Sadie

We added a new member to the Fixsen family. This is Sadie. Her mom is half yorkshire terrier, half shih tsu, and her dad is a teacup yorkie. She was so tiny when we picked her up, but has grown quite a bit already. She should be about 5-6 pounds full grown. 

The kids love her, until she starts biting their ankles. It has been an adjustment for sure. Like a new baby. Having to watch her all the time, up at night to let her out to pee. 

She's been around over a month, and we've started puppy classes, and she's sleeping through the night. We are so lucky that all our families love her. We've had to call on grandma to puppy sit already :)

Soccer

I love that my children are confident enough to play team sports. I feel like this is something I missed out on as a child, and now refuse to play team sports.  It was a busy season. Wyatt played Monday and Wednesday and Isla played Tuesday, Thursday. What will we do when we have to fit Stella in there somewhere? With Brett away quite often it was usually me taking the kids to all the games. Good thing Wyatt played with some sweet friends, who were very helpful when I needed back up!

Canmore Trip

It was slightly disappointing that our Canmore week happened to be only one week after Spring Break. It wasn't going to stop us from missing a little more school and enjoying and extra long weekend.

 We stopped at the Calgary zoo again to break up the trip.

 Screamer! Kids could not wait their turn. It was too good.

 Our condo is feeling more and more comfortable each time we visit.

 We love mountain bike rides and throwing rocks in the river.

Grandma even came for a couple nights. She was sooo sweet to watch the girls one day so the rest of us could spend the day at Sunshine Village.

 It snowed the WHOLE day. Late April and we lucked out with the best snow I've seen all year. It was an amazing day. Elesa and Rayly even met up with us, which made it even better.

I follow a NieNie on instagram, and she has been posting a picture of her family every Sunday after church. I really liked the idea of documenting growth and progress throughout the year. So, I am going to take a family pic every time we are in Canmore. Brett and I have big dreams for our time in Canmore, and look forward to owning our little portion of the condo forever. Should be fun to see a little book of my kids growing up appreciating the beauty of the mountains.

Easter

We had a low key holiday. It was very nice. 

Earlier in the week my neighbour hatched some chicks, and allowed us to chick sit. We really liked having them, but were happy the mess belonged to someone else. We hope they do it again next year. The chicks were soo cute.

 The Easter Bunny came!

We had dinner with Brett's parents Sunday and dinner with my family Monday. Delicious!

Potty Training

I have been dreading potty training. Stella is now 2 years and 4 months, and my others were trained by now. I have been working part time, and there hasn't been a good time to really commit. With Spring break, and mandatory time off, I decided it was the best time to just get it done.

The first day we went through at least 12 pairs of panties. I was ready to quit, and Stella would cry for her diaper. Day two, still had a few accidents, but mostly she'd start to pee, catch herself and finish the rest on the potty. By day 3, she was solid. We even brought her to church no trouble, later that week she was dry as we drove to Calgary and spent the day at the zoo.

She has been awesome. She will ask to go, and is comfortable asking her babysitters, and is starting to wake a little at night. It's an amazing feeling to be practically done with diapers FOREVER!

Spring Break

We didn't have a lot planned for spring break this year. I didn't want to send Wyatt back to school with nothing fun to report, so I decided to take the kids to Calgary for the night and then to the zoo. I am a bit of a home body, and would love to stay where I'm comfortable. It was also quite empowering to make to Calgary with all three kids, stay the night in a hotel (even go to the pool), and then the zoo and home all by myself. We missed dad, but he was on a little work trip of his own so was not able to join us. 

 Isla was ready to move into the hotel.

 Room service!

 A chilly day at the zoo, but there were very few other people there so we had the place to ourselves.

 We were very happy that our cousins were willing to meet up with us on their way home from Canmore.

A little adventure with lots of fun.

My buddy

Since starting school, the time we spend with this little guy is limited. I am SOOO lucky to be his mom. He is so sweet, generous and the very best big brother. He has unending patience for his sisters, and is very quick to forgive his quick tempered mom.

He has really developed a love of reading lately. He flew through the Harry Potter series, and he has started and finished another novel before I even know what he's reading.

 He doesn't draw as much as he used to, but I"m always impressed when he does.

