Some news to share!

Alan and I feel that it is probably time to share our big news with everyone - especially since it really is no longer possible to keep private without many questioning looks. We are excited to share that we are expecting our second baby as of February 2nd, 2012! I am now four months pregnant, back into the stretchy pants (which I despise) and I am happy to say that the 24 hour a day nausea is starting to subside - finally! Ewan is also very excited with the idea of a baby, kisses my belly each morning and also thinks that he has a baby in his belly too!

Now after the congratulations, I know that the first question on many of your minds is 'who will be teaching my child?' Well I do have a plan in place as well as a wonderful team of experienced staff that I am confident will continue to run A Gym Tale seamlessly and will win all of your children over as they have over the past three years. And as always I can always be contacted directly by email.

With regards to the Gym & Music classes, I do plan on working straight through my pregnancy until the very end of January. I will be running the first 6 weeks of the winter Gym & Music play classes - I make no guarantees that I will actually be able to get up from circle time, but I will be there! And then one of the girls will finish the session for me continuing on with all of my class plans. I will then be returning to teach all of the Spring session classes, most likely with the baby in a sling (yay, no need for a doll for the baby class!)

As for the Nursery School program, I will start to step back in January as Chrissy, a teacher who has been with us for the past three years, is returning from her maternity leave. Come the Spring I will be back part time in a 'supervisory' position.

We are very excited to share this news with everyone and I look forward to sharing stories of the pregnancy with all of you as well as hearing about all of your transitions from a one child family to two.

An enjoyable Sunday at home

After spending the morning at the dog park with both Ewan and Sidekick running around for a solid hour we made our way back home with the dog and the boy fast asleep. I was then free to take some time to go through the veggie garden which has been very good to us this summer with an abundance of carrots, yellow beans, broccoli, snow peas, spinach, onions, zucchini and now tomotoes galore. I spent the afternoon taking on the challenge of making homemade tomato sauce in order to freeze for the craziness of going back to work in the Fall - which as much as I have missed everyone, I have also really enjoyed my time off! Making the sauce was a surprisingly easy task - peeling the tomatoes were no problem, I decided to skip seeding them - next time I will try this. But then I just added all sorts of fresh veggies and herbs (carrots, onions, oregano, basil) that we had growing - making sure to puree it all so Alan will never find out vegetables were used! Dinner will be served in about an hour and the house smells amazing and I probably have enough sauce for 4-5 cans just from this batch.


I have really started getting inspired to cook and make more creative meals. The past week I have also started reading up on bento boxes and the hundreds of creative lunch ideas for kids and Ewan is loving them all. One mom from nursery school this year inspired me with all of her creative snack ideas. The idea is to make everything is small portion sizes and in creative designs and shapes. I have ordered my bento boxes so that I am ready for Fall lunch making (I have to find some way to make this task 'exciting'!). For lots of ideas just google bento.

Hiring Time!

The past week has been busy with interviews - meeting with 17 new potential members of A Gym Tale! We had some really great candidates and it was a difficult choice to narrow it down to 4 new party hostesses and a new nursery school and after school teacher - which is always a good thing to have lots of great people applying. Now this week I am undertaking the challenge of meeting with everyone for orientations and beginning training. Don't worry - the quality of parties and camps will not diminish at the least - no one will ever have a party host who is not trained to our standards. Quite the opposite actually, for the month of August and some of September, parties and campers will get to enjoy all their 'old' favourite hostesses as well as get to meet a new member of the team who will be mentoring with our senior staff.

It is an exciting time of year as we bring on new staff, but also a difficult one as we say goodbye to some very loyal and dedicated members of our team who are going on to school outside of Ottawa or their careers of choice post graduation. Alan and I are very proud to have the opportunity to work with so many wonderful members of the team for usually one full year and most often several years. It is also great to see how much pride and ownership our staff take in A Gym Tale and how serious they all take their 'mentoring' roles in training the new staff. It is a great relief as a business owner to know and see that your staff do actually care about your business and that they take their jobs as entertainers and teachers very 'seriously' and it is their own goal to create the very best birthday party or the greatest camp day ever!

So we welcome our new team members and we wish our current staff members leaving us the very best of luck and great success!


One last note - the only area that I am struggling to fill is our Princess character visits - so if you know of any potential princess's (especially a sleeping beauty), please send them my way!

Family Photo Session!

A few months ago Alan and I decided that we wanted to have another family photo session. The only one that we have ever had was when Ewan was 4 weeks old, it was a great experience and I absolutely love the pictures that the photographer had captured.

This time we wanted to have the picture done at our home in our back yard. We wanted them to have a more personal touch and we wanted Ewan to be comfortable in his environment for the session. We decided to have Elizabeth Fulton photography do our photo session. She has a wonderful website (http://elizabethfultonphotography.com/) highlighting lots of newborn, family even wedding sessions. On top of great pictures, Elizabeth also gives you a cd copy of your pictures so that you can print them where ever you would like and always have a back up on the cd. Elizabeth was relaxed and patient - even when Ewan decided to be a monster that morning! We had some great posed shots as well as lots of candid pictures of Ewan. And the the cd was ready within a week of the session!

