O, Canada!

We had a very welcome visitor at the end of October, Michael's brother. He had business in Toronto, so he flew into Buffalo and stayed with us for the weekend and then we drove him up to Toronto in time for his Monday morning meetings. Since we can literally cross over into Canada in five turns or less from our driveway, it was a very easy request. We decided to take the scenic way up and stopped at Niagara Falls along the way.

Once we arrived in Toronto, we drove through China town and then left our Tahoe at the hotel. We took a 20 minute walk to the CN Tower which is currently the tallest building in the world. After a very quick elevator ride up to the observation deck, we were rewarded with a spectacular view of the area at sunset.

Part of the observation level has glass paneled floors. Even though you know that you are completely safe, stepping onto the glass panels is truly a leap of faith. My sense of balance was thrown off when I looked around my shoe and could not "see" anything holding me up! Still, it was an awesome way to look at the city below.

Here are the five of us, with some weird lighting because the tower is lit up with purple and pink hues. It looks neat from the street level, but a little bizarre when you are in it.

So I think that Toronto is the largest city that our children have been to. They are experiencing things in their childhood that Michael and I are just getting to in our thirties! I love that they were brave enough to go up that high and do something totally new and unique. They each have their own passport and I am thrilled that we can explore new cities and places with them. We miss Utah tremendously, but it is truly fun to live in a new part of the country and have new adventures.

Expensive, Yet Necessary

From the very first look at this home in New York, we knew that the roof was in bad shape. We had it inspected during the buying process and also had a roofer walk it and give an estimate for replacement before we even closed on the loan. However, when we finally arrived and got to a point that we could get bids, roofing material had gone up over 30%. So, we blew the budget, but on October 20th, a huge crew showed up and put on a new roof for us. We had them do a complete tear off and remove everything down to the plywood layer before starting with the new materials. It only took one day, but it was a very, very loud process, and unfortunately, both Michael and Sydney were home sick that day and found it impossible to rest.

In the end, we are relieved to have this huge, expensive project behind us before we settle into our first winter here. It just isn't very fun to show off new shingles though. It is kind of like getting new tires. It is very necessary and extrememly expensive, but in the end, you wish that you could have spent the money on something that you could really enjoy- like new carpet or furniture. In fact, there are several projects inside our new home that I would rather have tackled, but we knew that the roof had to come first. Here is hoping for a Christmas bonus or a large tax refund to fund the next home improvement project!

From Ballet Shoes to Cub Scouts and Everything in Between

When you have a family of five, life is going to be busy, even if you just participate in the basics. When everyone is involved in mulitple activities, it gets a little crazy. The last few weeks have flown by as we have returned to school and created a fall schedule. This is a little of what we have been up to.

Maura is in a prekindergarten program each day from 12:30 to 3:00. I drop her off and pick her up, but her program is only a few minutes away from the house, so it isn't too bad. She loves school and her classmates. Maura also takes a dance class called Broadway Babies. The first half of the class is ballet and then they switch to tap shoes. She is catching on quickly and is adorable in her tights and leotard. I can't wait for the recital and the costume!

Sydney is adjusting well to her new school, but she was sad to learn that her wonderful teacher is pregnant and will be out on maternity leave after the Christmas break. Mrs. Starosielec has been very positive and the third graders just took a field trip to the zoo. This week she is working on making a caterpillar at home, but she hasn't decided what to make it out of, marshmallows? egg carton? giant gumdrops? Sydney is also in dance and is taking jazz and ballet. Activity days and weekly soccer games keep her on the go.

Hayden is officially in middle school. He has 8 classes and manages all of them well. He has been participating in school clubs like Spanish and swimming, and is signing up for 8 trips with the ski club this winter. He is in scouts and just completed a five mile hike. Saturday soccer games will be replaced with merit badge workshops shortly.

Michael has been missing in action at home. This is the end of the accouting year at work and so he has been working really late nights and bringing a lot of work home as well. On top of his workload he has been incredibly sick. After six doctor visits and three different levels of antibiotics he finally recovered from his severe case of swimmer's ear, only to get the flu, even though he got a flu shot, and horrible bronchitis. His breathing was so shallow, that he had to have a nebulizer (sp?) treatment at the doctor office this past week. I try to stay as far away from him as possible and Clorox wipe everything he touches from the phone to the remote, etc. I don't want to get sick! Now he is on more meds for his current illness. Guess he is taking the fall for the whole family as far as sickness goes. We are all sad for him, and hope that he will pull out of it soon.

I guess I should comment on myself too. I have been a little overwhelmed with cub scouts. I have done three on line training courses and have spent a lot of time reading the Webelos book, but this past week I helped the boys earn their Naturalist badge, so it is coming together. I get really lonely when all three kids are at school, it may be time to get a pet or something:) I have spent so much time helping the children adjust, that I am a little lost myself. I really miss my Utah friends and family and book club and things, but that is the reality of moving. Slowly but surely, things are coming together.

