Trick or Treat Trail

Downtown Salmon Arm businesses hand out candy to the kids from 3-5:00pm. It's a lot of fun.

-Sophie and Fynn met up with Buzz Lightyear (I work with Logan's mommy)
-A purple mermaid (I also work with Hunter's mommy and she goes to our daycare)
-Fat Cat (the mascot at the credit union where I work)
-Fynn flirting with two of my co-workers
....and a cast of other characters who were terribly spooky

We then headed home so we could put a casserole from Kraft Foods in the oven and hit our neighbourhood before we called it a night. Daddy lit a fire in our fireplace and a little wine capped off a great day.

pretty princess all in a row....

This morning was Halloween dress up at Sophie's preschool.
I got her dressed and we headed out the door at 8:00. I needed to be at work early to get my flu shot and attend a presentation for 8:30am (good thing my commute is short).

Sophie looked darned cute in her costume and the red Ariel wig just cracks me up. Thanks, Grandma. We did good.

Her little buddy Abby was Snow White. Tomorrow I'll attempt to get Fynn in his pumpkin costume and Sophie back in her Ariel get-up for the big night.

closing the loop...

On Sunday afternoon we had about 10 adults and 12 kids over for a belated birthday for Fynn and a quasi house warming party. To be honest, it was a great way to kill two birds with one stone. We got to see some friends we haven't seen socially in awhile and the little guy celebrated his birthday (again) in style.

When it was all said and done, I told Vic we only entertain about twice a year for a reason: it's expensive and it is a lot of work. Sophie's room looked like a bomb hit it afterwards and the kitchen was a disaster.

All for a good cause however. But it is nice to look forward to a more mellow weekened.

a little bribery...

Poor Sophie.
She loves ballet, but last Wednesday was the day when parents/family/friends could come into the studio and watch the class. I invited my aunt and uncle and of course, Vic.

When she walked into the class with me she started to get extremely self conscious seeing all the people who would be watching. Self consciousness turned into fear which turned into her crying and grabbing my leg. Under no circumstances was she sitting on the sidelines (not when I'd invited people to watch her!!).

So, I bribed her. Under my breath, I muttered to her, "Sophie, if you dance we will go to Zellers later and buy you an Ariel Barbie." Pay dirt. She participated, albeit a tad timidly.

Anyway, the show went on, and so did Sophie.

little spiders

I really like some of the Martha Stewart Craft things. I picked up these spiders at Michaels last week. They are kind of cute and a little creepy.

This is our front entrance of the new digs.

Preschool grand opening

Last Friday, Fynn, Sophie and I attended Sophie's preschool grand opening. Her preschool is part of the same society that runs her and Fynn's daycare. The staff and parents of the daycare have done a tremendous amount of fundraising in the past 2years to make the new expansion happen.

Vic and I have a special place in our heart for the daycare and the staff that run it. I have never worried about either of them while I'm at work. I often think they are safer there than with me (especially after Fynn's staircase fall last month).

We had fun at the grand opening and our MLA George Abbott even made an appearance.
Fynn of course hammed it up.

i am blogging at work...shhh

We are still missing the adaptor for our laptop, so I can't use our computer at home.

We have settled into the house. Thanks to Bryan, Paula and Auntie D who helped us on various days unpack rooms that we were having a hard time getting to.

I promise I will have some photos soon. Life is hopefully going to slow down a bit.

King for a day

My little Fynnie turned 1 on October 10. We celebrated the Canadian Thanksgiving and his birthday at my parents' place.

He is such a little man.
Wearing overalls.
Playing with toy tools, a school bus, Little People.
Eating mini cupcakes.
Cooing in his sweet little baby voice.

Moving In

After a long wait, we finally moved into our new home last Sunday.
It was a day filled with boxes, movers, more boxes and a fair share of stress.
But, it's behind us now and the house is slowly starting to shape up.

Sophie enjoyed jumping into the piles and piles of paper.
And here is the living room one night -- still a long way to go, but starting to look like home to us.

so happy that....

Today is our last day living in a hotel!

Tomorrow we get up early to meet the movers at the new house.

Can it be? Has this day really come?

Time crunchies

I am really enjoying being back at work.
But it is HARD work having a full-time job and being a mom of these two little ones.

Vic and I have worked out an arrangement where I get them ready in the morning and take them to daycare. I'm an army sargeant in the morning, and I like to be responsible for getting to work on time (so we leave dad to his own devices).
In turn, he picks them up, so I can have a bit of gym time Mon-Wed.

I have gotten our morning routines down to a pretty good science. Some tips:

- put out all clothes the night before
- prepare their lunches and put in lunch bags the night before
- have any daycare paperwork ready the night before (cheques, fundraising, etc)
- know exactly what I'm going to wear -- including underwear.
- don't even think about getting into the line up at Tim Hortons for a coffee -- that will make you late everytime. My trick is to get to work, drink the office brew and then sneak over to Tim's at about 10am when the crowds have thinned.

Adding to all of this, is that I'm still nursing Fynn. So at about noon everyday I pop over to the daycare and feed him. Then I drive back to the office and grab a sandwich. Our hotel fridge is too small for me to even think about keeping my lunch in there with the kids.

Tonight we had the added challenge of needing to do some laundry. We all went over to the new house, used our washing machine and then realized that the dryer wasn't hooked up yet. So, back we went to the hotel to dry the clothes. Grrr!!!!

I'm also getting a jump on some work for tomorrow -- tomorrow has enough stuff to get done, so if I can get a jump on it now, I will.

Off to bed....

First Days

In honour of my first day back at work and Fynn's first official day of daycare, we posed for a picture on the deck at the chez Hamilton-hotel.

Poor little guy is still getting over his cold and the tail-end of his eye infection. In spite of his woes, he had a good day. I managed to see him at lunch for a feeding and timed it just right since he was just waking up from a nap. I also popped down at 3pm to take Sophie to ballet and still get back to work for the last bit of the day.

On other news, my Silpada bracelet arrived today. Yummy, nice stuff.