Our 6th Annual Spirit Wheel Walk Run

The day of our event came. 

And we had a fantastic turn out!

We had 41 people come out as part of Nick's Cheering Squad.

We had families and friends, co-workers and school friends.
And we had 4 families with spina bifida together!

It was about half kids and adults, so we got a kid picture of everyone!
From 2 weeks old to 14 years!

Nick was very excited to start on his walk

We started relatively on time, with Nick leading the way

The weather was nice and sunny but not super hot.
So it was perfect (but I have said that I will walk rain or shine... shine is just preferred)

Everyone took turns pushing Nick, and he had a blast!

We stopped at the look-out and the kids had fun climbing up and watching all of the adults below

and I think the adults were glad to have a rest

The kids were playing a game and didn't want to go back! Except of course that that is where the food was...

We all posed for some pictures while we waited

But for some reason didn't get one of all of us together

I can see how our event has grown in the last couple of years. We used to be walk for the whole 3 hours. Now we walk more as a group together, everyone (almost) makes it to the look out, and then we walk back.

The leisurely pace we made let us all talk as we walked.
And catch up with other families

Katheryn and Hannah were together as usual!

Then it was back to the picnic area for some socializing and food

and baby snuggles

And Nick was doing lifts on his walker

We picnicked right beside the playground (too cold for the splash pad) so the kids all had lots of fun, and the adults weren't too far away

And I even had an opportunity to educate some people who stopped and asked us about our event

At the end of the day we all had another fantastic year of cheering on Nickolas!

Nick passed out soon after we got home...

Always a sign of how well the day went!

We are still fundraising until the end of the month

/https://www.canadahelps.org/en/pages/nicks-cheering-squad-2/

and I'm still working on some awareness posts and videos.

But you will definately see Nick's Cheering Squad walking, riding and wheeling next year!

Birthday Party

Katheryn had her birthday party this weekend.
She had a number of choices and picked Neb's Fun World and bowling. (She originally wanted swimming like Nick's party, but I didn't feel comfortable watching kids I don't know in the pool.) It was my first... I mean Katheryn's first... friend birthday party.

So she picked 5 friends from school (which turned into 9 friends from school) and family and friends and we had 16 kids for bowling. We had 3 lanes and so divided everyone up.

Family stayed in one lane and then friends were in the other 2 lanes. We had girl friends and boy friends and there were some friends who didn't want to play together (my first clue that there might be drama)

I assigned adults to every lane. One parent stayed and everyone else dropped their child off. It wasn't until the last parent asked about leaving a phone number that I realized that if anything happened to any of the children I had no way to get a hold of anyone.
I also had my list to keep track of who was there, and then cross kids off after they got picked up.

I was in charge of the girl team, and the girl drama. I hadn't realized drama would start at such an early age (thinking more teens). But we had tears and it's not fair and she won't let her and she's not sharing. I think that I did well with the drama and everyone had fun.

Because it was a girl and boy party I also had girl themed and boy themed loot bags (and left overs for Nick's party in November).

Katheryn had a great 7th Birthday! And smiles all day

Annual Zoo Trip

We had our annual girls zoo trip.

4 of us from high school. 

(This was taken a couple of years out of high-school)

Over the last couple of years our four-some has grown, but we still all get together at the zoo!

The kids have such a great time together.

Nickolas wanted Emily to push him everywhere!

And Katheryn and Hannah were two trouble-makers running all over the place. Trouble 1 and Trouble 2!

The Toronto Zoo has lots of animals to see. As usual, spending a whole day there didn't let us see all of the animals, but enough to keep everyone happy

We got to see some animals up close

Nick liked the hippos at feeding time (they eat hay)

There was some things to climb on too!

Katheryn's favorite was the polar bears. The baby polar bear that we got to see shake like Sammie, or the one swimming up close to the glass

Nick found some turtles... that he named Michaelangelo.

And he got to freak out Auntie Laura by "touching" a huge spider

The price for the zoo was discounted for us as well. With the Access2Care card, I got in for free and Nick got in for half price! We only had to pay full price for Katheryn!

The only I wish is that we could do it more often!

A Butterfly Birthday

Katheryn turned 5 this year.

And that is a pretty big deal!

A couple of months ago the planning started, and Katheryn said she wanted to have a butterfly/fairy party

We have started a tradition of dressing up for birthday parties (of course what is more fun than that?!)

And Katheryn really enjoyed her tea party birthday last year.

She had a couple of wishes for her birthday. She wanted a pinata (done) and a bouncy castle (unfortunately I had to nix that idea)

 The pinata was definitely a hit (not literally).
I had no idea that they made ribbon pinatas and was worried about giving a bunch of kids a big stick. Luckily I have a friend who knows about these things and each kid got a ribbon to pull.

 And then the collecting began.
The older kids (who cared the most about what was there) got the most.

But everyone left with a loot-box of toys

After a candy-filled Easter last week, there was only the minimal amount of candy. Most of it was little toys and stickers, glow sticks, dinos, princesses ect.

 I got a nice mom and Katheryn shot! With both of us looking and smiling.

Katheryn was full of smiles all day.
And had a lot of fun with everyone who came.

Everything she got she was thankful for, she opened and looked at all of the cards. Every times she opened something she said "Oh wow"

She loved the butterfly cake, and blowing out her candles. For the first time she really enjoyed a house full of people singing happy birthday to her!

And of course the house full of butterflies, fairies or other bug-creatures.

The fun-filled day ended with the kids asking to go to bed, but first we had a get a quick sibling picture (complete with rackets that they did not hit each other with - this time)

Happy Birthday baby girl! 5 years is a such a great milestone!
So much has changed in the last 5 years and you have brought such joy to all of our lives. Our lives have completely changed and life is so much better than we ever could have imagined it to be.