Lily is 4!!

We had a party for Lily at home on the Sunday before her big day. 12 of her classmates came, what fun, she had a blast!! All the kids were well behaved and they are all so sweet.

On her actual birthday, Dec 12, Violet and I went to her clasz with cupcakes. The kids were all there and they were so happy to see Violet, it was so cute!

We miss Johnny.... He has been with Mamie for a week now and we look forward to having him back. It has helped loads though since Christmas and travels are right around the corner.

A little haircut for Johnny.

Ahhh, on Saturday, November 17, we decided to cut Johnny's beautiful locks of hair. I cried.... He was perfect throughout the whole "cut". I kept each strand.

Lily is a swimmer!

I went to see Lily swimming tonight. She is awesome! Swam on her front, on her back, looks very comfortable jumping in and moving around. I was very happy to take her tonight and the first thing she says to me when we got out of van:

"Maman, je suis contente que tu es avec moi."

Daddy enjoyed his time with Violet and Johnny.

Videos...

We juat watched a couple of videos of Johnny when he was about 5 months old and Violet looks like him. So cute!

We also saw videos of Lily loving Johnny when he was a baby, so it's lovely to see Johnny now loving Violet so much.

First parent-teacher meeting...

Met with Mme Mihaela tonight. I went alone and Jayson stayed home with the 3 kids for the hour. Everyone happy when I arrived, sweet.

The teacher had nice things to say about Lily. She is counting and writing well, she likes drawing and painting the most and for the most part, she listens, follows instructions, albeit at a slow pace, but eventually, she gets it.

Lily can write her name very well.

An area of improvement for her is that after a few minutes of sitting and listening to a story she gets restless, so she'll start playing with her clothes, her velcro on her shoes and will cohort with another student who isn't listening.

That comes from daddy.

I'll work on it with her.

A different kind of baby...

Not sure what it is, but today, Violet went from being a new baby, to a baby.

Her eyes, her cooing, her body movements have more energy and seem to have a purpose.

It's 4 am and her jammies were wet, I guess I will have to teach daddy how to diaper a baby again ;-)

A little road trip...

November 1, Mamie brought Johnny to Gatineau, he came to spend a week with her and Papi and see his cousins and uncles and aunts and pepere. It's been great that he can go with Mamie, it helps me loads. We sure miss him!

On November 7, I loaded up Violet and Lily and we went to Gatineau. V met pepere, mon oncle Big et tante Martine. Her cousins and uncle Bob got to meet her as well. It was a fun road trip and Lily was an angel and so helpful with V.

Whenever V would start fussing or crying, Lily would squeeze the girafe or she would start singing O Canada. So cute!! Never mind lullabies when you have the national anthem!

Tonight, at Big & Martine's, the whole family came and we had dinner and then the kids got a few gifts, Johnny was super happy with a singing Elmo and a truck. Lily received a Hello Kitty dress, a book to write letters in and a puzzle.

We are going to see Zackary play hockey tomorrow for the first time!

A few quick updates on Lily....

Lily was a bit sad the other day after school. Apparently, her friends Sophie and Marianne were playing together and they didn't want Lily to play with them, they told her: " that she wasn't in the club". All was fine in the classroom groups the next day.

Lily always wants to wear dresses.

We received a note from Lily's teacher, Mme Mihaela saying that there was a few incidents where Lily was not being nice to a little boy in the school yard. Jayson and I both had chats with her and we hope that she listens and is nice to all her friends in class.

Her favorite thing to do is play Lego. I guess she is following in daddy's footsteps because that was also his favorite thing to do.

On Friday, October 19, Lily was "Championne du jour" she got a Congratulations certificate and she was allowed to be the first to line up and got to play with whatever she wanted during playtime.

Lily loves talking about all her friends in class: Sophie and Marianne were her first friends. Then came, Marc, Maxime, Johnathan, Jason, Sebastien, Tristan, Andre,

Johnny and daddy

For the last couple of weeks, Johnny and daddy have been hanging out together a lot. It has made them get super close and as a maman, it is awesome to see how much Johnny loves his daddy.

It also helps me out loads!

Both kids are still so much in love with Violet!

Cold and windy zoo trip!

On Sat, Oct 6: went to the zoo with Aunt Shannon, Uncle Matt, Kate and Ryan... It was very windy and a little chilly! The kids ran around from animal to animal, well, the girls did and the boys loved just sitting there and watching the animals do whatever it was they were doing.

The girls liked the monkeys the most and the boys liked the polar bears!

Violet was awesome (36 days!) and spent the day in the carier or in the stroller (mostly babywearing!).

Then it was pizza and movie night for all of us. Early bed times for the moms! And video games for the dads!

First zoo trip as a family of 5!

What a fun day! We took the kids to the zoo on Sunday, September 30th. It was a beautiful sunny Fall day and we walked around for 4 hours. Violet enjoyed the fresh air and Lily was happy to see giraffe's and Johnny's fave's were the stingrays and monkeys.

A super great memory!

First parent teacher night at Lily's school

Jayson and I went to Lily's school tonight. We saw Mme Miheala before the class assembly and she had a few things to say about Lily:

- she is adapting well to routine
- she doesn't like to stay still during resting times, but she is getting better
- she has made some new friends
- she always is in a great mood!
- she is fun to have in class
- she has a little defiant side to her where she doesn't always comform to what is happening... Not in a bad way!

We saw some pretty paintings and pictures of Lily in her class.

Hard to imagine that our little girl is doing all these things without us during the day.

It was a very good first school meeting... Lily and Johnny stayed home with a babysitter (first time we hired a stranger!) and things went well on the homefront.

Violet smiles!

