara Betta Fish Baker! 

(I apologize for the gross looking chalk board, but it Loralai was late going to bed, and I wanted to take the picture quickly, so I did not wait for the board to dry before I wrote on it)

On Thursday, Loralai, Grandma, and I had gone out for a Sushi dinner with our Friends Maggie and Drake; 

I had been thinking for a while that I would really like to get Loralai a fish, and since Daddy is away (working away from home for several weeks now :(  thought that it would be fun to add in another member of the family! So we went to a local fish store, and snatched up a beautiful blue and purple Betta fish, you cannot tell from the photo but she sure is pretty! I asked Loralai what she wanted to name her new pet, and after thinking long and hard, she came up with Tara (not exactly sure where she got that name from, but it works)!  We got the tank, food, etc. on the Thursday, but we went out the next day to a local Petsmart and got some accessories for Tara, you can certainly tell who picked them out! ;)

This next picture was taken a couple of weeks ago, but it was too cute not to share!

Loralai with her friend Drake at the park. Just look at how she is looking at him, boy oh boy am I in trouble when she is a teenager! :)

Welcome Fall...

we are glad you are here!

It had started to get chilly, but we were lucky to get a gorgeous long Thanksgiving weekend and we got to take back out our shorts and sandals again. 

Today after Loralai's dance class, Mindy, Loralai, Todd, and I, went to Chappell Farms for a little pumpkin patch fun. We did not actually go into the farm on today's adventure, but Loralai did not notice at all as she ran around in the pumpkins, chased a rabbit, and looked at the baby chickens and goats. We got a perfect pumpkin today, but we will wait until a little closer to Halloween to paint it. 

We will be going to Rounds Ranch Farm in a couple of weeks to partake in all the pumpkin patch activities :)

Dance

"Dance like no one is watching" is one of my favourite quotes because if someone can dance without the risk of feeling embarrassment, it can be so freeing! 

But without further ado Loralai started her first dance class on September 17th! Now she has taken pre-dance classes before at Holly Community Centre that lasted for a 9 week period, but now she has started with an actual dance studio (Borden Dance), that will last for an entire dance season and end with a recital! The class lasts for 45 minutes, compared to 30 minutes with the community centre. Loralai has been taking this class for 3 weeks today and she loves it! She is so excited to go, and practices throughout the week! 

Ms. Susan Loralai's dance instructor is very nice but disciplined, she does not tolerate crying or whining in class; by no means is she mean to them, she has to keep 10 3-4 year old's attention and keep chaos from occurring, so you have to be structured! Ms. Susan has a great lesson plan, and she keeps every dance and songs age appropriate (funny little bunny, rock a by baby, the Wiggles monkey dance, etc), and the girls have fun! 

I am so proud of my little dancer because she listens very well, and has great coordination! 

Now I have to apologize because I did have the camera ready, but I did not grab it on my way out :( so all the photo's were taken with my cell phone. 

The parents were allowed to watch the first two classes, this is so that the girls can get adjusted to the new environment, etc. (although Loralai jumped right in with both feet and had no problems!) but this morning was week 3, and the parents had to wait outside the room, so now I have to wait until they allow a parents viewing day, but I cannot wait to see the difference from the first two classes!  

First Dentist Appointment!

So Loralai had her very first dentist appointment on Thursday September 1st at 2pm; and man oh man, I have to say that she was amazing beyond my wildest expectations. The hygienist Crystal was also fantastic with Loralai! She gave her sunglasses to protect her eyes from the brightness of the light, Crystal let Loralai try out each tool before she used it in her mouth, she asked her questions, and let her know what she was going to do next! 

So the dentist Dr. Lea came by after Crystal had finished cleaning her teeth. Dr. Lea counted her teeth and just took a general look around at everything. Loralai's teeth are great, but we did find out that she has a slight tongue tie. The dentist asked if she had any pronunciation problems or a lisp, and she does not at all...so he said that because it is slight, to just keep an eye on it, but that it will likely not result in anything. 

Here is a little video of the appointment...enjoy! 

30 second (girly, unconventional) superhero cape!

Loralai had asked me to make her a superhero cape, so we went to the sewing/craft room to see what we could dig up. Now you know the attention span of a 3 year old is limited, so I knew that I did not have time to whip up a template and sew one together, so my brain started turning. I am sure this has been done before, but I honestly follow a lot of craft diy blogs, and I have not seen it myself yet. 

Instructions: I took a pretty pillowcase, and some self adhesive Velcro, and in about 30 seconds, Loralai was off protecting the city! :) 

So I know that it the pattern is a little unconventional for a superhero cape, but it sure is cute! Plus (at least) for now, Loralai does not care very much about the fact that it is not a traditional superhero cape. But then again maybe she can be the superhero of uniqueness, while also saving the world of course! 

Singing Sunday!

So I know that I have missed two Fridays of blogging! Honestly, I have great intentions, and then life sort of  sneaks up and gets in the way. But anyway, here is what we have been up to:

 On August 22nd, Great Grandma Eva turned 98; she is exactly 70 years and 2 days older then me, which if you haven't yet made the quick calculation, I was 28 on August 24th. I am so excited that Loralai has been able to create a relationship with her Great Grandma, I mean how many people have grandma's or great grandma's 98 years old and still kicking strong? We are certainly lucky :)

Happy 98th Birthday Grandma! We love you! 

Now why this post is called singing Sunday is because Loralai likes to go down to Daddy's studio, and pretend she is recording songs! We are eventually going to record her and make her own little CD, but we will do that when she finally signs songs the whole way through, without getting distracted or bored with her song selection :)

So daughter like father, Loralai loves to go into the basement with Daddy and pretend to record a song, and help Daddy mix! It is adorable :)

Our busy fun week!

So we had such a fun Mommy and Loralai week, as Daddy was either working or taking some training courses during the evening this week. So we took advantage of the girl time by going to the beach, Wonderland, and to the cottage with some good friends. 

On Tuesday, we met up with our friends Maggie and Drake at a local beach that had a great park. We ended up spending several hours together, and the kids had so much fun, and we had some great Mommy time too! :) I think the highlight of the evening was when we went to feed a family of ducks, as always the seagulls engulfed us within 5 minutes, so when we went back to the blanket, the family of ducks came running full speed towards us, and honestly I wish I had a video camera, it was so funny to watch 6 baby ducks and there mom and dad waddling full speed towards us. Here are a few pictures that I took with my phone of the kids just enjoying the weather, and each others company. 

On Thursday we decided to meet up with my manager and her daughter Chloe who is also three. They go to Wonderland every Thursday, and we have seasons passes, so I decided that it makes sense and would be so much fun to allow the girls to develop their friendship. We ended up closing down Wonderland, we stayed there until 10pm, so it was way passed Loralai's bedtime, but so worth it, both girls had such a great time.  Here is the picture of them enjoying their sugar filled lollipops! :)

Then last night Loralai and I went up to our friends Maggie and Drake's family cottage. We went kayaking, swimming, danced, ate, and just overall had such a fun evening. Then this morning we got up made French toast, went swimming and kayaking again, and then Loralai and I headed back home to see Daddy, since we had not seen him for most of the week. Again, I forgot to bring my camera :( honestly I packed it up, but left it on the mantel err...so I did not take any pictures other than this one this morning with my phone. It was so beautiful and calming to be up at the cottage, it was just what Mommy needed. 

Hope your week was just as fun too!