Christmas is Coming!!

So yeah, it’s been a CRAZY busy summer and fall and well our old blog software wasn’t that easy to post with so I upgraded to WordPress. I’m not saying you’ll see a lot more posts, but I can guarantee that you’ll see more regular photo updates.

Onto the update. There was a bunch of stuff this summer. I went Mountain Biking at Silverstar with the guys and had a great time though I ended up rolling my ankle on the first day, though I toughed it out the second day, but paid for that for a month and half as it healed. Dang that hurts.

We had a GREAT trip up to Grandpa Gilbert’s. Tyler got to play in the garden lots, went on a bungee trampoline and got to go to the game farm up there.

The HUGE news for the summer was that we went to DISNEYLAND!!!! We went with Casey and our friends Mark & Laura and their kids Taye & Nya. We had so much fun! Especially Tyler. She got to wear her princess dress lots and LOVED everything about the trip. Especially the characters and rides. We’ll definitely be going back one day!

After that it was a bunch of work around the house. We laid a new portion of our concrete sidewalk and then re-coated the fir floors in the house. Both projects worked out really well.

And now we come up to today’s news. We have a new furry member of the family named Grover. Yes Grover like the Muppet and the Monster At the End of This Book. He’s an 8 week old Welsh Terrier that we got from Darwyn Welsh Terriers in Mission of all places. There are only a few registered breeders in Canada and one of them happened to be 10 minutes from our house. They’re great people and breed some AMAZING Welsh Terriers. We have already posted some pictures and will have lots more to come.

That’s about it for now. We’ll have weekly photo updates and you might even see a blog post or two. We hope everyone’s getting into the Christmas spirit. We already have the Christmas music going in the car and have the Christmas lights up.

Thanks for Partying with Us!

Thank you to everyone for partying with us for Tyler’s 2nd birthday! Tyler had a great time with all of her “buddies” as she would say. She also said to say “Thank you much!” for all of the presents. I’ll be posting pictures over the next few days and I’ll also put up the recipe for the cake/icing. It was definitely a great find and one that I’ll use in the future. I hope everyone had a great rest of your weekends! We enjoyed a great day in White Rock with a nice picnic, some shopping and an ice cream faced Tyler walking down the pier.

Tyler’s First Sail on Papa’s Boat

Tyler took her first sail on Papa’s new 34” sailboat last weekend and LOVED every minute of it. The kid was CRAZY about the water and fearless about walking around the boat. She didn’t care how much the boat was bobbing around, she wanted to be right at the edge checking everything out. And when she got to see a critter in the water she went nuts! We saw porpoises, seals (puppies as Tyler called them) and lots of birds. This was Tyler’s initial test run on the boat. I would definitely call it a SUCCESS and we’ll definitely be going for many more sailing trips this summer.

Tyler’s Photo Shoot

Tyler was in her second photo shoot for Blue Sky Baby. Check out a few pictures from the shoot, which was shot by the great photographers at Revival Arts Studio. Tyler was a little tired at first, though once she was out there with her friend Maisie they started to have a great time. Tyler loved playing peak-a-boo around the corner of a building and that got some great shots! For the grandparents who want to see more shots, the photographers will be posting an online gallery in a few weeks where you’ll have the option of ordering prints.

Souvlaki Recipe – Tyler & Maisie Approved!

A few people have requested this recipe so I figured I would toss it up for everyone to try out.

Ingredients:

8-10 cloves garlic minced
2 tsp soy sauce
2 tsp salt (Kosher if you have it)
2 tsp pepper
1 cup vegetable oil (You can use part olive oil, but it’ll harden in the fridge. You’ll need to let it warm up before BBQing)
2 lemons juiced
5 chicken breasts (or 2 lbs of whatever meat you want) cut into 1 inch cubes
1/4 cup oregano
2 tsp balsamic vinegar

Optional : We like to throw a few veggies chopped into bite size chunks into the container to marinade as well so that they’re super yummy as well. 1 each of an onion, red and green peppers.

Directions:

Chop the chicken and veggies into 1 inch pieces and toss them into a large sealable container or at least something that you can plastic wrap tightly cause you’re going to be shaking this mixture up.

Toss the rest of the ingredients into the container with the chicken, seal it up and give it a shake.

Place the sealed container in the fridge and toss and shake it every few hours letting it marinate for at least 8 hours, though overnight is best.

When you can’t handle the wait anymore, skewer them up and pop them on the BBQ med-high heat 2.5 minutes a side (or until they appear done). Watch for flare-ups in the beginning as the marinade drips off of the chicken. The smoke just adds flavor.

Good luck!

Happy Easter!

We hope everyone had a great Easter. We enjoyed a quick hike in the park on Friday, followed by some bike shopping for Tyler!! She loves bikes and helmets. We also had a GREAT dinner at Melissa’s Dad’s on Sunday. I LOVE TURKEY!

Long Time no Post

I finally got my computer back after waiting a month for some repairs and the holidays are winding down so it’s definitely time to post some news. Tyler’s been to Science World, cut down a Christmas tree, made gingerbread cookies, rocked out on the drums, went Christmas caroling, ripped open a bunch of presents and went tubing at Sun Peaks. To fill in the blanks check out the 87 new photos that we just posted.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!! And in the words of Tyler “Mesmis and Happy Happy”

Martin

New Job & Lots of Tyler Videos

It’s been some busy times around the monkey house. I quit my job at Playground, after 6 years, and am now working for Bluetide Management. I’m a developer, I write programs and build cool websites. I can go into more technical details, but I usually get blank stares and nods.

Dude!!!

Ridin’ the Pumpkin Express

Pumpkin Bouncin’

Stealing Mommy’s Breakfast

Maisie’s 2nd Birthday

Tyler’s First Heels

Tyler tried on her first pair of Mommy’s heels today and she was definitely able to strut her stuff. Smack the link to check out the video.

Reduce Reuse Recycle

Most of the waste in your house can be recycled and we definitely take advantage of that. We composte what we can and what’s left over usually amounts to one small bag of garbage at the end of the week. Well the recycling bug has passed down to Tyler as I saw her recycle her first piece of plastic this week. I was cutting up some cantelope for her and the plastic wrap that was covering it happened to fall to the ground. I didn’t notice at first and she ended up walking over, picking it up, and then taking it to the recycling bin. We are SOOOOO proud! Now if we can only get her to take out the composte bucket that would be GREAT! Happy Monday!!