We All Scream For Ice Cream

I'm not an ice cream girl. I like ice cream, but I can (and do) pass it up. That was before I discovered Chapman's Hokey Pokey ice cream. It's fantastic! It's expensive! We don't have it very often. However, it was on sale last week and I couldn't resist!

Sarah enjoys the Hokey Pokey and insist on feeding herself.

Katie can help herself to the ice cream (I don't enjoy this trick).

Bethie loves it so much that she feels she must consume every last bit.

Katie, too, loves the Hokey Pokey.

But Sarah loves it most!

Out of The Mouth of Kate

Katie is a very articulate child. Recently, she has said to me:

• "I am sick and tired of you always telling me to put my own shoes on!"
• "Mummy, you're driving me CRAZY!"
• "How many times do I have to tell you....?"

She never got to finish the last statement as I am fairly articulate myself. She, instead, was subject to the Wrath of Moi! I realised too late that she will probably remember what I have said as I reprimanded her and adopt my words as her own the next time I hear the Wrath of Katie!

A Great Idea

It was a beautiful day yesterday. We spent most of the day outside. When Sarah woke up from her afternoon nap, Dan went in to get her up and to give her a snack. I was "in charge" of the twins.

At this point in the day, I felt that the twins didn't require a lot of attention. They were happily playing together and running all over the yard. I was enjoying myself in the front garden doing some planting, weeding, and watering. Despite not having a fence, I wasn't too worried when the twins disappeared from my view. They have an innate respect for our property boundaries, they are terrified to go near the road, and they typically warn me before they do anything bad.

When Dan went in, I continued to let them muck about out of my sight. Every couple of minutes, I would call out "Are you happy?". Both girls would respond "yes". Great. They were content and within ear shot. I kept on doing my thing.

Katie made an appearance. She said, "I have a great idea! Let's put water into the pool!" (the pool is their little plastic wading pool that Dan had left out when cleaning the shed). I told her that this wasn't a good idea at all. It would be far too cold. Instead, she and Bethie could pretend to swim. This satisfied her and off she went.

About 10 minutes later, Katie was back and Bethie was right on her heels. As Katie spoke, she started taking off her clothes "I've got a new plan. I'm going to put my bathing suit on". As I was frantically trying to get her clothes back on, I explained that she could pretend that she was wearing a bathing suit. Both girls were pleased and disappeared again.

Moments later, the girls were back. Sopping wet. Since I had the hose in the front with me, I was confused why they could be so completely wet. Katie explained that they had gone swimming in the pool, and then she asked me to join. Needless to say, I was interested.

As we head into the backyard, I saw that the girls had pushed the pool under the "wheel" where I keep the hose. There is a small leak where my two hoses join. By moving the pool, they had captured the water that was leaking and thus started to fill the pool. And then they went swimming.

Much to Katie's dismay, I dumped the water out of the pool. Then she and I had heated negotiations about what we should do with the pool. I wanted to put it away and she wanted me to put more water in the pool. While we were "debating" this, Bethie had sat down in one of my gardens and literally rolled in the dirt.

Katie was screaming and crying and absolutely dripping wet. Bethie was happy as a lark, but wet and filthy! This is when Dan came outside again and commended me on my magnificent parenting abilities. How did I react? I took Sarah and told him to deal with the twins!

There's Only One Boss In Our House

I wanted Big Sarah to go to church with me and the twins. I knew that if I asked her myself, she would instead tell me where I could go (and it wouldn't have been church!). I decided to use Bethie. Bethie loves church. She loves the songs, she loves dancing in the aisle, and she loves the attention. She definitely would be keen for Big Sarah to join us.

As instructed, Bethie approached Big Sarah and sweetly asked "Will you come to church with me?". Gotcha! How could Sarah say "no" to such an earnest little girl? In fact, Big Sarah did not say "no". Instead, she said "I have to ask my boss."

Bethie said nothing. She walked into the other room, found "The Boss" and said "Katie, can Big Sarah come to church with us?".

Bikes and Buddies

This was a very exciting long weekend for the girls. Big Sarah presented the twins with the ultimate gift: big girl bicycles with training wheels! The only thing was that these bicycles were not already assembled. I begged Dan to wait until later in the day when my father was coming over and he could assemble the bicycles for us. "Nonsense!" said my not-so-handy husband, he would do it himself.

Big Sarah and I took the kids to the grocery store. I stressed and worried and envisioned awful things happening to my babies when they mounted their bikes. Dan, historically, does not do well with putting things together, or taking things apart, or fixing things. Bearing that in mind, you can imagine my surprise when we arrived home and both bicycles were (properly) fully assembled. Bethie, however, was even more surprised than I was. She squealed with delight "Daddy, how did you put the bicycles together without any help?!" I laughed until I thought I would die!

The twins did well on their bicycles. We spent all weekend walking in loops around my neighbourhood. Once, we ventured onto the bicycle path but it was way too busy for us to continue.

Katie - learning how to make the bike go fast

And they're off!


Sarah, not to be outdone, is in the wagon watching the girls carry on.

Babies on bicycles!

For a special treat, I made "Strawberry Shortcake" (rather, my quickie version of it). The kids enjoyed licking the bowl.

Even Sarah.

We invited Trystan and Grayson over to play. Grayson is the boy wearing Baby Sarah's jeans and jacket. Sorry Mauricio, you gotta come prepared or I will take over!

After us ladies pushed for at least five minutes, we made the men take over. This is Dan doing laps around the yard with Trystan.

Mauricio was left to push the remaining children on the swings (he didn't realise that I was taking his picture too).

Summer's Comin'

Tuesday was great. The kids were in daycare and I had nothing to do but entertain myself. Needless to say, Big Sarah and I were off on an "adventure"! After Sarah's mandatory stop for coffee at Tim Horton's, we went from nursery to nursery to nursery. Everywhere we went, we bought more plants. We learned two very important things:

1. Sarah doesn't like spiders and is rather surprised to see them on plants.
2. I need to pay more attention when I buy plants. Specifically, I should look for the word "giant" - even when it's associated with a (presently) tiny wee plant.

We came back home and planted our wide variety of little treasures. When Dan saw how packed my gardens had become, he inquired if I was done buying plants for the summer. Sarah and I laughed and informed my poor husband that we haven't even started to buy annuals!

Sarah and I were delighted with the results and can't wait to watch everything grow. As we "toured the estate", we both commented how much it felt like summer. The kind of summers you have when you are young. The kind of summers that last forever and you have not a damn thing to do except enjoy yourself. What a good feeling!

Of course, I took some pictures. Here are my babies enjoying the afternoon:

Katie The Ham (left) & Bethie

Katie & Bethie

The Sarahs

Her Father's Daughter

Katie pushed Sarah on the swing. It started off sweetly enough...

...then she turned into her father!

Bethie didn't care who was pushing her as long as she was being pushed.