February Fun

Ava got a fun new toothbrush in her Christmas stocking that glows!  The genius behind it is that she has to brush for as long as it is glowing. It was so much fun, while it lasted. . . 

Cheeky and Chuckles in the morning, watching cartoons

A few cute shots of Owen

 With the weather cold and rainy, we took the kids to an indoor play place. 

 Where is Ava?

SURPRISE!

I tried to take a couple Valentines pictures of Owen but he really didn't want to cooperate.  Plus grey shirts and drool don't mix well.

Papa had a Valentines Day surprise for us when we came home. This bunch was all for Ava!

Snow Day!

The beginning of February was total bliss for this Canadian girl, because it finally snowed!  Snow isn't unheard of here in England but it is kind of rare, especially the kind of snow that collects on the ground and is sticky enough to make snowmen and forts. The snow began falling Saturday night and with the slow salt/removal system that the UK has we knew church would be cancelled in the morning, and it was!

This is Saturday night from my bedroom window.

Sunday morning! 

We woke up Ava and told her it had snowed!  She was so excited, so we opened her window and showed her.  She was pumped to get outside and play.

With a lack of snow days around here our 'gear' is a little on the hodge podge side.

Owen was awake while I was getting him bundled up but the excitement of it all was too much.

With a whole day of playing in the snow ahead of us we decided to take a morning walk and make the first tracks through the covered streets. Pretty sure we were one of a very few out in the cold on a snowy Sunday morning.

This fort protected us from the huge cul-de-sac snowball fight we all had and lasted for almost a week!

WE LOVE THE SNOW

Leeds Castle and Canterbury Pantomime

I went a little stir crazy and planned a spontaneous trip to Leed's Castle with an overnight stay in a hotel with a swimming pool (pools are rare in UK hotels.) Leeds was a beautiful castle and it's moat was crystal clear.  Can you believe this picture was taken in January? Look how green it is.

Ava still fully dressed for the outdoors, looking a little bored in the Library room.

Outside there were lots of fun things to do and see. This maze was huge and it took Dave and Ava a while to find the center, but eventually they did.  I didn't brave the winding mess of hedges with Owen being so small and hungry I stayed with him and waited on the outside.

 To leave the maze you had to walk through a strange grotto cave with scary looking carvings and sea life depictions.  WEIRD!

There was a large collection of birds to look at in outdoor cages.  They were loud and had lots of attitude!

After spending all day at the castle we headed to our hotel.  Ava was so excited to go swimming.  Owen had never been swimming before, so we tried to document the entire event. He seams happy but. . . 

 Oh no, he hated it!  It was a bit on the chilly side and he screamed the whole 5 minutes we was in the water.  Ava was the exact opposite, she loved her first time swimming at the Edelweiss Lodge in Garmish Germany.

  I took him out of the water and wrapped him up.  He must have been tired because he fell asleep in 2 minutes.

 The next day we had tickets to watch "Cinderella" pantomime at the Marlowe Theater in Canterbury. As most theater rules go there was no photography.  It was an amazing show with Drag Queen Step Sisters, real falling snow and a flying horse! Ava was in complete awe, she never sat down in her chair the entire time.

January 2012

January was a fun month.  We took loads of pictures of the kids (have to make sure second child Owen has as many photos growing up as our first child Ava did.)

Jessie had been acting out with bad behavior since bringing Owen home.  She was peeing on our bed almost daily, taking food off the table, counters and straight out of Ava's hands (once leaving tooth marks.)  Since things weren't getting any better we made the tough decision to give her to a new family.  Dave had her up on a online sale site as "free to good home" Long story shortened, the couple who took Jessie lied to us by saying they loved her and took her out to run and play every day. . . when really they had her up for sale the very next morning trying to make a few hundred pounds. Miraculously the mother of a friend from church ended up buying Jessie for 100 pounds and contacted us right away.  I was  in shock and called the family who originally took Jessie. They denied selling her to make money and claimed everything we had been told was lies.  We bought Jessie back for 100 pounds and decided that we couldn't trust anyone else to take care of her.  She is ours forever.  We now have a gate to close off Jessie from the dinner table and she has since accepted Owen and is no longer peeing on our bed.

This is a picture of me visiting Jessie at the "lier's" home, 4 days after giving her away.

Most of us needed our immunizations updated so we all went in together.  Owen had his 2 month shots, I got 2 needles, and poor Ava had 4!  I wasn't expecting for her to get so many.  She knew that she was going to get a needle and prepared herself by bringing Tiger and giving him a few hundred shots of his own.

We originally put a holding fee down for a new mini van back in October, but due to unforeseen contract rules (can't own 3 vehicles at the same time without paying expensive UK tax) couldn't pick it up until we sold the old van.  It took forever to sell and get all the paperwork transferred over to the new owners name and off of our gas ration card.  Finally in January we could pick up our new van (we had been driving the truck for over 2 months.) This was an exciting day! We have never owned something as new or expensive as this before, but the pleasure I get of having automatic doors, a DVD player, cruise control and recline stow and go seating with trunk space. . . is priceless. 

First gas fill up!