A Helping Hand

I recently re-discovered this video that was taken during the summer that I wanted to share with you.

We were on holidays and in the mornings, Caleb and Andrew were running around the hotel room. I wondered, how does Caleb get out of his crib in the morning? One day, I woke up early to solve this mystery.

I couldn't believe my eyes!

Weekend of Discovery

We had another wonderful weekend of discovery with the boys. Andrew was able to lift himself up with a pulley system; he thought he was so strong. Next the boys saw the dinosaur exhibit; they skelatons were so, so big. The next exhibit was a real live space craft. It was left here by aliens....can you believe it. Finally, onto the train remote controls...choo, choo! Needless to say, the parents were exhausted by the end of the day.

Espaňol

Andrew has a Spanish recital next week. We need to practice, practice and practice.

I have no idea what he is saying. He could be planning a revolution and reciting the teachings of Geronimo Stilton for all I know!!!

Homework

Our son really enjoys school; really he does. Andrew is at a stage where he is beginning to read. Learning new words really excites him. His favorite books, the Geronimo Stilton series. His classmate Claudia introduced him to these books. They are quite well written, even my husband and I enjoy reading the adventures of Geronimo, his sister Thea, cousin Trap and, his nephew Benjamin.

Caleb just loves Dora and her gang. He can now name all the characters. With a little prompting, Caleb can even say a few spanish words (not that he understands them). It is fun to watch Caleb as he interacts with the Dora DVD as she says "jump". Caleb will follow the commands and jump, or raise his hands, or clap, or other things she is telling him to do. We think Caleb has been conditioned by Andrew to follow commands, "Caleb, clean my room", "Caleb, get me the TV remote control" or "Caleb, put this away for me".

Andrew had a friend come over this weekend. He was only allowed to invite her over only when he had completed his chores (which he sub-contracts to Caleb whenever he can) and, finished his homework. I have never seen Andrew finish his homework so fast. At times working with him when he doesn't want to do the homework, can be like pulling teeth. My husband magically disappears when it comes to chinese homework, and you can bet he's not doing the laundry.

Chinese Food

The blog today is about me.

There something to be said about tradition. Thanksgiving and Christmas are two days when I really enjoy a good feast. A feast where after the meal, you need to go lie on the couch, turn on the TV and, take a short nap. The meal is of course turkey, and turkey means cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes, carrots, pumpkin pie and, lots and lots of gravy!!! This is a tradition that marks the beginning of fall, the "fall feast" I call it! Vegetarians come at their own risk.

This year was a little different, on my wife's suggestion, we went out to eat….a chinese restaurant of all places. Somehow eating rice, honey garlic pork, tofu, crab and some unknown fish is not what I pictured the pilgrams eating during their time of giving thanks. I mean, did the pilgrams become lazy and ordered take-out from Manchu Wok? Were they thankful for T&T opening up? I looked and looked for a turkey item on the menu, the closest thing they had was chicken....and it was steamed (gross).

Let’s remind ourselves that rice is not a substitute for mashed potatoes, pork is not turkey, tofu is definitely not turkey, crab is not pumpkin pie and, the pilgrams would have packed it up and gone home if they were served fish.

In the end, my wife went to Safeway and bought me a pumpkin pie that night, so all was not lost.

Happy Thanksgiving

We went over to my sister's place for dinner the other night. The boys just love it when we go over as my sister has toys that the kids just love to play with. They spent about an hour playing with this air hockey table....they had so much fun.

The highlight of the night? My sisters finding a source to buy frozen croissaants! What would they do without "Google"?

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!!!!

Good Night

Just before Andrew goes to sleep, Caleb gives him a peck on the cheek, and wishes him sweet dreams.

They are each other's best friends....most of the time.

Weekend Trip

We took a little ferry trip this weekend with the boys. Both of them are quite fascinated with the various modes of public transit. We think the novelty of not being strapped into a car seat while moving, plays a big part in the fun they have riding the buses, the trains or the ferry system.

Weekends are normally quite busy for us. With church, hockey (for both dad and Andrew), grocery shopping, laundry and the odd family get together, it can be quite overwhelming. It's moments like this little getaway where we enjoy being together as a family that makes the weekends very special....now if we can only remember to ditch the cellphones before we leave.

We have been doing a purge of the kid's clothes over the past few days. It is amazing to see how they have grown so much since the beginning of summer. T-shirts that fit them only a few months ago, are now too small. My husband's storage system (motto) of shoving it in a box and sorting it out later has really proven its worth (to him at least)......especially since I am the one now doing the sorting. Two years ago, in a momentary lack of judgement for no more than a nano-second, I agreed to HIS system. The other day, he pulled the storage totes of Andrew's old clothes out of the crawl space. Much to my horror, he had literally taken the clothes from the dirty laundry bins and threw them into the totes. I was horrified when I saw the tangled mess of fermenting laundry!!!! If it wasn't for the shrimp and artichoke salad he made me the other night, he would be doing the laundry right now (wait a second, he does a terrible job on the laundry and I end up redoing it anyways!!!).

His Hope, His Dream!

Those familiar with us know that our family enjoys hockey. My husband plays and is eagerly waiting for the day when Andrew and Caleb can play ice hockey with him. He is a goalie and although he always says he plays the sport for the fun of it, he can get quite competitive. If he had a shutout going, I am pretty sure that he would not let either one of the boys score on him just to make them feel good about themselves - he wouldn't be able to resist saying he managed to shut them out.

My husband also has a secret dream that Caleb (who seems to have really good hand-eye coordination) will be the next Roberto Luongo. In the unlikely event that Caleb did manage to make it into the NHL, his dad would undoubtedly justify his cause to buy season tickets! We'll just all nod and let him keep dreaming!