canada I

and now a ton of canada pictures that are only probably only interesting to the grandparents.  :)

grandma and grandpa didn't know the girls and i were coming.  and while the surprise had a few hiccups in the beginning, we definitely pulled off the surprise! and they were surprised!!!!!!

 

we just hung out the first night, but daddy got right into in setting up our fishing poles first thing the next morning....

 

we also got right to exploring the island....

 

and collecting and making things wilderness style....

 

we walked out to the island point, collecting things every step of the way of course....

threw rocks as far as we could....

they were especially into collecting crawfish claws....

we tested out the swingset....

i met stan, a northern pike, that lived under our dock. we bonded that first day and we ended up having daily meetings....(more on that later)

headed out for our first family canadian fishing....

mommy had the first bite - a crawfish! daddy got the first real bite - a baby walleye....

our little e fisherman....

we enjoyed the beautiful sunsets....

even got a close up view....

lanie got to reel in grandpa's HUGE fish, lol....

mommy caught the first keeper....

soaking up the sunset....

daddy caught the biggest one that night....

we ALL slept in a king for the week.  made for some interesting nights, but we take the family time seriously! 

here is elena's pine cone wreath.....

 

collecting more claws and exploring on the island....

 

 

we let my crawfish, fletcher, go free....he scurried off the dock and went airborne into the water....

 

we swam at the swimming rock.....but in a pool....

 

until daddy came into the water....

 

daddy diving off of the dive rock into all of the huge fish....seriously - there have been over 5' fish pulled out of here! so what HASN'T been caught?!!!  mommy wants nothing to do with it!!!!

 

so i sat up on the rock.....ha!

 

 

my girls!!!

 

 

 

 

there are minnows swimming everywhere around your feet and i happened to catch one, we named him marvin.  well that turned into hours and hours of us trying to catch more.  we failed.  all we did was ruin the nets cuz they swim so close to the rock and we'd scrape the nets. ack.

 

so we sunbathed....and swam....

 

and had family time and looked cute....

 

j and i fishing....

 

lanie read lots of books to help meet her goal of 75....

 

we colored and painted every single day....

 

family fishing...

 

 

 

a shot of the island....

 

our little ad fisherman....

 

 

ha!  i love this picture!

 

naps are so heavenly when you get lots of fresh fresh air....

 

mommy and daddy headed out in the kayak....

 

ladies, if you get the opportunity to do this with your man - sit in back....

 

mom and dad relaxing and having NOTHING to do....

 

we are headed to blue lake on this particular day.....

 

it's a huge campground with 4 different playsets....

 

we enjoyed them thoroughly....

 

 

elena mastered the monkey bars....

 

she was all over them. she's been able to do them, but didn't have the confidence to go it alone without one of us under her.  these were so much lower, so she had no fear.  i wish they were all lower like these!!

 

 and of course she practiced her penny drops....

 

adelyn loved the monkey bars too and i think could go it alone as well, if we let her.... ;)

she also loved the fireman pole....

 

 

 

 

get our swim gear on and enjoy the lake....

 

oh sand.....how i dislike you!!  but all kids LOVE you!!

 

 

the water was much colder at blue lake....but that didn't stop us....

 

 

 

 

 

 

ad and daddy swam out to the rope.....

 

e and daddy swam out to the rope too....

 

picnic lunch....

 

lookout baywatch.....

 

blue lake wiped us out, as we spent the whole day there.  when we returned we saw a beaver leave our island and swim away....look closely at that tiny little thing in the water....

 

j and i went fishing after we put the girls down and i, again, caught the keeper. we also saw leftovers from the beaver - big branches in the water sure do look like moose racks in the almost dark.  psssh.  if only you knew how many curse words i said while taking this picture.  i was beyond uncomfortable.  blech!

 

"Vacation used to be a luxury, but in today's world it has become a necessity." ~Author Unknown

road trip, shmode trip

we took a family road trip....with our toddler daughters....and survived to tell/write about it!

i kid. kinda. there's nothing i love more than some family time, buuuuuut... being on the road, "trapped" in a car with a 3 & 4 yr old doesn't scream the fun-loving family time that we are used to. but we are used to mommy going overboard on a parenting challenge being awesome....er, aka: google-over think-ask other mommies-over think-research-over think-put in a ton of time and money-over think-believe that you are now an expert on the subject at hand and could write a book. but since it's much easier to write a blog post, and ok, ok i'm not an expert, but we did ROCK at road tripping with our kids...

well maybe not all the time. lol.

but here we go.... family road trip to canada....can i get woot woot?!  ha!

 

i made binders "elena's/adelyn's road trip binders." they were FILLED with activity sheets (matching, hidden pictures, mazes, etc), several road trip games (scavenger hunt, the alphabet game, color buggy, etc), coloring pages, and on and on.  i put the activity and game pages in page protectors and we used erasable markers so that we could enjoy them over and over! the girls loved them and they entertained them for hours and hours and hours!

 

for every hour the girls were well behaved, they earned a "car buck." they had a hot pink envelope in their binders where they collected their car bucks and could then cash them in for treats and prizes along the way. i had a whole tote full of treats and a reusable bag overflowing of wrapped prizes. bigger prizes were worth more car bucks, so they could choose to pool their money and "buy" one together.

 

elena enjoying a treat and adelyn opening a prize....they responded really well to our car behavior reward system....

 

we did the trip TO canada in TWO days, so we saw the sunset the first night...

 

we stopped at fun/quirky/interesting landmarks....even in our pj's....

 

enjoying a prize they bought....

 

e loved the 4 page scavenger hunt...and we found everything in our 2 day trip!!

 

the girls made the best of our situation and played in the car! tickling each other...

 

we stopped at parks and let them run, move, jump, climb, stretch and be free...

 

 

we met a duck, thelma, she flew in RIGHT next to us as we were wading at a lake....thelma is used to being fed!

 

mommy and daddy got in on the moving too...

 

and of course we scheduled in nap time....

 

it was 17 hours total and the girls were unbelievably good!! it was actually fun for us! especially for me - seeing all the awesomeness my hard work brought! muahahahaha! it was great seeing the girls actually enjoy what could've been much much less than enjoyable. and jason said it was great seeing me so excited about all i put into it. :) buuuut, the very very best part was knowing we had an entire week to spend together!!!

pics of that coming who knows when.

"Those that say you can't take it with you never saw a car packed for a vacation trip." ~Author Unknown

my sweet girls

sunday morning. before church. looking sweet. perfect overcast day. hamming it up. crooked smiles. sisterly love. marshmallow bribes. dusty camera. go...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

"I think a photography class should be a requirement in all educational programs because it makes you see the world rather than just look at it." ~Author Unknown

mic to the head

we were just getting one of our nightly performances before bed from the lovely singing sistas and it's too cute to not share. especially when e nails ad in the head with the microphone right when i turn the camera on. ;)

singing sistas from Molly Leone on Vimeo.

love them!

"Having a sister is like having a best friend you can't get rid of. You know whatever you do, they'll still be there." ~Amy Li