The magic of big wheels and vehicles: Touch-A-Truck

by Karen This was originally published on Karen's Chronicles two years ago after our first visit to Touch-A-Truck. This weekend on June 10th, Mothercraft is bringing out all the biggest and best vehicles for your children to explore and enjoy. It's truly a fun time that appeals to a fairly wide range of ages - you should come out!

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I've had some strange looks over the last week whenever I tell someone that we were going to Touch-A-Truck this weekend. For some reason, there were a LOT of people asking me what I was doing this weekend. So, I had to explain what it is to each of them.

First of all, Mothercraft did a great job putting this really fabulous event together. I can only imagine the logistics that went into getting all of those vehicles and people together all at once. And the vehicle operators were great with the kids - even my shy guy.

School Bus! Brandon was most excited about seeing a school bus and the fire trucks.

Déjà vu - I was just doing this a couple of weeks ago at the Children's Museum when Brandon had to share the driver's seat there, too.

Matt was pretty excited they brought in a crane for the day. Brandon didn't seem to care much for it.

Brandon waited none too patiently to finally get to sit in the fire truck. He seemed to enjoy these vintage models, but the big new ones intimidated him.

Military vehicles! We retreated to the far side of the parking lot hoping to find shorter lines and hit the jackpot!

Brandon was shorter than the wheel - not so unusual on a lot of these vehicles, but this was the one we got to document.

She tried to get him interested, but he was having no part of the inside of that truck. It was DARK in there!

Brandon has a minor fascination with motorcycles now, so the Harleys they had inside were irresistible.

Brandon wants to be able to hold the handlebars, so he made it happen. That amused the man who was in charge of the Harleys (thankfully).

Last but not least, we visited the apple with the worm. I think he thought it was a turtle, though.

We didn't last long at Touch-A-Truck this year. The heat of the day and all the stimulation proved to be more than Brandon could handle for more than an hour. Considering his age (and how hot it was), I think he did really well. Who cares if I will never regain use of my shoulder again after carrying him everywhere. ;)

I'm already looking forward to this happening again next year so I can see how Brandon's reactions to it will change. He didn't seem bothered by the noise - and there was quite a bit of noise from all the horns and sirens. But lately we've noticed that he doesn't like crowds too much. I hope it will be less intimidating for him next year!

Will we see you at Touch-A-Truck this weekend?!?

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Karen Wilson is a wife to Matt and mom to Brandon (4), who blogs about her life at Karen’s Chronicles. She can be found at Wellman Wilson, helping business use social media more effectively. Lately, she's also busy planning a little conference and doing her part to keep the coffee industry alive.

Making fun and easy videos

by Lara I've been wanting to make fun little videos of the kids for awhile but I often get derailed when trying to figure out how I would do it: what software would I need? Where do I find copyright free music?

Then I remembered a program I've seen a lot of photographers use and decided to try it out : Animoto.

It was easy as anything.  Free if you're happy with videos that are 30 seconds or less or for $30 for the year, you get access to more themes and you can make your videos as long as you want.

It was super straightforward to figure out and within minutes I had made this video:

Then I saw they were advertising their iPhone app so I downloaded that and then created another video right from my phone (nothing could be more convenient since my phone and iPad are where I take all my videos of the kids)

Have you ever played around with making fun little videos of the kids? What do you use?

Review: Melissa and Doug Reusable Stickers

by Karen About a week before Brandon's birthday, I came across the Melissa and Doug reusable sticker book with various scenes for kids to fill in with plants, animals and objects. I completely missed the "reusable" on the cover when I bought it, though I'm not sure how:

As often sometimes happens, I forgot all about the stickers. They were "hidden" in the back of our car. So, Brandon's birthday came and went and the stickers remained in the car until one day a week or two later that he found them. He was excited and so were we. DISTRACTION! :)

Just think of all the laundry I can do if he's busy playing with the sticker book! (I had started with our bedding, apparently.)

All of the scenes are very appealing - farm, ocean, desert, etc. What child doesn't enjoy the immense variety of animals associated with those things?

Not to mention the animals are simple, cute and colourful. Because they're a sticky vinyl-ish substance, they don't tear easily like paper stickers and they're pretty easy for small, not-so-nimble fingers to pull off. Bonus!

Of course, it's equally fun when they get to share the fun with dad (or mom).

What are some activities you enjoy doing to spur your child(ren)'s imagination?

Karen Wilson is a wife to Matt and mom to Brandon (4), who blogs about her life at Karen’s Chronicles. She can be found at Wellman Wilson, helping business use social media more effectively. Lately, she's also busy planning a little conference and doing her part to keep the coffee industry alive.

