Life of an 8 year old

Owen celebrated his 8th birthday this week.  He was very excited to get a "gear bike" for his birthday.

What is this 8 year old like?  Let me tell you.

+He is my most active child with a seemingly unlimited supply of energy.

+Loves to play with his friends everday.

+Loves to play soccer and is quite good at it.

+He is a ladies man.  He is going to be nothing but trouble when he gets older in this regard.

+ Loves to collect things.  He has a drawer full of everything you can imagine.   Anything from gum wrappers, to rocks to paintbrushes. Whatever he finds, he stashes in his drawer.

+Will occasionally tell a lie and then when caught, say he was "just kidding". 

+Loves steak and pizza.

+Very and I mean very particular about what he wears.  Everything has to be just right.  When he finds items that meet his strict standards he will wear them over and over, even digging them out of the dirty clothes.

+Is good at math.

+Has a pretty good case of eczema that keeps him itchy and rashy if we don't stay on top of it with lotion and bathing every day.

+Patience is not his strong point.

+Sleepwalks

+Plays the piano, but is not a fan.  We will see how long it lasts.

+Likes to asks the same questions over and over.

+Likes to play the Wii, but generally prefers to be active.

+Enjoys drawing and coloring.  If you remember, years back he was my naughty child and would color on almost anything.  He is much better now, but we still will occasionally catch him coloring on stuff he is not supposed to.

+Gets along with most people.

Almost done

4 casts and 6 weeks later Chasey's arm is almost healed. He got his last cast on yesterday. 2 1/2 weeks more and he will be done. Little kids are so resilient. He hasn't let a broken arm slow him down in the least. Here he is, trying out his new bike. Scott and I felt like Goldilocks and the 3 Bears trying to find the right size bike for him. But once we found it he was good to go.

Found this on my white board last night

And My Baby Goes to Kindergarten

It is hard to believe, but my baby is old enough to go to Kindergarten. For months now, I have looked at him and thought that there is no way he is old enough. I didn't think this with any of my other boys, but Chasey is a different story. Maybe because he is my baby. Maybe because he is a little guy. He was so ready to go and didn't even look back! I'm so excited for him!

Canada

About 13 years ago, Scott and I and some of our friends went on a trip to Banff. I was around 15 weeks pregnant with Taylor. I know I was 15 weeks pregnant because around 12 weeks I was still sick as a dog and I told Scott if I didn't feel better we wouldn't be going. At 14 weeks I woke up and felt sooo much better. So off we went a week later.

Ever since that trip we have wanted to go back. The scenery is absolutely beautiful. 13 years later we made it back with just a few more bodies with us.

We visited a lot of lakes and did a lot of hiking. During the parts where we were driving, audio books kept the boys from killing each other in the back seat.
Moraine Lake


View of Lake Louise as we were hiking up to Lake Agnes.

Canoeing on Emerald Lake.

Peyto Lake

You are probably wondering if I did any Photoshopping of these lakes to make them appear bluer than what they really are. I'm not that smart. These are straight from my iphone. And yes, they are really this blue.

Not only are they blue, they are so clear and calm. I have so many pix that I took that shows an almost mirror image of the mountains and sky in the water.

We visited some lovely tea houses. Ever wanted a treat at the top of a long hike? Canada has a few tea houses that are at the end of some of the trails in the Banff area. They are up high in the middle of nowhere, however, they offer a decent selection of food and desserts for your picking. We hiked to 2 of them and enjoyed hot chocolate, apple and blueberry pie, and yummy biscuits. And there is no guilt when you have hiked up to them.


View of Lake Louise as we were hiking up to The Plain of Six Glaciers.


We saw quite a few impressive water falls. This one is Takakkaw Falls.


Athabasca Falls

And it wouldn't be right if we didn't visit a few glaciers as well. This was a beautiful hike. We hiked up Parker Ridge to view the Saskatchewan Glacier.

We saw our share of wildlife. 3 bears, at least a dozen caribou, a few elk, a wolfe and a fox, mountain goats and some marmots as well. The only thing we didn't see was a moose. However, I was informed by a reliable source that moose are reclusive and it is unlikely to see them by the side of the road.


And it wouldn't be right if we didn't have some drama added in at the end. On the second to the last day of our trip, Chasey fell from the monkey bars and broke his arm. It was bad enough that we had to drive 4 hours from Jasper to Edmonton so he could have surgery to fix it. Poor kid. He was a trooper though and will have quite a memory from this trip.

Despite the bumpy end, we all had a wonderful time. The boys enjoyed the scenery and hiking as much as we did. Till next time......

Straight from Chase

"I love everybody in the whole world. Except for Satan. He is a butt face."

Amazing.....

So proud of this boy! He was the organist for sacrament meeting yesterday. All 3 songs, plus pre and postlude. He did amazing!

I am a lucky mom.