The Talens' Tales

What is your favorite color? Green What is your favorite toy? Trucks What is your favorite food? Mac and Cheese What is your favorite tv show? Paw Patrol What is your favorite game? The Goose Game What is your favorite animal? Dog What is your favorite song? Jesus Loves Me What is your favorite book? Curious George books Who is your best friend? Titus What is your favorite thing to do outside? Play in the sandbox What do you want for dinner on your birthday? Mac and Cheese What do you want to be when you grow up? Farmer

We had a lovely time celebrating Gideon's birthday. This year was the year for a farm cake. He is three! But, he couldn't quite figure out how to hold up three fingers.  But, we have candle blowing figured out!  Opa, Oma and Tante Reina came for cake after school on Friday. Gideon opened his gifts and everyone had fun playing with them.  He got a new swim suit and insisted on wearing it for most of the day. We are all ready for summer here!

What is your favorite color? Green What is your favorite toy? Tractors What is your favorite food? Grilled Cheese What is your favorite TV show? Paw Patrol What is your favorite game? The Goose Game What is your favorite animal? Giraffe What is your favorite song? Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star What is your favorite book? Let's Find Adventure with Paw Patrol Who is your best friend? Kate What is your favorite thing to do outside? Ride his pedal tractors What is your favorite drink?   Milk What do you like to take to bed with you at night? Blankie and a cup of water What do you want for dinner on your birthday? Pancakes What do you want to be when you grow up? Farmer

We had a wonderful holiday season this year. The winter weather has been rather crazy, but that made for great time at our house with family. We had a nice looking tree. Made Cut-out Sugar Cookies...with all hands on deck for decorating. Joash and Mataya decorated gingerbread houses. Once they were assembled, they were both able to indepently put on the icing and candies! We opened gifts with our family, with a scavenger hunt for the kids to find their final gifts. Christmas day found us with a turkey and lots of lovely company. Boxing day was a great day for our almost annual Boxing Day walk on the beach. Wilbert's brother and family were here for the week following Christmas. That means lots of music... Cousin time (all of the kids LOVED Nieko)... More presents (including the gift that has been circling the family since at least 2010)... And a family swim followed by an early supper at Boston Pizza. The kids sure changed a lot in that week...

A few things worth noting have happened lately. First, Mataya got a hair cut and she loves it!  It is still long enough for pony tails and braids, but it is much more manageable and less tangley which make us both happy! Second, it was Storybook Character day this week at school. We went the Robert Munsch route this year, which was nice a simple. Joash made a cookie of play dough and was Christopher from Mmm...Cookies!  And Mataya rocked the side pony tail as Stephanie from Stephanie's Ponytail . We did some pumpkin carving. Mataya was going for silly and Joash was going for frightening! And finally, I headed back to the classroom and started teaching again last week. I am teaching the 9/10 English class at ICS. I teach three class periods a week, last period of the day on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. I asked to teach in the afternoon because then Gideon can stay with Wilbert and we don't have to worry about who is taking care of him. It has been g...

School has started once again. Joash began yesterday in Grade 3.  Mataya started Kindergarten today. She was VERY excited. She was all ready to go to school by 7:15 am this morning. Those last 45 minutes before we had to leave for school were a very long time to wait.  And Gideon wanted his picture taken with a backpack on as well. He get to have all the attention to himself now while brother and sister are at school.

My parents came for a week long visit and we had a wonderful time with them.  We spent a morning at That Fun Place.  We also went mini-golfing one morning, but we forgot to take pictures. Another day we went the Greenwich Beach, which has very interesting interpretive center, trails to walk and lovely, quiet beach. Exploring the map of eastern PEI a the interpretive center  Walking the trails at Greenwich Beach  They have nice lookout tower at the beach.  Playing on the beach with Grandpa and Grandma.  We also spent sometime downtown Charlottetown. We stopped a the library, had Cows Ice Cream and did the Fox Story Walk together. It was a fun day. We are so happy that Grandpa and Grandma could come to visit and we look forward to the next time we see them.

 We decided to head to Old Home Week again this year. On the dairy show day, because if we go, that is the day we go. We had fun with these animals!  Gideon went on his first amusement park rides and he liked them quite a bit.  And of course the large tractor. Everyone is a fan of this one!

There is still so much of the Island and so many things to do that we have yet to explore. Last week, we did two days trips to different destinations on the Island. We used the Heritage Pass that is available for check out from the Public Library. This pass is good for one free family admission to seven different sites on PEI.  One day we visited Orwell Corner Historical Village. This was a great hidden gem of a place! The main agricultral museum is air conditioned, which we really enjoyed since we visited on a very warm day. We had our picnic lunch by the school house, watched a working black smith, took a wagon ride around the site and saw some neat farm animals. The kids all really enjoyed this site and would like to go back again!  Another day we headed further east and visited the Elmira Railway Museum. This was a small museum, but very nicely done. They have a great model train display. There are also two different train rides you can ride on while there. ...

A few weeks ago we had a great visit from Emil, Karisa and Zeke. There was lots of cousin love...  Oom Emil love....  And Oom Wilbert and tractor magazine love...  There were lots of walks with Oma...  And trips to the beach...  They were here over Canada, so there was the annual Church Picnic, of course...  It was a cool day, but no rain.  But yes, I did wear my sweater on the beach.  We also took a family morning and visited The Butterfly House  It was lovely and peaceful and most of the family enjoyed it. Zeke was a little nervous the whole time, but over all did well. We also had a picnic lunch and saw the Young Company Show at the Confederation Center. We had a great time and were sad to see them go. Hopefully the time will just fly by until our next visit.