Tommy on a two-wheeler

For Christmas last year my dad gave Tommy a 'running bike', which is a bike with no pedals and no training wheels and you just run a bit then lift up you legs and ride the bike. They are how Europeans teach their kids to ride bikes in stead of training wheels. They totally work! He was awesome on his running bike, and really loves it, then one of your neighbors gave us a two-wheeler bike with no training wheels, so we decided to let Tommy try it. He rode around our culdesac on the very first try, all by himself! It was amazing. He is not yet 3 1/2 and he can ride his two-wheeler like a pro. The whole culdesace has come out to cheer him on and talk about how cool it is that he can ride. The only problem is that he is still a little bit too small for his bike so we have to help him get on it, so I try to get him to ride non-stop as much as he can around and around the culdesac.
This is Tommy telling me how many times he has ridden his bike around the culdesac so far. This is Tommy's very first try.

More mediocre talents

As many of you may know I love to learn to do things, yet I have neither the natural talent or the patience to become really good at any of these things. For example: playing the piano, singing, dancing, crocheting, doing hair and make-up, sewing, cooking, baking...really the list could go on. And I am very excited to let you all know that I am adding to that list by learning how to knit, and also gardening! I was first inspired to learn how to knit when I read the book "The Friday Night Book Club" which is amazing and you should all read it - if you haven't already. So Candise and I and a few other moms in my ward and some of my young women are learning to knit and my first project is a Griffindor scarf in honor of the new Harry Potter movie coming out - woo hoo!

I am also learning to garden - I am really proud of all my tulips and daffodils that I planted last fall and they all came up - this was a real miracle to me, because I have never made anything grow before. I am really pumped and might even plant a small vegetable garden. We'll see. But for now I am loving all the beautiful flowers that grow so easily in Vancouver weather.

April in a nutshell

April was a busy month, I turned 23, again, at the beginning of the month, and had a good birthday, thank you to everyone who remembered. Jesse and I went to see a play that was weird and artistic, we feel very hip. Then there was Easter - which was nice, we had an Easter party with all the little kiddies around my boys age and their mommies. They searched for eggs in the backyard and then just played there for awhile, it was such a beautiful day for an outside party. I love Vancouver because spring actually means warm. I taught a class at our stake relief society women's conference, which consumed my thoughts for most of the month - I only took a break to read "the confessions of fitzwilliam darcy" - which for all of you P&P fans out there, was amazing. The boys are loving being outside and I'm loving getting out of the house too...it's easier to ignore the laundry that way. Here are some pics from this month, sorry it's all just one big clump, I'll try better next time.

Tommy reading some weird mag on the potty - honestly not a set-up.

Sammy is getting so big, and he loves to eat, a nice break from picky Tommy.
When I ask Tommy to smile for the camera he insists on being weird - how long will this last?Sammy loves to ride his bike - and I promise I fixed his hair after awhile, but it's very hard to cut a 1-year-old's hair!Tommy with his head under at swim lessons, he was the only one in his class who would.The boys got cold so Daddy made them their own personal hot tubs.Playing at the park.No, we don't make him wear a helmet all day(although I've considered it), this is just a stop on a long bike ride.

"New Moon" sets in Vancouver

For those of you in the know, they are filming the second movie in the twilight saga here in vancouver, and I would be sad if I missed out on the opportunity to see some of the sets they are filming at. I am trying to avoid full-on stalking by only seeing the sets when they are not filming, and I have not yet hung around outside their hotel...although the thought has crossed my mind. It has taken some serious researching skills to discover the sets, mainly done by Candise, including, google-earth, twitter, fan-websites, youtube and a bunch of emails sent out pretending to be teenagers who write lol and :) all the time. Kudos to you Candise. But all of it has paid off and we have been to 3 of the sets.

First, what is believe to be Sam's house (confirmed by a questionable source).

Second, Jacob's house, where, althought filming was done there was still a big scary security guard who chased us away, it was all very exciting.

and finally, we went to the site where they rebuilt Bella's house, but I don't have any sweet pics yet because there was a cop there who wouldn't let people pass because apparently they were filming. we did see the forks cop-car, and as you can see, a bunch of teenage girls who had been hanging out there waiting for their chance to see the stars for over 9 hours. We'll go back again in a couple days when filming should be done, to get some good pics of the house. this site is actually only about 15 minutes away from my place, so ya, whatevs, we're cool.

We went back to the site today, because we heard they were done filming and it was great! we saw Bella's house up close, the security guard was super chill and just wouldn't let us go around the front or side of the house. Yes, that is the window that Edward comes in and that in this movie Jacob jumps out.They also had all the cars parked there, this pic shows bella's truck, the forks cop car and alice's car, the bikes were there too, you just can't see them.And my partner in spying - Candise, we had so much fun finding all the sets,now I feel like reading the books again.

A little chat with Tommy

The other day I noticed Tommy was in a particularly good mood so I got out the old video camera and did a candid interview with my little 3-year-old. What a funny kid - I don't know where he gets it from.

