The Talens' Tales

 M(om): Hey Gideon! How are you doing, big guy? G(ideon): Oh pretty good mom. I having lots of fun with this whole standing thing. It has been pretty exciting to figure out how to do it! M: We have been pleased to see you doing it. Any thoughts on walking yet? G: Nah...why walk when I can crawl, climb and be carried around any where I want to go? M: That is true. I have a feeling that one of these days you are just going to do it and then there will be no looking back. And I will probably be chasing you all over the place. What else it new? G: I have some new teeth. My first two molars came in last week. M: I know! Anything else? G: I really like to play with truck and tractors now. I like to drive them around in the kitchen and living room. Joash even shared some of the tractors he doesn't play with as much anymore, so I have lots of new ones to try out. M: It has been so neat to see you crawling along pushing the different vehicles around. You certainly are ge...

My birthday present to myself this year was to join the Modern Mrs. Darcy Book Club . It is an online book club and I am so excited to be a part of it. I haven't been in book club in a long time, mostly because all of the invitations I get usually end with, "and at our meetings, we usually don't talk about the book very much, so it doesn't matter if you read it or not." What is the point of a book club if you are not actually going to talk about the book? So, anyway, I am excited to be a part of a community of people who read as much as I do and like to talk about what they read. I was even more excited when I learned that the pick for November was going to be Emily of New Moon . And since I have lived on PEI for almost 7 years and had yet to visit L. M. Montgomery's Birthplace , I figured it was high time. So the kids and I hopped in the van this afternoon and drove through some lovely countryside to New London, PEI. Joash took this picture of ...

One thing Joash had on his summer bucket list was to climb to the top of a lighthouse (inspired by Wilbert and I going to a lighthouse on our anniversary). So we took the day yesterday and headed to the Wood Island Lighthouse . It was a great lighthouse with great museum about lighthouses on PEI, the Northumberland Ferry, fishing among other things. It was geared toward families and even had a scavenger hunt that Joash was able to do. If you are looking for a good lighthouse to take kids too, this is a great one! What can you find on the beach? At the top! Joash was a bit nervous at the top, so I am not really sure if he took it all in or not. But, we are glad he just made it up there. Watching a video on fishing. Gideon, the captain of the ferry. And of course the location is just lovely. We had taken a lunch along and enjoyed a picnic by the ocean and also found a geocache hidden in the area. Another item on the kids summer bucket list was a visit...

One thing I am trying to do with my kids to explore the place we actually live. It is so easy to never go to the places that are right around us. And also, it is a good way for me to have things to recommend for visitors to do, since we have done them ourselves.  So, yesterday afternoon, the kids and I did the Eckhart in the City Mousehunt in Charlottetown. And it was such a fun little activity to do with the kids and walk around Charlottetown. Joash was able to read the clues to find each one and with a little direction and help from mom, they spotted all 9 Eckhart statues around town. We took pictures with every Eckhart and some turned out better than others. First one! It was a lovely, sunny day as you can tell. Here he is! (A little blurry. Sorry) One of the Eckhart statues was in a construction zone. We thought is was so nice they put a little window in the fence around the construction zone so you could still see Eckhart. He is up there! Mataya al...

I never got around to sharing my June books because the start of July was rather busy. And then July went crazy with the whole gall bladder thing. So, now it is time for the June and July book recap. And there are a lot because it is two months worth of books and I spent 5 days in the hospital. The Hypnotist's Love Story ; The Last Anniversary ; and Truly, Madly, Deeply by Liane Moriarty - Again, I really enjoy Moriarty's work. Her books often have short chapters and jump between characters which is a writing style that really works for me. It makes it hard to stop reading because you always want to know what happens in the next chapter and since they are short, you continually tell yourself "just one more." They are all so different that it is hard for me to pick a favorite of the the three as I like all of them for different reasons. A God in Ruins by Kate Atkinson - A companion story to Life After Life as it follows the same family, but focused on a bro...

What if reality is only the edge of possibility? There isn't much that can throw Charlie Hazard off balance. But the mystery woman with the striking eyes and the intense request to follow her-- now --is about to shake his world. Knowing little more than her name, Charlie leaves his post as a guard at the Satellite Beach community center for what he thinks is just another risk-containment job. But Gabriella, an experimental psychologist, has far more in store for him than protection duty--if the two of them survive the test. Reese Clawson relishes her work at the Combine and all the perks and power that come with it--including the ability to manipulate perceptions. But the Combine never anticipated this mind-shifting technology. If Gabriella's experiments succeed, the Combine would be destroyed. And Reese will  never  allow that to happen. I have read the first book in this series, Trial Run , but missed this second one. However, that made no difference in the enjoyment of ...

Some how, the kids got the idea in their head that it would really fun to sleep in the tent in our yard one night. We agreed, as long as it was a night where we didn't have any big plans for the next day (just in case everyone was really grumpy). So a few nights ago was the night! While in their bath, I was talking to the kids about noises they  might hear and what to do if they got scared. This prep talk scared Mataya, so she decided just to sleep in her bed. Joash was very excited and went to bed just fine. And that night it rained, for the first time in a long time (it is very dry here). When Wilbert put up the tent, he figured the rain fly would just make the tent hot, so he didn't put it on. So, Joash got a bit wet, but still spent most of the night in the tent. Mataya felt brave the next morning, and with a little coaching and reassurance from Joash, decided to spend that night in the tent. We dried everything up and put the rain fly on and both kids went to sleep i...

It was my 35th birthday earlier this week. When my family asked what I wanted to do, I said I wanted to go to Shining Water Family Fun Park with my family. (Well most of the family. We decided it would be more fun for everyone if Gideon spent the day with Oma and Opa.) It is something I had been wanting to do with the kids all summer and weather was looking great on my birthday, so that was the day. And it was so fun! Big fish!   Shining Waters is a mix of amusement parks rides and water slides. I think our kids were the perfect ages to introduce them to the world of amusement parks. They were both tall enough to do almost everything. Joash was super brave and excited and tired just about everything once (except for the water slides. Everyone had to go down individually and neither of the kids were ready for that). Joash even dared to do the larger of the two roller coasters they have and he loved it so much, he did it three times! Roller coaster time! Joash and I are...

We have caught the geocache bug again and are so please that there is a whole series down our road. So, last week, we took a walk from our house after coffee time and found three of the closest geocaches.  Joash found the first one all on his own!  This one was a bit more tricky. Can you spot Denise in the background? I had to fight with a hawthorn for this one.  We let Joash be in charge of this one and with a little help from Wilbert, Joash and Mataya both spotted it. We hope to finish up the series on the road this summer, but the next ones require the van and a bit more planning. We also hope to find a few more geocaches in a few other places we visit this summer. It is a great family activity.

The kids were all on the late side of getting teeth when they were a babies. So, it makes sense they are the later end of losing their baby teeth. Joash just lost his first tooth this weekend and he was pretty excited about it.  He did it all on his own and said that didn't hurt one bit. I think he was rather surprised by how easily it came out in the end. Joash is also really into putting fresh fruit on his cereal. He is pretty proud of his creations.