Let's Go Fly A Kite!

    Every year since Gabe was 2 (15 years ago) the Easter Bunny has brought our children kites for Easter.  Kites are lots and lots of fun on .... television.  Oh on television they have a grand old time.  Heck, there was even a song written about "Let's Go Fly A Kite".  The reality looks a little different.

    Flying a kite means that you are prepared to work your tail off.  Work yourself into a sweat.  There is a fine art to kite flying, and I have yet to crack the code.  Maybe I need one of those wooden Davinci puzzle things like they had on the Davinci Code.  You need to calculate which direction the wind is blowing, know which way to run, oh way to complicated for me.

    Elly has been obsessed with flying her new Cinderella kite.  Every day, "It windy?" Most days it is not windy.  In theory the Easter Bunny brought them cool kites this year.  Instead of a cross bar which inevitably breaks or falls out, it inflates.  They provide a little straw for you to blow it up.  Yesterday was windy, and I gave in "Yes we can fly your kite."  I pushed the rigid straw into where I thought it was supposed to go, only to discover that I had put a hole in her kite in my attempts to push through the plastic.  Apparently the spot I shoved the straw through was meant to attach the string to.  The place you put the air in was at the bottom (which I would have known if I'd thought to read the instructions).
So finally I have the kite kind of blown up (the air kept leaking from the hole I had made).
    Christopher happened to be home for lunch and witnessed my kite attempts, as did all of the elderly ladies that live in the apartments behind our home (I'm sure that we provide them with lots of laughter with our insane antics).  So there I was, poised to fly this kite.  Elly was so excited that she was jumping up and down.  In my head I knew that I was the world's greatest mother.   I had just taken her to the Ivanhoe Cheese Factory, and now kite flying, WOW I'm great (it does not take much to over inflate my own self image it would seem). By the time we were ready to go there was no wind.  Then a wind came up, a small wind.  I ran with that little kite, running for my daughter's love.  The back ground sound was not "Chariots of Fire", but my husband's hysterical laughter.  I gave up.

    That night when Christopher got home from work he took the kids all out to fly their kites.  I now understand why he was in hysterical laughter at my attempts.  Of coarse there were many temper tantrums (only a few from the biggest kid).  There were legs tangled in strings.  Last but not least, there was not one single kite in the sky.  

    Maybe I am not ascribing this tradition the credit it deserves.  It's all in the way that you look at it.  I mean we have on a few occasions been airborne.  Those times usually end with a kite in a tree, or someone letting go of their kite, it usually ends in tears is what I am getting at.  The fun is in the anticipation.  In their heads they will sail that kite up near the sun and the clouds.  For me I am guaranteed a hysterical laugh.  Although it usually ends badly, there is some fun sprinkled in the middle.  So Mr. Easter Bunny... Bring it on again next year !!!! 

The Easter Egg Roll.

  

 Easter is slowly drawing to a close.  It has been busy, and I am looking forward to having a cuddle with my husband and a glass of wine, well a glass of wine anyway.  It has been a great day, but I am ready to wind it down.
    Today the kids began their day with the treasure hunt that the Easter Bunny left them, then we headed to the Thomasburg Hall to enjoy our extended family.  For the last 32 years my Uncle Bruce has hosted the "Easter Egg Roll".  In that time it has seen many locations, but has always meant fun for the little ones, and a great way to connect with the whole family.  It has been an interesting evolution that began when my cousins were small, and has seen us all grow up and have families of our own, and some of my older cousin's families are nearly ready to begin their own families.  32 years is a long time.
    The day has many different activities.  It begins before Easter morning.  We decorate eggs, but not in the way that you may think.  There is a best decorated egg contest.  We are not talking your typical dyed eggs, oh no you are thinking too small.  No the best decorated egg is usually more like an egg diorama, and usually topical.  There have been years that is more like an art show, and years that you laugh until yu nearly pee your pants.   As well as having a "best dressed egg", you will also require a "racing egg".

Grace and Riley's best dressed eggs.

Uncle Bruce presiding over the Easter Egg Roll.

    I'm not going to lie, my favourite part of the day is the lunch.  Everyone brings something.  My Dad is can usually be found at the barbecue beside a second barbecue that is manned by one of my cousins.  Inside the hall are every type of salad and treat you can imagine.  The biggest fight/ draw comes from my cousin Matt's wife Emma.  Emma is Philippino, and brings this delicious dish called panzit.  There has been many a fight, ending in Aunts stealing from nieces/ nephews, cousins stealing from cousins, all to get the lions share of Emma's panzit.  We gather around the tables, catching up with each other.  Often I only see these members of my family once a year at the egg roll.  It's nice to see them.

    After lunch we all gather around Uncle Bruce's crazy ramp that has been rigged with a patch at the bottom full of nails, mouse traps and holes.  The goal is to have your egg maintain it's yolk.  I personally like to be one of the first ones out because it earns me a big bag of candy, not to shabby.  As you roll your egg down the ramp, the rabbid crowd shouts "trap trap trap trap".   Then they all laugh at you as your egg is destroyed.  My kids LOVE it!!!!!
    At the end of the day everyone hugs and kisses and calls it a day.  Thank you Uncle Bruce you started a great tradition. It's nice to have an excuse to get our whole extended family together, even if we are all nuts!