 He has really picked up skiing this last year. We had a seasons pass at Sunridge, and he spent at least 5 days in the mountains. He is naturally a pretty careful and timid kid, but he snowplowed his way through some treacherous terrain. No matter the weather, he was always happy to be out on the hill. I am already excited to see how much he develops in the next few years. I see a lot of family fun in the mountains in my future.

Wyatt has been taking piano lessons this year after his 3 years with the Let's Play Music program. It is so fun to see how much he has learned in a single year of private lessons. He played in the music festival this year, and even though he was quite nervous, and totally mixed up his second piece. He powered through to the end as best as he could and finished with a smile. I was very proud. It seemed so mature of him to not get flustered or upset. He carried on and held his head high.

I'm one proud mom. He is an amazing little man!

BFF's

Brett has been incredibly supportive of my girl time! This is the first year I think that circumstances have allowed for this kind of reunion. With Kaycee in Red Deer, and Elesa in Calgary, we have made fairly regular dinner dates in Red Deer, summer sleepovers with ALL our kids, and this winter snowboard adventures. I adore these girls!! We have always been close, but these last few years we have really made an effort to stay connected. I'm so glad we have. We used to LOVE snowboard trips way back before moves, husbands, children etc. It's nice to get back to things we love, with people we love spending time with. A quick day trip to Sunshine was the first of many mountain adventures in the near future I hope.

Sisters

I may have mentioned this before, but one of the BIGGEST reasons I was willing to have another baby was so Isla could have a sister. I definitely lucked out that Stella was in fact a sister, but there is just something about Isla's personality that needed a little playmate and someone to watch out for. 

These girls have become the best of friends. As Stella's vocabulary increases, and she understands the little games girls like to play- they continue to strengthen their love for each other. For quite a while it was very one sided. Isla loved to over love Stella, and Stella loved to play hard to get. Now I hear them giggle together all day long. They are the best little companions running errands and cleaning up. I just love that they will have each other as best friends forever. 

I had Stella for Isla, and we have another little SURPRISE coming at the end of the month that I think Stella will appreciate the most. But that is for another post.

Day 6- Tuesday

Our last day!

We were up early and checked out of the hotel and headed to our WHOA (Wild Hawaiian Ocean Adventure) tour. It was the highlight of the trip.

We were on an old army style boat with the inflatable edges and we were in the back leaning up against a back rest and holding on to a handle  bar in front.  I did not even consider that I would get sea sick, but man did I ever.

 Almost immediately we saw these flipper dolphins. They were pretty little, but they were swimming around in a circle so they could sleep we were told. They did do a few flips that I caught on video.

I had bought this cheap little waterproof bag for my phone. I didn't use it much, and it didn't work perfectly, but I was very happy I had it on this tour.

We sped away from the other tour boats so we could get the best views of the ocean life. At one point we were seeing all these dophin, so they stopped the boat and told us to get our snorkel gear on. We knew it was a snorkel and ocean watching tour, but I figured it would be one and then the other. We were just stopped in the ocean and let out to snorkel with these dolphins. One of the most amazing experiences ever.

I seemed to be ok on the boat when it was moving quickly, but any time we stopped to check out some wildlife I got so sick. Puking over the edge of a small boat with 9 other people close by is terrible. Also terrible, is knowing you have another 3 hours left of the tour.

Half way we stopped in a  little cove to snorkel some more. It was nice to be in the water, and see the coral and all the tropical fish. My battery was dead by then, but there is something to experiencing something first hand and not through the lens of a camera. I wasn't too disappointed.

After the tour we went for an ultimate burger for lunch, ran to costco to get gas (they still use amex, which was frustrating since Canada has switched to master card) and we went inside to check if they had anything cool we might want to pick up.

Brett promised one of the big bosses at work that I'd bring home a bottle of Hawaiian Rum. So I picked some up at costco.

We headed back to the beach in town- where we had started our vacation and read for a little while before heading back to the hotel for a dip in the hot tub and to get cleaned up for our flight.

I had wanted to see a sea turtle on my trip, and hadn't seen one yet. As we were walking back to the hotel for our final walk along the shore, we saw a couple turtles in the shallow water. It just finished off the trip so nicely.












We ate dinner at a little cafe and headed back toward the airport to return the car and wait for our flight.
















It was a red eye flight and we weren't sitting together so we tried to sleep as best we could.  In vancouver we took our separate flights home and were happy to see our families. Not so impressed with the weather though!