Bring on the Dwarves

There is a lot of life in our backyard here in New York. When I stand at the sink and look out the window I can always sense movement, and at first it was unnerving. On any given day we can see several varieties of birds. The most beautiful are the red cardinals, but we have morning doves and robins and finches and several more that I cannot identify. The bunnies come almost every afternoon. They are extremely fast if they get spooked and can really cover a lot of ground if they get hopping. I hope they eat all of the weeds.

At night we can hear the frogs and toads. I used to think that there was one particular toad that lived in our yard. I saw it several nights and saw it inside of a small hole in our driveway many times too, but then it disappered for a bit. I saw this toad by our garage one evening when I went to get milk, but it has different marking than the other one and is much bigger than the first. Maura likes to chase them. One night a toad got into the garage and Michael and I had to chase it out.

Then there is this pesky little chipmunk. He lives under our deck and feasts on food that gets dropped when we BBQ or take snacks outside. He is sooooo irritating. I see him most days and he truly has attitude. It has dug a hole at the bottom of the lowest wooden step on our deck and goes underneath. It is warm down there because the dryer vent is under the deck. He thinks he owns the place because apparently he lived here long before we did. He and I don't get along.

There are several more animals in our yard too. The last two times that I have mowed the lawn I have stepped in deer droppings. I know that they come through the yard but I have not seen them yet, we have seen multiple deer around town though. We also get voles, mice, squirrels, and fox. I feel like I have moved into Snow Whites' enchanted forest, so I say, bring on the dwarves!

The First Day of School 2009

School traditionally begins the Wednesday after Labor Day in our area, but this year it began on Thursday September 3rd. Despite that, it was still the longest summer vacation of my children's lives because they finished June 5th in Utah and the kids in New York got out on the 23rd or so of June. We had a great summer, but it was time to go back to school. It was time for the kids to move on and meet more kids who were their same age. Hayden and Sydney started first, they each have a bus route to their schools and it stops at the end of our driveway. Hayden goes to middle school from 8:00 to 2:30 and Sydney leaves an hour later and is in school from 9:00 to 3:15. Maura began pre-kindergarten the day after Labor Day. She goes Monday through Friday from 12:30 to 3:00. So suddenly, I have no children at home for two and a half hours each day! It was a little weird, but it is going to be nice. I even met Michael for lunch one afternoon!

Maura was so excited for her first day and I took pity on her and bought her a new backpack even though there are several hand me downs in the house.

Sydney was nervous about riding the bus, but happy about her new dress and shoes that she chose for the first day of school.

The Last Day in Williamsburg

On Saturday, we decided to try to get to Colonial Williamsburg in time to see a fife and drums performance. But it was a busy day with students returning to William and Mary University and it took a while to park and track down the performance. We heard a lot of it, but it was breaking up when we got close to it. It was still fun to see the children in their costumes though. It was very hot and humid that afternoon, and it discouraged us from covering too much ground, but we did go through one of the original churches, and the candy shoppe, the Christmas shoppe and the toy shoppe. Another time we will have to pay the big money, like $50 per person, to go through the shops where there are costumed performers that tell you all of the history, the kids just weren't going to go to the colonial wig shoppe this time!!

Walking through the area, we found a family taking pictures in this tree, we noticed them because the father was wearing a BYU tee shirt. Of course, Michael's family knew them some way or another, always a small world within the Church. When they finished up, we took the opportunity to get out of the sun and took several photos in and around the tree. All of the kids had a great time climbing in it.


Hayden

Sydney

Maura

York, Virginia

Well, all good things come to and end, and on the morning of the third day of our trip we had to leave the Great Wolf Lodge behind and we moved into Michael's cousin's place in Williamsburg, VA. She and her husband and five children hosted us and we had a great visit, because in addition to the ten of us, eleven other family members were there for the weekend. Late in the day on Friday we decided to take in a little history and we caravaned to York. We went to the visitor center and watched a movie about the British General Cornwallis surrendering to General George Washington in 1781 to begin the end of the Revolutionary War. Maura said it was a great shooting movie. Hayden on the other hand didn't see why he needed to be there, he had already learned about it in a book at school. A book! We were there, where it happened, standing on the battle field, touching the cannons, but he wanted nothing to do with it. Oh, these almost teenagers, what are they, tweenagers?!? The attitude.

Michael and I forcing Hayden into a picture of cannon used at the battle of Yorktown.

The Victory Monument, erected along the shore of the York River by Congress to commemorate the victory by the Americans and French over the British forces.

The cousins tried to take in the history, but honestly, they could only handle it for so long, then the silliness returned.

One of many structures in the historic area of York. During the day you can visit the various buildings and experience a little of colonial life in the 1700's. Most of the shops were closed for the day, so we settled for dipping our toes in the river and then running for Ben and Jerry's in the rain and eating ice cream until we were beyond full.

The children were more interested in finding the multiple deer that were roaming through the village area. There were too many to count really. But Maura tried to count them up and eagerly pointed out each one she saw to me, begging me to take pictures. At another time, Michael and I will have to return and take in more of the historical stuff.