My parents came out to Vancouver for a visit in September. During their stay on the West Coast we decided to take a little trip to Seattle to shop at the outlets and to wonder around the city for a few days. We rented a home which turned out to be not so great but we made the most of it and had some fun.

The trip down to Seattle was interesting when we got to the border. We had a 45 minute wait and the kids started to get restless after 30 minutes so Jimmy took them out of the van to get a little fresh air. Traffic started to move pretty quickly and before I knew it I was alone in the van almost at the border crossing and Jimmy was running as fast as he could go carrying two 2.5 year olds in his arms on wet grass. It was insane! He just made it in time before it was our turn to see the border agent. Lesson learned….do not get out of your vehicle at the last traffic light!

It was nice having time alone with my parents and Claire & Rhys really enjoyed having their Grandparents all to themselves. We went to a great playground in the Green Lake area and the house we stayed in had a great playroom filled with fun toys for the kids. The highlight for sure was visiting the Seattle Children’s Museum where everything is interactive and the kids could roam about and have fun. It was very cool.

 

A few months ago we had Jimmy’s photographer friend (Carly) meet up with us at Granville Island to take some family pictures of us.

We spent a few hours walking around Granville Island on a nice sunny morning having Carly and her photographer Mom (Evelyn) take endless pictures of us. It was really mellow doing it this way and the kids were so good! Claire was a ham as usual and she sure loved the camera being pointed at her! Rhys was good as well but really… he just wanted to play in the playground.

We are now sold on having professional pics done once or twice a year.

Here are a couple shots from that day. Look out for an additional unseen photo or two come Christmas card time 😉

 

 

My favorite season is upon us! Fall is such a pretty time of year.

We have a lot of fun things to look forward to in the next few busy months. We plan to make the most of everyday!

Here are some cute pics of Claire & Rhys ‘swinging into fall’:

Claire & Rhys are still on the wait list for preschool so in the meantime we signed them up for ‘kids club’ which is preschool with more flexibility. We sign them up for how ever many days per week we want. We started off with one day per week in October.

The kids loved it! Jimmy & I sat in the classroom for the first 5 minutes then said goodbye to the kids and slowly made our exit. Claire & Rhys were so excited at all the new toys and craft areas that they barely noticed us leaving. Jimmy & I drove to the nearest coffee spot and had a great time with a mini-date/ re-connecting.

When it was time for the class to end all the kids exited one at a time from the classroom. Claire & Rhys were the last to leave and the teacher asked us to come in as they did not want to leave. We found them sitting on the reading carpet immersed in books. Awesome!

They are excited to go back this week – success!

Wendy, Chris, and Senna visited us just before my trip to Botswana.

We had such a good time and it was such a pleasure seeing Claire & Rhys enjoying their Aunt, Uncle and cousin so much. The relationship between cousins is so very sweet… Claire & Rhys adore their cousin Senna.

Making the most of our time together- we went to the aquarium, to the park, to the water-park and we went bike riding with Claire & Rhys on their new push bikes!

We enjoyed every moment of our visit together and look forward to the next one.

 

 

We have been a very busy family as of late. I was away in Botswana for the better part of July and Jimmy was super busy being an awesome Dad to Claire & Rhys. The summer seems to have flown by and now fall is upon us. The kids are getting bigger and talking so much now. It is really exciting.

Our neighborhood is rapidly changing as well. There seems to be construction on every block. Claire & Rhys love it and as ‘Monkey see, monkey do’ they mimic what they see into play. Diggers are big fun in our house  🙂

 

Yesterday we had an impromptu picnic after work…

Claire & Rhys have been asking for a picnic for a while so after a long day we hit the park & had so much fun!

 

Our friend Fred was in town for Canada Day with the Royal Canadian Navy. His ship, HMCS Vancouver, was docked at Canada Place to help with the Canada Day festivities.

We were lucky that he was able to give us a tour of the ship. Needless to say, Claire & Rhys were very excited!

The steep stairs inside the ship were daunting especially when the kids wanted to climb them alone. Rhys was a little timid when we went into rooms/ walkways that only had red lights in them and no windows. A bit scary for sure.

It was a fun day 🙂

Claire was too tired after the ship tour to walk back to the van:Claire