For all of you out there who have kids who love their Disney movies, you will want to know about this (if you don’t already). Disney has a Disney Disc Replacement Program that allows you to get any DVD or Blu-Ray disc replaced if the disc is damaged for only $6.95. It’s not free and you have to pay to ship them your old movie, but it certainly can be cheaper than buying it new again.

Several weeks ago we took 4 days off and visited with my parents in Comox. We had wonderful sunny weather for our visit and enjoyed lots of time outdoors, including two days at the beach at Kye Bay, and a visit to my favourite swimming hole on the river. We also went to the Filberg petting zoo with the girls.

Our basement is nearing completion. The drywall, painting, flooring, baseboards, doors and trim are all done. At this point the majority of the work is complete and the only significant items remaining are the cabinets, sinks and toilets in the bathroom. Assuming everything goes well, it should be done in a week or two. We’re very excited, and are hoping that it finishes before the baby arrives.

Speaking of which, we are 37 weeks today. So far everything is going well. The baby moves a LOT these days and I can often see the movement from across the room. While Christina has been having contractions off and on for a while now, they have started to get more painful as of late which has helped it sink in that a new member of our family will be joining us soon. I guess we better figure out the names!

The last few weeks were busy ones for our family with both Natalie and Jasmine’s birthdays and our 10-year anniversary. We celebrated both of them on Natalie’s birthday by going to the Cultus Lake Waterslides. We all had a great time and the girls both went down lots of slides. Natalie even went down the big ones with me and loved it.

We got Jasmine a run-bike (pedal-less) for her birthday this year. We also got the girls matching baskets and bells for their bikes. Natalie got a Disney Princess video game for the Nintendo DS that she loves to play. I was very impressed with how quickly she picked it up.

Last weekend I painted our bedroom. I had been dreading that one for a while as I had to move a lot of furniture out and we used two different colours, one for the ceiling and the other for the walls. It was a lot of work, but we love how it makes the room feel.

I found out this weekend that the comments weren’t working on the blog anymore after upgrading to the latest version of WordPress. Thankfully it was relatively easy to fix and everything is working again. I was starting to think I was the only one reading it. :)

I don’t normally plug bands I like, but we heard Andrew Allen at the Coquitlam Canada Day celebration and really enjoyed it. His sound reminds me of a mix of Jason Mraz, Maroon 5 and Jack Johnson… all favourites of mine as well.

His website: www.andrewallenlive.com

We picked up our colour package from Benjamin Moore on Wednesday. Amongst other things, it included our 16 colour choices all organized with swatches and location descriptions. With a extra-long-weekend ahead of us we decided to pick up some of the colours as soon as possible and see what we could get done.

Leaving Sunday as our day of rest, we managed to paint 4 different rooms and 5 colours. It left the weekend a bit of a blur, but we’re very happy with the results. We painted the main bathroom on Thursday, the girls rooms on Friday, and the master bathroom on Saturday. Here are some photos of the results.

We’ve been living in our new house in Coquitlam for almost a month and a half now and we love it. My schedule has shifted earlier to accommodate my new commute on the West Coast Express, however the early start means I’m home by 5pm and we have lots of time to eat dinner as a family and visit before bed. We’re all appreciating the extra family time.

Now that we’re fairly settled we’ve been enjoying our backyard and exploring our new neighbourhood.

We’ve gone swimming in the wave pool at the City Centre Aquatic Complex a few times. It’s a great facility and the kids really enjoy it.

We’ve been to White Pine Beach a couple of times as well. It is only 15 minutes from our house, on Sasamat Lake in Belcarra Regional Park and is quite beautiful. Apparently it gets quite busy, but we’ve mostly gone in the mornings so it hasn’t been too bad. The girls had fun digging in the sand and making sand castles, but it was still too cold to go swimming (at least too cold for us).

We attended the Annual Teddy Bear Picnic at the Town Center in Coquitlam. The girls got to play games and win prizes, and we we able to learn about lots of kids activities in the area. They even have a Teddy Bear Clinic where you can bring your teddy bear for a check up. The girls brought their teddy bears and had them checked out. Natalie even got her picture in the Tri-City News newspaper:

Today we tried out a section of the PoCo Trail. It’s just a few minutes from our house and was a very peaceful walk in the woods. The trail section we walked ran alongside a creek that is a fish habitat and we could see lots of little fish in the water. It was really nice to be out and enjoying nature.

Although we’ve moved in and are settled, there has still been lots of construction activity at the house. When we moved in the exterior of the house hadn’t been painted yet due to the weather, but it has finally been done and looks great. Additionally, we are about three weeks into the construction on our basement. It was unfinished, but we’ve hired a contractor to finish it and we’re making great progress so far. It’s only been three weeks and it has already been framed, plumbed, wired and inspected. We’re expecting insulation and drywall to start in the next week or so and we’re very excited. We also had a Benjamin Moore colour consultation today and love the new colours we chose. We can’t wait to start painting!