smiles

who ever said being two was boring???

not sure if it is the expression or the combination of the expression and the "props" that makes me smile....

funny

the kids have enjoyed our trips to Fort Edmonton this year.


on this last trip, they were excited to see the chickens.


and even more excited to see the "big chickens"....

seriously, turkeys are not the brightest of creatures. yet they aren't totally dumb.

these turkeys all walk together in a pack. very interesting. and we totally thought we heard them laughing....

so tempting to buy a few of these novelty hats....

you can understand.

they also had a moose and a bison hat. and yes they even fit adult heads!

first

time for a big girl birthday party.

Aidan still talks about his second birthday party. i'll never forget the smiles he shared that day. Kiara was only a month old and i nearly abandoned the idea of addition work. now i'm so happy that i put the work into it.

at the time he loved Bob the Builder. i found some plastic hard hats at a party store, so when the kids arrived they each added foam stickers to their own hat and wore it for the party. i had made yellow and orange play dough and they moved onto that activity. a few of them moved on to other toys. i had also set out a few Bob the Builder puzzles.

then we had a paper bag lunch on a blanket in the living room. they were so cute. i think they all had their hard hats on, and ate their lunches so happily. i had put in drinking boxes and some other fun lunch treats; but their moms made the sandwhiches to their liking.

and of course the cake continued with a construction scene.

their goody bags had some Bob themed stickers, the playdough they played with and some other typical goody bag stuff. but the goody bags were also paper bags. really it was a simple party and quite inexpensive to put on. construction is a good theme for little boys!

we gave him a train set shortly after Kiara's arrival....though it was actually his birthday present. a few of the vehicles were perfect for the cake! i need to go through those photos...i took a lot and only developed a few. i should do something with them that Aidan would like to look at.

i'm not sure if we encouraged Aidan more to enjoy a favourite character. it just seemed so common at the time. maybe we could have encouraged Kiara to "like" Dora?

whatever.

after Easter Micheals' had some leftover pink pails that looked adorable for goody bags. complete with feathery trim!

i found some tinkerbell party stuff on cheap sale at Superstore one day. i figured that would be a good theme. lol. caring mother. or maybe smart mother?

a trip to the dollar store did not help us find more tinkerbell. but we found princess stuff. and fun treasures for the goody bags. done!

Aidan found number candles.

then we had to start the party list.

given the princess theme, it limited it to girls only. and it was meant for Aidan to also have disappeared. as it was he had to stay home, but certainly enjoyed all the estrogen in the air!

so the party was planned. with a weeks' notice. yup!

and if you've been following, you'll have noticed that this past week was rather crazy for me. i don't think i mentioned my lower oven element burning out. or the ruined meatballs that had to be cooked under the broiler. or discovering that our BBQ is out of propane. why not?! for some reason it didn't register in my brain that i would need a working oven to bake a birthday cake. hmmm...

off we went Saturday morning looking for something that would be special for a little girl birthday bash. first stop - closed. ugh! second stop - that is the price? kicking myself for not ordering something ahead of time...but still wondering where i would have found the time...i swallowed hard and paid the bill with my eyes closed!


yeah. they were cute cupcakes. and tasted as good as they looked too!

one of the little girl apparently does not like cupcakes. she had two.

and before you get all "wow", i have to confess that the little girls had mini-cupcakes. Aidan was our resident boy...so he had a "big" one. and made himself a cake-hero in their little eyes!

they were nut free too. i'm reminding myself to be safety conscious....could not guarantee that in my kitchen....okay, i peeked at the bill a tiny bit.

i wondered what little girls do. Kiara loves to cuddle teddy bears and baby's them. and she loves to play whatever interests Aidan. i suppose that will change. i love three of the girls in their dresses...playing Rescue Heroes with Aidan. sigh.

love this photo.

can't wait to do a layout with it!

got my photos from Costco today. two boxes. wow. must be more intentional to stay caught up.