Stalking the wrong set *UPDATE* MAY ACTUALLY BE ONE OF THE SETS

Candise and I recently discovered what we thought was one of the sets for New Moon. As you may know they are currently filming New Moon here in Vancouver, so there it was a definate possability that this was in fact one of the sets. We thought it was Jacob Black's house, it is just a little shack in the middle of nowhere, and there is even a little work shack behind. We drove by it a MILLION times, trying to get pics or see people, unfortunatly we saw nobody, except a really big security guy who watched us drive by repeatedly.This is a close-up of the house, you can see some of the tarps and movie stuff around, the night before this they were definately filming something. Unfortunately for us we later came upon these pictures of what is the actual set of the Black's house...somewhere in Vacouver. It is definately the right place because Bella's truck was spotted outside it with the two bikes in the back. owell, perhaps I'll happen upon the set still, it has to be here somewhere! If you want to see more pics of the filming, a good site is http://www.newmoonmovie.org/

Fiji-rific

My mom and dad left last thursday to serve in the Fiji temple for the next year and I miss them so much! As soon as she was gone I had a million questions for my mom about recipes and sewing and books and a million other stuff. I don't know what I am going to do without them. They called last night but the time difference is craziness! It was 11:30pm on sunday my time and 6:30pm on monday night in Fiji. So we are still trying to figure out when we can skype and I can finally ask my mom how to make a stinkin' button hole!

I miss you mom and dad! but I hope you have a wonderful time there!

A visit from the Fitzners

My old roomie Jordana decided to come and visit me last weekend while her husband, Gibb, went to a dental conference out here. I was so excited to see her and her adorable little kids, Jayna and Kepler and we had so much fun! It was the perfect time for her to visit because she left Edmonton during a blizzard and came to Langley when it was bright and sunny. We went to the park twice the first day simply because we could. We played Rockband and went to girly movies and walked around the house in our jammies - she was the best kind of guest.
Tommy LOVED Kepler and was always giving him toys and hugs - I wish he was that nice to his own little brother.

I finally did it

So I have totally trimmed Sammy's hair before, to stop it from being super lop-sided and stuff, but this was the first time I finally gave him a full on hair cut. I know, he is 18 months, but I have been resisting because of his sweet and precious blonde curls, but as you can tell from the first picture, it was getting a bit out of control and he wasn't really looking super cute any more...PLUS this lady at the store called him a girl when he was wearing CAMO so I decided it was time. I buckled him in, put on a good movie and went to work.It's always so tempting to stop cutting halfway through and leave your kids with a sweet mullet.

This is the finished product, I guess he still looks super cute. And yes, he is eating a VERY hairy apple.

Visiting Nana and Grandpa

When we heard my parents would be leaving for Fiji so soon, we decided we would go visit them one more time...and left 3 hours later. It's hard to be spontaneous once you have kids and jobs and no money, but we decided to pack up and leave because we might not find another time to see them before they were gone (see:http://susanandfranksexcellentadventure.blogspot.com/). We drove through the night hoping the boys would sleep the whole time, yet, at 4 AM they both still had their eyes open. Sammy puked 3 times on the way there, but that was most likely due to his mild electricution earlier that day. We arrived at 5:30AM, tired, but happy to see Nana and Grandpa. Tommy loves them both so much! and Sammy likes pretty much everyone, so he was happy to get some attention too.
Tommy liked being able to "help" so much with all the baking my mom does.

It's not that we are snow deprived in Vancouver, but still, this much snow is always exciting for a 3 year old boy, and Tommy was out in it as soon as he could be.
Sammy came outside because Tommy was, but I don't think he was as into as his older brother.

If anyone thought the fact that all the streets were covered in 3 inch thick ice covered with snow would stop Tommy from showing Grandpa how good he was at riding the bike he got for christmas, they were sorely mistaken. We visited my mom at the office, and, simply to stop them from destroying everything we put them on top of the filing cabinet. When did Tommy become such a poser?
My dear sweet boys love to find "great hiding spots" wherever we go. It's awesome. I love it.

I don't know how Tommy gets away with climbing all over my dad during dinner, it definately would not have gone down this way when I was growing up.

My mom tried to help Tommy on his quest to become a pirate when he grows up.
I don't know why, but Sammy makes this face alot. I think he's happy.

SYTYCDC the concert!

Me and some of my girls went to the So You Think You Can Dance Canada concert when it came to Vancouver. Even my very bestie, Tams, came out from Calgary to visit and go to the concert too. We had so much fun, getting ready, riding public transit and screaming like teenage girls.


Candise came over early to get ready together...do you remember those days? I felt like I was 17 all over again. And yes, I am even hard-core when I get ready.

Just before we left Jesse told Tommy that mommy was weird, whatever, what does he know?


Riding the sky train downtown. We decided to drive Candise's car to the station because it was the least likely to be stolen.

This is us and our super great seats. If you look behind us you can see the suprising amount of middle aged men.

Isaac and Allie doing a pretty sweet hip hop routine.

We are all very excited!...why you ask, well just scroll down.

TWITCH!! Possibly the awesomest dancer from any season of SYTYCD, twitch, showed up at the concert during half time and it was definately a highlight. He sat just a bit in front of us, and I kept watching him to see what he thought of all the dances.

The dancers. The concert was so amazing.

Chinese New Years

We have an annual Chinese New Years Party, not because we are Chinese, or follow their calendar at all, but it is a really good excuse to eat lots of chinese food and leave all the kids at home.

Sammy was awake for the start of the party, I really only kept him up to show of his cute chinese PJs and hat. Tommy had his first big sleep-over with Grandma, it was wonderful.

My chinese centerpiece

Candise and Vanessa, what a cute couple.

We play a big "crazy rook" tournament. Jesse stayed at table #5 for most of the night. And no Josh, I was not trying to cheat by taking this picture.


Some girls at the 'loser' table, it was in the playroom and you had to play on an ikea kids table and chairs.


Some men at table four, this is my favorite picture, I'm not sure why, but the group of them make me laugh every time.




Ken and Barbie, I mean Mike and Steph...always ready for the perfect pose.


Some more of the players. I looks like the boys just got beat, and the girls are pretty happy about it.


The winners table, I can tell because they got TWO bowls of treats.