One more Year

This summer has flown by. It has been a great summer. We tried to do as many things as possible and with our son being 5, it is just the right time to give him has many experiences as possible. Although, at the beginning of the summer, I got a part time job, but before it began, I had to quit.  Partially because I have no one to look after my children.  Also, the pay is not worth it for me to pay for daycare and there was no transportation to get there and we share one car. So, needless to say, I was disappointed.  It was at Lindt Chocolate in the new outlet mall that was built in Milton, right by the highway. The store would have opened August 2nd, which was my son's 5th birthday. The work situation has been weighing on my mind a lot, maybe because I feel guilty and I fear that with my kids getting older, I need to be a good role model for them.  However, I have been babysitting this summer and my son gets a play date as well.  So, after much discussion with my husband, I have decided to take one more year off, but I have gotten a few more children in to babysit. I do love being at home.  This summer we did quite a few activities with the children.  Some of the activities are shown below:

I traced the boys on some paper.  The boys then drew where their heart is, eye's, ears, mouth, hair and whatever else they wanted to add.  They really enjoyed this project.  This was a favourite for this age group.

Another activity was using duck tape and card board box.  They cut the box anyway they wanted and we covered it in duck tape to make something useful.  In this case we made a school supplies box and filled it with crayons and pencil crayons.  It was a fairly simply activity.  it seemed fitting that they are going into sk.

Another project, I had them do was to take a fly squatter and cut a square right in the middle and I called it a "word finder".  I then made cut outs of words ending in "at" "ed" "in" etc and placed them around the house and they had to find the words that I called out.  This was done in preparation for the school year.

So, needless to say, we did a few great activities and some activities, I can not find the pictures for.  So, I am excited to start babysitting an infant for this following school year. While Sonja is getting into painting and drawing and feeling things and touching, so lots of activities with playdoh, it will be interesting to see where the 12 month old that I will start sitting for will be at.  Sonja is 17 months and I forget some of her mile stones.  It happened all so fast and I was also paying attention to Markus's schooling and getting him everything he needs.

Now, here are some pictures of the activities we did has a family this summer:

African Lions Safari.

For Markus's Birthday, instead of having a party this year, he was able to choose one friend that we would take to Legoland with us.  I have never seen him so excited.  The following week we went to Niagara falls, when his party would have been.  I did have a party but I cancelled last minute and decided this is what we would do instead because Markus seemed more keen on this idea then a outside bbq at our place. I also felt very tired this year. So, on the day his party would have been, we went to Niagara falls and he had an amazing time.  Sonja also loved it and was fascinated with the falls, although she cried on Maid of the Mist because there were too many people and she did not like getting wet.

Now, as the end of the summer is gearing down.  Markus spent the last two weeks in camp.  Starting August 12th, he went to soccer camp and the following week he went to Kindercamp, which he enjoyed more.  He got to do a lot of dressing up and this continued when he got home.  He loves dressing up and same with our daughter.  In the morning's while he was gone, it gave me more time with just Sonja.  Here are some pictures of the boys dressing up.

My mom made the capes for his birthday.  Sonja has claimed the superman cape as her own and Markus has claimed the batman cape.

This past week end, we went camping for the first time, only for one night and it was 20 minutes away from our home.  It was a lot of work for one night, so next summer when we go, it will be for a full week end, otherwise it is not worth it.  The kids loved it and did not want to come home. So, we will take this has a sign that we need to plan a camping trip and it is actually a cheap travel experience. Well, you have to buy the camping gear and food etc. 

As the summer is winding down, I have my kids practicing letter writing, drawing and following instructions.  

This is a pretty long post, but there is so much to tell, so many pictures and I feel so lucky that I am able to spend this time with my kids. I will try to start posting more activities that I do with the kids, especially if they enjoyed them and learned something from them.