A day with David

Sunday, as we drove to Victoria we encountered snow on the Malahat.  We pulled off to Spectacle Lake.  It was like a little winter wonderland.  The boys went bezerk.  Mommy got hit with a few snowballs and was COLD.  Back in the warm car we were quickly reminded of why we moved to the island.

 However, that night it snowed at 1210!  The boys grabbed their headlamps and disappeared in to the night.  Good thing Zuke was around, who needs parents?

The next day was a special day for David and mommy to spend together.  We had a great day.  Started with a little bit of last minute shopping, a donut at Tim Hortons, baking in the afternoon and then we built a super cool snow fort!  David was wonderful company for the day, we will do it again soon!

Elves

My little Christmas elves.

It's getting to be an exciting time!  Presents are arriving, cookies are being made and several crafts are on the go!  Hard to find quiet time in there.  It was pretty quiet when we watched Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.  "See, we could be living like that..."

And then the Christmas concert.  Will I ever be able to watch one without welling up?  David is front center in orange, Clive is second row from the back, on the left at the end.  He nearly fell off the risers.

The Tree

It didn't take long to find a tree in the rain.

The boys enjoyed decorating.

Molly helped too.

And there it is!

Breakfast with Santa

We were the first to arrive at the Cowichan Bay Hotel for breakfast.  We knew that Santa would be arriving by boat and didn't want to miss it!

Sure enough, he came in a fast Sea Ray and pulled right up to the dock.  Clive commented "Daddy, you never brought the boat in like THAT!"

 

Matthew (our bravest) was the first to visit with Santa.  He knew the drill and climbed right up on his lap and asked for Hot Wheels.

David was next.  He was happy this year.

Then, good natured Clive, who didn't really want to do this but did it anyway.

We enjoyed a lovely breakfast looking out at seals and birds, and lots of boats in the marina.  Certainly missing Uncle Jake while looking out, dreaming of having a boat again one day.

Christmas Season

'Tis the season.  Kelly gave the boys gingerbread men to decorate.  They piled as much candy as they could on their cookies, then mommy put them away until last night.  Last night we went to a magic show at the Royal Theater.  The boys loved it!  Thank you to Claudia for an early Christmas present!

 We had an important job to do on the weekend.  David wrote his letter to Santa.  He wants a crystal on a chain, just like one we found several years ago in Summerland.  We took the letter to the mailbox.

Here he is,

there it goes!

Hope Santa comes through for David!

We're back!

We're back!  Christmas crafting has begun.   The boys are making hats for someone special.

Molly doesn't like being outside.  She climbs on the roof and meows at the kitchen window until I let her in the bathroom window.

Hello all,

Apparently my photo storage is full.  Although my computer tells me it's only at 4%.
I can't put on any more photos, so, I'll be taking a break from the blog until this is fixed.  Thanks for tuning in!

Tofino!

We arrived in a down pour.  Then, the clouds broke and blue skies arrived.

We rode our bikes in to Tofino.  There is a bike path all the way along the highway.  The boys were thrilled!

Had to continue biking on the hard MacKenzie Beach sand.

A sunny day at Long Beach.  Great climbing and exploring.  A huge helicopter flew right over us as we are not far from Tofino airport.

Mommy was the only one who wore rubber boots here.  Hope everyone else learned a lesson.  Matthew was barefoot the rest of the day.

Beautiful day and the whole beach to ourselves.

Back to the cabin to enjoy watching the toy airplane.

Our routine swim before bed.  Clive and David learning to dive and Matthew doing cannon balls.

Snuggle in David's bed while watching Free Willy.

The cabins now have fireplaces.  Really useful considering there are often power outages.

The rain came on our last day, but that didn't stop us.  Finally got the boys in to rubber boots (Marc forgot his).  The boys have pulled out some volcanic rock and had fun popping the seaweed.

This was a great trip.  Three full days at Ocean Village.

Black on Black

Just love these two.

Kinda funny with the flash on.

I took Matthew skating for his second time.  We had the whole rink to ourselves and Matthew was thrilled!  

Halloween

It pounded with rain Halloween morning.

(Zuke is already possessed.)

Of course, that doesn't stop the ghoul's.

My "bat skeleton" was ready for action!  (This is Matthew's own creation)

Just as trick or treating time arrived, the sky lightened and the rain stopped.  The Schoyen's had some dead guys on their lawn.  My boys look like they're praying, but they're just staring.

Check out the grumpy face on the house!  Here are our trick or treaters, all in BLACK.  Super.  At night.  The mist came in at an ideal time, very Hollywood.

Here are the children dressed in black at night who refuse glow sticks.  They were done in less than an hour.  Being a school night, this was for the best.

We put out a "drive by" bowl and still had no takers.  Too bad we can't feed candy to the chickens.

A pretty good Halloween.  Matthew nearly ended up in the hospital but stopped just before the concrete ledge he was going to run off of.  Phew.  Made it thru another Halloween.

October

 It's that time of year for playing in the leaves.  The maple tree field is great fun for the little ones, especially since Clive has made all kinds of secret tunnels!

 The rope swing is good fun too.  The maple tree is like a big yellow tent, its branches reaching almost to the ground.

 Of course it's time to make cookies.  Clive wants the biggest cookie cutter, David is soooo careful, rolling and cutting, Matthew is bored after making three cookies.

David pulled the seeds out of the pumpkin for roasting.  This picture is overexposed, but that is a plate of seeds top left.  David wins the prize for patience. 

 Matthew has moved on from the vampire teeth.  It's weird seeing him with such long hair.

I'm still figuring out my phone/camera/life.  This is a rare moment of David and Matthew cuddling on the couch.  I cannot get Matthew's eyes to stop being green.  Perhaps there is a message here?

A good friend of mine told me she thought there should be pictures of me on this blog.  Her argument was that my boys needed to see how much their mother loved them at this time of their life.  I think these pictures might be used for other purposes, but here goes!

This is me trying to hug Clive in front of my phone/camera.

Matthew is still an easy target.

David is not too sure about things...

Here she is!  The chicken lady!  When my boys look back at this in twenty years, everything will make sense!

Matthew was soooo excited to go on his first field trip!  The best part was getting to ride on a real school bus.  He has a lot on his mind here.  This was the beginning of a big day.  Pumpkin patch, then swimming with Wyland!

This morning I took this vampire to Castle Care to register him for preschool.  Needless to say he is already very popular.