Day 3 - Black River Falls, WI

We didn't take the time for a swim this morning but we were ready and waiting for the doors to open at the LEGO Discovery Center at 10 am this morning! The kids were super excited and had a great time.

They loved the Dragon ride through a LEGO castle (we went on it twice), the 4-D LEGO movies (three different 10 minutes movies complete with wind, rain and snow where Noelle kept trying to grab the flying characters), the building centers and the store on the way out where they could build their own mini-figure!

We were back on the road by 2:30 pm. We stopped for supper about an hour out of Black River Falls, Wisconsin at Buffalo Phil's Grille - a very fun restaurant where our food was delivered on a train! 

After checking in we were thrilled to have gotten a suite - two rooms so the kids went to sleep really well tonight because we could turn off all their lights and close the door! We did go for a swim which felt nice.

The kids have done quite well so far driving each day. I hit Value Village a few weeks before we left and picked up a bunch of books that I sorted into days again so they have some new books and activity books each day – even I look forward to new books to read to them or CDs to listen to!

Dying Easter Eggs

I've been wanting to share about our fun Easter egg dying this year but just didn't have time while packing and getting ready to leave on our road trip. Now I have lots of time :)

Friends from church who grew up in Romania came over on Good Friday and we drew on and dyed hard boiled eggs. Mihaela picked up dye and egg sleeves from a Russian grocery store and we had fun colouring the eggs bright colours.

The highlight for the adults was making onion skin dye. I boiled dried onion skins the night before for 20 minutes and let cool overnight. The next day I removed the skins and then we took raw eggs, placed wet pieces of parsley, grass, and small leaves on them, and wrapped them in old nylons. 

We then boiled the eggs in the onion water for 20 minutes and when we removed the nylons they were a beautiful brown red colour with lovely patterns on them!

By then the kids weren't helping anymore but Mihaela and I had fun. Mihaela had dyed some eggs with tumeric the day before and they were a beautiful yellow colour. Next year we might try some more ideas (red onion skins, beets, etc)! Lastly, we put on the egg sleeves and shrunk them on the eggs by placing for a few seconds in boiling water.

We ate up all our hard boiled eggs and I didn't even get chance to try the recipe Mihaela suggested – in a casserole dish layer cooked, sliced potatoes, then sliced eggs, then sausage, ham or bacon (optional), then sour cream and salt and pepper, and repeat - I'll save the idea for next year!

Day 2 – Schaumberg, Illinois

After saying farewell to our friends, we went to Campbell Baptist Church in Windsor this morning. The people there were very friendly and it was great to worship God together. By 1 pm we were on the road, crossed the Ambassador Bridge to Detroit and across the border. About 6 hours later, after slowing down to pay at 4 different toll booths and a half hour of slow, heavy traffic through Chicago (who knew Sunday afternoon would have rush hour - at least we're not shocked anymore after living in Toronto!) we arrived in Schaumberg, a little north west of Chicago for the night. We're working on the kids not asking “How much longer?” and "Are we there yet?" - Jeremy is still having trouble! The hotel is right across the street from LEGO Discovery Center, our first stop tomorrow morning after our continental breakfast and swim in the pool! Nathan read about the Discovery Center in a LEGO book from the library and wanted to go so we planned it into our trip. I'll post some pictures of it tomorrow!

Day 1 - Windsor, ON

Well, we're off! We are heading back to Alberta for the summer. Daniel will work in Olds and we will spend time visiting family and friends. We'll spend about 6 days driving through the States.

We headed out of Toronto this morning on our way to Windsor to stay overnight with an "old" friend of mine from high school. I haven't seen Svetlana for 15 years but is wonderful to catch up and reminisce.  Svetlana and her husband have a son who is 9 and a daughter who is 5 which matches our children almost perfectly! Tomorrow is some more visiting, then to church and after onwards to Chicago.

Nathan's Birthday Party!

