Tuesday, 28 May 2013

My little girl!

One of the things that I have been waiting for when it comes to Natalie is for her hair to be long enough to but in a pony tail or pig tails. Tonight I was successful in convincing her to allow me to do this! Here is the results! Yes those are ice cream pjs!



Thursday, 18 April 2013

Come on Spring!


Here in Manitoba we have been waiting for spring to come. Currently in our backyard in Gimli we still have 3 feet of snow. However there a few puddles on the sidewalk. Natalie had her first puddle jumping experience. She happily discovered this long standing, time passing activity for all little ones when they see a puddle of water. Luckily for Natalie she has her puggle C.C. to join in with the splasing fun!

I personally can not wait for the snow to melt and we can enjoy the outdoors again. We live in a resort town on Lake Winnipeg. It will be great to be able to walk down to the beach again and enjoy the warm sand on our feet and the sun on our faces.

Bring on the spring flowers!

Saturday, 24 November 2012

Natalie turns 1

So on November 22, our little girl turned one. We got her a cupcake that she destroyed!

Today we had her birthday party, despite the weather we had a good turn out. Thank you to everyone who was able to make it! Here are some pictures from this weeks festivities!

Getting ready to open her gift from Aunty Shira, Aunty Lauren and Aunty Jamie!

I LOVE BLOCKS!

Using the icing as hand cream - and throwing on C.C.

One big mess!

Showing Grandma how good she is at walking now

Testing out our new sleigh/wagon. There's room for C.C. too!

Carter wanted to try it out too!

Me and Natalie, Karyn and Carter, Joanne and Emily

Ladybug birthday cake - thanks Aunty Kayla!

Our little book worm :)

Getting ready to eat birthday cake!

Me and Natalie!

Saturday, 1 September 2012

Welcome Baby Emily

Today I went a friend's baby shower, she had a little girl aug 17th. So we met baby Emily. She is just beautiful. Natalie and I are excited about having a little girl for her to play with. She is just amazing. I can not even express just how happy I am for my friends, for their little arrival.

Monday, 20 August 2012

Garden Fresh

We have been doing a lot of canning the last couple days. I made some crab apple jelly, and pickles. And tonight we juiced about 50 pounds of apples to make some hard cider. We are for the most part still new to doing all this, but we do enjoy the results.

Thanks to a childhood friend, I have successfully made my first batch of pickles. The recipe for the brine was so simple:

4 quarts water
1 quart vinegar
1 cup sugar
1 cup pickling salt

Boil all together. Sterilize jars and lids, I put in some garlic and dill weed to add some seasoning. There is no need to process the jars. So it really is one of the easier ones I have seen.

I also made some apple jelly the recipe for that was:

8 cups fresh crab apples
water as needed
3 cups white sugar

For this one I actually doubled everything, as we a ton to use. This is I actually made last year, and loved the results, so I decided to make more. Our garden has been great this year as well. We made some garden boxes at the beginning of the summer and planted our favorites! Some carrots, cucumbers, corn, peas, edipomme (soy beans), beans, tons of tomatoes, peppers, strawberries, and a little herb garden of basil and rosemary.


Sunday, 12 August 2012

Weekend of Visits!

Natalie and my Grandpa
This weekend has been full of visiting. Yesterday we headed out to Someret, to see my grandparents, then the Miami for our good friend's little boy's baby shower.

The whole family has been patiently waiting for my grandparents new condo to be ready, so we can move them, across the street!

In the afternoon, we headed to Miami, for our friend Martin's baby Liam's shower. He was a cutie putie! Each time Natalie got a glimpse of him she would just start to giggle, and smile like crazy!

I am super excited for Martin and Jessica, their little guy is already a heart breaker. It is just amazing how a lot of our friends have either just had or are having kids as well. Natalie will have friends to play with. 

And today, my good friends from Human Ecology came out to our place for the first time since we moved here in 2009. It was great to catch up, and just visit like we use to. It definitely made me miss living in Winnipeg, and being able to have impromptu visits.

Thursday, 9 August 2012

Our Puggle

first picture of C.C. we still had not named her yet.
I figured I should take some time to introduce our puggle, C.C.. Chris and I got her about a month after we were married. It took us some time to find the right dog for us. Puggle stands for a pug, beagle cross. When we went to pick her up, it was only her and her sister who where almost identical left. The breeder had four puppies, one was fawn (light brown like a pug), the last one was colored like a beagle. Those two are the most sought after colors/patterns for puggles. We picked C.C. she We got her back to my parents cabin, where we spent her first weekend with us camping. C.C. use to run around the house really fast when we had carpet. She has turned into a princess over the last little while. She refuses to sleep on our couch, unless there is a pillow or blanket to snuggle with.was the shy one in the corner.

during her non-running around fast time.
 There have been a lot of moments when I have "lost" her. Only to find her cuddled up in the strangest places, like the laundry basket - FYI she is typically afraid of them! Or on one of our shirts or some other cozy thing she found. She has grown up a lot since Natalie came home. C.C. no longer tries to run once you open the gate. She plays with Natalie too. It is the cutest thing to see.
sleeping on a huge pile of blankets

Over the last 3 years C.C. has really made her self at home, and part of our family. She is very projective of Natalie, and Natalie loves her dog. It is amazing to see the two of  them together. We were a little worried at first as to how well C.C. would react to there being a baby in the house. But she was in love with Natalie right away. When C.C. leaves her toys close to Natalie, and she goes to get them she is so gentle, to make sure she doesn't startle Natalie, or take one of Natalie's toys by accident.

Her favorite word is walk. because it means she gets to see other people and dogs, and get treats from the the ice cream store.


first time playing in the snow
C.C. loves snow, and her laser. She turns into a hover and goes around trying to eat as much snow as possible. When we have the huge pile of snow,  she likes to "bog" herself down till she can't walk any further to do her business. She will chase her laser around for hours if she could find someone willing to play with her for that long. C.C. also thinks that she is a big dog. She tries really hard to make sure everyone knows that her house and yard are hers, so you better not come near. The funny thing about that is that she loves everyone, so once you do come in, she will love you to pieces. She has a hard time understanding why cats don't like her, because they are the same size as her. She did find one, a kitten - my aunt's boyfriend's kitten Willow. It was cute seeing the two of them play.


sleeping on the blanket in the laundry basket