At 27 days young, Violet concentrated and focussed on me , maman , and smiled! She was mimicking my facial expressions! She is so beautiful and it's awesome having 3 little kids!

Lily's first day of school! Sept 10

As any parent would do, I asked Lily what she did on her first day of scool. She replied: "maman, what I didn't do what paint!"

I guess she had her hopes up a bit.

Violet Mary Ambrose

Born September 1, 2012. 8lbs 7 oz, 21 inches long.

Our Sunday...

Kids were with Mamie for a few days and they arrived yesterday afternoon. I am 37.5 weeks pregnant and Lily and Johnny are a couple of energetic kids. Will I make it to 40 weeks???

They might be full on energetic kids, but they are so fun to be with, they are kind and sweet and even Johnny is sweet on Lily.

We went to Ikea and had lunch and shopped a bit, then Walmart for a cone and some more errands. Good kids the whole time, it helps that they are ao cute and laugh a lot. Jayson took Lily swimming at 5 and Johnny and I hung around together at the house. He was hugging and kissing me so much!

We had a lovely mish-mash supper and after baths, we all read books and now they are both snoring. Today was a great day and I am looking forward to seeing the love that the kids will have for their new baby brother or sister!!!

The Leader

Lily has been the leader for a few weeks now, she makes sure that she tells us this often. Leader to get in the van, leader to walk to park, leader to finish her food etc...

However, this morning, she announced that today, she will not be the leader. She needs to take a break.

We are out of a leader, maybe Johnny will step up to the plate.

First "take away"...

Today was the first time I ever told the kids I would take away the right to watch tv for a day.

It took me an hour to get them down for nap, then they fought a lot, they were miserable and maman needed a break.

3 hours after being punished, they were watching a show.

Glad they are young and didn't really get their little punishment.

2 hands...

Hey Lily, did you take a drink of your milk yet?

Non maman, I only have 2 hands. See, I can't open my milk if I am holding onto something else. Please wait.

Alrighty then.

A thank you and a tear

Some times, as parents, you wonder if you are doing things right. Last night, at supper, Lily confirmed that we are on the right track....

The kids were gone for a week with Mamie and as a suprise, Jayson and I decided to paint the kid's room to make it a bit nicer and colorful. Since I am over 6 months pregnant, I left all the lifting, patching, trimming and painting to Jayson. He did an incredible job.

When the kids arrived on Sunday afternoon - daddy was out with a friend hitting balls and I did my best not to let them see their room before he got home. I failed. While playing outside, Lily, who usually pees in the grass outside decided to go inside to pee and ran in before I could catch her. When she opened the door to her room she yelled out "Oh, I love it, it's so beautiful, my daddy did this for me." I wish I had recorded that and I hadn't told her that daddy had painted that for her, she just assumed it.. Lily is a very thoughtful and expressive little girl. OK, so back to why we're doing things right...

It's suppertime, we're all sitting down and as a little family tradition, what we all do is give thanks to eachother and give kisses all around. Johnny proudly kisses me and daddy and then Lily kisses and says thanks. And then very sweetly says, thanks for my new room daddy. At this time, Jayson and I were behind her for our kiss and our hearts melted.

I must say, that I think that it could be our proudest moment so far. And in our eyes, that little split moment, that little sentence makes us think that we're doing something right.

Zoo sans Johnny...

Went to he zoo with our friends the Bahm's... Without Johnny. We sure missed him, but the girls had a blast! Especially at the water park!

However, a great day sometimes has a price to pay and Lily has been sick for the last 24 hours and now has a feet.

Not fun. Even sans Johnny.

First sleep-over!

Lily is having her first friend sleep-over with Scotlyn! She was so excited to have her friend sleep with her in her Dora bed. It's been an hour, so far so good! They did go to bed completely exhausted at 9pm, we figure they will sleep well!

Off to the zoo tomorrow.

Funny girl

Lily says: "maman, I am not a smart chicken today". She said that because then she would be able to be naughty. Mmmm. No. You have to be nice and you're not a chicken. Oh ok maman.

Great night sleep!

Kids slept all night, even after going to bed later than usual! Johnny woke up at 7:30 and Lily got up with me at 7:00.

Lily is in love...

After Johnny was in bed tonight, Lily and I laid on the couch tonight an snuggled. She hugged my belly, told her baby sister that she loved her and that she was so cute. We were watching Care Bears and I asked if her baby sister should bring her one and she said yes, just a small one though.

It makes me so proud to have a little girl that is full of love.

Late nap!

Lily fell asleep in the van after we picked up Daddy. We brought her in the house and she didn't wake up! Sleeping from 5:20 to 7:20 means its going to be a late night!!!

Our zoo day!

We went to the Toronto zoo today, how fun! Lily, Johnny and daddy (me too!) we're so excited to see all the animals. Lily's favorites were the elephant and the giraffe. Johnny really liked seeing the big cats.

Walking into a special rainforest room, where it was hot and packed, Lily yells out: "this place is beautiful". She is very expressive and is mostly always full of nice thing to say!

Johnny ran. And ran. And ran so much, we could tell that his little legs were tired.

We bought a membership so we'll be going back again soon!

Daughter's love

This morning, while Jayson and Lily were sharing a ham and egg sandwich, Lily put her hand on daddy's cheek and said: "daddy, you're so cute".

Daddy's heart melted.

McHappy Day

Lily and Johnny computer painting together. All for charity. And a cheeseburger.

Sleep

Last night, both kids woke up and ended up in bed with me, I had Lily's feet on my back, and Johnny's feet on my belly. I enjoyed it an it was so special - especially since they were both snoring! Jayson ended up in Johnny's bed! These are the memories I want to remember...

Weekend bests....

Lily and Johnny are so fun.