Easter Already?

    HOLY COW!!!!!! (please make a note that I said "cow" instead of what I my brain said).  I knew before we left for our vacation that we would be coming back to Easter, but still I feel completely unprepared.  Now Easter for most is not a big deal, but as you may already know, every holiday to us seems like a big deal.  I have not yet broken into the cold sweats, but I'm sure that they are coming soon.  There is so much do, and I may have run out of time.
    I am by nature a procrastinator, but not usually like this.  I think I have most things ready, but I know that there are a bunch of things that I have forgotten.  I need to shortly run out and buy a boat load of eggs, then the mess of decorating them begins.  The problem is that the car is still not unpacked from the trip, and the table is piled to the ceiling with souvenirs from the trip, as well as junk.  Take a deep breathe.  That is what I have to do, take a deep breath.  It is a strange combination that I suffer from, being both a procrastinator and a perfectionist.  To me everything has to be perfect.  I feel like if I screw one thing up I might scar them for life (perhaps procrastination and perfectionism are not the only things that I suffer from).  Intellectually I know that even if this holiday is a huge disaster it will not scar them for life, unless I go mental and physically scar them for life.  I find the intellectual voice is at this time being drowned out by the hysterical screaming of the perfectionist.  Deep breathe.
    Maybe I should make myself a list.  Part of the problem is that when we were away Christopher's work got stinking busy.  His first day back he worked from 10 am - 11 p.m.  This morning he left the house at 7:30 and won't be back until 6:00 that is provided no one else dies (my husband is a funeral director).  Long story short,  I am on my own.  So I am going to finish writing this and make lists.
    O.K. enough of my ranting.  There really is lots to do.  Easter really is a big deal around here.  The Easter Bunny traditionally leaves the kids a treasure hunt.  He leaves them clues that lead to the next clues.  At our house the Easter Bunny does not just hide their loot.  At some of the clues he leaves little things like tiny chocolates.  At the end of their treasure hunt they find the whole pile of treasure.  Traditionally the Bunny leaves them a basket filled with skipping ropes, kites, bubbles, chalk, as well as a few other little trinkets as well as candy.  I love watching their excitement as they run from clue to clue.  Sometimes the clues are harder and it's fun to watch them working things out.
    I guess this has been enough procrastination, I better get to work... wish me luck.

My Easter Centre Piece

    Valentines Day is over, and now I begin my Easter preparations ( I am not a fan of St. Patrick's Day, no offense to the Irish).  As you may now have figured out, I am OVER THE TOP.  I like to decorate the house for the different holidays/ seasons.  The funniest part of this is that I am a dreadful house keeper, so there are adorable decorations, and piles of garbage all around them, it's sad really.  I keep hoping that one day I will wake up and be a clean freak, it has not happened yet.
    For Christmas I had a great idea.  I brought in evergreen branches and placed them into one of my flat baskets.  I then took one of my vases and put my battery operated faux candle in it (so that it would look like a hurricane candle).  It looked great if I do say so myself!  It sat on the coffee table for the Christmas Season, and looked pretty good.  I liked it so much that I decided that I would do a coffee table display every holiday.

For my Easter display I ... 

I used a flat basket, basket filler, bunches of eggs I got from the Dollarama, and a ceramic bunny (again Dollarama), my battery operated candle and my vase.

I filled the basket with the basket filler.  Then I put the vase into the middle and dropped the candle in.

 I cut the eggs off of the branch they came on using wire cutters.

I placed the bunny then the eggs.  I tied ribbon around the bunny's neck and around the neck of the vase.  It took about 10 minutes and cost about $4.00.






  So there you have my Easter coffee table display.  I have already made my Easter curtains, and this week-end I'm going to make Christopher bring up the rest of the Easter decorations (it's a wonderful little surprise for him).  Maybe I will actually clean up before we decorate, nah who am I kidding.

One on One Easter Craft

Our afternoon one- on -one craft...
    This morning Elly and I went to the library and enjoyed story time, which also included a craft.  She LOVED it.  I never really think to do crafts with her.  I'm not sure why either, because I used to do crafts with all of the older kids.  I think it's because with Riley and Rowan there were two of them, and now that there is just one it hardly seems worth the effort (how's that for some great parenting).  After I saw how much she enjoyed the craft at the library, I decided to get off my lazy butt and do something fun with her.

   Today we decorated paper Easter eggs using the marble technique.  Being the together housekeeper that I am, I had no idea where any of the millions of marbles that we own might be.  Instead of marbles we used big wooden beads and some small beads (because that's what I could find).

I used three colours, and made sure that the beads were really covered in paint.

I cut construction paper into the shape of an egg.  I then taped it into a dollar store storage bin.

I was smart enough to keep a wet rag right beside Elly, but not smart enough to cover her clothes.  Luckily that t-shirt is getting too small.

She sprinkled glitter onto the wet paint.  I put some of the glitter into a salt shaker in the hopes that it would minimize the mess (it kind of worked?)

Elly loved shaking the container to make the beads roll.  She got a bit carried away a few times and the beads flew.  I had some paint clean up afterwards, but it was worth it, she loved it.

I guess we'll do more crafts.