My kids and their hobby

I have an 8 year old boy, Robby; and a 5 year old girl, Deanna. Since they were born they have been exposed to hobbies. Because I am self employed as a hobby store owner both kids have been coming to the store with me since they were born.

The day Robby was born I was doing payroll and had to fill in a shift for a sick co-worker during that morning. Later that afternoon, my tummy was pulsing so I called my husband to take me to the hospital. Good thing, as four hours later, Robby arrived. Two days later he was in a carrier as I restocked shelves and then did paperwork for my store.

When Deanna was born I was only away for 17 hours. In Canada, I don't put into EI so I can't get Mat leave benefits. I don't work... no money comes in.

We have a model railroad (train dept.), model kits, rocketry, crafts, regular priced stock and a clearance center. So my kids have a choice. And since my husband and I are both into hobbies, the kids follow.

This picture is of my son on his 8th birthday. It was at my store and his friends gave him items to do with his hobbies. Trains, Star Wars and homemade cards and gifts.

My son loves trains. So our family designed a simple layout for our basement that folds into the wall when not in use that has a track for both of my kids and was simple to do.

My daughter loves crafts and creating things. She is starting to show interest in the science kits we have and scratch building supplies.

We also do dioramas which are 'scenes' to play on or display. Like mountains and rivers.

Talk to your kids about what you used to do as a child, they may just want to try that too!

Kid Olympics

My six year old son asked me what the Olympics are. Once I explained and visited the Internet with him, he was so excited. He wanted to know if there is an Olympics for kids. He was perplexed when I told him NO. Then we proceeded in creating one for him and his friends.

• We decided on how many 'events' to have. We decided on 6.
• We planned out how many kids and what ages were going to attend. (Our games are for ages 3 to 8)
• We will have three adults for judges.
• 1st event: the tight rope walk: We place an 8 foot length of rope on the ground and the kids, one at a time, must walk forward and then backward on the rope. the one that can do both ways without stepping off the rope wins 1st and so on.
• 2nd event: Jump rope: For the older kids, whoever jumps the most times in 2 minutes wins. For the younger kids, lay the rope on the ground and the kids jump back and forth over it for 1 minute and the one with the most jumps wins.
• 3rd event: bean bag toss: We got a 3 by 8 foot piece of wood and one of the dads cut varying sized holes at various heights all over the board. We placed a line one third of the way up and the lower part was for the younger kids. A different colour outlined the holes for varying degree of difficult. The one that put a bean bag through all of the holes or got the highest before missing was the winner and so on.
• 4th event: Name that Character: the kids are shown pictures of various cartoon or whatever pictures you choose and the one that names the most or all wins.
• 5th event: Keychain making: The kids have all they need to assemble a keychain. A keyring, pipecleaner, 8 coloured beads and a charm. They are shown how to assemble the keychain and the start is sounded.
• 6th event: triathlon: choose 3 different activities suited to the ages of the kids. We chose 10 situps, running backward the length of an 8 foot rope, then bike or trike back to the beginning.

we assembled award ribbons from cupcake papers and ribbon to look like rosette awards and pickup up small prized from the dollar store for 1st, 2nd and 3rd place.

then we will end it with a water balloon fight!

Let us know how your event goes and what ideas you have for your own 'Olympic' events.

I Like to Have Fun!

I have noticed that as we age, we tend to loose our sense of fun. Its hard to let go with the kids or horsearound in the park because we are afraid of what others will think.

Today I took the kids to the park, and I decided to say 'Screw it' and all 215 lbs of me went down the slide a few times, climbed up the rock wall, ran around the playground yelling, "I'll get you Spiderman". And my kids and I made a new fun memory!

Yes, at first some of the moms looked at me like I had gone over the edge, but their kids started joining in on our game and I even pulled in one other mom.

Now both Kids are in bed and I'm so sore I'm walking like C3P0 from Star Wars, but I wouldn't trade a moment of today for anything.

What's the most fun you had with your kids lately?