~Ethan's Family Birthday Party~

We celebrated Ethan's birthday party with my best friend Melissa who had come up for a visit at his favorite restaurant: Boston Pizza.  We had a great time and Ethan enjoyed the Happy Birthday song sang by the servers!  Pictures of course!

~Ethan's 5th Birthday Party!~

Wow. 5!?!  Already?!?!  I.have.a.5.year.old.  Okay mini-meltdown over..that's how I felt almost three months ago when I woke up on Ethan's big birthday.  We had his party on the Sunday after his actual birthday and had our usual cast of friends for it.  This year however he got to invite 2 friends to the party...he chose two of his buddies from daycare. 

I, as usual, was the freak-a-zoid running around trying to make sure it was perfect.  Such a ridiculous habit!  But I just want it to be memorable for him...anyhow I digress.  This year Ethan wanted a Thomas the Tank Engine party.  Since we were in the middle of crazy (will link to post in a few days) I decided to just spend a bit of money to buy everything for the party.  I bought it online (I LOVE online shopping, less crowds, better selection)  I went to Etsy again for the party invite...I loved it!  On a side note I really need to take a photoshop class...it all arrived in time and looked awesome!  I made the cake myself and had Randy make the railway sign for the front step.  The cake took a painstaking 3 hours to do...but it looked wicked awesome and Ethan still talks about it!

We had a blast at the party and all his little guests did as well!  The proof is in the pictures!  I did train stops to coordinate the day.  Stop#1 was Pin the Funnel on Thomas, Stop#2 was Pinata Fun Stop #3 was Fueling Station and Stop #4 was Train Playtime in the basement.  Here is the railroad crossing sign Randy
made...I forgot to get a picture of it on the front step!

My little conductor put on his hat and got ready to welcome his guests!

The first thing they had to do was bring their 'ticket' and get their picture with Thomas and Percy!  Ignore the ghetto grey on the card, it of course, was not there when it was given out.  It is there however to prevent you from stalking me...teehee.

Each little guest got their picture taken with Percy and Thomas...

 Time for Pin the Funnel on Thomas fun!  The

boys had a blast with this!

Next Stop:  Pinata Fun!  Check out the expressions on those little boys standing in the line...love it!!!

 Playtime stop!  The little boys had a blast playing with Ethan's trains!  They probably got more play that day than they have in months!

The Thomas Cake!  It was a labor of love I tell you...it actually wasn't as hard to do as it looks...thank goodness for the template!

 The little boys had a great time discussing which part of Thomas they were going to eat...I was shocked at how adept they all were in all the Thomas terminology!

Ethan got some great gifts from his friends.  All were very thoughtful and reflective of Ethan's interests...he even got a $35 Visa gift card and a $15 Itunes card...which sent him over the moon!  You CAN buy your way into my kids heart with an Itunes Gift Card!  It was all fantastic and I know Ethan loved the entire day...that made all the running worth it! 

~My Boys!~

Well there is no doubt that these two are brothers!  Check this out and see if you can tell who is who!

~Ethan’s First Piano Recital~

Wow, prouder parents couldn’t have been found yesterday…it was Ethan’s first piano recital and he did it perfectly!  We were admittedly a bit worried about the whole thing because he woke up with a nasty cough and a bit of mischief in everything he did.  He didn’t have a great time at Music Class in the morning…wasn’t listening, and was acting silly while they did a dress rehearsal.  He ended up losing the Ipad for the remainder of the day as a result.  Randy came home from class very frustrated with him. 

So we had a good couple of ‘talks’ and made him practice his piece a few more times and set some rewards for good behavior up. We got dressed up and off we went.  I won’t lie and say that he was the best behaved kid there but he wasn’t the worst.  He was a bit quiet and almost sulking for most of it.  I was disappointed…it wasn’t how I pictured it to go.  Once it got started though and he saw other kids he knew go up and perform he knew what he was doing.  When it was his turn to go up he went straight up to the microphone, said “My name is Ethan Grounds and I’m going to play Little Helper for you today”  just like we had practiced.  He went to the piano and carefully placed his hands, played his piece, got down off the chair bowed his head and came off the stage perfectly.  He wasn’t smiling or bubbly, more quiet and focused.  But he did it and we were so proud!  I won’t lie, I cried! (We’ll blame the pregnancy hormones).

So here are the pictures of his day…we got all dressed up in a new outfit complete with little dress shoes for the event!

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At the church where it was held they had a ‘real’ piano…I was a bit worried that it would throw him off since he plays on a small keyboard style piano at Music Class and a keyboard at home but he had no problems at all with it!  They did their group song first where all the kids in his class from the whole week got together and played a little song using instruments.

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Then when it was his turn he did his solo piece!  You can click on the pictures to open and see the complete album!

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Is that not the most freaking adorable thing ever?!?! 

They finished off the recital with the entire Music Class keyboarding students singing their good-bye song..he really likes this song!

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He got his reward…a trip to play at the Multiplex Jungle Gym area and Bugs & Cheese for supper from Boston Pizza.  It was a great day and we all had lots of fun!  His next one is in May sometime…I can’t wait!

~Sunny Winter Day Snow Art!~

Ethan and I couldn’t resist going outside today!  The sun was shining and it was unseasonably warm out, in the pluses!  He wasn’t too keen on the idea of going out, he didn’t know what to do…admittedly there isn’t much to do in our backyard, especially in the winter and when Mom isn’t up to jumping around in the snow with him because she’s a day away from the due date with baby #2! 

