As we are drawing closer and closer to summer holidays, I am getting more and more excited! It seems as though the closer we get to summer, the busier the days get.
Last weekend Aidan had a soccer tournament which ment a few games throughout the entire weekend. This was a nice little bonus for him and he even got a cool trophy after.

They had a carnival there and the kids enjoyed pony rides and some other games. Liam especially like the cotton candy bigger then his head!

This week we are back to soccer games, gymnastics and school. This weekend is the Manitoba Marathon and I am getting ready to run it. My knee has been on the sore side lately so I am hopeing it doesn't slow me down. I would really like to beat my last years time, but it all depends on the weather. Last year the weather was perfect, no rain and heat.

Next week Aidan has his field trip to the zoo as well as Cassidy has her class picnic with the family. We are also heading to Falcon lake with three other couples from our small group for the following weekend. No kids are coming and I am SO excited about that! We are staying at a cabin and I am hopeing for nice hot weather.

Steve has two weeks off of holidays starting in July. We plan on spending the first part at my parents cabin at lake Metigosh and the second part camping at St. Malo. No big far away vacation plans this year but I am sure the kids would have fun just the same. We have no problem filling up our summer and it always seems to fly by way to fast.

As well, I am booking my summer months for photoshoots, so please email me if you are interested. I am going to be taking sessions on weekday evenings as well because alot of weekends we are gone. Feel free to visit my site.

Here are a few more random photos from the week.

Frustrated!!!

Yes that is where we are at right now. Why does money make us so frustrated? As most of you know, our kids go to a private Christian school. I love it and can not imagine them being anywhere else.

When we enrolled Aidan last year we were excited about the discount recived when our other kids started going. Every little bit helps when you are spending a fortune on there education. I also think every penny is worth it or else I would not be doing it.

The kicker is, this year, because of the schools huge debt load, they looked for ways to save money. Instead of increasing each individual tuition, they cut out the family discounts. So NO discount for us this year with Cassidy. None, zero, not even a penny! It is almost $1000 difference then it would have been. That is alot of money for us. I understand prices have to increase, but doesn't that seem like a giant increase? Yes, Steve does have a great paying job, but we also own two houses, and living expenses are not cheap. We don't go on big vacations, or buy extravagent things, we just don't have extra money to do so. Saving money?? what is that?? I call our Brandon house our savings account. With the cost of three kids there is just nothing left to 'save'

So there is temptation of unloading our brandon house. If it was only that easy though, since having a house sit on the market can cost, and getting rid of renters means us forking over the mortgage. But.....the amount of money we could pull out would be wonderful. On the other hand, in 20 years this house could put our children through University. Or at least buy me a great vacation!

anyways, that is just my little vent. It just teaches us to be more involved in our school so they can here our opinions before anything is passed. We didn't attend the board meetings, so we didn't realize this was all going to happen. Steve has already decided next year he will be in attendance. We just think it is sad that they have to pull one thing that really drew us to the school and helped us away.

Again, like I said before, I love the school and the teachers and the envioronment. I just don't know know how families are supposed to afford Christian education.

As for other news, I got some new business cards the other day which I made myself and had a small test amount printed with WHCC Sorry the pictures are crappy, I was too lazy to pull out my speedlight and I am not a great product photographer!

Almost done

Summer is almost here and we have begun the countdown till holidays! Cassidy has 9 more preschool days left and Aidan has 7 more school days left. Both kids are looking forward to field trips and parties. It is hard to believe Cassidy will be in kindergarten and Aidan in grade one in fall.
Cassidy had her kindergarten practise day last week and she loved every minute. Today when I took her for a walk she was planning out all the different things she was going to pack for lunches.

It feels like yesterday I brought Aidan to his first kindergarten day, I was so stressed up packing his lunches and snacks and that he wouldn't eat them in the right order, I was stressed about him getting his shoes on and off himself, as well as meeting me outside to pick him up. It is funny how those worries seem to disapear in time and how he is so independant now. I don't worry about those things with Cassidy. Mainly because she is my independant one.

I am very happy with there school. Yes, often I think it would be nice not to have to 'pay' for there schooling, but knowing they are in a christian envioronment is wonderful. To hear Aidan singing his bible songs, or reciting his verses, or replaying bible stories is just so neat. I believe it is a wonderful gift we can give them. Yes, financially it is scary, especially in fall with two kids. We have no idea how to make it work but I know it is important we do.

We have been keep busy around here as always. Aidan in his soccer, Cassi in her gymnastics. Every night we have something on and it defiantly helps the weeks fly by. Less then two weeks is the marathon which I am so faithfully training for. This year I feel alot less motivated, mainly because my running partners are either pregnant, or have a newborn. So i will be running alone. My running times are way faster this year then last so I hope to shave some time off.

This past weekend we didn't do much. I had a photoshoot and Steve dug out all the weeds in our lawn. Yesterday I started digging and cleaning up some flower beds in the back, places I have been avoiding but desperatly needed help.

We are already booking up our summer. No big plans this year but lots of little stuff. I have several camping trips booked up, as well as some time booked at Granny and Grandpa's cabin. I have swimming lessons booked for the kids to break up the time we are around.

That is about all for today. I really need to blog more often

Liam's mickey mouse party was a success. The weather was sunny and hot which made for the perfect day. We had lots of friends and family over for a big bbq and cake. I had found this big mickey mouse balloon on ebay and had it filled. It was a huge hit!
A friend of mine made me a Mickey mouse cake, rather impressive!

I made some Mickey mouse cookies!


Some of the cousins!
Granny with the kids.