We celebrated Nathan's birthday twice this in March - once with Grandma and Grandpa Jefferies on his real birthday and once with friends a week later. Here's some pics from the first party:

Don't look at the number of candles on the cake too closely! Daniel figured out after Nathan had blown them out that their were 9 not 8 candles on the iceceam pizza! Good thing our digital picture files are all dated or it could make it difficult to remember which year this picture is from!  Icecream pizza as a second birthday cake is a bit of a tradition. I drizzled it with caramel sauce and chocolate sauce and then topped it with strawberries and skittles. I realized that the quality of icecream is important if you don't want it to be too soft and starting melting immediately!

Then for Nathan's friend party he had a LEGO theme. Our three kids have been on a major LEGO kick lately - even Jeremy is having a great time building! I made a LEGO cake and LEGO pizza.The cake was angel food cake (Nathan's choice) and coloured whipped cream (I added stabilizer to the whipped cream). I used large marshmallows cut in half for the nubs on top and scammed the kids LEGO bases for the cake base (taped to a cutting board for stability) and some LEGO people to hold the candles! The angel food cake was a little hard to cut into rectangles and squares since I wasn't sure how it would bake in loaf pans so I used a tube pan and then carved it up.

I also planned some Lego games for the children (4 friends plus Noelle, Jeremy and a friend of Noelle's) - a Lego spoon race, Lego building contest (give everyone 3 minutes to build the tallest tower they can. Measure and award stickers, then 5 minutes to build a bridge (stickers awarded for longest sturdiest prettiest etc.), 10 minutes to build a home (similar prizes)). The kids had fun building although some had trouble sticking to the category! Everyone got stickers though :) We then had a LEGO scavenger hunt followed by building a race car and racing each other down a ramp we set up in the basement.

We had presents, pizza and cake, a bit of free time and then it was basically time for the kids to go. That was my goal - keep them busy so that there wasn't much time for roughhousing! Here is what I set up for the scavenger hunt. I got the scavenger hunt idea from Our Golden Apples blog and the rest of the ideas were a mix of other ideas I found on the Internet! We had three teams and I just changed up the order that they found their items.

LEGO Scavenger Hunt

Scavenger TEAM RED
Mission #1
You’ll find a lego HAT under the computer desk. Collect this hat in the box with your next mission. HURRY!
Scavenger TEAM RED
Mission #2
You’ll find a lego HEAD where the washing machine is located. Collect this head and attach it to your hat from Mission #1. Then tackle your next mission. TIME IS TICKING!
Scavenger TEAM RED
Mission #3
You’ll find a lego CHEST in the mailbox on the front of the house. Collect this chest and attach it to your head with a hat from Mission #2. WHAT ARE STANDING HERE FOR?!
Scavenger TEAM RED
Mission #4
Well done TEAM RED! You are doing fantastic. You’ll find lego LEGS under Jeremy’s pillow. Add your legs to your body. TWO more missions left! SCOOT!!!
Scavenger TEAM RED
Mission #5
You found it! BRAVO! Now your lego man needs tools. You should obtain TOOL #1 in the dress-up box. Add the tool to one hand of your lego man. NOW GET GOING!
Scavenger TEAM RED
Mission #6
WOW! You guys are super fast. Your last mission is to retrieve TOOL #2 from Nathan’s room behind his bed. Add the second tool to the other lego man’s hand. Your mission is complete TEAM RED! Take your lego man and ring the doorbell to announce you have FINISHED!!!

Scrapbook layout - Jeremy's 1st birthday!

I made this layout using the Mayberry Workshop on the Go with Animal Cookies paper (now retired). It's fun to remember how cute Jeremy was when he was one year old and good times we had as a family!

Scrapbook layouts - Wings Workshop

I didn't know what I would use my Wings paper for but when I looked at these photos from my niece's baptism they fit perfectly! I don't often scrapbook with black but I think I should more! I used the Wings Workshop on the Go for this layout, just changing some of the paper choices and rotating the right page, so it came together quite quickly! Let me know what you think!