So I decided to put some of the knowledge of fun things for kids to do that I have collected in my travels and actually DO one of them!  So I went around the house and found a few things to use to fill with colored water.  I used an old spray bottle, empty ketchup and mustard squeeze bottles for the RV, and a Gatorade bottle with a hole punched through the lid.  I used just ordinary food coloring and water, filled the bottles and out we went. 

He started off slow…not really getting into the swing of what he could do with them.  Finally he started using them to color “tracks” around the backyard and ‘wash’ the fence and chairs.  It was a gorgeous day outside, sun shining and so warm!  I hauled a folding chair outside and my camera and soaked up some Vitamin D while he played.  It was the most fun I’ve had in weeks!  Our backyard looks like it’s been attacked and is a colorful blend of yellow, blue, red and green.  We went through 2 fills of the bottles and I had a hard time convincing him to stop after 2 hours.  He made me promise that we would do it again which I totally agreed to!  I don’t know if we’ll get that warm of weather again for awhile though, it was glorious!

Here are some pictures of the day…it was nice to take out my SLR and snap some pictures, it’s been awhile since I’ve pulled it out!

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~Catch up From Christmas Post!~

Wow, I totally missed doing a post from our Christmas!  I can’t believe it.  Anyhow, we had a great Christmas season, we went to the Festival of Trees Teddy Bears Breakfast with our friends The Smiths and The Dombroskies.  It was a fun time however a bit complicated as we arrived late and couldn’t get a table to sit altogether.  Here are some pictures from the day!

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We had a great time decorating the tree!  I bought lots and lots of new little things for it this year…I think it was my favorite so far! 

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Randy and Ethan had their Annual Gingerbread House decorating Day!  This year they went ‘untraditional’ and made an Angry Birds camp!  Ethan had seen an Angry Birds design at the Festival of Trees and had his heart set on buying it…we didn’t bid on it as it was already over $200 and it was a bit rich for my blood.  Instead I suggested to Randy that they make their own…I think they did a great job, what do you think?

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We had a fun time at Ethan’s Christmas concert this season!  We arrived a bit close to the time though and ended up in the VERY back of the gym.  I had only brought my one lens so we didn’t get very good pictures being so far back…it was a very cute performance though and when the newsletter came out in January our little man was featured prominently in many of the pictures singing his little heart out!  We were bursting with pride!

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Our Christmas Day was just the three of us…we had a great quiet day at home.  We started out with our stockings of course and then quickly dove into our presents!  We loved watching Ethan open his presents as usual, lots of “Wows” and “Awesome” coming from his camp!  We had alot of fun wrapping his trains up….we bought him 90 assorted Thomas trains and freight cars…they were (thankfully) the highlight of the day and he still plays with his trains more than he did before!

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It was a nice Christmas.  We were sad that we didn’t have any family here with us and that we couldn’t travel but it was nice to spend the time just the three of us before we add a new baby to the mix.  Randy had almost 2 weeks off and it was wonderful for all of us to have that uninterrupted time together.  It’s been awhile!  We are hoping to travel home next Christmas to spend it with family and share baby’s first Christmas surrounded with them. 

~Summer Road Trip with Friends!~

This past weekend, Sept long, we jumped in a truck with our friends, Trudy and Wes Dombroskie and headed off North.  Our destination?  Liard River Hot Springs and anything in-between!

It was a lot of driving to get there, we went the first day to Fort Nelson and that was our main base for the weekend.  We got in early in the evening and went for dinner and then called it an early night.  The next morning after a fantastic free continental breakfast we hit the Alaska Highway and went further North than any of us had every been before! 

Right out of Fort Nelson the scenery turned to gorgeous foothills and then eventually mountains.  It took us almost 4 hours to reach the hot springs but we were stopping all the time!  We saw lots of wildlife on the trip: elk, goats, bears, a fox, ravens, and an owl.  We were hoping the see a grizzly but that didn’t pan out, we saw 2 black bears instead. 

All in all we had a great time and the springs were very nice, not at all commercialized like in Radium or Miette.  Still natural and not concrete!

Here are some pictures from the trip!  These ones were taken right outside of Fort Nelson, maybe 50kms away.

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I was so excited that we got to stop at Muncho Lake!  I had heard that it was gorgeous there and I was not let down.  The water is jade green from the stone below leaching I think copper into it.  It was so clear, clean and just as gorgeous green as you see in the pictures!

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Liard River Hot Springs.  It is a short 5 min walk through the woods to get to the springs but as you can see it is as natural as you can get!  The only man made stuff are the walkways and a small waterfall you can see in the top right picture that also dams the hot springs to the top pool.  There are 3 separate pools to these springs but you can only go into these two.  The other one is apparently 34 feet deep and upwards of 70 degrees Celsius! I’m pretty sure I’m okay with not jumping in there!

Randy did the “Rite of passage” at the springs though.  He was told about it by some guys at work.  Apparently you take a small rock from near the man made waterfall and walk it to the other end and see if you can make it all the way to the end to place the rock on the ledge above the hot spring itself.  Well he did it!  He said the last couple of steps felt like boiling water pouring on his legs though!  I couldn’t go in them as much as I wanted since I was pregnant and had to be careful so I stuck to the lower pool where the river starts and the water is like bath water temperature.  It is so amazing that these sorts of things exist!

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It was a fun trip, something I can see us doing again!  We talked about some possibilities for the next trip but nothing solid of course.  Randy and I will be grounded at home for most of next year with our new little one so sneaking off without kids will prove to be a bit more difficult!