Tales from Ashton Manor

Simon is talking all the time now. His words are clear, his sentences are well-formed. He loves to ask questions. His favourite question is why we say certain things. Say, for example, that I dropped a boulder on my toe and said "Shoot!". Simon would follow with "How come say shoot?"
He has a teddy bear which we received as a gift from the hospital where he is participating in a study. His teddy bear has been named Mimi and is a boy. When Mimi first moved into our house, he mostly just said "mimimimimimimimimimimimi" in a high-pitched voice. Now Mimi has begun to talk quite a bit too. Simon takes good care of Mimi, feeding him, fixing any ouchies he might have and making sure mimi gets his naps.
Simon is also getting sneaky. He approached his mom today and used a disguised voice to pretend to be another toy he had in the house. The toy, the voice stated, was hungry for chocolate. So mom gave Simon a chocolate to give the toy. But, after giving it to the toy, Simon discovered that the toy didn't actually like chocolate after all. So Simon had to eat it instead.
He loved Barney the large pink dinasour and his favourite song to sing before bedtime is "Oh Canada".
He is also beginning to use his imagination in very creative and astonishing ways. Today he used a box as a hockey net, a basketball for a puck and a container of glue for his hockey stick.
Simon will be, if all goes according to plan, in Boot to Blades in January.

Elliot passed his level one skating class and is going into level two in January. He has been really glad to have his Aunty Amanda back from school for the Christmas holidays and he is looking forward to his uncle Clayton being back after his Christmas holidays in Saskatoon.
Elliot is doing really well in school, enjoying being with his friends there and loving his teachers. He also loves Sunday School and his pastor Liz.
We still read a Cam Jansen story nearly every night but recently Elliot also recieved a dinasour book unlike any other. It is a huge pop-out dinasour book that you really need to see to believe. Anyhow, Elliot loves it and I don't mind the break from Cam Jansen's clicking. It was getting on my nerves.

Elliot has loved the snow, Simon is warming up to it.

No pun intended.

Ned's family is snowed in

Official Verwoerd Immediate Family Christmas(OVIFC2008)

Elliot passes level one preskating!

And Aunty Shelley visits...

Simon's Birthday at McDonalds

Simon goes adventuring through the tunnels at McDonalds for the very first time!

Simon's Birthday at Whitespot

Simon's Birthday at the Christmas Train

Hello there, Ned.

How do you do?

Tell me, tell me

What is new?

Elliot is four

Simon is two

Pictures to come...

I just downloaded (uploaded?) a boatload of pictures. Simon's birthday, Christmas, Snowdays and other cool pictures. I'm just away from the main computer right now. But I'll get to them as soon as I can so you can see them too.

curiouser and curiouser...

In a Wonderland kind of way, our kids are crazy.

Case in point:

Elliot: Simon, do you want to play Uncle Bridge?
Simon: Yeah.

Elliot and Simon (while running around the kitchen table): Uncle Bridge!! Uncle Bridge!!

Elliot: Simon, who is Uncle Bridge?

Post-Halloweeeeeen Post Post-Five (AKA Six)

Finally, Halloween Night arrives and the Ashton men head out for some real, honest-to-goodness door-to-door trick-or-treating. Simon lost a boot, but we got it back. He wore his orange rain coat over his pirate costume so most people thought he was a pumpkin. Elliot went with his friend Tate, who was dressed up like Jack Sparrow. Elliot's pumpkin bag was literally overflowing by the time we finished our townhouse complex. Our house only saw thirty seven kids this year. Great weather though.

Post-Halloweeeeeen Post Post-Four (AKA Five)

Elliot's preschool Halloween party, which mom volunteered to help with, which meant Simon had a chance to attend the party as well, which meant great fun for all!

Post-Halloweeeeeen Post Post-Three (AKA Four)

Here we are, us Ashton men, working on our Halloween crafts.

For the pumpkins, Elliot designed the faces and Mom and Dad did the carvin'.

Dad only cut himself fairly severely once this year. Mom is thinking of buying a plastic knife for Dad, corked-fork to follow.

Please note - Roughrider shirt on Elliot, as Oct 30 was the day Saskatchewan defeated the Toronto Argos to take home advantage for the... oh sorry, you stopped paying attention didn't you. More pictures you say? Alright...

Post-Halloweeeeeen Post Post-Two (AKA Three)

Simon Arrrrrrrie Ashton and his dad, Captain Yellowbeard after a long and treacherous journey.

Back to the great and proud Ship Dodgecaravan to head for home with our many treasures!

Post-Halloweeeeeen Post Post-One (AKA Two)

Arrrrr, we saw some scary sights on our journey through the dark waters of 176 and 176A St, but we wernt afraid. Nah, we kept on treckin from business to business repeatin our pirate words "trickortreat" - wait for candy to hit bottom of bag - "thankyou".

Arrrr....

Post-Halloweeeeeen Post One

Yo-ho-ho and bottle of rootbeer, those scally-wag Ashtons have hit the high-waters again, sailing fearlessly into the depths of downtown Cloverdale where they will pillage and pillage some more until their treasure sacks are overflowing with sweets and chocolate bars!! Led by the not-quite-as-smart-as-a-bag-of-hammers Captain Yellowbeard and his pirate princess, the great and proud Ship Dodgecaravan met dry land at the Surrey Museum.