Happy Canada Day!

O Canada!

Our home and native land!
True patriot love in all thy sons command.

With glowing hearts we see thee rise,
The True North strong and free!

From far and wide,
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.

God keep our land glorious and free!
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.

O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.

Thought I would get my Canada Day post done tonight. Tomorrow will be a Family Fun Day. The kids have good memories, and they remember doing many fun things at Canada's birthday party last year. Or, maybe they just remember from seeing my pictures and scrapbook pages! At any rate, we will do something fun! Usually, it includes birthday cake, or cupcakes.

The next two pictures are ones I just printed off the internet and I will have on the kitchen table for my kids to colour when they wake up tomorrow morning. I am sure we will catch a parade or two tomorrow, so there will be more pictures to follow after our Canada Day festivities! Enjoy your day, and have fun celebrating the best country on earth!!!!

A Little Thank You

Last weekend, for our church Family camp, we had excellent food. I wanted to thank the cook and her crew, so I made this card to give her. The stamp sets used are retiring as of 11pm tonight. Get them at my website for just a few more hours! (Voila, and Voila to Go)

Happy Days

We just got back last night from our church Family Camp... the theme was "Happy Days." Our speaker was Dave Currie - what a great communicator! He did 3 sessions on the topics: Joy in Life, Joy in Love and Joy in the Lord.

Dave and Donalyn on 50s Night!


The kids got to have fun with the Bertness Family. Here is Wayne Bertness and "Grandpa!"

On Saturday night, we did a 50s Diner for supper, and lots of people dressed up. Then we had a Variety Show that lasted almost 2 hours. What a hoot! Loved it all... so many different acts got up to do something - from singing and gymnastics, to magic and hula-hooping! What a talented bunch :)

Here we are as a 50s Family...

Hydrangeas

At our old house, we had a beautiful hydrangea bush in the front yard that used to bloom beautiful and blue. I love this new set from Stampin' Up!. It is a level 1 hostess set from the upcoming catalogue - it's called "Because I care."

A Birthday Card

Just wanted to share the card I made for my father-in-law's birthday. We will see them tonight for cake to celebrate my FIL turning 65!!! He is a retired airlines pilot, so I thought this set would be perfect for his card.

Happy Birthday Dad!

Today is a special day... both my dad and Steve's dad are celebrating their birthdays. When Steve and I were dating, and we discovered that our dads had the same birthday - we knew that was something special!!

I have always been close to my dad. I found this poem yesterday when I was browsing the internet for card ideas. One lady had used this poem inside their Father's Day card for her dad. I read it and thought it was perfect for me and my dad!

Dads and Daughters

Author: Reginald Holmes

Whole volumes have been written
of fathers and their sons.
Why must daughters and their dads
be such forgotten ones?

There are special ties that bind
a daughter to her dad.
And a certain kind of feeling
that sons have never had.

She goes to dad for counsel
when things get out of hand.
She knows he has the answers,
that he will understand.

From him she gets her courage;
she thrives upon his praise
and sometimes takes advantage
of his kind, loving ways.

With due respect to Mother,
today I'm proud and glad
to write a little poem about
a daughter and her Dad!

Me and my dad on my wedding day...

You Are Invited...

You are invited to my
NEW CATALOGUE OPEN HOUSE
Come out to my house on Tuesday, July 6th
Between 7 and 9 pm.

Make and Takes
Refreshments
Retired Items on Sale
and the star of the show...
The 2010-2011 Idea Book and Catalogue!
Reserve your copy today!
($10 each or free with a purchase of $50 or more)

Please RSVP

Sports Day

You know the end of the year is fast approaching when there are field trips (last week, both boys had a field trip) no more library books brought home (they still have library time but aren't allowed to sign any new books out) and Sports Day! There are only 7 days of school left. And for Todd, one of those is being spent on a field trip.

Today it was Sports Day. I always loved having my mom around the school when I was in Elementary School, so I thought the boys would like having mom and dad there for their Sports Day, too. With both of us at the school, it meant Elise got to come along. She was thrilled!

