2013 in pictures ~ october

millers pumpkin patch
skating lessons
silhouette sisters
fall has arrived
black cats
aviation museum
piano practice
mackenzie king estate

this girl of mine...

This girl of mine, has a massively special piece of my heart. How I love her.

She's maturing so much at the moment... especially in conversation. I love our special times together when we're alone and she just wants to chat and tell me all about her day. She absolutely loves her activities at the moment: she loves school, she loves swimming and she loves piano, but most of all... she absolutely loves skating! She counts down the days and talks about it daily! One of the things I've noticed most lately, is how excited she is over her achievements. Be it the two songs she could play on the piano this week, without error or swimming underwater for X number of seconds or learning her weekly Bible verse word perfect... she is just so super eager to keep trying until she succeeds. I imagine, with her confidence and determination, she will succeed at whatever she puts her mind to.

I'm so proud of her.

skating lessons

She loves to skate.
She started back at it today again.
I love her confidence.

aviation museum

From yesterday, a pictorial view of our morning at the Aviation Museum!

thanksgiving monday

We started off our Monday with a trip to the Aviation Museum. Lilah was practically on her knees begging us to go. Not sure what or why. But when our big girl gets something into her head, she sticks with it! You should have heard (probably did!) her whoop of joy when we told her we were going!

It was a fun morning. (I'll post those photo's tomorrow!)

Later, as I was getting lunch ready and Phebe was having a well needed nap, Lilah and Baba went out for a bike ride. Lilah really appreciates her one-on-one time with us now. It was special, because they each got to ride their own bikes alongside each other, for the first time, as opposed to Baba taking the third wheel and her pedalling behind.

We're not huge fans of turkey. Can you tell we are not the most traditional people? Turkey once a year is enough for us and it seems that I always decide to try a new recipe when a occasion like this arises. This is a Pioneer Woman recipe, from her book called 'food from my frontier' - page 190! Herb roasted pork tenderloin with warm date and fig chutney, roasted vegetables (parsnips, turnip, heirloom carrots, sweet potato & celery root) and cornmeal cakes. Yum! It turned out delicious. Oh yes, and we don't love pumpkin pie, but we ALL love carrot cake. See, we're so untraditional!

Thank you GOD for blessing me much more than I deserve.
[ Happy Thanksgiving ]

cozy new pajamas!

This year I wanted something special in the way of pajamas for my girls. Something really cozy... and cute!

Have you heard of Next(direct)? It was and still is one of my favourite UK stores, and now they deliver FREE to Canada!

The excitement was high when we opened this mail this evening! There were a couple of hot fuzzy animals running around our house, in their cozy new pajamas! A turquoise stripy rabbit and a pink spotted dinosaur - the PJ's were a HUGE hit! And even though the 'animals' were sweating, they still couldn't be convinced to take them off!

mackenzie king estate

It's almost officially Thanksgiving weekend! It was a PD day for Lilah (off school) and a smashing day outside - sun shining, 22°C. Since it was a long weekend anyway, Monday is a public holiday here, Baba decided to make it an extra long weekend and also took today off, so we could hang out together.

I just love it when we're all together.

We decided to visit the MacKenzie King Estate, which isn't too far from where we live. The estate is nested in the local Gatineau Park and it's a beautiful walk... especially at this time of the year, when the leaves are pure golden. Have I mentioned I love Fall? You better believe it! The girls had so much fun running around: finding sticks, walking the stone walls, gathering pines, finding the 'perfect' leaf, role playing, running with abandon... I don't know what my girls would do without each other, because they are inseparable and love each others company.

We had soup and sandwiches at the little teahouse on the estate and stopped into the famous little ice-cream shop on the drive home. I had their hot chocolate with a big scoop of vanilla ice-cream in it, topped with whipped cream. YUM! I'll definitely be recreating that at home, sometime soon. The ice-cream cooled it down just perfectly!

my favourite

I took this photo at the pumpkin patch yesterday.
It's already ordered and will soon be hanging in my hallway.
I love these three people.

visiting the pumpkin patch

Our annual pumpkin patch visit, is one of my very favourites.

I love Fall.
I love everything to do with the Fall: the weather, the food, the clothes, the colours.
It's perfect.

If there was somewhere in the world that had a constant Fall, I'd be living there!
Me, and the pumpkins and the hot apple cider and the delicious soups and stews and the light jackets and the stunning coloured leaves.

Our day at the pumpkin patch was wonderful...
the weather was so perfect and my girlies loved the hay ride, the baba spins in the wagon,
playing in the straw and picking out some pumpkins.

So much fun with our two little blessings.

[ the flickr set is here ]