Fall - when the sun comes out.

After a summer of crappy weather, we've been rewarded with a couple of weekends of SUNSHINE!

Thanksgiving weekend was fabulous this year, with blue skies and 20+ degree weather - just the way it should be.

We hosted my mom + sister's family on Saturday night. Hosted is pretty much it - my mom (in typical mom fashion) made the turkey and all the side dishes and it was delish! A great time.

Sunday, we went to Petrie Island and let the kids run! Loads of pics; playing in the leaves, in the sand on the beach, on the play structure...(SLEW of photos to follow.)





































After all that activity, the kids collapsed in bed for the afternoon, then we went to Paul's parent's place for dinner. Fr Soucy was there - last time we saw him was at Nolan's baptism in December last year. Peyton greeted him by saying "you're the one who appetized me, right?" She is a riot. So she's now been corrected, and she's also had some exposure to WHAT a baptism is at school - so this past weekend she was asking about her "bath-tism." Hmmm...she may be on to something :)

Thanksgiving Monday was a quiet day spent at home with Paul and I tackling the never ending list of to-do's. We did manage to get the kids out to the "big park" in late afternoon - always a hit.

Back to work on Tuesday - then Wednesday brought bad news. My grandmother (mom's mom) had passed away. Expected, but a bolt of shock at the same time. My mom rushed up to Hearst (look north on a map of Ontario) and she just returned yesterday.

This past weekend was the second consecutive weekend of beautiful weather, and we certainly didn't take it for granted...

Our little darling

So I mentioned back in the Cape Breton posting that I had video on my Canon camera of the lovely 16 ( times 2) hour trip out east. Found the camera today.

Enjoy. And do watch it through the end, so you can see how the other children coped.

Make an on-line slideshow at www.OneTrueMedia.com

(And just so you don't think we're horrible parents, we did try literally everything we possibly could to keep her happy for the 32 hours - thank GOD the other two travelled so well, because the whole drive was all-about-Paige. I did not videotape her because I thought it was cute - more, I wanted a reminder of just how well she travels in case we think of doing it again soon.)

All about Peyton

Peyton is enrolled in hockey again this year - she was in the Learn-to-Skake program last year; this year she's in fundamentals.

Season's already begun; on a hot summer night, here we were trying on her hockey gear from last year (still fits!)



AND THEN, she started SCHOOL! Well, actually - school really starts tomorrow, but she's been twice. First last Friday for the "meet the teacher"/orientation (with mom & dad along for the meeting) :



Madame Natalie is her teacher - a very sweet, warm woman. We chatted, she had Peyton write her name; outline her hand on some paper which we then in turn kissed - the hand is hanging in her cubby, and if she ever misses us she can stroke it. Like, how cute??


And then a week later, she started her "stagered entry" - this was an emotional day for me, as we put her on a school bus and off she went - she didn't even glance back!




I'm so happy for her - anyone who knows us well knows that she SHOULD have been in school a year ago - so this day has been a long time coming.
She loves it.
We received a calendar of (learning) events for the month - she'll be learning about the letters "A" and "S" - the number "1", and they'll be reading the book "Chicka chicka boom boom." Ya, you know the one that Peyton reads to her sisters almost every night? She's going to kick kindergarten's ass!

In other news...we're stepping up efforts to toilet train Leah & Paige. Ugh, so much harder than training a singleton! We've put together a sticker/reward system. Not working too well (yet) but they do like their boards:






'Tis it for now!

Kari
xoxoxoxo

The rest of our summer

Paul & I had an additional week of holidays once we returned from out east, with which we worked around the house - (basement is thisclose to being finished!) and on the last Sunday, we went to my company barbeque at the Lone Star Ranch (few pics of Leah, as she was shy and attached to my hip!)






Bea looks on :(





One Saturday morning, horsing around:





Off to Brewer Park with Erin, Peter & Nolan:





Future accountants. Ha. That's a joke.