The Pinata



Liam favorite gift was his mickey mouse crocs he got from Nathan (the boy I babysit during the week) He won't take them off. He was outgrowing his old pair so I was thrilled with this gift.
Saturday night the cousins all had a big sleepover in the basement. They stayed up late watching Enchanted and crashed!
The next morning we had a crazy event. I left early to go for my 10 mile run, when I was almost home, i noticed a trampoline on the side of the street, missing several legs. I knew right away it was mine. Sure enough, ours was gone. I dragged Steve out of bed and we retrieved the trampoline, Steve even found the rest of the missing pieces in the park. Obviously some kids were trying to get it to the park but freaked out and dropped it. Thankgoodness it is all fine and back together again. I was not happy but now we can laugh about it.

We live in a great, quiet bay but often the quiet areas are the easier areas for kids to get into trouble. I was just beyond frustrated that some kids can be so stupid.

Monday was Liam's actual birthday. Hard to believe it has been 3 years! We celebrated his birthday with Mcdonalds happy meals, which is a real treat since it is rare for them to each get a happy meal. I also got Liam to stay still for a few minutes to take a few 3 year pictures.

Cassidy has her kindergarten practise day on friday. I can not believe this school year is almost done and Aidan will be in grade one next year. It is exciting yet scary since haveing two kids in private school will make quite a dent in the pocket book, but so worth it!

LIAM IS THREE!!!

HAPPY 3RD BIRTHDAY LIAM!!!! We enjoyed a hot day on saturday, perfect for his Mickey Mouse party. I will be sure to share lots of pictures when I get a chance but right now I am off to bring Cassidy to school!

Finally. . ..

It is up!! Click here to visit my BRAND NEW site! I made this all myself (with a template) and didn't have to ask once for help! Still in the making and I have lots of pictures yet to plug into it, but you can still take a look.

Is it really May?

These past few weeks I sure have been wondering why we live in Manitoba. Especially since someone informed me that we are the coldest city in Canada. Is that true?? Our weather has been so unpredictable. For example, last weekend they were calling for +21, and what do we get?? +6 with snow!!!

I am glad to say that is done with and we enjoyed a beautiful weekend! Yes, it is rainy today but my poor grass so desperatly needs the rain so I know it is good. The long weekend looks amazing, so hopefully the forcast won't change too much.
The week for us has been VERY busy. Soccer started up, twice a week for 1 1/2hours. Defiantly a big commitment but Aidan loves it!



Tuesday I spent the afternoon photographing a Christian Business Trade Show at the Viscount Hotel. This was defiantly challenging, dealing with bad lighting and overall different subjects then what I am used to but overall it went very well. I was asked to present my own table at this show originally but I wasn't ready for all the preperation it would have taken but hope to take part as an exhibitor next year. This is just a sample of some of the stuff I did. I covered a panel discussion as well as the crowd and different exhibitors.
Wensday right after his soccer game we rushed to the Calvin Christian spring concert. Here is him and the class singing there songs. (sorry for the terrible picture, I was jammed in so I couldn't move to get a nicer shot)Thursday Cassidy had gymnastics and I was able to get a few shots. Parents are not allowed in to watch but they made an exception for one class.


Steve worked the entire weekend. That was a bummer since I never got a real 'day off' on mothers day.

I also had my first maternity shoot, here is a small taste. I am so happy with them all and will have lots of them on my website (once I finish it and get it going, http://www.erinkeownphotography.com/)

Today Aidan is having a Poem reading party at his classroom and famlies are invited. It is during Cassi's preschool time so Liam and I will go, I will be sure to bring the camera!

Long weekend is coming up! Steve is working, this is his last weekend he will be working for a long time. I have a few photoshoots, as long as the weather is nice and hopefully I can go look at purchaseing some flowers and hanging baskets. The following weekend is Liam's big Mickey Mouse party!

I forgot to share some great news in my last post. Last week I found out that a nursery school was moving into Calvin Christian. It isn't run by Calvin, they are just renting a space. I became very excited for the possibilities that all three kids would go to school in the same place in fall, which is also just down the street and quickly registered Liam before they filled up!

fun with blocks. . .

What a busy weekend and it is still not over. We were able to get a few things accomplished this weekend. We were expecting very warm temperatures but last minute the forcast changed on us. Kind of a bummer since we had a beautiful week. I am tired of the up and down temperatures and wish we could just stay the same.

Yesterday I convinced Steve to do a few things around the house. We have SO many things that need to be done and since everything is so expensive we haven't been able to do things as fast as we would like. Steve insalled a new vanity downstairs in the bathroom, finally!! So all you visitors, you will get to wash your hands in the guest bath rather then using hand sanitizer. This was a project we kind of weren't in a rush to do since it is our third bathroom but it is nice that it is done. This bathroom still has alot of work but it is now functional.

We also found a new light for our entrance. I have been watching for a while for one that matches our light in the dining room and we finally found one. I was so happy to see the ugly old brass light fixture go in the trash.

Last night Steve and I hired a babysitter and went to the Starfield concert with some friends. I am sure you all heard of the accident, or read it in my sister Jamie's post at there concert a week earlier. They shared quite a bit from there experience there and had a prayer time for the people who are hurting. They had a fantastic concert and I am glad I got to see them. The reason I say "I" and not "We" is that Steve had to leave halfway through because Liam started freaking out. He has been doing this lately and we didn't want our young babysitter to have to deal with that. At least I got to enjoy it.

Tomorow is Aidan's first soccer game. We all enjoyed soccer last year and it was good to get out with the entire family. The other kids enjoy the time as well. Last year we had a terrible experience and Aidan's soccer coach quite halfway through, just never showed up. It was dissapointing for the kids but thankgoodness for some willing parents who stood up and took charge. I am sure this year will be different.