This was Todd's favourite moment... playing hockey!


This relay is called the Caterpillar, and it is so funny to watch. So glad for a sunny day, because in the rain this would make for one messy activity!!

Elise hamming it up for the camera!

THIS was Elise's highlight of the day... when "Hawkey" from the Abbotsford Heat got down and hugged her. It was so fun that the Heat mascot and another representative came to our Sports Day.

This was my favourite "Kodak moment" of the day - Scott and his friend in a bunny hop relay, and I happened to catch them both in the air at the same time!

Here, Scott is trying to unwrap a candy while wearing oven mitts! Not as easy as it sounds :)

Thought for the Day

I just heard this quote, and I thought it was a good one to share....

"Every dollar you spend is a vote for what you
value in life."
— Anonymous

Wedding Bells ♫

On Saturday, we had the honour of attending my cousin Maren's wedding in Victoria. She married a great guy named Chad. When we met Chad for the first time a month ago, my kids fell in love with him instantly - that's a good sign!!! They are just the perfect couple, and the wedding was really fun. All 3 of my kids were in the Kids' Parade during the ceremony. The boys got to wear the cutest little bow ties and vests, and I got Elise a white dress (from Avon! Thanks Andrea :) with a pink bow to match the wedding colours). I helped out with the music... played piano for the prelude and processional, and sang a song in the processional, too. Chad's sister and cousin also sang a song during the ceremony that his sister wrote, and it was so beautiful.

Here are a few pictures from the day... which was gorgeous and sunny, just like the bride :)


Just married... and so very happy!!!


The cake in the centre was made by a friend of my aunt. It was so pretty. The 2 cakes on the sides are called Kransekake. This is the traditional Norwegian wedding cake, and one of my favourite desserts! These cakes were made by my Auntie Marit (Bride's mom) and decorated by Vegar, a cousin from Norway who came over for the wedding.

Congratulations, Maren and Chad! May God bless you as you start your life together :) xoxo

Science World through my lens

Here are a few pics that I took at Science World, yesterday. It was such a fun day, and the workshop on roller coasters that the kids got to participate in was also very well done. The instructor, Andy, was funny and related well to the kids. The kids loved him!

Here's Scott on a giant hamster wheel... it was a lot of work to power this thing, but he got the metre up to "clock radio" power!


Boys love water and building dams.

In the Pirates/Treasure exhibit, they were promoting geo-caching. One of these days we'll get a GPS and take our kids geocaching... it sounds like so much fun!

Pirate canon shooting game... another thing boys love!


Scott practicing his piano recital song on the larger-than-life keyboard!



This is the Science World favourite. They should make a whole wall of these things! This is something the boys (I was in charge of Scott and his friend) kept going back to throughout the day.


Homeward bound... some kids fell asleep on the bus ride back!

Abstract Photos

I had the wonderful privilege of being a volunteer mom for the grade one field trip to Science World today. On the way there, Scott had my camera for a few miles, and he really made good use of it. Just to humour him, I thought I would share some of his budding photography skills.

Tomorrow, I will share some of the pictures that I took of the day :)

The highway:

The side of a truck:

The front of a truck:

A driver illegally talking on his cell phone in a truck: (I blurred out his face, because he look rather less than impressed that his picture had been taken... get off the PHONE!)

Hmm... do you see a pattern? It's a truck!

Oh, this one's a sign:

He had a bit of a fascination for cell phone towers on the way in... took several pics of them:

Yep... you got it - a truck!

His shoe... must not have been any trucks out the window just then!

The other goal he had (kind of like a photo scavenger hunt) was to take a picture of a fire hydrant. He was quite pleased with this particular shot!

This one is probably the most clear out of any he took all day, so I had to include it! (plus there is a truck in the picture!! )

The front of the UPS truck. He took this one for me :)

He would have taken several hundred more if I had let him. He loves taking pictures... I'm thankful for digital :)