Cate's first race

by Laura As a part of our family’s commitment to a healthy and active lifestyle, we are always on the lookout for fun and active things to do as a family. Having struggled with weight issues our whole life, hubby and I are determined to encourage our children to eat healthy, stay active, and most importantly, have fun doing it.

Since the arrival of our second daughter, Maddie (15 months), we’ve noticed the importance of have special one on one activities with our eldest daughter, Cate (3). An afternoon alone can work wonders for her attitude the rest of the week.

Recently, hubby and I have taken up running (more of the former, less of the latter). We’ve done a few 5K and 10K races between the two of us. Much to our surprise, Cate had started to express an interest in running too and so in February we decided to sign her up for her first race!

I researched many of the races in the Ottawa area. Some of them were limiting since the kids have to run on their own, which is fine for a “there and back” kind of run, but some of these races are far too long for a 3 year old to do on her own. In the end, we decided that the 2K race at Ottawa Race Weekend was the best fit. This way, we could all sign up and run together.

In preparation for race day, Cate and I did a handful of practice runs. We talked a lot about what to expect at the race and how we had to train to make sure that we would be in good enough shape to run fast on the big day. I tracked each of our training runs with an app on my iPhone and we would check in with the map when she would start to get tired or distracted. She loved to see where we were on the map and it made it easier for her to understand how much we had left to go.

At first, it was a bit of a challenge to keep her interested in running, but soon I figured out that we could run from fire hydrant to stop sign to street corner. I watched her cues to stop and catch her breath but quickly set a new goal of when to start running again. When all else failed, I started running backwards, sideways, and skipping -  these were sure to get her playing around and not noticing that she wasn’t actually tired, just bored! I also made sure to bring water, especially on the hot days. Most of our training runs were about 1.5 kms, which really only took us about 15 minutes. Somehow, she talked about those 15 minutes all week long and continued to ask to go for another run.

Finally, the training was done and race day approached. We brought her to pick up her race shirt and bib (number). She even got to swipe her own timing chip to activate it. We toured the expo and she tried a bunch of the samples for health foods like organic granola bars, greek yogurt, and protein packed chocolate milk. She seemed to really get a kick out of the whole thing, knowing that she was just as much a part of it as anyone else.

When race day arrived, we headed downtown sporting our race shirt and bib numbers. Grandma and Grandpa watched over Maddie as Cate, hubby and myself headed over to the start line. Hubby hoisted her up on his shoulders so she could see the sea of people huddled around us – the look on her face was priceless. When the starting horn blew, the crowd started moving. We weaved our way through the crowd as a family and kept a good pace going on the way down Elgin Street. Once we turned on one of the side streets, Cate’s interest level waned and the heat increased. A few sips of water helped her to keep her spirits up and soon enough we were turning the corner to come back down the Queen Elizabeth Parkway in the dash to the finish line. Spectators had lined the street cheering us all on. Excitement was in the air and Cate just started motoring down the street!

We crossed the finish line as a family with our arms in the air and a time of 21 minutes and 3 seconds. Of course, Cate was .1 of a second ahead of the rest of us. There was cookies and Gatorade waiting on the other side – a real treat for this little girl! After catching her breath, we went on to collect our medals. What a treat!

We had a blast the whole weekend and really felt part of something so special to our city. Between the expo, the race, and the photos that followed the very next day, I can’t say enough about how well organized I found the whole weekend and I would highly recommend it to anyone - no need to be a runner to participate!

On another note, Cate has yet to take off her medal…

Laura is a Marketer by day and Mom by night. She recently returned to the workforce after spending a year dedicated to losing weight, getting fit, and of course, her new baby! Laura and her husband, Rob write about their trials and tribulations with weight loss, parenting, and everything in between over at lalaland. 

Flashback : paint pucks

This is one of the first posts I ever wrote for kids in the capital.  Those exact paint pucks from two years ago are still the ones we use!  :) by Lara

Do you remember these from elementary school?

I'm always looking for new crafts to do with Kiernan and when I saw these at Wallacks (I know you can also get them at Scholar's Choice) a wave of nostalgia came over me from elementary school art class and I couldn't help but pick them up. They cost about $13 for the starter pack and then you can get replacement pucks as well as other colours for when you want to mix things up.

They are awesome. We use them all the time. The colours are vibrant, there's no wasting, and best of all when this happens to your paint (and if you have a 3 year old too, the chances of this are quite high ;)....

... all you need it a little water to get the paint looking good again.

And the best part of all is the artwork you end up with at the end.

Lara is the mom to 5 year old Kiernan and 3 year old twins Quinn and Juliette. You can find her at her blog Gliding Through Motherhood.