Danielle is 3

Happy Birthday to Danielle!!

The long-awaited day finally arrived, her birthday

The girls waiting for the birthday guests to arrive. The simple, easy-to-make cupcakes. (butterflies in case you can't tell)

Getting ready to open presents with one of her friends.

It was a pretty quiet party, two families called in sick, one was one out of town, one mom was working and another mom couldn't make it, but thankfully the last two families there kids could come, so it was kinda like a big kid birthday for them.

I can't believe that she is three already. (I know moms say that ALL the time, but it is so true) I am so thankful that God has given her to us, to raise, and pray that we will be blessed with many more years with her.

Hard at "work" with a bunch of friends that were over.

Don't go walking across my garden in the dark...you just might lose a leg...down a big hole. And there were two of these deep holes. I really got to get my kids to put their energy into something else. It takes a lot of energy to dig deep holes like that. Like, maybe washing my windows.

Both of them are school shoes...of course.

My mud hole of a patio.

I don't expect any grass to grow...any time....soon....and it only got worse.

the muddy shoes... hey those are my shoes, who wore them out here and left them. grrrr

ummm...Mrs. A, where should I wash my hands?

I really like these pictures. Just simple creative, muddy play. I think this was right up there with Disney Land for these boys. I don't think they would have the patience to wait in line for hours, and here there is something to do all the time.

Timothy said the water ran for hours. (doesn't always have a real concept of time)When they play nicely outside I tend not to notice things, like the water running.

That box is our old compost bin that is now a trap, to catch girls of course. Inside of the box is another big hole...boys!! They didn't tell me what they were going to do with the girls once they got them in the hole.

See the waterfall, complete with rocks. How cool is that?

I really enjoyed seeing Timothy have so much fun, and seeing what they could come up with, but Gerard was right when he said "Tomorrow you are not going to like the mud anymore. And he was right (I wish I could put he was right to part in really, really small letters) as the next day I was DONE, with all of it, and so was Gerard, he said all we needed was some beater, broken down cars in our back yard and that would complete the "look" we were going for. With the shanty town, mud everywhere, and two weeks of spring break toys all over the place, it was clean-up time. So we got a load of fresh, wet, stinky, fly-buzzing manure to fill in the garden, ( our neighbors LOVE us) and Gerard sunk up to calves a couple times as he misjudged where the trenches were, he was so not impressed, at pulling his leg out of the stinky stuff or at me laughing. Sometimes I just can't help but laugh.

Good thing I took lots of pictures so Timothy can remember what a nice mom he has, as Gerard said never again.

Spring Break

Can't you just feel spring...it's in the air. All the girls were in their pretty skirts. We met up with a bunch of friends at the park at the last minute. The kids never get bored with their friends around.

The girls play outside in the hammock enjoying the dry weather. These two are playing together so well, and have so much fun together.

And this is the shanty town that Timothy put together during Spring Break. It took him a lot of time which is good as it gives him something to do ie. stay out of Mom and his sister's way. They all have a lot of fun playing in it together. This is only the beginning of what my backyard looked like. You have no idea, more pictures to come. I don't like all the "mess" but he loves nailing and tying it all together, and in some way, he learns by doing things like this, so I allow it to happen.

And the Library called to say that Sharleen won a book. She was very excited.

Ohhh she is such a little doll...

such a little keeper...that little grin of hers...and her chubby little cheeks, Gerard says there like soft rubber, I wonder how many kisses she gets in a day? Tons and tons...

We all LOVE her so much. I am so thankful for such an incredible blessing. And even better is she is becoming an easier baby. She will now sit in her bouncy chair or even the exersaucer and be happy, as not need to be held every second some weeks ago. She is sleeping during the day by herself which is nice so I can get things done. She still spits up TONS, I am getting her weighed this coming week so will know if she is gaining enough, she seems to be growing.

Band

Band or Noise?...it's hard to say. You can imagine how LOUD this is... no wonder we have hearing problems in this family. But it is really neat to see all the kids playing together, making music. I especially love it when they sing all the Christian songs that they learn at school together.

Yup, those are skipping ropes that they are using for their microphones.

Niessa even got dressed up for the show. She gets dressed up for everything.

The upcoming rock star.

Dennys

We were all spoiled to go to Denny's today. I met a friend at Mill Lake to do a kid swap,( and to play in the beautiful spring weather) the girls had a sleepover at her house and her son stayed the night at our house. And since I still had three free meals and desserts for Denny's that had to be used by the end of the month, we went there for lunch. I love these pictures, you can just see how much the kids are enjoying their dessert, something that we very seldom order, OK, like never.

Love that tongue sticking out. The best part for me was that TWO people came up to me and said what a lovely family I had, and that they were so well-behaved. WOW, that is not going to be our claim to fame so it was nice that they could put on a good show for others. lol

It was a very "successful time". When I am by myself I always try to think things out to make it flow as well as possible. The first thing we did was everyone went to the bathroom, and then I made sure we got a booth near the bathroom, so I could let them go by themselves. ( they must have to go so much b/c of the empty water cups, I LOVE that there are lids on the cups, as the cups got dumped a couple times) Of course, Breanne needed to be held most of the time so it really ties up my hands, so I really just try to take things slow and stay calm...even when I get covered in spit-up and then a milkshake...I try to keep smiling, hopefully no one will notice how dirty I am all the time. SMILE.

Friday Gerard took the day off work and we went to the Vancouver Aquarium. I really wanted to go to the art gallery to see Emily Carr's paintings (I read the book "The Forest Lover" and that got me interested). But Gerard said the kids would not have that much fun there, so off we went to see some fish. (nope no bitterness)

There were lots of beautiful fish, it is always amazing to see God's beautiful creation. Peek-a-boo...wow isn't that cool.
Timothy is always a very eager volunteer. Here we are learning about global warming. Today Timothy got his clothes wet outside so I told him to throw them in the dyer, but he said "Mom, I don't want to warm up the baby beluga's habitat more" (one of the ways to stop global warming was to reduce energy consumption, and using your dryer less was one of the ways to reduce energy consumption). So he was listening, gotta love that.

The dolphin show is my favorite. I think it is so amazing how someone can train a dolphin to do all these tricks with a hand wave or whistle and by giving them some little dead fish. I need to learn from the trainers, I could use it for my kids. lol.

There was a new 4D show that we got to watch, which was quite something. Niessa was the most scarred and as long as I kept Breanne nursing she was OK. I took her out to burp her at one point but she got sprayed with water and started crying...so back to nursing, and then she was fine.

The nice thing about all of them being close together in age is they all like doing the same things, and all want to stay and play. And of course only if there is enough stuff to go around.

Gerard loves these Jellyfish and would love to have some in our house.

Then we went to a wet lab, that was very interesting and hands-on, something that most of the kids like to do.

Here we are being shown how to tell the difference between and male and female crab.