As a mother, I will never give up on my child. As a mother of a child who has autism, I will never give up hope.
I look into his eyes and I see all the potential that he has to offer to this beautiful world and I just know that one day the world can see what I see.

Follow my blog as I share my life and my experiences as a person who loves someone with autism.

Showing posts with label holidays. Show all posts
Showing posts with label holidays. Show all posts

Sunday, March 31, 2013

Breaking Tradition

Our Easter morning traditionally is an Easter egg hunt, our annual Easter Egg Smashing competition, and a very delicious breakfast. It’s usually raining or muggy outside preventing us from going to any Easter family festivities, but today the sun was out so we decided that it was time for a change in our tradition. By the way, Bryce was the winner of the Easter Egg Smashing competition again.

I quickly searched online for events going on in our community and came across Easter in Queen’s Park. Petting farm, balloon animals, crafts and face painting, magician and jester, and concession services. It was local and one of the few events around our area that was free admission, but I was sold at ‘petting farm’.

It was off to Rainbow Playland in Queen’s Park.

We immediately headed to the petting farm and saw bunnies!

And baby chicks!

A couple hens and a rooster!

A handful of little baby piglets!

Then one of the volunteers announced it was feeding time and all of the animals, not behind a fence or in a cage, came running to the trough.

It was a great opportunity to be able to actually pet something at the petting farm so we took advantage of it.

After the petting farm we walked around for a bit and checked out a couple of the craft booths as we made our way to the edge of the park where Mr. and Mrs. Easter bunny were located for pictures. Unfortunately, the line up was ridiculously long but I wanted a picture of Bryce with the Easter bunnies.

I hope this is a new tradition we will be able to maintain. It was really nice being able to go out as a family and into our community and take part in the Easter events. It’s not something we have been able to do before and I’m already looking forward to next year... to reclaim my title of the Easter Egg smashing champion that is!

Happy Easter!

Thanks for reading,
Tanaya

Where NOT to hide your Easter Eggs

Celebrating Easter with a traditional Easter Egg hunt in your own home? Here are some tips of where NOT to hide your Easter Eggs.

Not to hide your eggs: In plain sight.

Hiding your eggs in plain sight (like in front of your television) not only makes it too easy to be found, but it makes the hunt end way too quickly and that means less time to brew your first pot of coffee.

Not to hide your eggs: in the dishwasher.

Forget about how unsanitary hiding your eggs in the dishwasher can be, but what if it was never found and you forgot about it? We’re talking scrambled eggs!

Not to hide your eggs: in messy areas.

Chances are you will be taking pictures of this momentous occasion and you will look back at photos from this day of hiding eggs in pure regret for not hiding the mess as well!

Not to hide your eggs: in the bathroom.

Ok! Now we’re concerned about the sanitation of the eggs and the sanity of person who was in charge of hiding the eggs. (xox Daniel)

Not to hide your eggs: in, around, or on top of the kitty litter box.

... REALLY??!!!

We hope you all had a beautiful time with your loved ones this Easter!

From our family to yours, Happy Easter!

Saturday, March 30, 2013

The Art of Easter Egg Decorating

Step one. Boil eggs.

Step two. Lay out supplies.

Step three. Test product to ensure quality and yumminess.

Step four. Using a crayon, draw on remaining eggs you did not devour in previous step.

Step five. Create gradient effects, beautiful contrasts, and colourful transitions by dipping the egg into different cups of coloured dye and/or take the easy way out and just put the whole egg into one colour as seen in picture below.

Step six. Place eggs back into egg carton and refrigerate until ready to consume.

This concludes the art of Easter Egg decorating by Bryce.

Happy Easter!

Tanaya, Daniel, and Bryce

Thursday, February 14, 2013

Bee Mine Valentine’s

Happy Valentine’s Day to you all!

Bryce was busy as a bee last night writing his name all by himself on all of his Valentine’s Day cards to his class mates and teachers. On a side note, I think it’s safe to say he’s mastered the ability to write his own name.

I’m not sure if he really knows why I asked him to spell his name over a dozen times, but I will always do the whole Valentine’s Day card-giving-thing because to me, it promotes giving, caring, and showing appreciation.

Valentine’s Day may be a Hallmark day to most or that one special day of the year for some, but to me it’s a way to teach and show love. That’s what it’s all about!

Happy Valentine’s Day, my little monkey! Mommy and daddy love our Valentine’s Day card from you! We love you so much!

Thanks for reading,
Tanaya

Sunday, April 8, 2012

Our Little Bunny

Last night we decorated our Easter eggs and put them in the fridge only to wake up this morning to discover that they were all gone!

Thankfully, our little bunny was able to find them.

Happy Easter from all of us!

Thanks for reading,
Tanaya

Sunday, December 25, 2011

Merry Christmas and Happy Boxing Day! :)

Bryce’s Christmas presents had a little bit of a theme this year. We focused his gifts on his favourite thing right now: Boxing rings! Also a couple of gifts were for his favourite thing to do ever: Draw! Bryce loves to draw!

When Bryce started to open his boxing related gifts, he got really excited. Like, the anticipation was killing him. Every time we walked past the toys section in Walmart he would point out this boxing ring and would say, “Want boxing ring!” and we knew that was going to be one of his Christmas presents. As he started to open his stocking, I think he knew! (His stocking had the wrestler figurines in it.)

We tried to capture his excitement on film! We hope you can see how happy he was! Look at that smile! Love it!

From our family to yours, we’d like to wish you all a very Merry Christmas!

From Bryce, Tanaya, and Daniel

Monday, April 25, 2011

It’s Easter Time!

Today we woke up earlier than we did for Christmas and hid a half a dozen decorated eggs around the house so Bryce could have a little Easter egg hunt. I held Bryce’s hand as we walked downstairs and told him, “It’s Easter time!”

He was very excited and had been anticipating our Easter breakfast ever since we made the eggs yesterday. I asked him to get the eggs from the fridge and he opened the door, pulled out the carton, opened it and said, “Oh no, all gone!” I said it was OK and that we had to find them.

That is when the hunt began... and then ended. I guess we weren’t really good at hiding the eggs because he found four of them before I could even grab the camera to take a picture.

After Bryce found all the eggs, we sat down for breakfast and had our traditional egg cracking competition where you smash your egg against another persons egg to try and crack their egg. Bryce won again.

Hope everyone had an egg-cellent Easter!

Thanks for reading,
Tanaya

Saturday, April 23, 2011

Colouring Eggs for Easter

Today Bryce and I decorated some eggs for our Easter breakfast tomorrow.

We hope everyone is having an egg-cellent Easter!

Daniel

Saturday, April 10, 2010

A Late Easter

Since I was sick last week we didn’t do anything for Easter, so today we decided to have eggs to make up for it. Traditionally, we would have Easter breakfast at Daniels parents house with some close friends and family, but Daniel’s mom has been sick for a couple of months in the hospital and it was cancelled this year. With that said, Daniel and I never made hard-boiled eggs before, and it was such a part of our lives to eat those on Easter. With the help of Google we found the directions, pulled out the crayons, and dyed some eggs for dinner.

Bryce’s favourite part of our Easter tradition is smashing his egg against another persons having a contest to see who was the ‘winner’. Between the three of us, Bryce was the ultimate champion!

Thanks for reading,
Tanaya