Here are a few of my favourites - 

I hope everyone enjoys their week!

A weekend getaway...

So last Thursday evening we packed up the car and drove to Toronto - Ewan did surprisingly well, just singing and chatting, even though he was up for almost the entire drive right to 11pm! Friday we had a wonderful day beginning with a fantastic breakfast buffet at the Delta east (great hotel) followed by a day at the zoo.

The highlights for Ewan were the pony ride and seeing the penguins, polar bears, rhino's and the tiger. It is incredible how big the zoo is and how much there is to see - Alan and I were exhausted by the end of the day. But we did manage to finish the day off with dinner at the Rainforest Cafe - which is a great themed restaurant, but Ewan was a little freaked out by the mechanical elephants.

The next day we spent a low key morning by the hotel pool to try and recover from the zoo day. That afternoon we took Ewan to see Winnie the Pooh - his very first movie in the theatre! He likes Winnie the Pooh - but definitely liked the popcorn better! Once he was finished his popcorn he was more or less ready to go.

Unfortunately, on the Sunday we went to Wonderland and our weekend getaway took a turn for the worst. Compared to any other amusement park that I have been to, Wonderland was a disappointment - it was too small and way too many people. There was only one sit in restaurant to actually get out of the heat and it cost $40 for 2 burgers and fries! We went on two rides in the crazy heat before Ewan napped and then we attempted the water park. There were no lockers - they sold out first thing in the morning, so we had no choice but to leave our stroller with the other strollers at the stroller parking to go on the lazy river together. Getting out of the water - 7 minutes later, we quickly realized our stroller was stollen along with the diaper bag, our shoes, Alan's cell phone, wallet and car keys amongst many other diapers and our clothes. We spent the next 6 hours dealing with security and then the medical emergency centre as Ewan began passing out  from what we thought might be heat stroke. The day just continually got worse until we finally had to cab home. Later that night Ewan began vomiting and we could not get his fever down and so we had to call an ambulance to get us to the hospital. Truth be told, this was probably the highlight of Ewan's weekend - riding in the ambulance! They got the fever down and and chalked it up to a virus, not heat stroke, which is supposedly very rare. The next day I realized he had gotten all 4 of his 2 year old molars in and that was most likely the reason for his fever.

We were lucky to have family ship our extra car keys to us in Toronto and we were on the road that afternoon excited to get home. Just a word of advice, at least bring a bike lock to keep your stroller locked to fence if you do bring it to an amusement park. Even when we thought we had not brought many valuables, the loss very quickly added up!

We have another weekend away to Montreal planned for next weekend - hopefully this is a better trip!

A must read...

So, if you haven't already heard of the book titled 'Go the F--k to Sleep' by Adam Mansbach, you really must read it or You tube the version read aloud by Samuel L. Jackson. It is hilarious, although vulgar, especially if you have a child that is difficult to put to sleep. I mean, so funny it actually made me cry! If you are looking for a laugh definitely check it out!

Summer Fun!

It is only the second week of summer and it has been absolutely wonderful so far!

Last Monday was my first official day of summer and we started the week off by taking a family day trip to Calypso Waterpark! If you have not been to Calypso yet, it really is a phenomenal day out. Although the entrance fee is very steep, it is a full day of fun and in my opinion is comparable to any large amusement park. You are encouraged to bring your own picnic lunch and there are more than enough picnic tables in a shaded location. There are tons of sides for the older kids and tons of fun for the younger ones - Ewan had a great time last year at 16 months and an even better time this year at 2 years being able to go on all the little slides. It was a great day to start out our summer.

 Later in the week I also set up a science table outside and tried a few messy experiments with Ewan. Ewan is now in the stage where he must do absolutely everything by himself and so I set all the ingredients up in a way that he can manipulate them. For example squirt bottles with the colored water and vinegar, little scoops for the baking soda and corn starch and lots of spoons and bowls for mixing and pouring. As difficult as it was to not direct him, I was able to just let him go on mixing trying different things and he lasted for over an hour just mixing and pouring! We experimented with volcanoes using baking soda, colored water and vinegar and then making magic mud with corn starch and the colored water. And afterwards I just hosed Ewan down. It was a great messy afternoon! For more messy and creative play ideas visit 'Play at Home Mom' blog http://playathomemom3.blogspot.com/. It is a wonderful blog emphasizing all sorts of indoor and outdoor play activities.

I also have to highlight that we are so thankful that the water ban has been lifted. Almost every day before dinner I have the sprinkler on and Ewan will run around the yard for at least an hour. It gives me time to prep dinner and he cools down and my grass and gardens are finally starting to turn green and bloom!

This week we have some playdates lined up and a trip to Toronto to visit some family, Wonderland and the Zoo!