Happy 9th Birthday Ben!

lunch at his favourite restaurant on Saturday, followed by an afternoon at the pool with his friends and a BBQ afterwards.  Oh, and many hours of playing on his new computer game, and current obsession; Skylanders.  Our little boy is growing up so fast!

SKYLANDERS!!!

a little help from Sofia

BIONICLE!

CAKE!!!  Though, the candles wouldn't light, so none to blow out :-(  But the sparkler worked at least!

Flashback: First visit from England

It's an absolute travesty that I am only now just blogging about this, considering how big a deal it was and is for us.  Waaay back in March, we welcomed our first visitor from England - unsurprisingly it was our lovely Jossy :-)  We packed a lot into her short visit - Wednesday: breakfast in High Park and a walk around the neighbourhood, Thursday: a workshop at the National Film Board, Friday: lunch in Chinatown with Nick, followed by dessert in Kensington market, then a long play and walk through High Park, Saturday: a visit to the Distillery District for a girly afternoon sans enfants, Sunday: a day trip to Niagara Falls with Lunch at the Red Lobster, and finally on Monday: a visit to the CN Tower before heading back to the airport.  Phew!

Here are the lovely pictures:

I had tricked Joss into thinking we were unable to meet her at the airport, so this picture perfectly captures her moment of surprise :-)

An Allen style welcome!

Irie Man!

mmmm, cake!

Sofia was not co-operating

The Horseshoe Falls at Niagara

The American Falls in the background

simply stunning

how close?!

BFF's

SEAFOOD! My favourite :-)

even Sofia tucked right in

on the viewing deck of the CN Tower

lying on the glass floor - quite an unnerving experience the first few times!

someone was very tired

and I had to add this picture of Joss' favourite Subway stop - and not for reasons you might imagine ;-)

Flashback to July 2010: Meet Robbie

I found this post still in my drafts folder, so, considering Robbie has made it to Canada and is still in one piece, I thought I should give him his spot on the blog :-)

I finally got around to knitting the little toy Ben had been begging me for (but I was too busy knitting Tara's birthday bag) just after his birthday. Now that he's back at school, he wanted to take it in to show him off. When i went to pick them both up from school, I found Ben sitting alone, looking quite sad, on the Friendship Bench. I sat down next to him and asked him what was wrong - I was fearing the worst, that some ruffian had been picking on him or something. It turned out he had misplaced Robbie. His little face was crestfellen! Anyway, we told his teacher Mrs Day, and she promised to keep an eye out for him when she tidied the classroom. And lo and behold, Robbie was waiting in Ben's drawer for him when he got to school this morning.