Camp Cousins- part 4

It was the 100th year of Saskatoon having public buses, so they offered a "free rides" day and festivities downtown.  My sister suggested we go and figured out the schedules (THANKS JENN!)  This was for sure one of the biggest highlights of Saskatoon.

We met at my sister's school and took the number 6 bus downtown from there.

The kids loved that there weren't seatbelts.

There were a few games downtown, several buses we could tour and the longest line you've ever seen for free burgers.  Fortunately we had already eaten, because the wait would have done me in!

This is what the buses looked like when I was a kid and the story on this is that my sister used to ride a city bus to school at age 4 to go to and from pre-kindergarten.  The driver was the same all the time and did a special stop for her at our school.

But one day, there was construction and a substitute driver and she was dropped off across the street.  I remember this because I was on the playground with my friend and saw it happen.  My sister did not know how to cross the street and we weren't allowed off the playground, so we yelled at her through the fence to tell her when the walk light came on and she made it safely to school.

Can you imagine sending your kids Emora's size on the city bus?  I am still shocked by it, but I guess times and society was different then and my sister sure was courageous. 

This is the inside of the 1970s bus.

This was at my sister's school, where she teaches kindergarten and where Imogen started school last year- en Francais!

They really liked to pretend to drive it.

Dominique was trying to figure out the pedals.

This was the diesel/electric bus- a new fancy thing.

This was the bus for people with disabilities.  We got to talk to the driver some.

The bus celebration was held in front of the library that we like to visit in the summer for their puppet plays.  Dominique seems to always get chosen as a volunteer.  These theater guys are great!  We got some books too.  It was so nice to get there without having to deal with traffic, or find a parking spot or pay for parking!!

And the people were so friendly on the buses- It was a great way to spend the day, especially since Jenn didn't even get us lost!  I still don't know how she figured out the routes.  She had maps, but then we added in a trip to the university and back, so that made it a bit more complicated, but it all went without a hitch and there was little waiting either!  The buses drove up shortly after we'd gotten there each time.

Camp Cousins- part 3

We did the story of David counting his men for "in all your ways acknowledge him", so I did several activities and games with numbers.  In this one, Isaac rolled 4 dice, Ivan arranged them in a row and called out the big number, the girls arranged the numbers to make the big number he rolled.  Then they lined up and I asked where we should put our trust in _______ number of $/talents/lbs/years... or in God.

 

Then they had to race from a line with their name on it and go to the best answer.

They worked really well together and liked the racing best, but I should have made Ivan's line closer- his disadvantage was too big.

The kids are growing up so much.  Jenn and I were talking about in future years.  It's nice having our "camp" with some structure to most of our days and the rest of our time for things we want to take in and a last day of no structure.

We've gone to the Western Development Museum most years, but didn't this year and my kids were noticing and commenting on the fact that we weren't going, so we may have to catch that another time.

Jenn also remembered that we usually do journals, so she put some together quickly.

Camp Cousins part 2

We were figuring out how big 9 feet tall is- which is one of the guesses as to how tall Goliath was.  Dad is 6 foot, so he told the kids to add 3 feet to his height.  Next time we will need to include dad in the games.  He was asked to be a part of some of the activities and managed to be a part of some of the others too. ;)

The 2 "babes" of the group (Emora and Isaac) were having issues with their paper.  She wanted it only her height for one thing.

9 feet is what the tape measure is at on the wall. 

Emora wasn't so sure about standing up on his shoulders.  That's my girl!  When I was a kid, dad wanted me to stand on his shoulders while he walked down the stairs and I refused.  But Jenn did it- so Dominique must take after her!

Ivan was getting crazy tall and wasn't as comfortable standing up that high either.  See the pics in the background?  They are paintings done by a family friend Marlys Rivard.  She did mom and dad's wedding portrait and each of us kids at about age 2.  Can you tell which one is me?  This was the reason I wanted to do my kids' portraits at about that age.  I loved that we still looked some baby and like us too.

Camp Cousins wouldn't be the same without face paint.  Ivan didn't get his done.  Dominique and Imogen picked new designs that I had never done before, so that was fun.

Jenn painted Isaac and Emora.  Isaac wanted to be scary and Emora was a butterfly with shiny paint that unfortunately smeared easily.

Tuesday night was a real treat.  A theater group in Saskatoon was putting the play Alice in Wonderland on in parks all over the city throughout the summer.  We caught it on a night when it was in my sisters' neighborhood.  My brother and his wife met us there too.  It was really well done.  Here Alice had grown big and was busting out of the house.

4 people played tons of characters and sang and did a bit of music...

The kids loved it and it helped that my two big kids have already seen a play of this so they knew the story line.

This is my brother and his wife.

Camp Cousins part 1

OK, so get ready for a marathon.  I'm going to try to write these all at once, so at least they will appear all this week.  I took a ton of pics from our week in Saskatoon.  Most of the pics are from Camp Cousins.  We did a theme of David's life and our scripture theme was Proverbs 3:5-6  "Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding, in all your ways acknowledge him and he will make your path straight.

We tried to protect our sheep by taking out the prey animals with slingshot, rocks, karate punches and kicks.  Ivan gave us demonstrations.

Here was a snack.  Yep, as kids we didn't get soda or lots of sweets.  Now mom and dad's house has nutella, chocolate flavored cereals, and jelly beans at 9:30 pm.  Hahaha- grandparents so sweetly loving their grandkids ;)

Ivan's favorite times were when he was helping grandpa.  His refrain all week was "where is grandpa?"  Ivan's favorite moment of the week was getting to drive the riding lawn mower.  All week he was asking dad when they could mow again.  Here he was trying to help dad from getting eating alive by mosquitoes.  They were so terrible that we avoided being outside- which was unfortunate.  In the city they weren't as bad.

Ivan was also the big helper for most of our puppet shows.

Jenn and I both prep for 2 of the days' activities of Camp Cousins with show, craft and activities.

We had lots of fun the week long, going on adventures and the kids loved having time with the cousins and extended family in Saskatoon.

They decorated hats.