Thinking about spring...

We went on our annual sugar bush run today at Fulton's Pancake House.  It was a bit blustery to do the trails, so we will have to go back, but we had a great morning just the same!

Rory's favourite part was the maple-chocolate chip cookie.

Graduation day!

Maggie graduated from puppy class today (I'd like to say "with honors", but that may be a bit of a stretch.)
She did pass the "hot dog test" though, where they hold a hot dog under her nose and she has to resist it... She failed a similar test (with flying colours) the other day when Ben accidentally left the package of bratwurst unattended on the counter. It's a work in progress, is what I'm saying.

Here is a picture of Maggie (far left) and her siblings Hunter (middle) and Negi (right) at the last class. It was fun to have three from the same litter in the class every week.

We took our classes with Carolark Canine Learning Centre and can't say enough about them. They were so great at training the people and even incorporated the boys into the class. Great experience. We will continue on to level 1 with them.





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Jack's Lego Party!

These are little Lego guy crayons. We gave these out as party favours.

The Lego Cake!

Lego parties are pretty straightforward... Primary colours, throw in some green accents, and you're good to go! (The "Superkid popcorn from Kernels made for fun centrepieces, and played right in to the colour scheme.)

Lego bags- just some plain solid coloured giftbags, with circles of the same paper cut out and glued on in a lego pattern.

The birthday brother!

We had some friends from Jack's kindergarten class over to play. "The Lego Guy" came and did a workshop with the boys, teaching them about the structural engineering side of lego!

Testing for strength.

Lego-robot battles!

Pizza lunch with the birthday buddies.

Blowing out the candles.

Happy Birthday Jack!

We are celebrating Jack's 5th birthday this weekend! Tomorrow will bring lots of little boys from Jack's kindergarten class over to our house for a Lego party- complete with "The Lego Guy"- someone who does Lego robotics workshops with kids.

Stay tuned for pictures... I'm sure there will be lots of fun ones!

Best buddies.

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Christmas is officially over.

I came downstairs and found that Rory had found new employment opportunities for two of the three wisemen.

Merry Christmas!

We had a great Christmas at home with the boys. We had both Joanne and Paul with us for the day and my parents and Sarah joined us for a big turkey dinner. Jack and Rory got spoiled rotten and have been having a blast with their new toys ever since!

We are heading to Ayer's Cliff later for the week and are looking forward to that as well. Jack and Ben got skis for Christmas so I'm sure they will be hitting the slopes sooner than later!

Wishing everyone a happy holiday and a joyful new year.

Maggie's initial attempts at respectable German Shepherd ears.

Not quite there yet!




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And in happier news....

Introducing....

Miss Maggie Britton.

The house was just too quiet. We couldn't take it.

Maggie is a 9.5 week old German Shepherd puppy. She is very sweet, and yes, she will be enormous!

Remembering Riley

Riley passed away tonight. He has been a beloved member of our family for over 11 years and will be forever missed.

Riley was a gentle giant. I never once worried about him being around the kids or the cats.

We went to the General Dynamics Christmas party for kids today. Rory was brave enough for face painting this year!



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Visit with Santa.

A little something to get you in the spirit of the holiday season...

'Tis the season to be jolly!

Update on Rory

Rory had his surgery yesterday.  Not a big deal- that's the line the ENT gave me. And walking around CHEO, I felt guilty in my worrying- and I did worry. This whole week has been stressful. Although walking past the neonatal intensive care unit, the cardiology and oncology units... we are fortunate that our kids have been as healthy as they have.

Rory has had so many troubles with ear infections so the specialist decided it was time for tubes in his ears. The procedure itself is no big deal, but they had to put him under general anesthetic- which was traumatic for him (and for me!).  He really hated the feeling of coming out of the general anesthetic though, and cried for a full hour and a half after waking up. That part was horrible. He was not himself at all and was inconsolable.  He settled down pretty much as soon as we started driving home, though. He was beside himself one minute and then the next thing we knew, he said "I all better now" and has been doing great ever since! I think he was just overwhelmed and confused with the whole situation but was fine when we got back to familiar surroundings.

He's such a trooper.

Happy Halloween from the Brittons!

We had a great Halloween! This was the first year that Rory *really* went trick-or-treating, and let me tell you... he's a pro! I think that Jack approached the whole thing with a bit more trepidation when he was first starting out, but not Rory! He thought this was a great idea! I'm sure he's wondering why we don't do this every day!

We started out at our house.

My little goblins.

Then we went over to visit Grandma and Grandpa with our Halloween pillow cases.

We even saw Super Grandma at Aunt Nancy's house and got to see Auntie Kristen and Cousin Addisson!

Getting ready for Halloween!

Our Jack-o-lantern. Or Rory-o-lantern, depending on who you ask.


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Carp Fair

We had a fun morning at the Carp Fair!